Follow this reasoning …

A vehicle at 15 mpg and 12,000 miles per year uses 800 gallons a year of gasoline.
A vehicle at 25 mpg and 12,000 miles per year uses 480 gallons a year.
So, the average clunker transaction will reduce US gasoline consumption by 320 gallons per year.

The government claims 700,000 vehicles were traded – so that's 224 million gallons a year.

That equates to a bit over 5 million barrels of oil.
5 million barrels of oil is about ¼ of one day's US consumption.
And, 5 million barrels of oil at $75/bbl costs around $350 million dollars.

So, we all contributed to spending $3 billion to save $350 million.
How good a deal was that?

Barry's stable of idiots will probably do a great job with health care too!