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A friend of mine was telling me that the reason Subaru actually put the back seats in the bed was to avoid the 25% tariff on foreign small trucks. Is that the reason the Baja had 4 seats? When I was younger, I used to see a lot of smaller trucks. (Does anyone remember the Chevy LUV?)

I'm just curious as I don't see a lot of small 2 seat pickups out there. The market could really use a small fuel-efficient AWD pickup.

The tariff was on 2-door SUVs vs 4-door ones. Don't know about pickups, except that they had tariffs on them. Don't know whether the tariff is still in place or not, either.

The Baja wouldn't be/have been subject to the tariff even if it had been a 2-door, 2-seater because it was assembled in the USA.

"The Baja wouldn't be/have been subject to the tariff even if it had been a 2-door, 2-seater because it was assembled in the USA."

Good point. I had forgotten about that.

i believe the tariff was lifted or relaxed later... thats why the newer brats didnt have the jumpseats. And I am sure the lawyers had something to do with it maybe...

Flowmastered87GL wrote:i believe the tariff was lifted or relaxed later... thats why the newer brats didnt have the jumpseats. And I am sure the lawyers had something to do with it maybe...

Nope, the tariff still exists today - it's why you don't see any foreign-built trucks sold in the USA. By welding the jump seats in the bed, the Brat was classified as a car and thus not subject to the higher tax rate.

When NHTSA told Subaru to ditch the seats, they only continued to sell the Brat here for one more year; only '87 Brats came in without the seats.