The Fall Of General Motors

A just-announced plan for General Motors to repay roughly $8 billion in debt to the United States and Canada would be re-evaluated in June, the Obama administration's top automotive official said.

The three sit atop the insurance industry's annual list of the safest new vehicles, according to a closely watched assessment used by car companies to lure safety-conscious consumers to showrooms.

The company is in a position to start paying back taxpayer loans, but still lost $1.2 billion in the third quarter.

For all its financial troubles and shortcomings as an automaker, no aspect of G.M. has confounded its critics as much as its hidebound, command-and-control corporate culture. The New York Times looks at the carmaker's effort to change.