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A case in point was when we were looking at buiding a home, back in the seventies. Houses were at a premium as our area was booming. We found it hard to buy with a GI Loan, because everything had to be in great shape. That was nice, but then the cost was more than we could afford monthly. There was a program for building so we checked into that.

Everything up to the painting had to be hired done. There was no way anyone could have really done that. It was simply financially impossible to hire all the work out on the amount they would loan out. The kicker was that the person we talked to had a blueprint that was supposedly for a three bedroom home, but none of us could find the third bedroom.

All of this was a blessing in disguise for us, as we borrowed money ourselves in did all the work except the basement and shell. Later, when the area was in a bust stage, we held onto our home, when many with GI loans lost theirs. The government was not kind to anyone who was late on a loan.

So, I have to agree with Mumsee. Such a program looks better on paper than it really is. It helps a few and usually sets up more government bureaucrisy.

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I also think Mumsee has a point about people who do buy new cars every two or three years. And I suspect she’s correct that the clunker law was drafted by people who are able to or who choose to do that, with little thought given to the large numbers of people who buy used cars and/or who replace cars only when absolutely necessary.

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My point exactly. The people I know who drive clunkers out of need (like us for example) could not afford a new car in any way based on the clunker help. It is just not designed to be helpful though it sounds so on the surface. It was not my intention to be airily dismissive in any way. Or any other dismissive, just saying how I understand the law and what I have seen in people, wealthy and extremely poor and a whole lot in between.

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Our Jetta’s been a fantastic car, and up until quite recently it was still getting more than 40 m.p.g. We’d like to hang onto it, but it won’t pass state inspection as it is, and it will cost more to fix than the car is worth. We’re trying to rest in the knowledge that God’s provision for our needs has never failed yet, and to save what we can for the car fund.

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My objection is to someone diagnosing that no one will be helped by the law because she won’t be, and therefore the law is “not designed to help people.”

It won’t help me either. But I know people who will be helped by it, if they choose to make use of it. Not everyone driving a clunker is doing so by choice or for frugality … except maybe the unchosen kind.

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I believe that what Mumsee was saying (based on what I would be saying) is that people who drive clunkers don’t turn around and get a new car, because we understand that an old car costs a lot less. So a tax incentive to go into debt on a new car isn’t helpful to most of us. My car is 15 years old, and I’d gladly get a newer one . . . but “newer,” not new. I’ve owned only three cars in my life (I’m 42), and each one I bought at five or seven years old. I can’t see going much newer than that, honestly.

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I mildly disagreed with Mumsee’s statement because I know there are also many who drive clunkers because they can’t afford anything else. But I did not think she was being dismissive of that thought, just that she was more familiar with the frugal type.

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