“chips” have become a proxy for all the components in all the JIT supply chains that broke-down, and shipping delays, and multiple exogenous events - mostly because people are too lazy to get into the details, which are all there.
Nobody who makes cars wants expensive, unused capex capacity (those factories cost a fortune to build and operate), plenty of labor, plenty of dealerships staffed and ready to sell - but are missing 1-2 parts to finish tens-of-thousands of WIP units they can’t sell. In this volume business, nobody is getting richer overall because they have fewer new cars to sell, nor enough used cars to substitute with.
