Survey Faults Draw Flak-MB knocked Off Top Spot
 

"While it is true that all cars are now much better than they were 10 to 20 years ago, it is alarming that so many of them have quality problems," Fornell said.

"The number of recalls is at an all-time high. This should not happen with modern manufacturing technology and has negative consequences for driver safety, costs and customer satisfaction."

This is a bit of a misguided opinion. Cars are getting evermore complex, so it should be expected that the number of faults should increase - the enemy of reliability is complexity.

Also, one has to consider that regulations are continually getting more stringent, which naturally results in more recalls/faults.

Finally, peoples' standards have sharply increased resulting in things that were once considered non-issues now being catastrophic in the eyes of the consumer.