6 ms·

Guy has what looks like a luxury truck and is apparently having trouble deciding between food and his car payment. Sell the car, get a cheap used beater, reduc

by rhexs 6y ago

Guy has what looks like a luxury truck and is apparently having trouble deciding between food and his car payment. Sell the car, get a cheap used beater, reduce expenses, keep looking for a job. Not sure what NPR wants me to take from this example.

CPLX 6y ago
Car payments don't work like that. And that's not even addressing the fact that the entire country went into economic free fall, so "Just sell the X" isn't quite the advice it used to be.
Guest42 6y ago
Hiring is very slow at the moment and the beater would likely require a lot of maintenance and have a high price tag although I agree that it’s smart to drive cars that are more economical.
- Alupis 6y ago
  Anecdotal, but I keep hearing about restaurants and other small businesses that can't convince their employees to come back to work. Something about the unemployment benefits + CARES Act bonus being more than they were earning while working...
  - Avicebron 6y ago
    Well maybe that should be a red flag for the economic situation of many many people that should cause some inspection on how we structure and think about work.
  - korethr 6y ago
    Also anecdotal, but unemployment + CARES Act did in fact result in one of my housemates bringing in more from the two than they did from their employer. But, they went back to work anyway when their employer called them back from furlough, because 1) in my state, IIRC, refusing an offer for work cancels one's unemployment benefits, 2) they knew they the structure of having a regular job again would be much better for their mental health than not working.
  - DevKoala 6y ago
    A friend of my girlfriend is on that situation, $1600/wk is more than what she earned previously, and isn’t looking forward for the store where she worked on to re-open or looking for a different job. It gives me a mixed feeling about the policy because it turns out I personally know the one example conservatives would like to point out. However, I’d like to read a deep study about the impact of the measures taken before I form an opinion on them. I want to believe that the policy had a positive effect unless data says otherwise.
    - mydongle 6y ago
      All that proves is how deeply underpaid those jobs were. Say that $1600/wk is perfectly livable for her. That means formerly, she was working at a job that did not pay her enough to live, but she was forced to because the alternative is worse. Arguably, for many people, they could live on even less than that. Countless people who are forced to be in the job market, slaving away at crappy jobs at the threat of poverty and homelessness. They are forced to be at jobs they hate, propping up industries that survive only because of exploitation of human labor, and they don't even get a proper living wage from it. Human life is very limited. Time is the greatest asset we have and it goes away even when we do nothing. Yet we force so many people to trade their time for a pittance. If these people were provided a base amount of money they could live on and do something else, then those jobs would either be unfilled (and the industries die off) or the businesses will be forced to raise the wage, thus providing more money to people who are willing to work for it.
      - Alupis 6y ago
        > All that proves is how deeply underpaid those jobs were. How does it do that? The CARES Act specifically pays money per week in addition to what unemployment pays. So, whatever you made before, even if it was a sustainable wage, you make more by not working right now, even if you could be working.
        colejohnson66 6y ago
        It’s worth keeping in mind that unemployment benefits are around half or less than what one was making. I know someone who’s job was paying him about $600 every two weeks. COVID-19 hit and they furloughed him. His unemployment benefit is about $150/week.
- rhexs 6y ago
  Sure, it’s a rough situation. He lived beyond his means and sank due to the black swan. Now, if the story was about repossessing the truck he needed to drive to a food pantry, I’d have a bit more sympathy. The loan company should be barred from repossessing for generating subprime auto loans or whatever these are called, but this was still directly caused by lack of financial awareness.
hamandcheese 6y ago
Many people finance expensive cars with no money down and are immediately underwater on their loan. In a situation like that, you can’t offload your vehicle easily without also coughing up thousands to cover the difference between the car’s sell value (who is even buying right now?) and the cars loan balance.
- sct202 6y ago
  I had a friend who kept rolling the negative equity of his previous car loan on to the new one. It's pretty ridiculous what the deals will help you do now. He's since gone bankrupt.
- MattGaiser 6y ago
  Those kind of people are going bankrupt eventually no matter what.
- londons_explore 6y ago
  Auto loans should allow you to return the vehicle and walk away... They should be more "rent-to-own". In fact, in my opinion, all secured loans should be this - you should be able to hand over the security to the lender, and walk away without penalty.
  - _jahh 6y ago
    what happens if you crash it first it or ding it up or run it as an uber and have lots of trash passengers? you're talking about leases vehicles which already exist.
    - quickthrower2 6y ago
      Well look at it this way: hiring a car is a thing. Avis etc. They sell lower excess too.
jniedrauer 6y ago
I suspect not many people are buying trucks right now, used or not. It would be hard to sell. It may not be bright to buy a truck worth more than your annual income, but I don't think the situation can be entirely blamed on consumers. It's a systematic problem. Trucks like this are the only profitable sector left for US car dealerships, and they have gone to great lengths to get people on the hook for them. The result is pollution, dangerously large vehicles clogging roads, and consumers stuck in over their heads.
- fred_is_fred 6y ago
  It's the opposite, a crap load of people are buying trucks right now, dealers are begging for more: https://jalopnik.com/not-even-a-pandemic-will-stop-american-demand-for-truck-1843582753 https://jalopnik.com/not-even-a-pandemic-will-stop-american-... Now - they are drawn by 0% financing which is hard to get on a used truck.
  - x86_64Ubuntu 6y ago
    That's terrible. That means when the COVID-19 lockdown is all said and done, and we find out that many jobs won't be coming back, many of these folks will be underwater on a truck. I say "jobs won't be coming back" because I've heard that many companies are using this lockdown to let go of divisions and employees they've always wanted to let go of, but never got around to doing.
  - r00fus 6y ago
    One of the comments on the link indicates the actual situation - Truck sales haven't increased, but are now relatively even more popular to other vehicles which have dropped in sales considerably. Most likely, as you say, by the good deals - 0% financing. How long this keeps up is hard to tell.
opportune 6y ago
If enough people experience this in aggregate it still has big effects on the economy. You’re focusing on the wrong thing
unchocked 6y ago
That is not a luxury truck. It's an extended cab F-150 with cloth seats, probably an XL. A familiar comparison for someone unused to seeing trucks in ordinary use would be a base model Chevy Malibu. And he's probably underwater on the loan, which makes it hard to sell. NPR wants you to see that a lot of ordinary people who made ordinary life choices are going bankrupt.
- rhexs 6y ago
  What price does that start at?
  - photoGrant 6y ago
    Passively rhetorical or genuinely struggling to use google or see the point?
- devado 6y ago
  The starting price of this is 28k per edmunds. That is quite expensive (even for someone from tech sector).
  - colejohnson66 6y ago
    $28000 for a car is cheap, especially for a truck. For comparison, the 2020 Honda Civic starts at just shy of $20000.
    - rhexs 6y ago
      An absolutely amazing claim. $28,000 is cheap for "millions of Americans". What's a moderately priced car to you? 50K?
      - colejohnson66 6y ago
        Did I say “cheap for millions of Americans”? I’m pretty sure I just said “cheap”, as in cheap compared to most new cars.

by rhexs 6y ago

CPLX 6y ago

Car payments don't work like that. And that's not even addressing the fact that the entire country went into economic free fall, so "Just sell the X" isn't quite the advice it used to be.

Guest42 6y ago

Hiring is very slow at the moment and the beater would likely require a lot of maintenance and have a high price tag although I agree that it’s smart to drive cars that are more economical.

Alupis 6y ago
Anecdotal, but I keep hearing about restaurants and other small businesses that can't convince their employees to come back to work. Something about the unemployment benefits + CARES Act bonus being more than they were earning while working...
- Avicebron 6y ago
  Well maybe that should be a red flag for the economic situation of many many people that should cause some inspection on how we structure and think about work.
- korethr 6y ago
  Also anecdotal, but unemployment + CARES Act did in fact result in one of my housemates bringing in more from the two than they did from their employer. But, they went back to work anyway when their employer called them back from furlough, because 1) in my state, IIRC, refusing an offer for work cancels one's unemployment benefits, 2) they knew they the structure of having a regular job again would be much better for their mental health than not working.
- DevKoala 6y ago
  A friend of my girlfriend is on that situation, $1600/wk is more than what she earned previously, and isn’t looking forward for the store where she worked on to re-open or looking for a different job. It gives me a mixed feeling about the policy because it turns out I personally know the one example conservatives would like to point out. However, I’d like to read a deep study about the impact of the measures taken before I form an opinion on them. I want to believe that the policy had a positive effect unless data says otherwise.
  - mydongle 6y ago
    All that proves is how deeply underpaid those jobs were. Say that $1600/wk is perfectly livable for her. That means formerly, she was working at a job that did not pay her enough to live, but she was forced to because the alternative is worse. Arguably, for many people, they could live on even less than that. Countless people who are forced to be in the job market, slaving away at crappy jobs at the threat of poverty and homelessness. They are forced to be at jobs they hate, propping up industries that survive only because of exploitation of human labor, and they don't even get a proper living wage from it. Human life is very limited. Time is the greatest asset we have and it goes away even when we do nothing. Yet we force so many people to trade their time for a pittance. If these people were provided a base amount of money they could live on and do something else, then those jobs would either be unfilled (and the industries die off) or the businesses will be forced to raise the wage, thus providing more money to people who are willing to work for it.
    - Alupis 6y ago
      > All that proves is how deeply underpaid those jobs were. How does it do that? The CARES Act specifically pays money per week in addition to what unemployment pays. So, whatever you made before, even if it was a sustainable wage, you make more by not working right now, even if you could be working.
      - colejohnson66 6y ago
        It’s worth keeping in mind that unemployment benefits are around half or less than what one was making. I know someone who’s job was paying him about $600 every two weeks. COVID-19 hit and they furloughed him. His unemployment benefit is about $150/week.
rhexs 6y ago
Sure, it’s a rough situation. He lived beyond his means and sank due to the black swan. Now, if the story was about repossessing the truck he needed to drive to a food pantry, I’d have a bit more sympathy. The loan company should be barred from repossessing for generating subprime auto loans or whatever these are called, but this was still directly caused by lack of financial awareness.

hamandcheese 6y ago

Many people finance expensive cars with no money down and are immediately underwater on their loan. In a situation like that, you can’t offload your vehicle easily without also coughing up thousands to cover the difference between the car’s sell value (who is even buying right now?) and the cars loan balance.

sct202 6y ago
I had a friend who kept rolling the negative equity of his previous car loan on to the new one. It's pretty ridiculous what the deals will help you do now. He's since gone bankrupt.
MattGaiser 6y ago
Those kind of people are going bankrupt eventually no matter what.
londons_explore 6y ago
Auto loans should allow you to return the vehicle and walk away... They should be more "rent-to-own". In fact, in my opinion, all secured loans should be this - you should be able to hand over the security to the lender, and walk away without penalty.
- _jahh 6y ago
  what happens if you crash it first it or ding it up or run it as an uber and have lots of trash passengers? you're talking about leases vehicles which already exist.
  - quickthrower2 6y ago
    Well look at it this way: hiring a car is a thing. Avis etc. They sell lower excess too.

jniedrauer 6y ago

I suspect not many people are buying trucks right now, used or not. It would be hard to sell. It may not be bright to buy a truck worth more than your annual income, but I don't think the situation can be entirely blamed on consumers. It's a systematic problem. Trucks like this are the only profitable sector left for US car dealerships, and they have gone to great lengths to get people on the hook for them. The result is pollution, dangerously large vehicles clogging roads, and consumers stuck in over their heads.

fred_is_fred 6y ago
It's the opposite, a crap load of people are buying trucks right now, dealers are begging for more: https://jalopnik.com/not-even-a-pandemic-will-stop-american-demand-for-truck-1843582753 https://jalopnik.com/not-even-a-pandemic-will-stop-american-... Now - they are drawn by 0% financing which is hard to get on a used truck.
- x86_64Ubuntu 6y ago
  That's terrible. That means when the COVID-19 lockdown is all said and done, and we find out that many jobs won't be coming back, many of these folks will be underwater on a truck. I say "jobs won't be coming back" because I've heard that many companies are using this lockdown to let go of divisions and employees they've always wanted to let go of, but never got around to doing.
- r00fus 6y ago
  One of the comments on the link indicates the actual situation - Truck sales haven't increased, but are now relatively even more popular to other vehicles which have dropped in sales considerably. Most likely, as you say, by the good deals - 0% financing. How long this keeps up is hard to tell.

opportune 6y ago

If enough people experience this in aggregate it still has big effects on the economy. You’re focusing on the wrong thing

unchocked 6y ago

That is not a luxury truck. It's an extended cab F-150 with cloth seats, probably an XL. A familiar comparison for someone unused to seeing trucks in ordinary use would be a base model Chevy Malibu. And he's probably underwater on the loan, which makes it hard to sell. NPR wants you to see that a lot of ordinary people who made ordinary life choices are going bankrupt.

rhexs 6y ago
What price does that start at?
- photoGrant 6y ago
  Passively rhetorical or genuinely struggling to use google or see the point?
devado 6y ago
The starting price of this is 28k per edmunds. That is quite expensive (even for someone from tech sector).
- colejohnson66 6y ago
  $28000 for a car is cheap, especially for a truck. For comparison, the 2020 Honda Civic starts at just shy of $20000.
  - rhexs 6y ago
    An absolutely amazing claim. $28,000 is cheap for "millions of Americans". What's a moderately priced car to you? 50K?
    - colejohnson66 6y ago
      Did I say “cheap for millions of Americans”? I’m pretty sure I just said “cheap”, as in cheap compared to most new cars.