or, maybe, if you are the type of person who can only afford a car whose brand no longer exists, you are sufficiently risk averse that you are much less likely to get an accident. Makes sense to me. Also, it may be that a lot of these car brands only exists in a sort of suvivorship-biased place. For example, I drive a '94 Camry, in large part because I've never had a need to replace it, having never been in an accident.