A VIN starting with a 2 is made in Canada. American made vehicles VIN starts with 1. I think the drop in quality is more related to how people think of vehicles now. People like to trade them in before even paying them off. I’m always amazed when someone brings me a vehicle for a standard maintenance repair like brakes, water pump, timing belt, etc and they decide to just get rid of rather than spend a few hundred on a normal repair. Why make cars last forever if they’re going to get scrapped in 5 years?