Cash for Clunkers - it seems like such a waste

I dealt with financial hardship once. I was dealing with a medical tragedy, a newborn, and loss of all income. The very small fixer-upper house we lived in hadn’t had any recent fixing-upping since I had stopped working three years before to go to school. My two-bedroom house was too small for the four of us and needed repairs that I couldn’t afford.

My best friend/associate pastor was promoted to pastor of our small church. His family moved out of their modest home into the very nice parsonage provided by the church. He didn’t sell his house – just moved out of it. I had a plan; I could sell my house, use the equity for some financial stability, and then rent his house from him. Pastor wouldn’t do it. He wanted no one living in his house. Consequently, his closed up house developed a bad mildew problem, was vandalized, and his very expensive tools were stolen from his storage building. He took a huge loss on his house when he finally sold it to move out of state several years later. He would have been money ahead to let me live there free, let alone pay him rent.

The pastor's decisions were his own business. He had a right to do as he pleased. Can you imagine how I felt, though, living in substandard conditions while watching a perfectly good house deteriorate just because someone didn’t want anyone else sleeping in what used to be his home? It seemed like such a waste.

Let’s look at Cash for Clunkers. Senator Tom Coburn (R-Okla) proposed that, instead of destroying the very drivable $4,500 clunkers, we develop a program that would make them available to low-income families who cannot afford transportation. That program might be hard to manage, and maybe it wouldn’t work, but it’s worth looking into. Not gonna happen. His proposal was immediately shot down at its mere mention.

Think of the guy walking or bicycling a very long way to work every day. Think of the mother dividing up a paycheck’s worth of groceries between her kids to carry as they walk four miles home from the store. Throw in some 90 degree temps or cold rain. Now think about this family watching their neighbors smiling and waving as they drive to the dealership to receive $4,500 toward a brand new car just to let the government destroy their current reliable transportation.

I betcha this walking family is looking at the Cash for Clunkers program and thinking: “It seems like such a waste.”