Ron Paul trashes Cash For Clunkers with logic
Filed under: Shopping, Transportation
I've been railing against Cash For Clunkers for quite some time, and it's been starting to feel lonely. Friends tell me that I "just don't get it" and angry blog comments accuse me of elitism and arrogance.But at least Ron Paul is on my side. In a scathing blog post, Congressman Paul explains everything that is wrong with Cash For Clunkers -- all in just 524 words. Paul writes:
Low-income earners who would have been in the market for those perfectly serviceable, working cars will have fewer to choose from, and those cars will probably be more expensive than they normally would have been. Automotive repair shops actively lobbied against this program, as it will destroy many of the cars they would have repaired. They were out-lobbied. And of course, Americans as a whole are hurt, because this additional bailout of auto companies comes at our expense through inflation.
And then this brilliant point:
Requiring cars to be destroyed and new ones made to replace them might help the auto industry in the short run, but any improved fuel economy will not make up for the environmental impact of junking one car and making a new one. So this is not a program that should really make environmentalists happy.
Lastly, Paul points out that this "artificial boom" in car sales may be followed by an "extended drop" because all the people buying new cars now won't be buying one a year later when they might have anyway.
To sum it up: We're using taxpayer money to provide a temporary boost for the auto industry while hurting the mechanic's business -- and doing little if anything to help the environment in the process.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
8-12-2009 @ 11:10AM
Riodejnro5 said...
Amen what a stupid program and watch when all the cars are taken back will the banks have to have another bail out?
Reply
8-12-2009 @ 11:19AM
Idaho said...
People with clunkers usually actually OWN them.
Debt is the drug being pushed by Big Brother once again.
Reply
8-12-2009 @ 1:09PM
whadafa said...
The biggest flaw with this program is that it doesn't create wealth! You don't create wealth by destroying something and then rebuilding it. If that was true, the second world war would have been one of the biggest wealth creation excercises ever!
Reply
8-12-2009 @ 6:51PM
BD said...
This hurts poor people the most is so many ways....
Reply
8-16-2009 @ 1:58PM
norris hall said...
JD Powers forecasting firm may raise its outlook for 2009 U.S. industrywide sales by 200,000 units, taking into account the runaway success of the U.S. government's "Cash for Clunkers" incentives to trade in old gas guzzlers for more fuel-efficient vehicles.
The program helped boost July auto sales to the highest annualized rate of 2009 to date, raising guarded optimism among industry executives and analysts that the market had hit bottom after a severe downturn that forced General Motors Co GM.UL and Chrysler Group LLC to restructure in bankruptcy.
Cash for clunkers won't please anyone and lots of people who will see the glass as half empty.
It was designed to jump start a morose auto industry
and take polluting gas guzzlers off the road.
It has done both.
Reply
8-15-2009 @ 6:41PM
Van Addington said...
I have mixed feelings about cash for clunkers. I feel that we are destroying a part of history. These cars will never have a chance to become a classic. The biggest problem that I have with this program is that I can not aford a new car, and some of the clunkers that I have seen on the lots are beutiful with nothing wrong with them. Some that I have seen are in much better shape that my 2002 Chrysler Town & Country with 152,000 miles on it. I would love to see some of these cars as an option to trade for to up grade from what I have now insted of crushing something that has nothing wrong with it.
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