Reply to WaPo -- New cars out of reach for many

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I'm a little aggravated by this article (or at least the headline).  Yes, a new car was part of the American "dream" -- but by definition that meant it was always out of reach for many.  I remember the first time my parents bought a new car (in the 1970s) and how thrilled they were -- they were almost 50 and had decent jobs.  People in the 1960s, and 70s bought used cars and fixed them up or made do.  Then everything got exported to cheaper countries, and financing became ridiculously cheap, and all of a sudden you had new cars become the norm for teenagers and 20-somethings.  Unfortunately, during that time period, people became really snotty about cars, so now it's considered failing not to have a nice new car.  I recall in the 70s, it was not uncommon for someone to have a car up on blocks in their driveway, even in a middle class neighborhood.  Now that's the kind of thing that would have you on the HOA list.  
I'm 50, so I guess that's old to some people, but I have a recurring pet peeve that people seem to not realize that the consumer opulence of the past several decades was an anomaly and probably due for a course correction.

(And none of this takes away from the fact that the depression of American wages for the working and middle class over the past several decades is an awful thing for our country.  But the two are rather connected -- we exported good manufacturing jobs to cheaper countries in order to get cheap consumer goods, but in the process hollowed out our working/middle class.)[/quote]

I grew up in a blue collar neighborhood in the south with small homes and no one would tolerate cars on blocks in the front yard. We didn't have hoas back then but people knew not to do this. Every family had one car. People were snobs about cars in the 60s. That isn't new. Cadillacs were the big thing. There were no Asian imports and very few European cars around.

Credit was what changed everything. Literally everything. When I was young there were no credit cards and the only thing people financed were their homes. Credit was something akin to gambling and would ruin everyone.

New cars have always been out of reach for many. Since financing became a thing, peoople have always been willing to take on unreasonable debt to have a nicer car than they can afford.

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