Cash For Clunkers is a Junker
Edmunds.com, the automotive consumer information company, has publicized their analysis of the government’s Cash For Clunkers program and it’s not pretty. According to Edmund’s, the government spent $24,000 of taxpayer money per car (when you subtract the cars that would have been sold regardless of the program) and 80% of the cars purchased through the program would have been sold regardless of the program. In other words, only 20% of the cars that the Obama administration claimed were a product of the Cash For Clunkers program were due to the government incentives.
Once again this proves that government interference in the private sector does one thing and one thing only, cost the taxpayers money.
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Do you think they’ll ever offer Cash for Clunkers again?
Hopefully not. It is understandable that many American’s would love the opportunity to take advantage of this plan again but the actual cost to the taxpayer far outweighs the benefit the program provided. As our deficit grows due to sweeping social reforms and programs such as cash for clunkers it would behoove us to look at the burden we will be leaving future generations. As the Iroquois Indian Confederacy once said “In our every deliberation we must consider the impact of our decisions on the next seven generations.” That is some good advice for our overconfident and cocky representatives in Washington.