“There were two thousand auto companies: the most important invention, probably, of the first half of the twentieth century. It had an enormous impact on people’s lives. If you had seen at the time of the first cars how this country would develop in connection with autos, you would have said, ‘This is the place I must be.’ But of the two thousand companies, as of a few years ago, only three car companies survived.21 And, at one time or another, all three were selling for less than book value, which is the amount of money that had been put into the companies and left there. So autos had an
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