Little Willie's senseless ramblings

Monday, July 27, 2009

Bad Idea?

Have you heard about the "Cash for Clunkers" campaign being offered by the car companies these days? You trade you're old gas guzzler in for up to $4500 off the price of a new car - thanks to the American Taxpayers. But who is this supposed to help? Take me for example -- my PT cruiser doesn't qualify because it gets good enough mileage according to the program, but my truck supposedly does (it's hard to be sure, because the official MPG website doesn't list the specific engine on my truck -- the high output version of the V8 magnum). Of course, since my truck is a 2006 with only 6000 miles on it, it's worth a lot more than $4500. And, since it only applies to new car purchases, people without new car budgets can't take advantage of it either. I've read a little bit about what happens with the cars you trade in -- they get retitled to the name of the program, certain parts can be removed and recycled, but the engines have to be destroyed (the oil is removed and replaced with an abrasive substance to cause the engine to seize up). The program isn't going to help wealthy people, because their vehicles would all be worth more than $4500, and the poor probably can't afford new cars. As a matter of fact, this program will take the cars the poor could afford off the market -- I looked at list of probable candidates for the program and notice a lot of those cars driving around the poorer sections of town. And the real clunkers ('70's era LTD's, Caprices, Caddilacs -- genuine clunkers) are all to old to qualify.

So who knows? Maybe it will help -- and maybe it will be a big boost for middle class America. It can only help the car manufacturers, so maybe that will be a good thing too. Or maybe it's too narrow in scope to do much of anything really constructive. Time will tell.