Toyota Done Building U.S. Plants?

Did you catch this one on column three above the fold on the front page of today's Wall Street Journal? You need to be a subscriber to read it online, but the basic thrust is this: Toyota's building of assembly plants in the U.S. may be at an end, for now. The plants have scored political points for the company as it ascends to the dominant world position in automobiles, but it may be facing excess capacity in U.S. factories. Furthermore, the factories in the U.S. are not configured to be as flexible as some of its factories in Japan, which can produce more than six vehicle models, as opposed to one or two per plant in the U.S. And the most interesting fact: right now, it is cheaper for Toyota to build a car in Japan and export it here than it is to build it here (thanks largely to the weakness of the yen versus the dollar).