To Kill a Clunker (081009) by J. F. Kelly, Jr

A commentary by J. F. Kelly, Jr. By way of full disclosure, I love old automobiles. I hope that doesn’t make me a bad person. My wife and I have four cars, the youngest of which is over eight years old. Their average age is 26 years. They all are lovingly cared for, insured and registered and they run real well. Since I don’t own a private aircraft, boat, RV or gas-guzzling truck, I really don’t feel that I am abusing the environment anymore than the average guy. After all, we can only drive one car at a time and look at all the registration fees we pay to help keep California afloat, not to mention keeping the auto insurance industry profitable. And our combined annual mileage is only about 10,000 miles. I don’t buy new cars anymore, ever since they started to cost more than my first three homes. I’ll allow someone else the costly privilege of breaking it in for me and savoring that new car smell which I find rather unpleasant. I think that we’ve become a wasteful, throw-away society so it troubles me that the Cash for Clunkers program requires a qualifying trade-in to be branded a clunker, sometimes undeservedly. This results in a death sentence for the unfortunate vehicles, some of which are still proud, serviceable and full of life and spirit. The program requires that they be immediately euthanized. No hearing. No appeal process. Their engines are injected with sodium silicate and then started which results in engine seizure, a particularly ignoble end for a faithful servant. “Cash for Clunkers has been a proven success,” said President Barack Obama as Congress approved another cool $2 billion for the program. Democrats in Congress hailed the program as a mighty stimulus and shot in the arm for the auto industry, in which the U. S. government, it should be noted, holds a substantial equity position, having already provided General Motors and Chrysler with the cash necessary to continue in business. “The reality is that this is a program that has been working,” gushed Sen. Debbie Stabenow, a Democrat from (where else) Michigan. “Consumers believe it’s working. Small business people believe it’s working—everyone involved in the larger economic impact of the auto business believe it is working,” she added. Here’s some more reality, Senator. Not everybody believes it’s working, at least not for them. Examples include repair shop owners and their mechanics and other employees, parts suppliers and their employees and the aftermarket industry and its employees. They question why it’s necessary to destroy all the trade-ins, many of which could provide affordable, repairable transportation to those who can’t afford new cars. The Obama administration seemed surprised that the program which offers $3500 or $4500 for qualifying trade-ins would exhaust the initial funding so quickly. Duh! Here’s a clue. If you give money away, people will line up for it. It will be a wildly successful program. So would just dropping hundred dollar bills out of an airplane. My concern is this: Why are my tax dollars going to help pay for someone else’s new car purchase? I don’t even buy new cars for myself. And since the government is already deeply in debt, why are we burdening future generations with yet another stimulus program of highly suspect value? It seems like everything this administration tries to do has unintended consequences. Here are some that this program has produced. It has driven up the price of new cars because of increased demand. It has driven up the price of cheaper used cars, the only kind that most low income people can afford, because of decreased supply. It has hurt business in the repair and parts industries. It is adding to an already obscene deficit. As government programs go, this one is a clunker. It may be wildly popular with recipients of these giveaway dollars and with new car dealers but it should not be popular with the rest of us taxpayers. Me, I’ll just keep driving my 1994 sedan until the wheels fall off. Hopefully it will happen gracefully on some quite side street. Don’t laugh when you pass my car. My other cars are even older. Some day you’ll be old, too. Let’s hope that under Obama Care, you’re not considered too old to repair. Copyright 2009 by J. F. Kelly, Jr.