cash for clunkers

Auto industry observers have long predicted the death of diesels in the U.S.--though to be fair, that's not a shocking idea. Diesels never really caught on with American motorists, and the fuel savings diesel cars offer have been diminished by hordes of hybrids and electric vehicles zipping quietly...Read More»

Many eager auto shoppers in Japan have been stymied by inventory shortages, but according to the Wall Street Journal, the wait for new wheels may be coming to an end. The Journal reports that most Japanese companies are ramping up output, with significantly more cars rolling off the lines over the...Read More»

It's the cycle of life. As we buy new vehicles, we trade others in; frugal used-car owners buy those, and sell their older vehicles. And in turn, a tired heap of a vehicle is retired. Trouble is, we're not retiring as many vehicles as we used to. The average vehicle in the U.S. is now about ten...Read More»

Sales were up 29 percent this past month, versus last September. But before you crack open the champagne and celebrate the end of the auto-industry recession, remember that last September a number of showrooms were very, very quiet. It's a little hard to interpret, as the Cash for Clunkers program...Read More»

Some of the phrases used in headlines this week, to describe August auto sales, have been brutal: "sales slowing to a crawl," "taking a tumble," or "struggling along" were just a few. But they're pretty appropriate. "We saw the worst August in 28 years," looking at sales altogether, assessed Jesse...Read More»

Without a Cash for Clunkers boost, August car sales were soft. Recovery summer, where for art thou? [Detroit Free Press] The 2011 Chevrolet Volt is close to reality: production begins on Veterans' Day. [AutoBlogGreen] GM is seeking to trademark "range anxiety" as it pitches the Volt at...Read More»

The industry is still suffering, and sales haven't truly found their rebound yet. But Ford and Chrysler are showing surprisingly strong in the market, compared to where they were last year. Versus the Cash for Clunkers frenzy of last summer, sales are way down—about 20 percent versus last...Read More»

It seems that some Cash for Clunkers vehicles—and paperwork—have gone missing. We knew it would happen. With hundreds of thousands of vehicles taken on trade—some in good shape and worth potentially more than their $4,500 rebate value—it’s no surprise that a few, somewhere, didn’t end...Read More»

Last year the federal government's CARS program—better known as Cash for Clunkers—sparked a frenzy of shopping for smaller, more fuel-efficient cars, retired older guzzlers, and boosted an ailing industry. Now, a year later, it sounds like a significant portion of those people are...Read More»

While last summer's Cash for Clunkers program appears to have accomplished many of its goals, car and light-truck sales are still far from returning to where they were just a few years ago. In fact, just months ago, the U.S. was scrapping more vehicles than were sold. R.L. Polk & Co. studied...Read More»

We haven't heard a lot about HUMMER lately. The closing of its sale to Chinese firm Sichuan Tengzhong Heavy Industrial Machinery has been delayed several times, vehicle sales have fallen, and U.S. production of its H3 is at a halt though it has announced 2010 updates. So we thought a couple of...Read More»

For the first time since Word War II, the annual number of vehicles scrapped exceeded the number of new vehicles sold. That’s solemn news for the auto industry. U.S. vehicle sales had been in a sustained boom period of 15 to 17 million vehicles per year from 1994 through 2007. And the size of the...Read More»

Drivers in California and Washington, D.C. realized the most benefit from last summer's Cash-for-Clunkers program, using federal incentives to purchase vehicles that averaged 10.4 miles per gallon better than their old ones. At the other end of the scale, folks in Louisiana saw the least...Read More»

As congress planned the controversial Cash-for-Clunkers program over the spring and summer of this year, there was some discussion of limiting new car subsidies to American brands; that provision was dropped, however, following outcries from other countries and from thousands of employees who work...Read More»

As overall auto sales have slumped, Subaru has been one of the few bright spots in the auto industry this year, with many year-over-year sales increases to report; in fact, through November of this calendar year, Subaru has already sold as many vehicles as it did in all of last year. And over the...Read More»

Vehicle history provider Carfax has partnered with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to introduce a new Clunker Check service. The simple Carfax query page allows you, merely by entering the vehicle identification number (VIN) of the suspect vehicle to check whether it was written...Read More»

It's obvious from the comments on this site and others in the High Gear Media family that Cash-for-Clunkers remains a hot-button issue, and new data about the program is likely to fuel the fire: according to stats from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, most car buyers used...Read More»

Speaking at a World Economic Forum in New Delhi, Carlos Ghosn -- head of Nissan Motor Company and Renault SA -- had some interesting things to say about the global auto industry. Among the most notable and encouraging items, Ghosn believes that the international sales slump has ended and that the...Read More»