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Here's How Trump Can Make American Cars Great Again
Investor's Business Daily ^ | 2/24/2017 | Staff

Posted on 02/24/2017 4:02:49 AM PST by IBD editorial writer

Regulation: If President Trump wants to help autoworkers and car buyers, he doesn't need to attack imports. All he needs to do is junk the government's misguided 40-year campaign to force consumers into smaller cars.

For those who don't know, the federal government first imposed the "Corporate Average Fuel Economy" standard in 1975, in response to the government-caused energy crisis. The standard requires automakers to meet annual fuel economy targets based on the fleet of cars they sell in a year, or pay stiff penalties.

By the time the standards started to bite in the early 1980s — which forced a radical downsizing of the domestic fleet of cars — President Reagan had deregulated the oil industry, thus ending the energy crisis. And now, with fracking, the country is awash in domestic oil supplies.

But the CAFE standards persisted, and President Obama hiked them in 2009 and again in 2011. If left in place, cars will have to get an average 54.5 mpg starting in 2025 — less than eight years from now.

This was a thinly disguised effort by the Obama administration to force electric cars onto the market, since not a single conventional vehicle comes close to that mileage standard today.

The little Honda Fit, for example, manages just 36 mpg. Even hybrids struggle to hit the 50-mpg mark.

(Excerpt) Read more at investors.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Editorial; Government; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: automotive; cafe; trump
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To: ETL

CAR P0RN!!!

Thank you.


21 posted on 02/24/2017 5:03:06 AM PST by Quality_Not_Quantity
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To: meyer

Which is why the real envirowacko push is for bicycles ...


22 posted on 02/24/2017 5:07:08 AM PST by PIF (They came for me and mine ... now it is your turn ...)
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To: IBD editorial writer

CAFE def has to go, but so do the special California regulations and standards.

Manufacturers can’t be successful while excluding the California market, and as a result, their cars suffer across the board, in all states.

Not sure how to get around this.


23 posted on 02/24/2017 5:09:39 AM PST by ConservativeWarrior (Fall down 7 times, stand up 8. - Japanese proverb)
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To: IBD editorial writer

CAFE def has to go, but so do the special California regulations and standards.

Manufacturers can’t be successful while excluding the California market, and as a result, their cars suffer across the board, in all states.

Not sure how to get around this.


24 posted on 02/24/2017 5:09:48 AM PST by ConservativeWarrior (Fall down 7 times, stand up 8. - Japanese proverb)
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To: Quality_Not_Quantity; HombreSecreto

Lol! You’re welcome.

They are pretty ‘sexy’, in a mechanical sense.


25 posted on 02/24/2017 5:11:10 AM PST by ETL (Trump admin apparently playing "good cop, bad cop" with thug Putin (see my FR Home page))
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To: ConservativeWarrior

Make one car model that sells in California only


26 posted on 02/24/2017 5:12:57 AM PST by bert (K.E.; N.P.; GOPc;WASP .... Macroagression melts snowflakes)
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To: ConservativeWarrior
Not sure how to get around this.

Stop selling vehicles in California. Or sell them only one select model.

27 posted on 02/24/2017 5:35:09 AM PST by meyer (The Constitution says what it says, and it doesn't say what it doesn't say.)
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To: ETL

My dad was a car dealer back in the ‘60’s and had given my mom a ‘55 Chevy for the family car. It didn’t even have a working choke, but it ALWAYS started, even on the sub-zero mornings that none of the cars in his used car lot would start.

He used ‘Betsy’ to jump-start all the other cars. Made Mom feel pretty good about ‘the old gal.’


28 posted on 02/24/2017 5:36:09 AM PST by Quality_Not_Quantity
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To: IBD editorial writer
They should just "freeze" the emissions standards to EPA Tier 2 Bin 5 for automobiles--already achievable now at a reasonable price, especially with the extremely precise control of the fuel ignition process. In fact, the exhaust coming out of a Tier 2 Bin 5 certified engine is often cleaner than the air going into the engine!

Secondly, diesel-electric locomotives should all be certified to standard slightly better than the Tier II standard, which already removed just about all the harmful emissions from diesel prime movers anyway, especially particulates and NOx gases.

29 posted on 02/24/2017 5:36:46 AM PST by RayChuang88 (FairTax: America's economic cure)
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To: IBD editorial writer

PAID GASGUZZLER TAX OF $1750.00 AND BURN LOTS OF GAS IN MY DODGE HELLCAT.... AND BURN LOTS OF RUBBER TOO.... LOTS OF SMOKE BURNOUTS...

FU LIBTARDS

CO2 IS GOOD FOR THE TREES AND A CAR THAT CAN DO 202 MPH SAVES MY VALUABLE TIME IN TRANSIT.... 10.59 at 130.53 miles per hour QUARTER MILE....

DID YOU SAY TESLA..... GREEEN.... sure if you forget about the lithium in the batteries and the pollution that goes into making and disposing of them... plus the rare earth comes from china... our good friend... plus yeah the electricity it runs on.... go look at smoke belching from non-scrubbed hi sulpher stancks.... CLEAN MY ASS... plus the excitement of your ride self igniting and runaway automonous driving feature....SWEEEET.... GREEN IS LIBTARD BS


30 posted on 02/24/2017 5:58:23 AM PST by zzwhale
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To: IBD editorial writer

I own a classic car. The difference between it and my modern vehicles is especially pronounced in the materials used. Today’s cars, to save weight in an attempt to get better gas mileage, use plastic and like materials almost everywhere. Even your “chrome” is just plastic.


31 posted on 02/24/2017 6:00:28 AM PST by SkyPilot ("I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me." John 14:6)
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To: ETL

Hah! The ‘67 GTO was the first thing that came to mind.

Let car manufacturers remake those true to every detail...they won’t be able to keep’em on the lot.


32 posted on 02/24/2017 6:01:44 AM PST by moovova
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To: rickmichaels

“With a few exceptions here and there, American cars of the late 70’s and early 80’s were complete pieces of shit.”

Yes, yes and yes! IMO that’s how the Japanese got their strong start in the market. Their little cars of that era were good for well over a 100,000 miles.

We bought a brand new Ford Bronco in 1980. Timing chain went at 39,000, broken piston at 42,000. Oil always changed, never hot rodded. I know many other Ford owners with similar luck, including my dad’s 1979 Econoline that broke a piston. Forensic work on both engines proved the cylinders were over bored & crank journals were cut too small.


33 posted on 02/24/2017 6:06:51 AM PST by redfreedom
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To: IBD editorial writer

After that, he can move on to make American showers and toilets and washing machines and clothes dryers and dish washers all great again!


34 posted on 02/24/2017 6:08:41 AM PST by 9YearLurker
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To: babble-on

Some people, yes. CAFE raises the price of large cars and subsidizes the price of small cars. Some people are driven by fuel prices and gas mileage but for many the price of the car drives the purchasing decision.

A big car is expensive and in the US we don’t even have very many big cars. We now have big trucks that masquerade as cars because trucks have different, lower, CAFE standards.


35 posted on 02/24/2017 6:09:38 AM PST by FreedomNotSafety
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To: RayChuang88
Between the CAFE standards and the EPA standards, it is a wonder that we even have cars that we want to drive.

Behold the power of research + time.

I wonder how small the EPA would become if the federal gov’t froze all existing standards in place?

36 posted on 02/24/2017 6:11:18 AM PST by texas booster (Join FreeRepublic's Folding@Home team (Team # 36120) Cure Alzheimer's!)
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To: IBD editorial writer

Shut CAFE down. Drain the swamp. Drill baby, drill. Wreck the REGS.

MAGA


37 posted on 02/24/2017 6:12:12 AM PST by PGalt (HOORAY President Donald J. Trump)
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To: rickmichaels
With a few exceptions here and there, American cars of the late 70’s and early 80’s were complete pieces of shit.

Agree, back then the Europeans made better cars. The BMW's were terrific, Imagine a brand new 2002 without all the regulations - Let's not forget that it's not just fuel standards, it's safety standards like mandatory airbags etc that also drive up prices.

38 posted on 02/24/2017 6:17:59 AM PST by 1Old Pro
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To: IBD editorial writer

For many people MPG is mostly hogwash. Many people do not drive enough miles for high MPG cars to lower the gas bill enough to make a small car an attractive purchase. High MPG in the pantheon of scams with low water flush toilets, low-e windows, high efficiency appliances, air tight houses, and LED lights.

They all start with artificially and government created high prices and scarcitiy and end with a mathematically illiterate society incapable of properly analyzing financial investments and payback periods.


39 posted on 02/24/2017 6:19:28 AM PST by FreedomNotSafety
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To: IBD editorial writer

I’m with others here - GET RID OF AIR BAGS. We have seat belt laws already - is there ANYTHING showing that Air Bags plus seat belts is better than seat belts alone? And if that may be the case, what’s the cost per life saved, as that is ALWAYS the critical factor when it comes to safety.


40 posted on 02/24/2017 6:31:26 AM PST by BobL (In Honor of the NeverTrumpers, I declare myself as FR's first 'Imitation NeverTrumper')
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