Americans are focusing more of their attention on the value a car brings to the table. According to research from the Consumer Federation of America, the majority of drivers in the U.S. support fuel economy standards and want to see better mileage on cars they purchase in the future.
In fact, this trend has already started coming to the forefront of sales. New cars sold in the month of April had an average rating of 23.7 miles per gallon, which is 0.4 miles per gallon higher than at this time last year and maintaining record levels that have been present for three months.
"Relatively high gas prices continued to push consumers towards fuel-efficient vehicles in April, resulting in another month of record-high TrueMPG numbers," said Jesse Toprak of TrueCar. "While small cars and SUVs kept their sales momentum, the higher fuel efficiency of new larger vehicles - including large trucks - contributed to a 0.4 mpg improvement since last year at the time."
While saving just 0.4 miles per gallon may not seem like much, it translates to a country-wide savings of about 170 million gallons of gas in this year alone. Not only can this cut down on costs, but it can also decrease the amount of vehicle maintenance a car needs, as the systems are working more efficiently over longer stretches of time.