This Blogger Says Cash For Clunkers Costs Taxpayers $45,000 Per Car. Is He Nuts Or Brilliant?

Where is he getting the 22,000 sales number from?

The people driving all of these decade old ford explorers and what not generally don't buy new cars. I would argue that close to 80% of the sales were generated and not simply advanced.

Joe_Limon- there is a base of cars that would normally be sold. Subtract out that base and you get around 22,000 estimated are extra sales of vehicles that would qualify. The rest simply just took advantage of the cash laid out before them. They were going to get the car regardless.

Is this 22,000 over the amount sold last year? We are in a recession now...

Hmm thinking about it more, wouldn't you need to take into account the number of vehicle sales that took place that didn't use the cash for clunkers program? because I could still be right, if 220,000 vehicles were sold under the program, 200,000 vehicles weren't sold under the program (so 420,000 total) then that would make each of the vehicles sold new ones and not simply just people cashing in. I know those aren't the numbers, but without the number of people who didn't qualify yet still bought then you will never know what they are claiming.

We didn't write the article. And we asked the question if he is right or wrong.

How is that spin?

001

It's "Spin" because a blogger only gets as much attention as he gets hits.

Repeating such "assume this/assume that/and what if this" stuff gives it circulation, and spreads some wild-assed guesses as "analysis."

It's obvious that this person started his calculations to show a bad result. If you start with that bias, you can't produce a valid outcome.

I'm perfectly certain (bias) that if W had done the same thing (which he sort of did with the refund checks), the same blogger would have produced calculations showing how brilliant the program was.

Spin, spin, spin.

And speaking of spin...the media would have everyone think Obama can do NO wrong but the PEOPLE just voted and he couldn't even get a 'B' grade in his home state of Hawaii.



Seems the same with the success of C4C.

The entire media is lauding this disaster that will put us in further debt and NOT create long term sustained jobs and sales.

As soon as it ends people will wait for the next gov't deal.

001

And before you all comment that I don't like Obama it couldn't be further from the truth.

I think he is an outstanding American, wants the best for the country and is really trying.

I just disagree with his policies and strategies that apply to stimulating the economy and his ideas on healthcare.

That's it.

001

keep trying with your B.S. Obama will fix this mess, win again in 2012, and you'll all be left crying and whining again wonder why he did not fail

I think there is something to this, but the US government did get to choose what type of vehicle the gas guzzler was replaced with. I am not a fan of this program, but I also feel that it isn't as bad as the author here states.

You actually could look at it that way.

BUT... What about the extra revenue generated in the auto industry from those sales? What about the boost in the economy from those auto workers actually working again to churn out more new cars that are being sold? The money those workers make goes back into the economy in some form or another. Why isn't any that in the calculation? As far as I'm concerned it was a billion dollars well spent considering the hundreds of billions in sales of new cars its generating. I think that this program was actually a good idea. Mr. Avery Goodman just isn't looking at the bigger picture and trickle down effect of this. What else is happening around the world as a result of that sale?

And where did South Korea come from? How many Hyundais/Kias were sold from this program for them to be singled out like that? FYI, The most sold cars from this program so far are the Toyota Corolla and Ford Focus.

I think it is a good program. Any unexpected increase in sales helps us close the budget gap in CA. Think about getting nearly 10% per car sale. That's millions of unexpected revenue. Now the Governor has more money to hire police officers after they let out an 43,000 inmates. Sorry I digress.

Here is the 'missing math' from the above snippet taken from the actual article:
""However, over the next 90 days, according to Edwards, 200,000 of those low mileage clunker cars would have been traded in on new models anyway… without the program… and its billion dollar price tag.""

So, that is where the 200,000 base number comes from.

If it is assumed that total sales caps at 222,000, then the 22,000 "could" be considered incremental sales. In such a case, you 'can' say that the program really costs X per car (where X equals (cost of program/the number of incremental sales) or ~$45K in the example give above. Doing so, however, is a somewhat sensationalized way of reporting information. Similar to using graphs with differing starting and ending point to exaggerate peaks, bars, etc.

It would be even more interesting to extrapolate further to find the amount of [future] taxpayer money spent per American-manufactured vehicle sold, based on the types of vehicles purchased. This would give a better sense of how much of our money our politicians spent to generate each additional sale for the American auto manufacturers they just largely nationalized, and if it would have been less wasteful to just give them the money directly...

And let's not forget how much taxpayers chipped in for the otherwise economically non-viable Mercedes Benz plants in Alabama, etc.

If the program results in 222,000 cars sold as a result of the $1 billion dollar program, only 22,000 were incremental sales. The rest would have occurred by November anyway. One billion divided by 22,000 and you get $45,354 per car sold as a result of the Cash for Clunker plan.

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hahahahaha yeah right....no wonder autospies posted this....more right wing spin lies propaganda.

Like I said, Obama will fix this mess. But keep whining about. We all know you want him to fail. What's good for america is bad for the conservatives. And CARS is good for America: ))

Why not give the automakers a $4500 tax credit per vehicle. They keep that profit and have the opportunity to pass it on to the customer. No unearned tax dollars spent....gee what a concept.

because we need people to buy cars, and giving automakers tax credits will not get the job done. this clearly does get the job done, which is why repubs hate it.

and we just had 8 years of nothing but tax cuts= FAILURE. lowest economic growth in decades, smallest number of jobs created in decades (7 times less than under clinton, 21 million compared to 3 million jobs in 8 years) biggest deficits in history and the biggest collapse since 1929

yeah tax cuts work awesome. what a novel idea!

and the probability that the dealers/manufacturers actually pass this on? Sniff more glue, you're not nearly high enough.

it's simply AMAZING how the r-wing wackos are SO critical of this because it "adds to the national debt." pfah! what's a MEASLY
$3 Billion compared to the $100+ billions to gm and chrysler, and the $700 billion to the banks--including 'bonuses' for loser execs?

these guys will spin a dust devil to make snively points, while ignoring HURRICANES whipping away tax dollars!