The VOLT is a shock at the Pumps!

Chevy Volt MUST NOT be allowed to fail!
"The Dirty Little Secret Behind the Chevy Volt"
$5/Gal. Gas + $1/Gal. Fed. Tax

The VOLT is a shock at the Pumps!

As of June 7, 2011,  Dan Akerson, the CEO of General Motors has announced that he fully backs an immediate  gasoline pump tax levy of $1.00 per gallon as a "Green Tax" to encourage the general public to buy his Chevy Volt as a leading answer to an alternative transportation to encourage clean air and less dependence on fossil fuels.  Say MORE GM Bailout??... Does this mean that when Obama is re-elected in 2012 that he passes a "Cap and Trade" Bill that this is in addition to it too?

The Real Story...
 

Patrick Michaels is a senior fellow in Environmental Studies at the Cato Institute and the editor of the forthcoming Climate Coup: "Global Warming's Invasion of our Government and our Lives", as well as the author of several other books on global warming.

His Forbes column on the Chevy Volt is a case study in the nexus between big government corruption and big business rent-seeking.   Michaels briefly recaps the well-known consumer fraud in which GM has touted the Volt as an all-electric mass production vehicle on the supposed basis of which its sales receive a $7, 500 taxpayer subsidy, which still renders it overpriced and unmarketable.

Michaels notes that "sales are anemic: 326 in December, 321 in January, and 281 in February." There seems to be a trend here.  He adds that GM has announced a production run of 100,000 in the first two years and asks what appears to be a rhetorical question: "Who is going to buy all these  "Green Energy" cars?" But wait, keep hope alive! There is a positive answer to the question. Jeffrey Immelt, CEO of General Electric., confirmed that GE will buy a boatload of those uneconomic GM cars. But, why?

Also, GE is also awash in Windmills waiting to be subsidized so they can provide unreliable, expensive power. No one in the Obama administration is mentioning that environmental groups are mad as hell that these contraptions are killing many endangered eagles and bird species by the hundreds and want their construction to stop. Will there be a huge bailout purchase for more "Green Energy" power sources like the GE Windmills?  Hmmn?...

Here the case study opens onto the inevitable political angle: Recently, President Obama selected General Electric CEO Jeffrey Immelt to chair his Presidential Economic Advisory Board.  Consequently, and soon after his appointment, Immelt announced that GE will buy 50,000 Volts in the next two years, or half the total produced.  Hmmn?...

Assuming the corporation qualifies for the same tax credit, we (you and me) just shelled out $375,000,000 to a company to buy cars that no one else wants, so that GM will not tank and produce even more cars that no one wants. And this guy is the chair of Obama's Economic Advisory Board?

Michaels includes this hilarious detail in his case study:

In a telling attempt to preserve battery power, the heater is exceedingly weak. Consumer Reports their tests averaged a paltry 25 miles of electric-only running, in part because it was testing in cold Connecticut . (The [GM] engineer at the Auto Show said cold weather would have little effect.) It will be interesting to see what the range is on a hot, traffic-jammed summer day, when the air conditioner will really tax the batteries. When the gas engine came on, Consumer Reports got about 30 miles to the gallon of premium fuel; which, in terms of additional cost of high-test gas, drives the effective mileage closer to 27 mpg.  (FYI: A conventional Honda Accord, which seats 5 (instead of the Volt's 4), gets 34 mpg on the highway, and costs less than half of what CR paid, even with the tax break.)

Now, The Rest of the Story...

The story of the GM Volt deserves a place in the Harvard Business School. It's a classic tale of the GOVERNMENT deciding what the public needs, not the marketplace. curriculum....but of course, it won't.

What is the primary reason for this debacle? Why it is to keep the United Auto Workers Union in the business of jobs of course, because Obama owes it for his 2008 election. Starting to make some  sense yet?  It's only taxpayer money to buy political preference. Chicago brand change we can believe in.