Cash for Clunkers
Cash for Clunkers
I suppose that most of you are now aware of the federal government’s cash for clunkers program to removed old, less fuel efficient vehicles from our nation’s highways. So far, it has been wildly successful and no one seems to know why or if they do know why, they seemed surprised.
Hello people, if you are giving away free money, people will respond to the offer.
This is not rocket surgery gentle readers. If you have an old vehicle that is worth next to nothing and someone will give up to USD$4,500 just for buying a fuel efficient vehicle, why wouldn’t you take advantage of free money?
The proposed extension contribution of USD$2 billion is not going to go very far. I think that money will be gone by August 15th.
Then, what happens next?
I think that new vehicle purchases will dry up or at least slow down dramatically. Take away a sweet incentive and people will return to their old ways; they will continue to drive their older cars.
Remember folks, this program was designed by the same Ivy League geniuses who are managing the federal government’s economic stimulus program.
Does that make you and your money feel any safer?
I read in the local newspaper this morning that at one local dealership only three out of fifteen cars for clunkers buyers could qualify for a loan to finance the purchase. I thought that the federal government was helping banks to lend to consumers. That was one of the objectives of the nearly USD$800 billion rescue plan for the nation’s financial system. I also read about government computer system crashes and failures. Did I mention changing rules and confusing policies too?
No? I’m sorry.
Looks like another mismanaged government program.
Just for kicks, I took a look at the successful cash for clunkers program in Germany. Germany has a population that is about 25% of the United States. The German plan put the equivalent of USD$5 billion into the purchases of older vehicles. If the United States followed Germany’s example, it should have funded the program with something close to USD$20 billion.
Where are we going to get the USD$20 billion? I don’t know where.
Paulina Garces
Any weekend day that has a Paulina Garces infomercial broadcast is a good day for me. I was trolling through my dial over the weekend and found Paulina in two new infomercials in addition to the regular two automobile dealer infomercails.
Excellent.
Paulina was in a new, for me at least, infomercial on skin care products. Since the infomercial was in Spanish, I really didn’t understand it. That’s fine since my skin is so old. The other young woman from the automobile dealer infomercials was in it too.
Excellent.
The second new infomercial for me was one for Direct TV, satellite television broadcast service. This was the first infomercial that I can recall were Paulina wore a dress. It was a short dress that stopped about half way between her hips and knees. Unfortunately for me, the infomercial never went with a long shot of her so much of the benefit of the short dress was lost to me.
Paulina was wearing a rather wide grey belt in this infomercial. I thought the wide belt was a poor choice since it drew my attention to her waist. A narrower belt would have been just as effective in my mind and would have been less likely to draw my attention to her waist..
Why am I always spending time with Doug?
One of my acquaintances asked me offline why do I spend so much time with Doug and hardly anytime with the Princess.
Perfectly good question.
I spend much more time with Doug because of geography. He lives about an hour’s drive away. Last Thursday, for example, when we had lunch, I was already in Anaheim for school and well over half way to his home.
The Princess, on the other hand, lives in Seattle, about 1,160 miles or 1,870 kilometers. It is a 17 hour drive according to MSN.com’s maps function. A round trip plane ride to Seattle is about USD$250, more or less, depending upon how far ahead to book your flights.
Visitors
The last week was better than the prior week but not much for visitors to the blog. We had 184 visitors to the blog who viewed 239 unique page sites. There was a slight shifting in favorite pages. For some reason, the blog itself moved into second place from the usual third or fourth spot in the most viewed pages list. Of course, I do have to qualify this by saying that I only go to blog periodically and Sitemeter.com only lists the most recent 100 pages views in the rankings.
For the month of July, we had a good but not great month for viewership. We had a total of 1,426 visitors who visited 1,426 unique pages. The blog is on track to have its 50,000th visitor sometime during the month of August.
I do appreciate all of you who stop by the blog from time to time.
I hope you al had great weekends. I did in spite of the coastal clouds that blocked the sun for most of the weekend.
Be well and stay happy.
I suppose that most of you are now aware of the federal government’s cash for clunkers program to removed old, less fuel efficient vehicles from our nation’s highways. So far, it has been wildly successful and no one seems to know why or if they do know why, they seemed surprised.
Hello people, if you are giving away free money, people will respond to the offer.
This is not rocket surgery gentle readers. If you have an old vehicle that is worth next to nothing and someone will give up to USD$4,500 just for buying a fuel efficient vehicle, why wouldn’t you take advantage of free money?
The proposed extension contribution of USD$2 billion is not going to go very far. I think that money will be gone by August 15th.
Then, what happens next?
I think that new vehicle purchases will dry up or at least slow down dramatically. Take away a sweet incentive and people will return to their old ways; they will continue to drive their older cars.
Remember folks, this program was designed by the same Ivy League geniuses who are managing the federal government’s economic stimulus program.
Does that make you and your money feel any safer?
I read in the local newspaper this morning that at one local dealership only three out of fifteen cars for clunkers buyers could qualify for a loan to finance the purchase. I thought that the federal government was helping banks to lend to consumers. That was one of the objectives of the nearly USD$800 billion rescue plan for the nation’s financial system. I also read about government computer system crashes and failures. Did I mention changing rules and confusing policies too?
No? I’m sorry.
Looks like another mismanaged government program.
Just for kicks, I took a look at the successful cash for clunkers program in Germany. Germany has a population that is about 25% of the United States. The German plan put the equivalent of USD$5 billion into the purchases of older vehicles. If the United States followed Germany’s example, it should have funded the program with something close to USD$20 billion.
Where are we going to get the USD$20 billion? I don’t know where.
Paulina Garces
Any weekend day that has a Paulina Garces infomercial broadcast is a good day for me. I was trolling through my dial over the weekend and found Paulina in two new infomercials in addition to the regular two automobile dealer infomercails.
Excellent.Paulina was in a new, for me at least, infomercial on skin care products. Since the infomercial was in Spanish, I really didn’t understand it. That’s fine since my skin is so old. The other young woman from the automobile dealer infomercials was in it too.
Excellent.
The second new infomercial for me was one for Direct TV, satellite television broadcast service. This was the first infomercial that I can recall were Paulina wore a dress. It was a short dress that stopped about half way between her hips and knees. Unfortunately for me, the infomercial never went with a long shot of her so much of the benefit of the short dress was lost to me.
Paulina was wearing a rather wide grey belt in this infomercial. I thought the wide belt was a poor choice since it drew my attention to her waist. A narrower belt would have been just as effective in my mind and would have been less likely to draw my attention to her waist..
Why am I always spending time with Doug?
One of my acquaintances asked me offline why do I spend so much time with Doug and hardly anytime with the Princess.
Perfectly good question.
I spend much more time with Doug because of geography. He lives about an hour’s drive away. Last Thursday, for example, when we had lunch, I was already in Anaheim for school and well over half way to his home.
The Princess, on the other hand, lives in Seattle, about 1,160 miles or 1,870 kilometers. It is a 17 hour drive according to MSN.com’s maps function. A round trip plane ride to Seattle is about USD$250, more or less, depending upon how far ahead to book your flights.
Visitors
The last week was better than the prior week but not much for visitors to the blog. We had 184 visitors to the blog who viewed 239 unique page sites. There was a slight shifting in favorite pages. For some reason, the blog itself moved into second place from the usual third or fourth spot in the most viewed pages list. Of course, I do have to qualify this by saying that I only go to blog periodically and Sitemeter.com only lists the most recent 100 pages views in the rankings.
For the month of July, we had a good but not great month for viewership. We had a total of 1,426 visitors who visited 1,426 unique pages. The blog is on track to have its 50,000th visitor sometime during the month of August.
I do appreciate all of you who stop by the blog from time to time.
I hope you al had great weekends. I did in spite of the coastal clouds that blocked the sun for most of the weekend.
Be well and stay happy.
posted by Chuck Reinhardt at 12:25 PM
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