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I can't say the program is ideal, but given the trade in mileage compared to the new vehicle mileage, the owners of the new vehicles will spend about seven grand less on gas during the vehicle's lifetime, and that means about $4500 is staying in the local economy and not going to foreign countries for their oil.
There's also the savings due to Carbon reduction, which was about a grand or so IIRC, and pollution reduction, although that depends largely on the area the vehicle is located. Not to mention the shot in the arm to the economy. I've read a lot of complaints about this program being at the cost of future auto sales, but unless you're set to make money off of the recession, that isn't exactly something I would complain about.
Generally speaking, it's better to spend during a recession even at the cost of a more tepid recovery because it's the bust cycles that can really cause trouble to an economy. A flight to liquidity and all that will depress prices more than they would w/o intervention, and seeing as how the only upside, if we can call it that, to greater than normal economic growth when we aren't in a recession tends to be bubbles, it's overall, a lot better for employment and a stable economy to insure recessions aren't too bad even if it's at the expense of a slower economy. Arguably, slowing a recovery can also mitigate the formation of bubbles and prevent exacerbation of the boom/bust cycle.
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