[Ben M.]

Anyone complaining about "kids these days" and "social media" and "devices" is missing the biggest point for the decline of interest in our cars:

They don't make them anymore and haven't for literal decades now. Pontiac ceased as a brand in 2011 and stopped making their own engines in 1981. The further we get from those dates the further people's general knowledge of it becomes. It becomes history you read about in a book vs something that you actually experienced and saw in person.

As time marches on the cars that were plentiful when used and easily able to be bought become rarer and rarer. Most cars reach the trough of their value between 10 and 15 years old, with some continuing to be worth less into their 20s when they aren't in very good shape. Once they start getting in their 30s and beyond, nice ones start to command more of a premium simply due to the supply. Once we started getting into the "old cars are an investment" aspect of the hobby starting in the mid-1980s, the ceiling on car values and selling prices seems to have nearly no limit. Who is spending $100k+ on a '70-72 F-body? I know it ain't me. Prices for the remaining cars keep going up as a result.


Also, as has also been alluded to here, money is hard to come by for most people who didn't buy a house 20+ years ago. Rents and food prices keep going up, wages aren't really going up as fast and jobs keep expecting you to change or find another every few years. If you don't have an extra grand or so a month, how are you going to be able to afford to buy a spare "fun" car much less maintain it when things break? Sure, a good chunk of parts are still available but their prices are going up and up. When you factor in the time passed aspect, finding a competent shop to work on your car when it needs something beyond simple hand tools is becoming harder and harder to do as well.

I know plenty of kids in the late teens to mid 20s who very much like cars and want an older one for fun, but none of them have any way of being able to buy a decent project much less a nice driver for anything that's more than 15-20 years old. Stripped '68-72 A-body and '70-81 F-body shells and projects are being put in the classifieds for $8-10k. Where's a kid just out of high school or in college going to get that, then put it some place they can put it back together and drive it again? A car they may never have even seen driving on the road fully assembled that only is a box of parts? Especially with us old fogies sitting on these boards talking about how stupid and selfish young kids are and that they need to get off their phones and their tiktoks and learn to be real men? And if they do manage to get it built and make it fast, the first time a cop sees them do a burnout or accidentally chirp the tires pulling out of a gas station they get slapped with a reckless driving charge and the car is seized and sold at auction.

The hobby is changing. That's just how it is. Kids like what they saw and lived in growing up, just like we did. And they are buying what they can afford - which is whatever "fun" car that wasn't gobbled up by the investors with deep pockets (like imports and trucks).

[jww]

My neighbor talking about his collector cars told me one day, “ when I die someone’s gonna weld my cars doors shut and put ‘em in the local demo derby at the county fair”
I sure hope not, but then he does have FERDS!!