Its not just the US which has all the knockoffs and people being cheap. If you go to other parts of Asia, people are more interested in looking like the real deal than actually having it. All the super stickered up rides and knockoff body kits, wheels etc.
I went to Autobacs in Taiwan :
(pics:
http://oiishi.150m.com/taiwanautobacs/ )
All the wheels and a lot of parts are knockoffs. They instead of Spoon parts for Honda they have Spoom. AVS wheels becomes AVA, Kosei/Buddy Club K1/P1 wheels become E1 wheels. And this is AUTOBACS, a Japanese company!
Others have their own brand name but clearly rip off others. Tein has some knock off suspension with the same green color scheme.
I could go on...
In Japan, people will dump their life savings into a car. When is the last time you heard of someone investing 60K into a 4K car? In the US people rarely do that. People would rather spend the money to have the "look" and be done with it or invest in other stuff. Also, people "outgrow" cars and invest in family, house etc. The high prices in Japan make homeownership near impossible to most people so they spend their money elsewhere.
I think the current trend towards cheap stuff will continue but the few who do spend the big bucks on the real stuff will continue to support the companies that make the real deal... at least for now.
That's capitalism for you!