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Politics : A US National Health Care System? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Lane3 who wrote (10796)	10/28/2009 10:18:14 AM
From: Mary Cluney	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 42652

<<<people didn't buy cars they would not have bought anyway. They might not have bought them just then but they would have bought them whenever conditions were right. The total number of cars sold over, say, a five or ten year period was not affected significantly by the clunker program. The only difference is the timing, which could matter >>> Timing is everythiing. There is quite a bit of experience with a cash for clunkers program in the world. They have been set up for various objectives. There is a history. Our program came when the economic situation during an economic meltdown probably the worst in modern times save the 1929 depression. Auto sales fell from 17 mm annually to 9mm. The auto replacement market is thought to be at 13mm annually. The point is consumer confidence was in the toilet. Many people thought as they do now things could get much worse. Our program (perhaps by luck) was designed to target those buyers who kept their cars under normal circumstances 10 or 15 years. These were the super cautious and frugal. They didn't have to borrow money to buy a car. They generally had terrific credit and they were inclined to pay in cash. Without an incentive these buyers could easily keep their cars another 5 to ten years. I will agree that most public works programs are miserable failures. They are poorly conceived, executed, and full of fraud. But this Cash for Clunkers program perhaps through sheer happenstance came off brilliantly. There was no fraud. The timing could not have been better. It exceeded all realistic expectations.