Edmunds.com | Inside Line | Auto Observer Your Account | Help | Directory
You are here:
![[F]](http://a332.g.akamai.net/f/332/936/12h/www.edmunds.com/media/townhall/webxicons/site.gif){kind=small}
Forums
Automotive News & Views Cash for Clunkers - Good or Bad Idea?
4110 messages, Last post on Nov 23, 2009 at 11:42 AM
You are in the Automotive News & Views Forum. Your Hosts are steve_ & claires
For questions about how the program works or to discuss program details, please visit our discussion titled, "Cash for Clunkers - Does it Work for You?"
|
|
|---|---|
|
Replying to: hpmctorque (Nov 01, 2009 10:04 am)
|
|
|
Replying to: hpmctorque (Nov 01, 2009 10:04 am) Typical unfounded fears you come out with are 'our grandchildren are going to have to pay for this forever'. What are these poor babes going to have to pay for if there's little or no debt coming from this program? Another typical unfounded fear is 'OMG they're going to crush a classic'. Puleeze. Another goofy and false one was that 'OMG you're going to have to pay taxes on the $4500 rebate'. Fed by Faux News of course. It's like you people live in a cartoon world fed fears of hobgoblins by Faux News. I have data and facts that none of you seem to want to discuss or refute in any way. Why is that? Show me data to substantiate your fears. Keep it focused on C4C. I asked 4 questions of one poster above and he said he had no idea what the answers were and he asked me to give him the answers. How can you be afraid if you don't have any facts? This is typical. Heck none of you are even involved in the industry. Everything you get is 2nd or 3rd hand.
|
|
|
Replying to: imidazol97 (Nov 01, 2009 10:28 am) Look if it will put things in perspective. I agree fully with your last sentence. We killed more clunkers than all but one store in the state of VA. It was a shortterm bonanza not only for new car sales but also for used car sales. At the end of the program where we should have had 250 - 350 new cars and 100+ used cars on the lot we had SIX new vehicles and 15 used vehicles left over. Everybody involved got a boost from the deluge of buyers that suddenly appeared at our doors. Our Chevy store was nearly wiped clean. |
|
|
Replying to: kdhspyder (Nov 01, 2009 11:38 am) As for C4C, you need to be careful of the statistics. The increase in sales isn't just from additional units, but also from higher prices the dealers were able to gouge from the government market intervention and distortion. The market for vehicles is rather finite and few people buy cars every year or two, so ultimately most C4C sales units were just moved up rather than new incremental volume. The impact from the removed clunkers is marginal at best. Not high enough to really affect global oil demand, and as someone already pointed out the resulting tax consequnces probably wash between less gasoline tax versus higher insurance, car license and sales tax. I resent using public monies to subsidize cars and houses. As I've stated before, if the economy needs a jump I'd rather see public works jobs and let the newly employed spend the money as they see fit. I don't watch Fox news and am not a registered Republican. But I think I'm probably pretty representative of middle class America.
|
|
|
Replying to: kdhspyder (Nov 01, 2009 11:23 am) So we should make our economic decisions based on what a car salesman tells us rather than Fox news? Are you gunning for the position of "Car Sales Czar"? Remember, in order to qualify you have to owe a lot of back taxes, and have a rather unsavory background, etc. If nothing else, this thread is entertaining.
|
|
|
Replying to: berri (Nov 01, 2009 12:44 pm) I could get behind programs modeled after the WPA. I doubt they would be possible with the Union influencing the WH. The whole bailout including C4C was paybacks to the auto industry Unions. It is obvious guys like Wagoner did not kick in enough to save his job. All the babbling about getting the $3 billion back in taxes is just that ramblings of a fertile imagination. That money is gone and we are right back where we were in June. Only the cars are mostly 2010 models. I would be real surprised if C4C added 125k sales to the total for the year. Of course there is no way to prove it one way or the other. So both sides spin it to fit their fantasies. Same as the crap about jobs saved by the stimulus.
|
|
|
Replying to: gagrice (Nov 01, 2009 1:57 pm) No program is perfect, state funded or corporate. Cash for Clunkers had a limited scope and focus and seems to have met or exceeded the goals that wound up in the legislation. |
|
|
|
|
Replying to: berri (Nov 01, 2009 12:44 pm) Amen on that. The prices on new and used cars went up. It was just like Nixon's price freeze: Krogers had the stockers in changing prices on the shelf before they opened so that would be the new higher price limit at which they could sell. The car companies took advantage of the people buying in a similar manner.
|
|
|
Replying to: berri (Nov 01, 2009 12:44 pm) Over the first 6 mo's of the year LV sales were Jan... 655K Feb.. 687K Mar.. 855K Apr.. 817K May..923K Jun.. 857K ==> Avg 801K Jul.. 995K ====> +194K over the 1st 6 mo's average Aug 1,259K ===> +458K over the 1st 6 mo's average Sept 774K ==> returned to near the 1st 6 mo's Avg monthly sales In our case very few of the buyers had ever set foot in our store before. I don't doubt that there were some 'pull forwards'. There had to be. But those pull forwards were needed this year, not next year. Newxt year will take care of itself. The market is beginning to improve if we are to believe Edmunds forecast today on Oct sales due out on Tues. The C4C may just have been the impetus to get buyers out of their homes and into the market again. |
|
|
Replying to: imidazol97 (Nov 01, 2009 2:32 pm) First of all you have neither your logic nor your wording correct. The 'car companies' did nothing during C4C. I'll repeat what I noted before. The car companies built cars in the 1st 6 months of the year, shipped them to the dealers from Jan to Jun and then invoiced the dealers at the time the vehicles were shipped. The vehicles that were on the lots when the C4C buyers showed up had already been invoiced and paid for before the buyers arrived. Faux News would lead you to believe that 'the car companies' were the beneficiaries of direct subsidies from the US Treasury. This is simply false and if you believe it then you live in a fantasy world where everyone is taking advantage of you. What berri did correctly refer to was that buyers often did pay higher prices to 'the auto dealers' ( not the car companies, the car companies already had their money before the buyers arrived ). That was mainly due to the fact that supply began to run out during the end of the program and the buyers still wished to buy. That was their choice. However nobody from either 'the car companies' nor 'the auto dealers' went off into the night and dragged poor Mr and Mrs America down to the showroom in their pajamas and nightgowns, held a gun to their heads and said "BUY". If you believe this then that's another manifestation of living in a fantasy of unproven fears. |
|
You are here:
Forums
Automotive News & Views Cash for Clunkers - Good or Bad Idea?
New? Join Now!
Forum Tools
Search Forums
Browse by Vehicle
Browse by Board
Browse by Topic
Today's Chats
