I want YOU to buy a new car!
By Eastan McNeal on March 31, 2009 at 3:10 PM in Current Affairs
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If GM fails it won’t be because Washington did not try to give it every advantage imaginable. One advantage, not withstanding the formidable Obama marketing machine’s vast resources, not easily attainable is consumer trust.
Following the first bailout last year several studies of consumer perceptions have been conducted. These studies’ results are now validated by the market data that has emerged. Keep in mind that GM and Chrysler took government money last year. Ford did not. |
A survey released this month (March 2009) by polling firm Rasmussen Reports found that 88 percent of Americans would prefer not to buy a car from an automaker receiving government aid. That’s worse than the 63 percent who said they would eschew buying from a bankrupt car company. Isn’t that the same percentage (88%) that think congress is doing a poor job?
According to CNW Marketing Research, which specializes in the auto industry, in the first two months of the year, the number of buyers considering a GM or Chrysler vehicle fell 12 percent and 33 percent, respectively,. At the same time, Ford saw a 12% increase in consideration.
Since the first congressional hearings on the auto industry in November, U.S. sales by GM and Chrysler have fallen a combined 45 percent compared with the year-earlier period. Taking federal money is keeping people away from their lots, these consumer surveys suggest.
“GM and Chrysler are sending out messages that are very definitely in conflict with each other,” said Kelly O’Keefe, a professor at Virginia Commonwealth University’s Brandcenter and the son of a former Chrysler executive. “On the one hand they’re saying they’re in trouble, and on the other they want consumers to keep buying. It’s a marketing nightmare.”
By comparison, Ford Motor Co. has seen its share of the retail car market rise for four consecutive months, the first time that’s happened in 14 years.
Are they making better cars? Are they offering more attractive deals? Are they conducting a brighter advertising campaign? Or are they benefiting from accidental PR brilliance?
The government can’t honestly bestow upon GM and Chrysler unfair advantages. If they allow sales tax deductions and if congress goes forth with their plan to grant up to a $5,000 stimulus rebate to new car buyers, those perks will have to be awarded to consumers without regard to the brand they select. Hello Tata! If just the big six automakers hit their 2007 mark of 16 million cars sold in the U.S. that is around $80 billion a year of new stimulus spending our country will have to borrow until Obama is gone.
Who will pay the taxes for this loan, if the world affords it to us? Will a charismatic Obama convince the kool-aide drinkers to only buy GM so his car company will succeed? I don’t know. What do you think.
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Wagoner’s replacement hand picked by the great one, Ken Kresa, was once a senior advisor for The Carlyle Group. Guess James Baker was busy.
We always bought American cars (except for my affair with a Volvo P1800 in the late 60s). But they aren’t making anything I want. So I’ll stick with my 95 Buick Roadmaster (the last of the great station wagons) and my 87 Chrysler convertible until something I want comes along. I’d love to convert the convertible to electric.
There used to be an old poster of Richard Nixon that was captioned, “Would you buy a used car from this man?” The answer was usually “NO!” I feel the same way about Obummer and new cars, and for the same reasons.
Holy crap! I thought I was stretching my calculations by using yesterday’s top offer of $5,000 per car. U.S. Rep. Candice Miller, R-Mich., has now proposed a $7,500 rebate for anyone trading in an older car for a new, fuel-efficient vehicle. With that offer I can go to the junkyard, buy a heap, trade it in and get a brand new Serbian Zastava Koral (Yugo) at (3,500 euro, 4,300 USD), plus a hot new Tata at $1,800 plus shipping. Oh. What wonderful news. Life under the watchful eye of Chairman Obi-want-a-new-car is going to be great for Detroit automakers.. as soon as they move South of the Panama Canal. Or maybe our Treasury bond holders will suggest we move the factories 6,637 miles West, which is the distance between Detroit, Michigan and Beijing, China.
Wow! So he is giving us free stuff after all! LoL! He can keep it!
Or, we can just let China buy GM and the people in Michigan can continue to work for them for subsistence wages… or, if they won’t work, we can flood Michigan with illegals. Because illegals need a job too and because all money is evil anyway… right? The irony underneath the “brown shirts” of change.
The problem is Americans require too much money in wages so ultimately if we want durable goods at a cheaper price it follows that we need to have a cheaper labor force. The midwest use to have a lower cost of living but even still workers are too expensive. Employer health insurance ain’t cheap either. Add into that labor unions taking cuts from people’s salaries and suddenly outsourcing to China/Mexico/India looks like a good idea. The reason American workers need more money to live is their expenses are higher i.e.; healthcare, car insurance, mortgages etc. don’t think the Chinese or Mexican workers have quite the same expenses nor are they required to have such frivolity as car insurance (I live in California where it’s mandatory) or cover their employees with health plans…
Health insurance is one of the biggest problems we have. even as we have deflation in other areas, health care costs always go up. Hospitals hire full time people with law degrees to figure out creative new ways to charge more for less services. This is off the topic but we need nationalized health care because there is no real competition to lower cost in the system we presently have. The third party pay system along with Medicare have removed any natural competition forces. But to the other point, in Mexico if you get into a car accident and you don’t have insurance, they hold you in jail until you can pay for damages. That is why so many from there just run when they get into an accident.
Hospitals hiring lawyers? Maybe like Mrs. Obama’s work at the University of Chicago Hospitals?
i sure as heck don’t want to use china or mexico as a standard of living for americans to emulate. jeezus christ. the problem is that you cannot allow goods produced by countries that pay slave labor wages to be sold in the US with no tariffs on them. if you do, then obviously, american wage rates are no longer going to be “viable.”
I drive a Volvo. Volvo is owned by Ford, and some might argue that it’s part of the reason why Ford isn’t in more trouble. Of course there are people who warned me not to buy a Volvo last year because of the taint of the Ford name alone. But as far as I know all Volvos are still European cars with better safety features, which is why I got it in the first place. Sorry about not buying American and all but I survived a crash in a Volvo, walking away without a scratch while the other car was totaled and driver injured seriously.
Rahm must think that he has learned everything Bill Clinton knows about running the presidency. It is obvious that he has not, and all of them put together still don’t have what it takes to navigate these perilous economic times and they are too proud to ask Bill’s advice. Ha, ha, ha!
well you know the old saying(pride goeth before the fall)
That is the reason I go to the synagogue every saturday just before I go to the corner pub.
Signs of the times–screw the state owned GM autos and build your own vehicle– then again, maybe not.
Man arrested for drunk driving on a motorized barstool. AKA The Stool Fool.
http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/years/2009/0331091stool2.html
I have been thinking of retrofitting an existing small car with an electric engine and batteries. So, when there’s no gas we won’t have to take a bicycle to the grocery. Of course that is dependent on the grocery having food, having electricity to charge the car and having money to buy anything. Maybe it’s a wasted effort.
Im’ building a hybrid that runs on beer because you can make beer out of just about anything that will ferment. And the perks is you can drink the fuel and enjoy your sunday drives too. LOL!!!! Food? Oh Yeah, you can make beer out of that too.
. I believe the Stool Fool may have been running on white lightening. ;(
What a bunch of crap, who can afford a new car even with rebates on unemployment? What a loser!
I just read on NPR that the head of the Pakistan Taliban is out to get Obama, quote–
“Soon we will launch an attack in Washington that will amaze everyone in the world,” Mehsud told The Associated Press by phone. He provided no details.
As if he is supposed to provide the details, idiots.
Anyway, as we are sinking quickly in the sand of Obama’s desert, the wasteland that once was our country can rise up against this so-called man who is out to destroy not only our Constitution but our rights as Americans as well.
Obama is not American, why do you think he is working so quickly to run our country into the ground?
Nobody is stopping him, nobody is asking questions, why? Who do you think Obama is, some kind of god that can make the entire congress do his bidding? Its looking more and more like there are no people left in Washington who give a shit about our country. Fire them all and put regular hard-working Americans in their place, maybe then we can get some accountability on Capitol Hill.
O.M.G.GIRD YOUR LOINS…
Well foxyladi, I girded my loins in my most revealing loin-girdings. Now I’m going to put on my trench coat and head to the mall . . .
where are my comments?
as you were saying?
Reuters is now reporting that plans are in the works for an imminent GM bankruptcy:
http://uk.reuters.com/article/consumerproducts-SP/idUKWEN670620090331
My former Chevy dealer’s repair shop is now the Federal Bureau of Unionized Auto Repair aka FUBAR.
they better not give that rebate to buyers of foreign cars. as much as i’d like to get a 5K rebate to buy a new ford mustang, i’m not sure this plan is a good idea.
Obomba says “buy a new car”. The unemployed/underemployed reply “With what?”
[...] away from Uncle Sam’s clutches) is attractive to customers and partners. Last month you read polls here that suggested that auto buyers were more likely to choose a car from a non-government run company. [...]
[...] away from Uncle Sam’s clutches) is attractive to customers and partners. Last month you read polls here that suggested that auto buyers were more likely to choose a car from a non-government run [...]
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