Transportation

We have a ubiquitous and serious, but eminently solvable, economic problem, a major contributor to the Ouroborus of poverty in which many thousands of people find themselves. Here is a presentation of that problem and a possible solution that, if instituted by some enterprising entrepreneur or nonprofit, could become a nationwide institution, perhaps removing forever one significant weight that helps hold a large number of people gasping for breath at the bottom of the economic pool .

The Problem
I have known a number of hard-working young women who share (though it is shared by many men, and not just the young) a currently intractable and self-perpetuating problem, a dilemma partly of their own creating because they were not given a basic economic education at an early enough age, nor do they come from families that are able to help them find their way in these matters. Most importantly, however, and most insidiously, the problem exists because they have been repeatedly taken advantage of by business people who see them as easy marks. Not only do these businesses not provide the service they are engaged to provide: selling a decent car at a fair price, they bury their customers further in debt and bad credit. For example . . .

Angela's car, a car she had owned for maybe 18 months, died on the side of the road on her way to work at her $9.75 an hour job. She works two such jobs. (I would like to rail for a paragraph or two against the punitive measures her ridiculous employer took against her, but that's another problem, tangential to the current topic.) Her vehicle was a disaster of a car that should not have been sold to anyone; but it was sold to Angela. And it was sold to her at a price and interest rate that, after the six year term, she would have put out enough money to have bought, say, a new Prius, a car that she could depend upon for a decade or more. She was somehow managing to make payments of  $350.00 a month for this garbage car. She was doing this because she participates in an economy that preys upon the desperate. She walked away from the car and didn't make another payment. She was right to do so from the perspective of fairness and justice, but not from the perspective of a credit rating. The dealer and lender had both already made a profit on the transaction, and the next four-and-a-half years of payments would have been legal theft, ill-gotten gains, if they had gotten them. Thank Gott they will not be got. Caveat emptor? Of course, every buyer should, in every transaction. Plain common sense. But that time honored phrase is a warning to the buyer, not a license for merchants to commit crimes and prey upon the inexperienced or desperate.

Unfortunately, this pushed Angela deeper into the cycle of debt and exploitation. She had to begin looking for another car. She was now an even greater credit risk (wink, wink, nudge, nudge) to whatever crook used car dealer and crook lender she'd be forced to seek out. The new crook put her in a gas guzzling, 2002 Chrysler POS, that shouldn't be on the road, equipped with a spare tire that was not made for the car and almost obliterated the brake system on the afflicted wheel when, after buying the car, she had a flat tire, that same day, on the way to work. The dealer "found" her credit at an obscene rate that, along with the price of her "new" car, would have--should have--paid for a high-quality new car. And so on. Copy, paste, and repeat . . . or can the entire problem be deleted?

A Possible Solution
People like Angela can have reliable transportation, including maintenance, towing, and repairs if necessary, for $200.00, a bit more or or less per month, without incurring debt. The market for this service is massive and growing, and it will help many thousands pull themselves out of poverty as one significant problem of the cycle is solved forever. Here's how:

You have heard the pleas for donated cars from local National Public Radio affiliate and other nonprofits. These cars go to brokers who sell them for a percentage of the sales price, the rest going to the nonprofit. Nothing wrong with that. How much better, however, if the cars go to a nonprofit that puts them in good running condition, maintains them, and leases them to the Angelas of the world?

Most individual facility expenses could be met through the first one hundred cars thus leased, bringing in $20,000 a month, out of which a good full-time mechanic could be paid, say, at $6,000. Another $5,000 could pay for the lease of a lot and a building in a low-rent area. This leaves $3-4,000 for a secretary, and another $5,000 or so for insurance and other operating expenses. The next hundred cars would cover the expense of a manager for the facility, another mechanic, staff as necessary, and money to seed additional projects in the same or other cities. I think each individual facility should probably have a 200 leased car limit. Money could also be raised by means of occasional car sales and community donations.

Seed money would obviously be required from one or more foundation, of which there are, of course, thousands. A project like this one could arouse some significant interest from them. The prototype facility would probably have to use foundation money to buy an initial inventory of used cars while publicity and networking to receive donated cars is established. As seed money from operations is set aside, new facilities in new cities could be established. Education projects about debt, finance, and borrowing could be offered to customers, as well.

This is, of course, a cursory presentation of something I nevertheless believe could work very well. The idea is so obvious that it is probably not original, and it certainly needs development . . . but I wanted to put it out there in the hope that it might circulate and inspire someone to further develop and perhaps make it a reality. I have neither the organizational skills, business skills, nor time to make this my life's work . . . but I'm sure there is out there some young (or old) entrepreneurial hero who will undertake the quest to pull this Ouroborus's tail from its mouth and remove its head.