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Cash for Clunkers is dumb

syadasti

syadasti

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Apr 15, 2002
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dan-o said:
I'd like to see what brands those Top 10 are being traded for. If they're Fords, it is a win.
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Only one of the top five is Ford:

autoblog said:
The more things change, the more they change back again. Or something. As of August 3, Reuters reports that the number one car Cash for Clunking consumers were purchasing was the long-in-the-tooth Ford Focus. Well, just two short days later, the Focus has been dethroned and Toyota's Corolla – the best selling car in the history of the world – has reportedly taken the crown. Two fun piece of relevant (if tangential) trivia – Corolla means "little crown" in Latin, and one example is sold about every 40 seconds, meaning that by the time you finish reading this post, two more will have found homes. In case you were wondering, Ford's price leader drops to number two and the Honda Civic has shifted into third place. Toyota has two other cars rounding out the top five, the Prius and the Camry. And just over 80% of the clunkers being traded-in are still trucks.
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Sandwich

Sandwich

Pig my fish!
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May 23, 2002
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They probably intend to replace it with the Fiesta HB. Not having more cars be hatchbacks is the dumbest thing modern automakers do. I love seeing BMW or mercedes come out with new "grand tourers" which are just wagons and hatchbacks with fancy names. It'll trickle down, and they'll start building them again.

Until then, I'm going to drive my stupid audi S6 wagon into the ground.
 
jimmydean

jimmydean

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Sep 10, 2001
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BurlyShirley said:
Have you guys seen that Ford ditched the hatchback Focus? WTF?
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While Toyota releases the Yaris 5 door. I would have bought the Yaris 5 door if it were available when I was shopping.

The other hatches seem to sell well. A 5 door is awesome for small active families. I didn't want a Element, so we looked at the Scion xD and it was only beat out by the used Corolla because of price and warranty.

The Mazda 3 hatch was my favorite to drive, but the mpg sucked ass.
 
jimmydean

jimmydean

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Sep 10, 2001
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boogenman said:
This may stir up 2-4 more sales a MONTH at a dealership but that is not much at all. No stimulating sales there.
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Quoted for awesomeness.

Through Thursday, auto dealers have made deals worth $1.9 billion and are on pace to exhaust the program's $3 billion in early September. The incentives have generated more than 457,000 vehicle sales. Administration officials said they have reviewed nearly 40 percent of the transactions and have already paid out $145 million to dealers.
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Toshi

Toshi

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Oct 23, 2001
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furthermore, consider that GM has been paying their suppliers (and presumably dealers?) on net 90 terms… suddenly sounds like a bunch of sour grapes.
 
syadasti

syadasti

i heart mac
Apr 15, 2002
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DOT funny business, true top clunker sales revealed:

1. Ford Focus
2. Ford Escape
3. Honda Civic
4. Ford F-150
5. Toyota Corolla
6. Toyota Camry
7. Honda CR-V
8. Chevrolet Silverado
9. Hyundai Elantra
10. Honda Accord

http://www.autoblog.com/2009/09/01/autoline-on-autoblog-with-john-mcelroy/

http://money.cnn.com/2009/08/07/autos/cash_for_clunkers_sales/index.htm

Cnn.com said:
The government's results showed small cars as the top choice for shoppers looking for Cash for Clunker deals. But an independent analysis by Edmunds.com disputed those results, and showed that two full-size trucks and a small crossover SUV were actually among the top-ten buys.

The discrepancy is a result of the methods used. Edmunds.com uses traditional sales measurements, tallying sales by make and model. The government uses a more arcane measurement method that subdivides models according to engine and transmission types, counting them as separate models.

For example, the Ford Escape is available in six different versions including two- and four-wheel drive and hybrid versions. The government counts each version as a different vehicle using guidelines from the Environmental Protection Agency. Only the front wheel drive, non-hybrid version made the government's top ten list.

The Ford Escape crossover SUV, instead of being the seventh-most popular vehicle under the program, as the government ranked it, was actually the best seller, according to Edmunds.com. The government pegged the Ford Focus as the top seller.

Trucks tend to be available in more variations than cars. That's because truck buyers have a wider variety of needs than car buyers, General Motors spokesman Brian Goebel said.
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Cooter Brown

Cooter Brown

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May 30, 2002
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Pesqueeb said:
I did a KBB, 2 door sport 4.0 liter (got the straight 6), with 105,000 (I ride my bike to work a lot), plus alloy wheels, etc, etc. and KBB says 4425 for trade in fair condition. So for now its looking like a push on the cash for clunkers program. I don't know if its worth picking up a car payment when I havn't had one in 5 years, even with the trade of in MPG. The straight 6 in those things is good for at least 200k properly maintained.

Thoughts?
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keep the jeep
 
Toshi

Toshi

Harbinger of Doom
Oct 23, 2001
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So did it work?

http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2010/04/05/did-cash-clunkers-work-intended

On June 24, 2009, President Obama signed into law the Car Allowance Rebate System (CARS, commonly known as 'Cash-For-Clunkers'), one of several stimulus programs whose purpose was to shift expenditures by households, businesses, and governments from future periods when the economy is likely to be stronger, to the present when the economy has an abundance of unemployed resources that can be put to work at low net economic cost.

Critics of the CARS program argued that it would have little ultimate effect because most of the purchases under the program would have happened soon anyway - they were merely 'pulled forward' from the following few months. In contrast, the CEA's September 10 economic analysis of the program argued that a substantial proportion of the CARS sales were pulled forward from a far more distant future, and thus represented an important increment to aggregate demand at just the time when such demand was sorely needed.

With seven months of post-Clunkers sales data in hand (September 2009 through March 2010; see dark blue line in figure), now seems a good time for a reckoning.

...

According to a survey conducted by the Department of Transportation as part of the program, the average timeframe over which new car purchasers said they would have otherwise sold, traded in, or disposed of their old vehicle was 2.87 years - far longer than the timeframe of a few months that the program's critics hypothesized. A plausible interpretation of the available data, in fact, is that many of the CARS sales were to the kinds of thrifty people who can afford to buy a new car but normally wait until the old one is thoroughly worn out. Stimulating spending by such people is very nearly the best possible countercylical fiscal policy in an economy suffering from temporarily low aggregate demand.
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CN: Yes, it worked.
 
boogenman

boogenman

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Nov 3, 2004
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What the all mighty government says and what is real are two different things. C4C created a huge burst in auto sales followed by a deadly 'hangover' period for the auto industry. Sales in our market were down 30% post clunkers and created a massive rise in used car prices which made new car inventory sit for months on dealership lots.

Cash for clunkers was retarded. Don't even get me started on thiS nonsense.
 
boogenman

boogenman

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Nov 3, 2004
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mattmatt86 said:
I loved C4C, I got rid of my pos dodge pickup that got 11mpg and now I get 30mpg in my civic.
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It also did a lot of good for the thousands of people with Accords and civics from the early 90's that got jack $hit.

There was also a handfull of small trucks and SUV's that didn't qualify by one MPG that were complete gas hogs and $hit box vehicles. Like most other crap the govt' does this program was put together like crap. Should have just let a bunch of kids with downs syndrome run around handing out bundles of drool covered benjamins.

C4C's can suck Obama's scab covered pecker.

I want some free fukkin govt' supplied bacon!
 
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