i have mixed emotions about

"Cash for Clunkers".

on one hand, i like the idea that someone can get a new, fuel efficient car, and i'm sure many of these cars are "clunkers". on the other hand, my husband's truck would qualify as a clunker. it's a 2001 toyota tundra with 120,000. gets about 15 MPG. it's well maintained and will be on the road for many more years. the thought of destroying this auto bothers me. just yesterday i found out that my friend's car died last week. i'm sure he would be happy to pay $4500 to get this truck. he lost his job and is on unemployment.

BTW. the truck is our 3rd car. we both drive sports cars and only use it when we're doing shopping.

your thoughts?

So, I can trade in a 7mpg 1982 Bronco for a 10mpg Hummer? Wonderful! :eyes:

i thought you had to trade it for a fuel efficient car.

according to some stats I saw today.

Also, a small increase in a gas-guzzler, is often times better, in terms of actual fuel saved, than a large increase for a car that's already fuel efficient.

"If both the new vehicle and the traded-in vehicle are category 2 trucks and the combined fuel economy of the new vehicle is at least 2 miles per gallon higher than that of the traded-in vehicle, the credit is $4,500."

Source: http://www.cars.gov/faq#category-07

As long as it's even one mpg higher, you can get $3,500.

for the environment.

I hate to be a "Debbie Downer," as one of the posters below called it, but it seems to me that the losers in the Cars for Clunkers program are all the poor saps who gave a damn about the environment and already bought fuel-efficient cars -- essentially, their tax dollars are being used to subsidize the purchase of new cars that may not even be particularly efficient.

bought that truck in 2001 he could have bought a 4 or 6 cylinder instead of an 8. like i said we only use it once in awhile and both our sports cars get approximately 26-28 mpg.

well.

They sold a quarter million cars in a week in a car market that is shrinking fast, and if the credit amount remains the same, it looks like another 500,000 or so will be approved.

For the car salesman who hasn't seen a customer in a month, it's a welcome sight - and it managed to miss at least some of the potential Repuke cry of "socialism for the car companies!!".

As a construction guy, I can tell ya, ya gotta have a truck. The strong ones aren't fuel efficient and that's what I need to haul block and sand and equipment. Just curious.

They take a perfectly good, running vehicle and intentionally ruin the engine. They drain all the oil out, then fill it with a solution that hardens when exposed to heat. Then they start it up and rev it. Soon, noxious smoke starts pouring out the exhaust. Nice for the environment, eh? Then at some point the engine seizes up. That's it.

The damage done to the environment to manufacture that vehicle's raw components has already been done. The oil used to transport those components to an assembly plant has been used. Electricity to light the plant has been consumed.

Now we're dumping a perfectly good vehicle and replacing it with one that used oil, electricity, etc., also to make. Yes, it gets better gas mileage. How long will the new car need to be on the road to undo the damage done by scrapping the other vehicle before its time?

Congress did nothing to address the smoking, polluting cars on the road. Those should have been targeted, in my opinion. Congress did nothing about donating some of these "clunkers" to poor people who either don't have transportation, or are driving an oil burning 1983 Plymouth Minivan that didn't qualify for the clunker program.

There are a lot of inconsistencies with the EPA fuel economy data as well.

I think the longer a vehicle is used, the less its impact will ultimately be on Earth. As vehicles age, they are normally driven less, so do less damage even if their fuel economy isn't as good as a new car. That old "clunker" sitting in the garage, driven once a week, doesn't use much fuel or pollute much. But the new tinker toy import that is driven daily, thousands of miles a month, will.

i wasn't sure how they disposed of the cars.

like i said, it bothers me to destroy something that still has value.

for a friend. My dad used to have a truck of the same kind as yours and it was a good vehicle. You'd be doing your friend a great favor by selling it to him rather than having it destroyed for a discount on a new one.

It's only for people who want to!

The vehicles have to be running, and insured for the last 6 months, legal, registered. You only get the 45 hundred if you are buying a new car, something hard to do on unemployment. Good gov. website on this, even gives you the miles per gallon estimates for your car.

that he would be happy to buy my gas guzzler for $4500 if i were selling it.

your 2001 Tundra, even with those miles, is worth considerably more than 4500.00 unless it is the most plain-jane of models.


So whether you take 4500.00 for the sake of the program, or take it from a friend, you're being altruistic.

through edmunds. it was $4,600 on a trade and a little over $5,000 if sold privately.

that way you don't have to worry about a dealer using the money to fudge the numbers on the sales price side.

we're discussing the issue.

Some of the "clunkers" I've seen getting crushed on T.V. are a lot better then what I'm driving. I also don't like seeing descent cars getting crushed that could provide affordable transportation for families and individuals who cannot afford new cars, even with the $4500 rebate.

then it's worth way more than $4,500. Heck, I'd go as far as to give you $5,000 for it, and I'll fly out to where you are to drive it back to NY!

but hubby doesn't want to sell it. BTW. i'm in phoenix.

Just think, in a couple years when the unemployment rate has risen yet again, we'll all be driving new cars. I wonder what kind of financing people are being offered.
If this program was being offered for electric cars I might be on board.

Our 2001 Subaru Forester got too much mileage to qualify for the program. So we hand to buy our new Escape Hybrid with our OWN money.

This is like making smart people pay stupid people to make a good decision.