What does it cost to build a car?

Ti editors are a rum lot, I tell you. ‘DT’, came the missive from above. ‘Dash off, if you would, a thousand words or so on what a car costs to make. No need to go into too much detail. Thx’.

I assume Tolstoy’s editors sent a similar outline: ‘Hope you are doing well, Leo. Could you do us a few thousand words on the war against Bonaparte? Plenty of battle stuff, lashings of gore, you know the kind of thing the punters like. Keep it short though! Thx’.

So here goes. I don’t feel too bad about giving such a complex subject such skin-deep treatment, though – we’ve already chewed over the economics of the car business in pieces like Dumb and dumber and Net Present Value for the hardcore accounting fans out there. So let’s give it a shot.