Gulliver

Car manufacturer Tesla makes electric cars in China, Germany and the U.S. The company has come under severe criticism for its “full self-driving” mode in its vehicles. Tesla vehicles have been involved in 273 crashes, of which six were fatal and five resulted in severe injuries, over a nine-month period between 2021 and 2022. Telsa’s factories reported 10 times more safety violations than Nissan, despite the fact that Nissan built something like 10 times as many cars over the same time period.

Tesla has benefited from several billion dollars in government incentives such as a $1.3 billion tax break in Nevada. One of the most unsustainable components of a Tesla vehicle (and all electric cars) and power storage systems are the batteries, notably the use of cobalt, lithium and nickel, which are mined under horrific human rights conditions. The company buys cobalt from Glencore’s copper mine in the Katanga region of the Democratic Republic of the Congo which is alleged to use child labor. It buys nickel from the Vale mine in Voisey's Bay in northern Labrador, Canada, which has long been opposed by the native Innu and Inuit people as well as from sites in China and Indonesia with serious environmental pollution problems.
 

Total is a fossil fuel exploration company. Founded in 1924 as the Compagnie Française des Pétroles (French Petroleum Company) with the support of the French government and banks, it was renamed Total in 1985. It is the biggest shareholder and operator of the Yadana gas pipeline in Burma (now Myanmar) where the army was accused of forced labor and killing in the Tennaserim peninsula. In 2005 the company paid out €5.2 million to eight Burmese villagers who sued the company for human rights abuses. Total has also been sued by villagers in the Lake Albert region of Uganda for land grabbing. In 2018, the company was denied drilling permits in Brazil's sensitive Foz do Amazonas basin.
 

Toyota makes and sells more cars than almost any other manufacturer in the world. Founded in 1937, the company has been investigated for a number of safety defects such as unintended acceleration in certain vehicle models, use of sub-standard metal components, installation of faulty airbags, and seatbelt failures. It paid out a fine of $1.2 billion in 2014 to the U.S. for hiding information about acceleration problems from buyers and government officials, as well as $1 billion in compensation to car owners, after as many as 37 people were reported killed in runaway vehicles. Workers at Toyota factories in Canada, India, Mexico, and the Philippines as well as the state of Kentucky. have protested the company’s low pay and benefits, and union busting.