WHEN JEFF KANTOR of Car World in Candia first learned of the Cash for Clunkers program, he wanted to be sure his auto recycling business would get its share of cars.

“We knew there would be some good cars and it would be very important to our business to get involved,” Kantor said.

At that time, $1 billion in federal dollars was put toward the program. That money was gone within a week and the program was extended. But the six-month deadline for crushing the cars was not.

Kantor said more than 800 “clunkers” have come through his lot. He has hired two extra staff members to deal with them, but only about half have been processed. He said he runs a “green business” and recycles everything he can, making sure all fluids are drained, mercury switches are disposed of properly and that all good parts on the vehicles are recycled.

He is concerned that he and other auto recyclers will have to crush perfectly good parts if the deadline is not extended.

Kantor and other members of the national Auto Recyclers Association have been working with their legislators to get the extension.

“With so many vehicles going through automotive recycling facilities in such a short period now, there is a high probability that without regulatory relief many valuable parts will be lost, thus resulting in diminished profits for automotive recyclers participating in the CARS program,” according to a legislative action alert from ARA.

Kantor said he was heartbroken when he saw the number of quality cars coming in to be crushed.

“What will happen is we will be crushing quality parts that people in our state will need to keep their cars running and on the road for the next year or so,” Kantor said.

Each car turned into a dealer under the program had to have its engine disabled; the engine gets crushed with the cars.

Kantor said the Cash for Clunkers program is having unintended consequences.

“They didn’t think about the auto repair shop that needs an engine for one of its customers, or low-income families that might need an engine,” Kantor said. “One million engines are being crushed that were perfectly good.”

Fred Kelley, owner of Fred’s Garage in Candia, said it is difficult to find used motors now. If one is found, the cost is much higher.

Kelley said he had a customer with a 1999 Ford pick-up that needed a motor.

“About a year ago, I could have bought that same motor for four or five hundred bucks. That same motor if you can find one . . . is running 1,200 to 1,500 bucks because there are none out there,” Kelley said.

He said the price of used cars has also gone up.

“The price of used cars is going out of sight. If someone needs a used car now, they are going to pay,” Kelley said.

http://www.unionleader.com/article.aspx?headline=Clunk+The+clock+is+ticking&articleId=e233816f-2eaa-48dc-9d61-d01cdd9f5bd6

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Alan Blinder, a Princeton professor who was among the first to push an auto sales incentive program in the United States, doubted it provided much stimulus, in large part because it was in effect for only a month.

“Most of the idea of any stimulus is to pull spending up from the future, but it doesn’t make any sense to design a program that only pulls up spending by one month,” said Blinder, a member of the Council of Economic Advisers during the Clinton administration. “Why in the world would you make it a one-month program? The Germans didn’t do that. The British do that. When I designed a mock version of this I was thinking of it as a one-year or two-year program.”

Was the $3 billion wasted as a stimulus?

“Yeah, mostly,” he said. “It provided a lift to GDP [gross domestic product], but it was so fleeting.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10/01/AR2009100103573.html?wprss=rss_nation

When Congress gave away $3 billion for buyers to trade in their “clunkers” and buy new cars in August, lawmakers thrilled as buyers swamped showrooms to take advantage of the big discounts. “Cash for clunkers has captured the public’s attention . . . (it) has the possibility to truly jumpstart our economy,” said Rep. Candice Miller (R., Mich.). Other, more sober analysts, warned that the clunkers program was only stealing from future sales.

September sales are in, and sobriety can take a bow.

Edmunds.com reports that “September’s light-vehicle sales rate will fall to 8.8 million units . . . the lowest rate in nearly 28 years, tying the worst demand on record. After the cash-for-clunkers program boosted August sales to their first year-over-year increase since October 2007, demand has plunged. In at least the last 33 years, the U.S. seasonally adjusted annual rate has only dropped as low as 8.8 million units once — in December 1981 — with records stretching back to January 1976.”

“Many people regard February as the darkest month of the recession, but even then (sales were) higher, at 9.1 million units,” adds Edmunds.com statistician Zhenwei Zhou.

But sobriety comes hard for Washington. Now NHTSA says that, despite burdening manufacturers with $60 billion in new costs, its new 35.5 mpg fuel mandate will stimulate the economy by boosting auto sales by 65,480 vehicles through 2016 because Washington “expects stronger consumer demand for fuel-efficient models.” Sure.

Oh, what’s the point. You aren’t actually concerned with logic and results, you just want to whine about anything that is associated with ‘democrats’. Forget I wrote anything.