Hybrid Pricing

I as a lover of the environment is always recommending hybrid cars. A friend of mine has been looking to get a new car. He loves american cars and will only drive american. So I told him to look into the Ford escape hybrid. He went down to the dealer and priced both the hybrid and the non hybrid, and what he found was a big difference in price. How are we supposed "go green" if we can't even afford to. If the automakers don't come down on there prices we as a nation will never be oil dependent.