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"We asked them to put a halt to the program -- I think we said 'very soon' -- but a suspension at midnight tonight would make sense," McEleney said in an interview today. "Our survey opened the eyes of the Transportation Department."
A suspension would allow dealers to submit all pending claims and permit the government to process them so that a precise determination could be made of how much money, if any, is left in the program, he said.
NADA conducted an informal electronic survey of its 18,000 members earlier this week, McEleney said. A limited number responded, and the findings were extrapolated, he said.
Transportation has been conducting its own dealer surveys. Federal and NADA officials are comparing notes, using the two sets of findings to draw conclusions about funding availability, McEleney said.
A matter of how
Transportation spokeswoman Jill Zuckman declined to comment directly on McEleney's remarks.
Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said earlier today that he would announce in the next few days a strategy for winding down the program so dealers aren't left holding the bag for vouchers paid to customers.
The agency will rely on its own twice-a-week surveys of dealers as well as other unidentified surveys, he said.
"We can make a pretty good judgment call," LaHood said at a news conference. "I know dealers are frustrated, but they're going to get paid."
Claim tally
The Transportation Department has said that 411,624 dealer claims for $1.72 billion had been filed as of the morning of Tuesday, Aug. 18.
The difference between that claims figure and the $3 billion total may be accounted for largely by rejections of dealer applications that had not yet been resubmitted. McEleney said.
The dealer backlog of claims that had never been submitted was relatively small, he said.
Among the questions asked in the survey were how many cars were sold under the program, how many claims had not been submitted, and how many claims had been filed but rejected, McEleney said.
Déjà vu
The NADA results echoed its findings in a similar survey conducted the last week of July.
Those findings were that the $1 billion initially budgeted for the program was used up in the first week of its formal operation. The program formally began July 27.
On the basis of that earlier sampling, LaHood told NADA and members of Congress that the program was being suspended.
He was overruled by the White House, which kept the program going until Congress appropriated another $2 billion before recessing earlier this month.
McEleney said today that if the government were to suspend the program and find that any money was left over, it could extend its operation a while longer.
LaHood and Ford Motor Co. chief economist Ellen Hughes-Cromwick had predicted that the $3 billion would last until Labor Day.
You can't get a Focus at any dealer anywhere near me.....
Good thing GM is upping production next month for C4C!! :-P
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)
http://www.cardealerreviews.org/?p=116466
http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/content/aug2009/db2009085_823256.htm- - -
A shortsighted program, with money that could have been used elsewhere (many states and municipalities are looking at huge shortfalls in revenues compared to their funding needs). New York State for example is billions short of funding it needs to take care of basic transportation needs like pavement repair.
Not much fun driving your new car over potholes and detouring around closed bridges.
A program that has not benefited the public at large. And the public realizes this, which is why the majority were against it, in poll after poll.
Interfering with the market-raising the prices of used cars and new cars for non-Clunker buyers even though the basic economic conditions for those consumers, conditions that brought about a so-called "buyers market", have not changed.
A program with a very minimal environmental benefit.
A wasteful ripoff, and even many who benefitted over the short run (dealers, carmakers), will find that the long-term benefit was nil (or worse).
LaHood: Winding Down C4C
It's been fun!
What program does "benefit everybody" anyway? I live in California, why should I care about potholes in New York. I don't have kids, why should I care about schools in Chicago?
But I do care, because we are all in the same country under the same economy.
So benefit here, benefit there, it works for us all in the long run IMO.
You have to look at the Big Picture and you have to be patient.
But I do care, because we are all in the same country under the same economy.
Then why do I pay 7 times more per KWH for electricity than people in other states. Where is my subsidy? C4C was a program that benefited a very minute segment of the population. It got a lot of press, because it was the only visible thing this Congress and President have done to stop the bleeding. A band-aid that is about to fall off.
Your 3100 autoworkers back on the job is meaningless to the economy. Congress could have put 60,000 people to work for a year at $50,000 each with that $3 billion wasted on C4C. They could have cleaned up National parks, fixed potholes, etc etc. Truth is only $3.3 billion of the $787 billion will go to fix our infrastructure. So no it is not helping US all.
I agree. And here's the latest data on the Big Picture of the U.S. economy.
http://www.usatoday.com/money/economy/housing/2009-08-20-mortgage-delinquencies_- N.htm
What it shows to me is that there are a lot of people out there who borrowed more then they could afford if the housing-market or economy turned down. There were people buying houses at prices that required 2 full-time good-wage earners. They bought more than was prudent, being supported by a society that thought house-values and the economy would only go up.
And since the economy is slowing from all these people slowing their spending, more people are losing their jobs.
I'll say it again - our society was like a drunken sailor for many years. Spending more money then was coming in and living it up. Well the money's about run-out and the hang-over has started. The sailor's borrowing $5 more his Uncle Sam for another beer; but that isn't really going to help.
What this economy is going to need long-term, is for people to face the facts that have to work long and hard, and maybe for not so great pay, to produce more then we consume, and begin working our way out of debt. We may have to trash the expectations of high union-wages, high-pensions, early retirements, and a government that in total may have 30M employees providing inefficient services to our ever-poorer public.
I do not want my tax $ going to companies that have run themselves into bankruptcy over MANY years, having been arrogant, incorrect, and unbending in their philosophy. I do not want my tax $ going to organizations to build vehicles we don't need, build warplanes we don't need, support foreign countries, support ethanol producers or farmers. Nada - no favoritism, scams, potential for fraud,
So benefit here, benefit there, it works for us all in the long run IMO.
Favoritism and special-deals are forms of corruption. Yes our system is corrupt and needs to be cleaned up, by removing the money and power from the sytsem except for the essential-services.
I don't think most Americans realize the extreme danger we were in last year.
I guess you missed all the AIG type stories.
While some dealers have bailed out of C4C, the manufacturers are holding to their guns:
"Saturn, under stewardship from its new owner Roger Penske, is offering a dealer cash allowance ranging from $2,500 to $3,500. This is the highest cash on the hood ever for Saturn, and if you combine this with the cash for clunkers credit, you can potentially save up to $8,000 off the price of a new vehicle.
Toyota, Nissan, and Volkswagen have announced a set of lease incentives this month, which utilize the cash for clunkers credit to offer low monthly payments. In order to qualify, you must agree to a 60 month lease."
Automakers Offer Incentives for Clunkers (Edmunds Daily)
Hey, keep in mind you're going to need those little brats to fund your social security, Shifty! Well, maybe not yours so much, as you're a few years older than me...but I'll certainly need them!
And they'll be paying a lot more into the system if they get an education and good high paying jobs, than they will flipping burgers, dealing drugs, ho'ing on the streetcorner, or wasting away in prison.
Certainly our financial systems seem to operate that way.
But Saturn was losing $ before. Doesn't this just mean they will lose more $/car?
you can potentially save up to $8,000 off the price of a new vehicle.
And when Penske/Saturn can't offer this sort of incentive and C4C goes away, and saturn is back to a few customers left with jobs, who really like the brand, what sort of sales is Penske/Saturn going to have?
If the root of our economic problem is people have too much debt to keep consuming, and this has caused people not to be able to afford their payments and mortgages, causing the bank problems, which caused the stock market problems, which caused spending to decrease, which caused many to lose their jobs ... how does more consumption-and-debt programs help? :confuse:
Yes we need to produce more; but at the same time we need to consume less than we produce. We need to save.
I'd love C4C if it resulted in $3B of autos produced in the U.S. that were then sold overseas, and brought $3B into this country. People could then use to reduce their debt, and pay for all the foreign-made goods they already bought and still owe on.
They'll make up for it on volume.
I dunno; maybe Penske really needs some cash flow right now to help transition the company. Even if the feds are slow to pay, he can take those receivables to a bank and get some credit extended.
You have to wonder about the long term prospects of the smart car too; a return to $4 a gallon gas would help I suppose.
Maybe they should have jumped on C4C
U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said today the expiration day was determined by using conservative sales estimates, to ensure that there is enough incentive money left in the pot to cover what's expected to be brisk sales this final weekend.
"This program has been a lifeline to the automobile industry, jump-starting a major sector of the economy and putting people back to work," LaHood said.
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"At the same time, we've been able to take old, polluting cars off the road and help consumers purchase fuel efficient vehicles."
As of today, the Car Allowance Rebate System, as the program is officially known, has resulted in 457,476 vehicle deals worth $1.91 billion in rebates."
'Clunkers' program ends Monday night (Detroit News)
1) Is the amount of CO2 in the atmospher going to decrease?
2) Are the auto manufacturers financially healthy again?
3) Is the auto market back to 17M / year?
4) Is the U.S. economy growing quickly after this C4C?
Since there aren't that many clunkers left that people a) want to trade-in on a new car and b) have job security or the money or credit to get a new car, what would be next?
Maybe a new topic would be how much money do you think the government should continue to put into the U.S. auto industry? For how long - 10 years? Should the U.S. government still be giving Fiat/Chrysler $, while Fiat decides that a Mexican Chrysler plant will stay open to build a new model, while at the same time the U.S. Chrysler plants are shutting?
Wake-up! The government and corporations are working hand-in-hand - running this country further and further into debt at the expense of the common man to help a select few of the 300M people.
1) yes.
2) healthiER
3) No
4) No, but maybe faster than it WOULD have without it.
More winding down factoids in It's Dealers Versus DOT as "Clunkers" Program Set to Close. (AutoObserver)
What it doesn't show is how many of the remaining 75% were aided indirectly by C4C. The marketing/advertising from C4C getting buyers in dealerships might account for 50% or more of the new car deals made in the last month.
Traffic at most dealerships doubled or even tripled from early summer (non-C4C) to late summer. I would feel safe to say that C4C moved 1 million units directly or indirectly. It may not have worked as well as hoped but it did work and dealers will have their money in September.
Something had to be done, and the amount of stimulus money being spent on the auto industry is puny compared to the financial and insurance sector bailouts.
It wasn't even their fault, and those who were the blame got much more money.
If the C4C put money into the economy and people back to work and put some cleaner cars on the road, then it was not all bad.
I always felt like $4500 was too much, though. They should have been half that. Then you'd really be getting clunkers only.
I'm glad the C4C does seem to have done more good than harm, which is probably rare for a government program. However, one side effect that I heard mentioned is that it has taken money from other businesses. Instead of eating out, buying big-screen tv's, or other types of consumption, people who might have just held onto the old car are now tied into a monthly car payment of $200, $300, $400 or whatever...money that would have probably been spent elsewhere.
But on the flip side, it's helping the car dealers, manufacturers and their suppliers, etc, who employ people who, might have been spared their jobs as a result, and can now go out to eat, buy tvs, etc. So maybe it's a wash.
It had many flaws but it did serve as a defibrillator (sp?) to a seemingly dying industry.
CLEAR!
We have a pulse... :shades:
Also, for those who bemoan the program's eco-friendliness by saying people will drive their new cars more, what will they do while driving? Stop for a bit to eat. Hit a more distant mall. See a movie or visit a museum. All of those involve spending outside of the auto industry.
The other reason for the $4,500 is the average new car in the us is in the mid $20,000 range. Many banks just aren't financing someone with less then 20% down right now. A 4,500 dollar clunker trade covers your 20% down.
I think it will turn out that large percentage of these deals will be cash deals anyway so maybe that didn't matter but I see what their thought process was behind it.
I think there should have been a lower 2,500 dollar bracket just for older cars regardless of gas mileage. Say vehicles more then 15 years old would qualify for 2,500 no matter what their mileage was. The greeneies never would have let an amendment like that through though.
Thanks for your consideration.
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My thinking was it would have lasted longer with smaller incentives.
Also less incentive for fraud.
Despite Payback Fiasco, Dealers Will Regret End of Cash for Clunkers (AutoObserver)
In addition, the maintenance and repair of existing vehicles is more labor intensive than manufacturing new ones, and virtually all of the work is performed by domestic labor.
Yeah, I've always suspected this, too. I wonder what's going to happen when things go back to "normal"? For instance, if a dealership was in danger of closing up or laying off people, but the C4C only prolonged that for a few weeks or a month, is our economy really better off?
I also wonder how many people over-extended themselves to get out of a
guzzler"clunker" and into a new car that they really can't afford?Tear down some older, inefficient, houses and build new ones; put a whole lot of people to work. Oh, wait, this has already been done! And aided and abetted by guess who? That's right, your government. And we know how that turned out.
C4C was so bad on so many levels; the list is long. But there is one overriding reason why it was bad; the government took money from people who worked hard to earn it and gave it to other people who did not work for it, without the earner's permission. The program distorted the car business and all the other industries and services connected to it.
You can say that permission was given by virtue of the recent election results, but I don't recall any mention of the program during the campaign. This is a perfect example of a government increasingly contemptuous of the electorate.
Still, we had a lot of fun talking about it.
Regards, DQ
P.S. Cash for Clunkers: Not so good.
Ie - they tested a 3.91 ratio and got 19mpg, but 95%+ shipped with 4.10 or 4.56 ratios and so there's just nobody on the planet that gets close to even 18mpg. 16 is more common, in fact. Running new exhaust, fuel additive, and several new emissions and air/fuel system parts I managed to get a whopping 18.5mpg *highway* on a recent trip across California using every hypermilling trick I could manage including drafting big rigs and running in neutral down hills.
Sigh.
This oversight for trucks really made me upset but there wasn't a thing I could do about it. There isn't a single work truck in the last 30 years that hasn't had multiple gear options from the factory, either. Even some cars had different rear diff ratio options.
If they bring this back in the future I really really want an adjustment for this to be considered. Or to allow higher MPG vehicles if the 10mpg difference is still maintained. That would be reasonable - replace your 20mpg truck or SUV with something that got got 30mpg+.
When are we going to learn that the millions of buyers and sellers are more capable of allocating scarce resources than a Washington functionary who never ran a lemonade stand?
So we achieved an abundance never achieved in the history of the human race and instead of trusting the market lets centralize planning like every other collectivist disaster over the last 100 years.
Thanks to the governmment schools the majority of American's do not understand economics and cannot think critically.
So please tell me again how it is moral for Washington to take money from a productive taxpayer and reward a failing automotive company?
It is still not too late to get off the Road To Serfdom but we are dangerously close to the edge of the cliff.
Tell your local elected representatives to cut spending now before it is too late. Enough with Washington for clunkers already.
I don't believe winning an election is any kind of mandate to do everything a party wants. The win was only by a few percentage points and those supporters have long since gone back to votiing for someone else in 2010 and 2012.
C4C was poorly planned by the legislators, whether they wrote the text or received it from Bob Lutz. They are responsible because that is what we paid them for.
I understand it didn't give aid to the poorest or the working people to get a different vehicle because they couldn't meet some of the requirements worded into the bill.
If the purpose is to get green, they still have many cars that are being driven that get low gas mileage and those folk could be encouraged to trade. However, that would take some planning to implement do it actually helps those needing more efficient cars trade them for a used car or a new car.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
Well my middle-class neighbor's kid is going to a local college this year and needs a laptop and a car (+insurance+gas...) to get back and forth. He is having to take loans for these things and tuition. He isn't getting any government help, except thru the tuition-loan program. It is my thought that it would have been nice if the government had kept his taxes lower, letting him keep his money to take care of his family, rather then paying for the "wants" - not needs, of someone in another state who has a vehicle and probably a job! :mad: