The close of the Cash for Clunkers programme in the US, in which the government took in old or large gas guzzling vehicles for upto $4,500 and offered new fuel efficient ones in exchange has led to a feeling of de ja vu among American car dealers.

For car dealers in the US, July and August were hectic months when thousands of people trooped into dealerships to take advantage of the government rebate to exchange for older vehicles.

Now at most dealerships across the country things have suddenly become quiet again with hardly any buyers on the horizon. Dealers say the government rebates brought people to buy cars they otherwise would have bought anyway but maybe a little later when things improved on the economic front.

Many dealers have depleted their stocks with clunker sales, and funnily enough car companies are not in a hurry to renew the stocks, hence there is hardly any choice for people who want to buy cars currently.

GM reported 379,000 cars and trucks in its supply at the end of August which is half of its inventory in August last year, while Ford Motor Co. said it had 243,000 cars and trucks in its supply down from 461,000 a year ago.

Dealers say people's confidence in the economy had not yet returned. According to a University of Michigan-Reuters survey, consumer confidence rose from 65.7 in August to 70.2 in early September though employment declined further. Companies shed 216,000 jobs in August while unemployment rose to 9.7 percent, the highest since 1983.