During a record-breaking summer for car sales, dealers may be shouldering the brunt of the cost so that consumers can continue to enjoy discounts and pricing incentives.

According to a recent analysis by Edmunds.com, an automotive resource site, the employee discounts are expensive for participating dealerships, with GM dealers covering 71 percent of the sticker-price difference since June.

The June discount from GM’s sticker price was up $952 from May.

Dealers have been buying the cars at invoice, hoping to sell them at a higher price. However, the employee discounts have allowed buyers a price of approximately three percent below invoice.

The reason dealers have not been losing money, though, is because of holdback collected from the manufacturer. GM dealers, for instance, receive about a three percent holdback of the MSRP. With the presence of summer discounts, those holdbacks have increased to five percent. So dealers still manage a return above invoice.

The study shows that dealers have also benefited because consumers would rather buy big than save money. For GM, the average MSRP sold was $32,712 in June. That is a significant gain from May’s average of $31,181. The higher MSRP brings with it a higher holdback for the dealer.

Though the opportunity is there for dealers to make money off of a sale, the profitability on each car is less than it was just a few months ago.