Cash for Appliance Clunkers

Let me start by saying that this is a stupid program. Like the original cash for clunkers, it takes money from a large number of people and gives it to a small number of people to spend. It does nothing to encourage manufacturers to create products that people want and in many cases the appliances purchased will not even be made in the USA.

While I think the policy is stupid, if the government is going to waste our money this way, they may as well waste some on me. So, this morning I am trying to reserve my rebate for a new refrigerator. Reservations are necessary because the government has a limited amount of funds for this program.

Of course even the way the reservations are being handled is the typical government snafu. The government began taking reservations at 8:00am CST today via a website and over the phone. It is now 8:20am and for the last twenty minutes, the web site has been unavailable and the phone lines have been busy. You would think that the state's IT shop would have anticipated the demand and farmed this out to a web and call center provider who actually had the capacity to handle it.

The government can't even misuse our money efficiently.

Comments

[Gary D]

Dave, can you post the URL so we can continue to torment the web master?