Cash for Foreigners

by Larry Levin

As usual, the main stream media is not telling you the whole story about the "cash for clunkers" gimmick. I guess that's my job. The whole story is that the vast majority of taxpayer dollars, like TARP funnel-through AIG dollars and the $1/2-TRILLION Federal Reserve swap arraignments with foreign central banks, are stimulating foreigners...again. It may as well be called "cash for foreigners!"

According to Transportation Department data, FOUR of the top five models sold so far under the gimmick known as "cash for clunkers" program, are made by foreign automakers. It makes one wonder how truly inept Congress really is. Were the microcephalic idiots aiming to boost the US auto industry - or foreign automakers? Are they even capable of thinking?

The cars, according to government data, are; the Ford Focus, followed by Toyota's Corolla, then Honda's Civic, and Toyota's Prius and Camry. Doesn't that just make you feel all warm and fuzzy inside?

In fact, our thought-challenged friends in Congress are so enamored with giving YOUR TAXDOLLARS away to FOREIGNERS that they just passed a new bill to steal another $2 billion from you for this very purpose.

Moreover, transferring money from taxpayers to car buyers is exactly that: a transfer. The money taken from taxpayers can't be used for something else.

But the absurdity doesn't end there. The government is not creating GDP; it is only pulling future demand forward to today. The "cash for foreigners" plan also demands that useful assets (working vehicles) be destroyed. Why would we demand that we destroy assets? This is madness. And finally, these consumers are cashing in their PAID UP vehicles...to go deeper into debt with these new cars. Again, more madness brought to you by the clown-posse in Washington DC.

James Hamilton, professor of economics at University of California, San Diego, says cash for clunkers adopts the worst of the New Deal policies and adapts it to today's circumstances.

The Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1933 "paid farmers to slaughter livestock and plow up good crops, as if destroying useful goods could somehow make the nation wealthier," Hamilton writes on his blog. "And yet, here we are again, with the cash for clunkers program insisting that working vehicles must be junked to qualify for the subsidy."

You can just hear it in Professor Hamilton's voice - the whole idea is short-sighted at best and flat-out stupid at worst.



Previous Day's Trading Room Results:

Trade Date: 8/5/09

E-Mini S&P Trades*
(before fees and commissions):

1) VA buy @ 8:30am at 1002.25 = -1.50 (1 lot)

2) OTF sell @ 10:10am at 995.00 = -.50 (1 lot)

3) Algorithm positions (4)

4) "Reading the Tape" positions (8) ...combined Secret's, Algo, & "Reading the Tape" total...+5.25


Electronic (YM) Mini-Dow:

1) None today



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