One of the fundamental ideas of Cash for Clunkers is sound, in my opinion: Get people interested in buying more fuel efficient vehicles. But the wastefulness of destroying perfectly usable cars bothers me a lot. We know that they’re useful because the "clunkers" have to have been insured for the prior year, and they have […]

 In the discussion following yesterday’s Cash for Clunkers article, John Rodes made an excellent point: "It IS obvious that different "factors" are "present" and the most obvious is price. Simply stated, the typical trade-in with 65,883 miles is worth MORE than the $3500 – 4500 rebate range. A decent four- or five-year-old car with 65k mi is […]

  I hate to see old cars die. They represent the efforts of so many people—designers and engineers, mechanics, accountants, miners, and myriad others. And a car is such a personal object, perhaps it is one of the most personal objects we own. They are the second most expensive thing most people will ever purchase. […]