Junk cars dominate national roads

According to data from the automotive sector research company Samar, roughly 50% of all cars in the country are more than 11 years old. This means that the roads are filled with exploited cars and recent used-car imports have further worsened the situation by 51,000 vehicles in May alone. The excise tax on these imports netted the budget revenues of zł.75 million last month, which is zł.60 million more than a year earlier. "The prices of used vehicles are falling, especially with regard to those produced before 1997," said Edyta Wasiluk from Eurotax, a company which collects data on the price of used cars. Market players stress that the majority of vehicles are in a poor technical condition and will not bring much benefit to its new users nor the economy. The projection for junk car imports in June is also somber reading, as its seems up to 90,000 old autos could be brought over the border. (Rzeczpospolita, p. B5) M.M.