Bits Bucket for March 18, 2011
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The Housing Bubble
Examining the home price boom and its effect on owners, lenders, regulators, realtors and the economy as a whole.
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Why inflation hurts more than it did 30 years ago
Inflation hurts more than it did 30 years ago for Americans stuck with flat income.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Inflation spooked the nation in the early 1980s. It surged and kept rising until it topped 13 percent.
These days, inflation is much lower. Yet to many Americans, it feels worse now. And for a good reason: Their income has been even flatter than inflation.
Back in the ’80’s, the money people made typically more than made up for high inflation. In 1981, banks would pay nearly 16 percent on a six-month CD. And workers typically got pay raises to match their higher living costs.
No more.
Over the 12 months that ended in February, consumer prices increased just 2.1 percent. Yet wages for many people have risen even less — if they’re not actually frozen.
Social Security recipients have gone two straight years with no increase in benefits. Money market rates? You need a magnifying glass to find them.
That’s why even moderate inflation hurts more now. And it’s why if food and gas prices lift inflation even slightly above current rates, consumer spending could weaken and slow the economy.
“It feels far more painful now than in the ’80s,” says Judy Bates, who lives near Birmingham, Ala. “Money in the bank was growing like crazy because interest rates were high. My husband had a union job at a steel company and was getting cost-of-living raises and working overtime galore.”
“Inflation hurts more than it did 30 years ago for Americans stuck with flat income.”
And flat income REALLY hurts the various government entities that depend on forever-inflating incomes for forever-increasing tax revenue.
“And flat income REALLY hurts the various government entities that depend on forever-inflating incomes for forever-increasing tax revenue.”
Which disprove the notion that the economy has been growing. States and munis have been in a perpetual budget crisis for years now. Here in the Centenial State we used to get TABOR refunds (all monies collected beyond TABOR llimits have to be refunded to taxpayers) every year in 90’s. IIRC there hasn’t been one since 2000, only budget cuts, year after year.
True, but you’ve got just about the lowest state and local tax burden in the U.S., so you can’t complain about budget cuts year after year.
Here in NYC, with just about the highest state and local tax burden in the U.S., we have more reason to complain.
States and munis have been in a perpetual budget crisis for years now.
Could any of that have to do with out of control public union growth? Just wondering.
“States and munis have been in a perpetual budget crisis for years now.”
That’s because they used to be able to borrow money.
As long as they (or anyone) can borrow money then they can spend more money than they take in. But when the ability to borrow money is suddenly yanked away then they are screwed.
We are now at the “are screwed” point.
“But when the ability to borrow money is suddenly yanked away then they are screwed.”
This is the point when it is great to be a TBTF bank which can borrow from the Fed at 0 percent and lend at ‘market rates.’
“Could any of that have to do with out of control public union growth?”
In Colorado TABOR limits tax collection growth to inflation and population growth.
During the 90’s the state always over collected and there would a tax credit in the state income tax form, as high as $1000 per couple filing.
However, since 2000 Colorado tax revenue growth has not even kept pace with inflation and in many years it actually decreased. The state has a 1 billion dollar hole to plug this year. K-12 spending is going to drop to 6K per student. There are school districts in Colorado that have switched to 4 day weeks to save money (mostly rural districts).
In my home county (Larimer) the median HH income has dropped 10% since 2010. New housing starts have gone from 2-3K per year to about 200-300.
Fortunately, our local city gov’t didn’t splurge when money was plentiful. Instead they saved it and that’s how they paying today for things like the library expansion.
Interesting stuff, Colorado. Sounds like they try to budget in a fairly responsible way.
No union power / no raises.
It’s that simple? Wow.
Sorry — I omitted the part about how the public employee unions are a financial menace to Main Street Americans on a similar threat level to that of great vampire squids who roam Wall Street.
Another pointless screed.
At least you made sure to use your tried and true defense of, “Wall Street is bad”. I’m sure this is a great example for any 4 year old trying to talk himself out of his own wrongdoing.
Keep telling yourself that unions will solve all problems. Never mind how they drive up costs for small business, and in the case of public unions, drive up the cost of taxes for the average guy. And I am sure that all unionized employees are sure to support the right of others to make a decent wage. I bet you never see any of them go to Walmart for all of their needs. I bet none of them ever employ non-union, or even illegal, labor to perform jobs for them. Yes, I am certain that all union employees fight for the rights of all other working people to make a comfortable living.
Yes, I know that teachers are perfect and should all be paid like they are the centerfielder for the Yankees. Never mind that their success is usually more dependent upon the parenting of the children than their own super human skills.
Your blindness, and intellectual inflexibility, have shown through very brightly on this issue. Keep it coming.
“Yes, I know that teachers are perfect and should all be paid like they are the centerfielder for the Yankees.”
Oh please, who is even saying that? Especially given that the average teacher’s salary nationwide is 50K. My sister who teaches would just love to get paid 50K.
Your poor sister. Please give her my regards.
Please pass along the calculation methodology they used to determine that average salary.
Why don’t we agree to the fact that different States are different in the degree of tax burden from public Unions for starters .
Since New York City has been one of the biggest recipient of
the transfer of taxpayer funds to their main industry the financial industry ,I think that it’s clear that New York City private sector employees should be counting their lucky stars that they didn’t have massive lay offs when the financial
disaster hit . Many private sector employees in the financial district should of been in bread lines by all rights .
I think people need to acknowledge this fact before they go
throwing stones .
Are you looking at me? Are you looking at me?
I acknowledge that all the time. It doesn’t make for easy conversations. I point out that this city has been the biggest recipient of bailout bucks in the country. I also point out that the nation would have been better off if it wasn’t dumped onto this city. I draw a lot of heat for speaking truthfully. Unlike many here I would rather have a stable society than just blindly defend my own narrow self interest.
Why don’t we agree to the fact that different States are different in the degree of tax burden from public Unions for starters .
Who hasn’t done that? No two are identical. But please do tell me which states and cities have minimal governments. Most municipalities and states seem to get you one way or another.
Another pointless screed. NYCityBoy
Although accurate, the foreshadowing of your own posts should be more subtle.
Please pass along the calculation methodology they used to determine that average salary.
(Of teachers salary being the average of 50K)
(it’s even less than 50K)
OK NYCityBoy what do you have on it? Nuthin’ much I think. You don’t “do” numbers. Here’s what I got.
Let’s look at the median salary as the median salary is more important than the average because of the outliers as median net worth is more telling than average net worth.
http://www.payscale.com/research/US/All_K-12_Teachers/Salary/by_Years_Experience
All K-12 Teacher’s median salary by experience:
Less than 1 year $34,666
1-4 years $37,077
5-9 years $42,687
10-19 years $49,511
20 years or more $57,769
Now I didn’t find figures from all states but Florida’s average teacher’s experience is 12 years. SOURCE: fldoe dot org
And Texas’s average teacher’s experience is 11.5 years. SOURCE: dallasindicators dot org
Therefore: By looking at the three sources and numbers given, it is logical to assume that the median teacher’s salary is somewhere between 44K and 47K per year.
There is your proof that although far from perfect is way better than your friend of a friend in NY examples.
“I know that teachers are perfect and should all be paid like they are the centerfielder for the Yankees”
Centerfielders for the Yankees should all be paid like they are the teachers (or some multiple b/c of the brevity of their job life).
I don’t want to get pee all over me from your p-ssing competition, but there you go.
But please do tell me which states and cities have minimal governments.
Check out Grand Forks, ND …in January.
Why don’t we also acknowledge that a great deal of the problem with sustainable public sector benefits have to do with the Health Care obligations that have skyrocketed by bubble economies and price fixing monopolies . No talk about these
greedy monopolies that want to pass all the risk to the public coffers and take the profit from the gravy non sick customers .
This is all about private industries/insurance companies attempt to dump many costs to the tax coffers while taking the gravy .
Unless people see the problem in it’s entirety ,hacking away at the worker sector ,mainly middle and slightly upper middle class sector .is crazy . It’s just as crazy as the policy of promotion of
Globalism at the expense of the standard of living of Americans
and the erosion of the the entire tax base as a result ,especially
tax breaks for the rich and multi-national corporations and oil Companies .
It’s a transfer of pain by the very Culprits that do not have the best interest of America at heart . That is not to say that corruption wasn’t present in all areas regarding the build up to this crisis ,including some of the Unions actions .
Correct correction is necessary ,and that isn’t happening .
“Your poor sister. Please give her my regards.
Please pass along the calculation methodology they used to determine that average salary.”
Please pass along one iota of evidence that supports your rants.
My California park ranger brother in law could not understand that it was the $20,000 a year in tax I used to pay that paid HIS particular salary for the first 4 months of each year, and that there used to be two others just like me who paid the rest.
When my job was off-shored, his job was also lost…
In the next decade this will play out over and over…
No union power / no raises.
Funny, I’ve never been part of a union, yet have gotten a raise every year of my professional career, save for the one time I was laid off when the company closed it’s doors.
During the 1970s, when the Fed ran inflation at high levels from 1974-1980 or so (remember them WIN = Whip Inflation Now buttons?), relatively more powerful unions than those that currently exist were able to collectively bargain for pay raises that lifted their memberships’ wages along with inflation. Pay increases flowed into higher stock, housing and gold prices, and many who bought were made happier by asset price appreciation.
Today’s version of stagflation hurts Joe the Plumber more than the 1970s version did because there is less negotiating power in the unions to bargain for pay increases to keep up with ever higher food and energy prices (aka non-core inflation).
“Today’s version of stagflation hurts Joe the Plumber more than the 1970s version did”
Especially when Joe the Plumber is unemployed. We know a family that is in that boat. He’s been laid off twice in the past two years and does jobs on the side when he can get them.
And I knew a lot of people that were unemployed in the late 70s that didn’t reap the rewards of those union raises.
And how many of those raises made American manufacturing uncompetitive?
Barnyard economics, as old as time. When there is more, those in the collective get more.
And how many of those raises made American manufacturing uncompetitive?
None of them. If you go down that stupid route, only one country will manufacture everything.
What made America “uncompetitive” was “free-trade” to benefit the rich and corporations.
Every country needs to protect part of its manufacturing base.
This is not an academic exercise anymore. The results to our country prove it.
And how many of those raises made American manufacturing uncompetitive?
It probably contributed, but it’s not sufficient. Fine, so a union secures a raise from $14/hour to $18/hour. Who cares, when your wage slave in China makes $0.50 an hour, or when electricity in China costs half as much?
America uncompetitive? Turns out it’s a lie.
http://abcnews.go.com/WN/fullpage?id=13001236
http://sandiegonewsroom.com/news/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=43307:abcs-made-in-america-series&catid=230:economy&Itemid=261
“America uncompetitive? Turns out it’s a lie.”
Of course it’s a lie, otherwise those making the argument would produce some evidence- other than personal anecdotes!- that actually supports their position.
The bottom line is that wages are currently set on the global market. Unions have no relevance anymore as all companies have to do is send the jobs to China etc.
Government jobs are a bit harder to offshore, leading to a good deal of friction, but since the underlying money the unions depend on is gone anyway, the issue is moot.
GH, please follow the links I posted above.
The whole “unions made America non-competitive” has been about union busting for the last 30 years.
If our wages are too high, why do they need tax breaks to send our jobs offshore?
The world made the unions non-competitive.
I never said unions made America non competitive. In todays world, even minimum wage is vastly over the going rate for labor, and everyone agrees that protectionist policy only hurts the economy further. I cannot see how union demands could have ANY weight when all a company has to to is move manufacturing where the going rate for a days work is just a dollar or two…
I personally think Unions are great, if they represent every working person in the possible work pool, but they break when there is not enough to share or another available cheaper pool to choose from.
I reckon it is time for western workers to wake up and smell the $2.00 a day labor rate coffee, because without protectionist policy and soon that is where we are heading, minimum wage, unions or otherwise.
“I’ve never been part of a union, yet have gotten a raise every year of my professional career…”
I didn’t mean to suggest that unions were a necessary condition for getting raises, but rather that they were sufficient to help Main Street America’s take-home pay keep up with inflation in the 1970s in a manner which today’s unions are not.
What? How is that possible? No way. Well, you should find some union employees and thank them for those raises. Certainly without them you never would have received a raise.
Where in the history of the Employer/Employee relationships
has the Employer willingly giving raises unless pressured into it . For part of our history
the profit takers thought nothing of even having real slaves .
Next their going to want to get rid of min. wage saying that
they can’t globally compete without the removal of that protection .The new trend in Industry is trying to get out of prior obligations in spite of getting the benefits of it for 50 years .If you made a math computation of the benefits derived from business in offering these benefits that they are trying to renege on now ,it’s a grand heist .
I can’t see just going for a one-sided attack on workers without the consideration of how the other side is benefiting and a careful analysis of how this further erodes the tax base
in favor of advantage to the low pay tax sector . Again ,no meaningful talk about how the Health Care Monopoly price fixing increases are staining every sectors ability to pay their obligations . No talk of the liability on Wall Streets part concerning mis-ratings on investments . This is just a quick FIRE call ploy to avoid the entirely of the problem and how the Culprits want to avoid the piper .
no meaningful talk about how the Health Care Monopoly price fixing increases are staining every sectors ability to pay their obligations . No talk of the liability on Wall Streets part concerning mis-ratings on investments .
Don’t worry, I’m sure the Tea-Party freedom fighters will be protesting this soon.
Not.
NYCB …I don’t understand how you can conduct a analysis without looking at the entirety of the situation .I am a witness to one extreme reaction after another while all the while the looters and raiders are getting away with murder .
For now I see the public sector workers as being one of the few that are contributing to the tax base while the private sector
continues to erode the tax base by out-sourcing and
out=manufacturing ,tax breaks for the rich ,tax welfare for oil companies and Multi-national Corporations , etc. ,price fixing monopolies raising prices in a recession .
Until the grand heist is addressed and the acknowledgment that we have a take-over of our government and tax
coffers going on ,I’m not willing to attack any worker group
right now . It’s not going to really solve the problems we
face . I rather like the 30% we get back in taxes from the public sector worker and the buying power they have ,which I wish the private sector would have . If you take away the Health care benefit factor the salaries aren’t that out of line with the public sector worker ,especially if you consider inflation . Sure adjustments are needed ,but it’s the private sector that has been royally screwed in terms of bubble inflation . How many middle class families of 4 can afford 1500 a month for health care for God sakes . It’s all a big joke . It’s just like the joke of the artificial prices with real estate . NYCB ,your talking about doing a oil change when the engine already blew up and we need a new engine .
For now I see the public sector workers as being one of the few that are contributing to the tax base
the public sector workers are funded by the tax base.
they contribute nothing to the tax base, how does it make sense to pay them from tax revenues and them tax them to get a portion back?
it would make more sense, and be more efficient to pay them less but tax free.
“they contribute nothing to the tax base”
They don’t pay taxes?
Seriously, can you hear yourself?
But a portion of the wage goes back to taxes that fund whatever . Whenever you have a erosion of the tax base by job loss in any sector ,while you give tax breaks and welfare to
the 10% upper class and Corporations, than it becomes increasing impossible for Government to function ,even in vital areas . Corporations /Industries attempt to transfer the tax burdens to Government .who is increasingly getting less and less
from those Corporations and 10% upper class sectors ,is what is happening for most part . Not only has the USA been job robbed
but the public funds are going to shore up the very sectors that
need more money the least and they are betraying the USA just
using the Governments stupidity for their own Global gains .
Apple employs 1 USA worker to 10 outsourced or out-manufactured worker .
So going after public sector workers acting like they are the culprits is just stupid and its a ploy to take the heat off
the entire way in which all systems have become not functioning ,such as the health care absurdity .
The real battle is a totally different battle .
Thank your lucky stars that you don’t work at Hewlett Packard in the USA. Only the “walk on water” employees get raises. I know HP’ers who haven’t had a pay raise since the early Carly days (10 years ago). And they cut everyone’s pay 5% 3 years ago, even though they were making billions in profit.
Damn those school house cafeteria workers and their dangerous thinking! Damn them for robbing the US Treasury blind!!!
And they cut everyone’s pay 5% 3 years ago, even though they were making billions in profit.
Non-sense, they care about their workers & their customers,…they care…even more than the “TrueAnger™” reduce-peon-workers-wages-now! recruiters up in WisCONsin & Michigan &…they care
Damn the blinders that led those workers believe in the pols they worshiped, to deliver the entitlements from thin air, to take from others but not from them.
Somewhere along the line I presumed you had an advanced degree. Clearly I was wrong.
Damn the blinders that led those workers believe in the pols they worshiped, to deliver the entitlements from thin air, to take from others but not from them.
You’re damn right it’s an entitlement. And you should never forget it but you have. Why?
A country’s responsibility to protect the economic base that benefits 95% of the people instead of the 5% of the richest IS an entitlement in a country such as is the USA.
“take from others”??
Loot at the wealth, income and pay charts, the change over time, look at the numbers, look at reality, look at the job figures, look at the median income falling, look at the number of BK’s, those with out health insurance. Now you tell me who took what from whom.
google: Mother Jones income inequality.
Have to noticed while they cut pay they think nothing of raising prices by any excuse possible . Lets face it until the middle glass is gone and millions are thrown into poverty ,unable to afford health care ,or maybe even shelter and fuel ,will these greedy bastards be happy .Give me a break ,tax breaks for out-sourcing . Can anybody be in illusion who owns the government now and who is in control of policy . T
Good post Rio . Rather than a discussion on USA Industries responsibility to maintain a livable wage for the Majority based on the real cost of living , were talking about talking away the long term standard of living of the middle class while we are
maintaining the illusion that the Majority can pay for 1500 a month health are costs while they are making under 50k a year.
No talk about how loss of jobs creates a burden to the tax coffers and base in the form of Food stamps and all the other social
programs that become necessary when you Industrial and job base betrays you and the tax base by outsourcing and out-manufacturing .Of course the right wing claims this can all be handled by private charity …sure bet .
The costs are far to high
there about to reach the sky
While Industry is gaining
for the rest its raining .
Those costs are to damn high .
“You’re damn right it’s an entitlement.”
Hey, I’m from NY. We invented entitlements. I am also in the “cow class”. The grass isn’t as green lately, so there is less milk. The mafia stole the cream so we are left with skimed milk, and less of it. Yet baby is entitled to her bottle, she screams in agony with her hunger. She is entitled to full rations, damn everybody else, especially the cow.
The mafia don’t pay taxes. The baby can’t pay taxes (net). If you raise taxes to keep the baby fat, the burden falls on the cow. Scream all you want, the cow will figure out how to slip through the bars on the gate, easier the thinner she gets. Then where will your milk come from?
Rather than a discussion on USA Industries responsibility to maintain a livable wage for the Majority based on the real cost of living
i think you just made that “responsibility” up out of thin air.
“Damn those school house cafeteria workers and their dangerous thinking!”
In our neck of the woods they are paid about $10/hr.
“Business” does not and never should have a higher priority than a nation’s sovereignty.
And a nation’s sovereignty rest upon the foundation of a prosperous society. Prosperity of the many, not the few.
But what did the Founding Fathers know, eh?
i think you just made that “responsibility” up out of thin air.
You really DO want this country to turn into Somalia, or Haiti, or Central America. But what do you care. You’ve already amassed your pile.
If people think that I’m being out of line to think that USA companies should support the USA worker and the USA tax coffers ,and that the USA Corporations shouldn’t only use America as a entity to rape ,fleece and pillage ,than raise your hand now .
I seriously have my doubts about that one oxide. The loudest and most ignorant ideologues are usually those with the least.
Funny, I’ve never been part of a union, yet have gotten a raise every year of my professional career, save for the one time I was laid off when the company closed it’s doors.
That conveniently proves your point.
And because your company and Taco Bell are hiring, the USA is on the mend too.
“I’ve never been part of a union, yet have gotten a raise every year of my professional career,”
Ahh, personal anecdotes- Can’t make a right-wing argument without ‘em! (I was behind this guy buying a Rolex with food stamps the other day…)
“Funny, I’ve never been part of a union, yet have gotten a raise every year of my professional career, save for the one time I was laid off when the company closed it’s doors.”
Lucky you! I haven’t received a raise in 3 years and adjusted for inflation, I am now making less than I was in the mid-80s.
I am sure you are very good at what you do, but don’t discount the luck involved in your situation.
I, too, have never belonged to a union, but I don’t minimize the good that unions have done to improve pay, benefits, and working conditions for all of us.
I, too, have never belonged to a union, but I don’t minimize the good that unions have done to improve pay, benefits, and working conditions for all of us.
I’m not minimizing the good the unions have done, nor the luck that may or may not have played out in my life.
I’m simply busting the notion that unions are required for one to get a raise. They’re not.
The “TrueAnger™” + “TrueWageWarrior™” repubicans “we’re-gonna-constantly-protect-n-improve-the-America-workers-wages-really-trust-us!” U-top-peon political goal:
non-union workers starting salary 1981: $4.85 per hour + urgent care Insurance
30 years later:
non-union workers retiring salary 2011: $9.13 per hour + urgent care insurance
“Thanks, see ya later peon, enjoy your retirement and…stay healthy!”
Outsourcing to other countries has contributed greatly to wage stagnation.
The 2012 GOP White Flag mantra: GOP = “TruePurity™” ask Newt Twit, he’ll tell ya all about it.
Right on, Prof.
“COLAs” came about almost ex-ACTLY the same time public unions got the right to collective bargaining. Imagine that.
Before that, we had to make do with what what we were paid for our actual work.
OMG — a voice of reason among the Republicant screeds!
Thanks, ahansen.
How did ahanen’s comment prove anything Prof? You are so lost it is comical. You have yet to make any valid points.
You have been good at pointing fingers at Wall Street and calling names. Everything else is just a complete failure. You are locked so deep into your little beliefs that no light is going to come through and you really like it that way.
How did ahanen’s comment prove anything Prof?
You don’t got too much common sense do you NyCityBoy?
I mean really.
Here’s a measure…. it’s good insight into someones character.
Roll time back to early 19th century USA and ask yourself who on this blog, family, acquantances, coworkers would be slave owners. The ask yourself how they would treat those slaves. Would they abuse them? Would they grant them freedom?
“How did ahanen’s comment prove anything Prof?”
And by the way, I did not just make up the story about the role of unions in bringing the benefits of 1970s inflation to the workers (something which is clearly not in the cards this go round). It is well-documented in this tome:
Secrets of the temple: how the Federal Reserve runs the country
By William Greider
Some of you who feel the knee-jerk urge to inflict an ad hominem attack anyone who says anything regarding unions ought to McEducate yourselves a bit before launching into your attacks.
Without lamenting how the banks and multi-nations stole all our money, what are your proposals about how we make good on the pension and wage promises made to government workers during the giant bubble which forms the basis of this blog?
I for one would love to see pitchforks and tar chasing every last bankers out of town forever and outfits like GS gutted, but I have yet to see a single explanation about how debt ridden and defunct municipalities should get the money to honor existing pension and wage agreements.
As long as corporations continue to off-shore our jobs and send profits elsewhere in the world, our tax base will continue to be gutted.
My best suggestion if we really want to help the middle class - and I mean the middle class, not just government workers is to immediately levy a 100% tax on the retail value of all products manufactured overseas. Sure the cost of a lot of things would go up, but so in the long term would our quality of life…
A state Repub wants to severely weaken child labor laws. (posted here with link the other day)
Now the Repubs are proposing making it against the law for anyone on welfare to have cash.
http://crooksandliars.com/susie-madrak/war-poor-minnesota-republicans-want-b
Back in Sept, the Repub defeated a bill that would have ended tax breaks for offshoring jobs.
Damn janitors!
ABC has done a series called “Made in America” that show that American made product are really not more expensive and are mostly better made than foreign products.
Damn unions!
We have really reached the point of being brainwashed if we think that handing over a lifestyle that was fought for for decades in the USA is now called a entitlement we don’t deserve . No we don’t
deserve to get the benefits of our Corporations that were the same Corporations that prospered and grew rich by the sweat of the USA worker and the buying of the USA worker . Just because these
entities are betraying us and bride the stupid Politicians for their insane entitlement rights to “The World is my Oyster ” mentality , with a greed that knows no bounds ,to the destruction of the USA middle class ,don’t mistake what entities are the “WE ARE ENTITLED ” entities .
In my view ,these entities that have been so destructive to
how well the USA Majority lives ,needs to stop the greed base rape of the World agenda ,and come down to a balance between humanity and greed .
We are seeing a greed based insane Dictator with all the wealth
concentration going bananas and killing his people ,just to maintain power ,and this is a extreme example of wealth concentration to the few .
We need to take a look at if our Corporations should have any loyalty to their Home base ,the USA ,and do they have a
responsibility to not destroy us financially while they destroy our tax base . Wall Street apparently didn’t think they had any responsibility to not launch financial weapons of mass financial destruction on the World for a profit motive ,while expecting the victims to bail them out . In addition ,how much nuclear fall out are we going to get before we question the greed of Corporations
and their ability to regulate themselves for the public welfare verses the profit motive gone awry. How many more toxic products do the
public get to consume just so Stock Market Corporations can rise on the New York stock exchange .
Look at how those workers in Japan at the nuclear plant go in to die as they clean up the mess of the profit motive creators of that
nuclear plant .
Shoot! I agree. The American lifestyle of one breadwinner, spouse, two kids, 1200 square foot house in a GREAT climate (um, California) paid for before retirement, pension plus social security. Well it is no more.
To the childless single people who rent. Stay that way. Be flexible. This is not the American economy. This is the world economy. Those who cannot handle change and think government should protect their fiefdoms, well you are DOOMED. And good riddance to you stasists. You are rotting and do not know it. To the dynamists embracing change, welcome to courage and humanity!
“This is not the American economy. This is the world economy.”
Excellent! This is why there’s such a push toward global tyranny/socialism/Marxism/communism these days. Unions are getting slammed due to unsupportable cost. The support among moonbats toward even more centralized control is the result.
When did Wall St. turn liberal?
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Bill, the whole idea of sovereign nations is not dead yet, but once again we’re going to have to find out the hard way.
Gaddafi threatens to attack passenger jets and ships in the Med as UN finally backs air strikes to protect Libyan rebels. ~ UK Mail
Britain, the US and France are on the threshold of bombing Libya after the UN backed military action by authorizing a resolution on a no-fly zone by ten votes to zero. It led to wild celebrations on the streets of the country, but could mean the RAF are deployed to protect rebel-held Benghazi as soon as this weekend.
You’ve got to understand Gaddafi’s annoyance with the West. He pays them off for Lockerbie, buys his way out of the penalty box and now they put him back in there on some flimsy reason. (As for firing on his own people, what do you think would happen if a militia in the US decided to declare independence and reject the US government?)
I’m surprised China and Russia only abstained in the UNSC vote and didn’t exercise their veto. Maybe they’re hedging their bets and expect that he will be replaced anyway.
If Obama was my President for 41 years, I’d declare war on the US government too.
My, aren’t we Full Circle.
No, just illustrating a point, that NOBODY should be President for 41 years. Why declare War when you can just vote them out? Or, at worst, wait 8 years (as many did with Bush)?
While 41 years is certainly a record of sorts, there are plenty of Western backed monarchies out there that have long reigns of absolute monarchs. Usually dig a little and you’ll find oil in the ground
Anyway back to the topic of housing, I think Gadhafi’s choice of living arrangement is as earthquake proof as it can get.
“While 41 years is certainly a record of sorts…”
Fidel Castro beat him (1959-2008 = 50 years).
But…you are a government lover! I am now confused
His mistake was to not announce Al Queda was behind the rebels.
He did, nobody believed him and some radio talk-hosts ridiculed him for doing so.
– Fri Mar 18, 3:12 am ET
WASHINGTON – The Obama administration and America’s allies have won an open-ended endorsement from the United Nations for military action in Libya, where Moammar Gadhafi’s regime is pressing to eliminate any opposition to his rule. Now they’ll have to move fast.
Awesome a new war ! I was getting a little bored with the other two….
Awesome a new war ! I was getting a little bored with the other two….
I like your evil mind, Hard Rain.
But sequels are never as good. We need a new plot line so we can get another really big one going.
That situation is quickly coming to a head.
No, its quickly going nowhere. No-fly makes it a bit harder for Quadaffi, but he still has the upper hand. This will just make the fight a bit longer.
I am going to add Nuclear Power to my list of Great Disillusionments. As a spin off of my curiosity about EROEI of altenergy things of recent years, I’ve been looking at nuclear plants from this perspective. It just nags me that the whole thing looks like another humungous Ponzi scheme, a pull forward from the future, where a plant pencils out only if you ignore a lot of the associated energy inputs, and especially if you ignore the decommissioning and disposal costs to be born by the yet unborn. Free money and a zero value for environmental costs are requisite. No wonder that no nuclear plant in the world has disposed of their spent fuel; this is the responsibility of generations of the future, after 100 years of cooling off. What a freaking legacy. The profit in nuclear plants is for the builder and the financier.
So what’s your solution?
The birds on the Flintstones cartoons. Now we are doomed.
I think you are ignoring countries such as France which gets up to 85% of its electricity from nuclear and has effectively closed the cycle by recycling the rods and storing the small percentage of waste in a manner which addresses the long half-lifes of elements in the waste.
BTW, here is a chart about the impacts of wastes: http://twitpic.com/49mm4l
BTW, radiation rates at the plants are about 1/1600 of what they were just a few days ago. 1/4 sievert.
Does anyone believe Tepco or Japan’s reporting?
The radiation levels hitting the West Coast are consistent with their reporting. Their actions are consistent, not doing helicopter drops of water until radiation levels were reduced is consistent and finally the fact that we do not seem to have the 180 fighters or helicopter pilots dropping dead from fighting the radiation is consistent. It would be different story if we had an event consistent with a 7, as we had in the Ukraine where people were dying in hospitals of radiation sickness and even the KGB could not keep the news from reaching us.
Amen, Skye. Humongous Ponzi scheme indeed. There’s a nuke plant not too far north of here in Florida, Crystal River. It was shut down for repairs and is supposed to re-open in April. Gonna cost big bucks, which Progress Energy of course is going to pass on to their customers.
Safe, cheap and clean fuel. Michael was making fun of me regarding the old saying about “Pick Any Two”. Feh. How about none of the above? Not safe, not cheap, not clean.
From AP:
“Low levels of radiation have been detected well beyond Tokyo, which is 140 miles (220 kilometers) south of the plant, but hazardous levels have been limited to the plant itself. Still, the crisis has forced thousands to evacuate and drained Tokyo’s normally vibrant streets of life, its residents either leaving town or holing up in their homes.”
(But it’s safe. It’s all contained.)
Great post, Blue.
For those of you familiar with Kunstler’s work, he thinks that returning to the land (IE, less energy dependent) would be a good thing, as opposed to whizzing by each other in cars and sitting in front of a TV in air conditioned boxes. Or, as you stated the other day, spending time with three dimensional friends.
This spent fuel that needs a hundred years to cool off is an energy source in itself, is it not?
Geothermal energy can be tapped, I don’t see why this hundred-years of cooling off of used nuke stuff can’t be tapped. I don’t see why doing so should be all that complicated.
Maybe this looking at storing nuclear waste as being a big problem - a problem nobody wants to deal with, a problem that nobody wants to have in their back yard - is the wrong way to look at it.
“I don’t see why this hundred-years of cooling off of used nuke stuff can’t be tapped. I don’t see why doing so should be all that complicated.”
Good on ya, cobber! That’s the spirit! I see a career in nuclear energy in your future, yes I do.
Thank you for your endorsement.
It’s pretty difficult to effectively use the relatively low levels of heat involved. Especially when you keep in mind that the source is radioactive, so you have to have a working fluid that that is kept seprate from the environment.
Maybe the term “nuclear waste” needs to be looked at.
Maybe the idea of getting possession of substances that for many years will predictably, consistantly and relentlessly generate enmass various sub-atomic particles and high-energy gamma rays is something one would WANT to do.
Who know at this point? We are in still the infancy stage of the Nuclear Age.
Well I suspect that it IS possible that due to our “once through” fuel cycle, it’s possible that in hundred years or so, people WILL want to retrieve high-level wastes for reprocessing into fuel. Like fossil fuels, fissile fuels are a finite resource using them as efficiently (and safely) as possible today, preserves supplies for future generations, when the need may be greater, and the technology better.
Actually the DOE was keeping the concept of reprocessing in the back of their minds even while it was still banned. That’s part of why Yucca Mountain was such a disaster. They had to prentend to build a permanent repository, but with a wink and nod to retrievability.
If they really wanted to dispose of waste permanently, they could dump it into a few very deep ocean trenches, or they could dig the Very Deep Hole and dump the stuff down there. But they know full well that they would never get it back. And there is such a thing as Peak Uranium.
Also, what happens to nuke plants when they get too old to operate?
When you close one down for good, can you tear it down and build condos?
Or does it hafta sit there forever?
My recollection is that when a reactor is disassembled, much of it is burried as low level waste. But I also recall that often the costs of totally dissassembling and disposing of reactors is high enough that it tis cheaper to guard the site forever. I also suspect that like asbestos, it may well be SAFER to leave it in place rather than to take it appart and try to dispose of it.
I don’t see why this hundred-years of cooling off of used nuke stuff can’t be tapped.
That’s a great idea. Anyone know if they do this already? Would the water pumping etc. require more energy than would be produced?
The had a perfectly acceptable plan and had spent hundreds of millions of dollars, if not billions to prepare the repository at Yucca Mt. Nevada. Until Sir Harry Reid whipped everyone into a frenzy about it.
I always found the timing ot be interesting, coming as it did after the $$ were spent in Nevada to do the construction of the repository, but before any waste could be moved there.
I noticed that as well.
They didn’t actually build anything except for one research tunnel nearby. They spent upwards of $12 billion, mostly for all the research and contractors. The end result is that they kept changing the design to accomodate whatever research result they came out with. Finally they proposed a “flexible” design, which was fancy terminology for “we’ll figure it out AFTER we get permission.” They didn’t even have a finalized tranportation plan.
Nuclear plants have a great EROEI. Once you take into account:
1. Energy spend building the plant
2. mining and enriching the fuel
3. Dealing with the spend fuel for the next 100+ years
4. Decomissioning the plant
The the EROEI is not so great. I found it impossible to get any unbiased information on any of the energy sources. If you look at the lobbyist for that energy group ethanol/nuclear/wind/etc you always get great EROEI. If you look at the anti-ethanol/nuclear/wind/etc. crowd you always get EROEIs close to 1. Of course with oil/gas it largely depends on the resource you’re exploiting. Oil shale in the artic is near 1 while a gusher in Texas used to be at 100+.
Hydro is the only one that seems to be consistantly in the 7 - 11 range. Instead of our politicians commiting to one energy source over another it might be a good idea to get reliable EROEI estimates before sinking billions of $$. But I guess that’s expecting too much, especially when lobbyist’s money enters the picture.
But with an expansion of hydro, you’d be ruining views therefore impacting high priced real estate values. And we wouldn’t want that. ; )
I think they already have good EROEIs. The problem is that there aren’t enough EROEI 7 energy sources around to power the world.
I can only imagine that like Japan our economy would shut down if we took our nuclear plants offline. I can’t help but notice the polititians including Obama are loath to point that out.
Maybe I should invest in hydrofracking (while living in another state)
Technological Ponzi schemes have a way of front-loading the economic benefits and back-loading the catastrophic environmental damage when containment fails.
I should add that the front-loading of benefits and back-loading of catastrophic environmental damage makes technological Ponzi schemes attractive to politicians with limited terms in office (along with other Ponzi schemes, for that matter).
Technological Ponzi schemes have a way of front-loading the economic benefits and back-loading the catastrophic environmental
Might this be such an example? (Should negative human health effects discovered only after 60+ years later be an “adder”) ? :
Hybrid GMO corn / rice / soybean / wheat + Inc. patented chemical herbicide / pesticide / fertilizer
Fleeing Continues as Japan Raises Its Nuclear Threat Level
By Hannah Beech / Niigata Friday, Mar. 18, 2011
On the Beach.
Frantic Repairs Go On at Plant as Japan Raises Severity of Crisis
Kyodo News, via Associated Press
By HIROKO TABUCHI and KEITH BRADSHER
Published: March 18, 2011
Japanese engineers battled on Friday to cool spent fuel rods and restore electric power to pumps at the stricken Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station as new challenges seemed to accumulate by the hour, with steam billowing from one reactor and damage at another apparently making it difficult to lower temperatures.
As the crisis seemed to deepen, Japan’s nuclear safety agency raised the assessment of its severity to 5 from 4 on a 7-level international scale. Level 4 is for incidents with local consequences while level 5 denotes broader consequences. It was not immediately clear why the action had been taken. The partial meltdown at Three Mile Island in 1979 was rated 5, and the Chernobyl disaster in 1986 was rated 7.
…
So, according to Japan, Fukushima is now as bad as TMI. Now correct me if I am wrong, but I don’t recall TMI blowing up, or catching on fire or causing a bunch of workers being exposed to most likely lethal doses of radiation or residents in a 20 mile radius (or whatever) having to be evacuated, or 6 distinct reactors being in trouble at the same time or the crisis going into a second week or huge amounts of radiation being released into the environment.
I think the Japanese leadership is completely delusional.
Well yes, it certainly IS measurably worse than TMI. However I’m unfamiliar enough with the scale that they measure this stuff with to assert that it has jumped to the next category. There’s certinaly a BIG gap between TMI and Chernobyl. I can’t help wonder how it compares to Chalk River.
If you follow the link you will get to a page that has the criteria for rankings:
http://www.iaea.org/Publications/
Looking it over, I can see an argument over whether it is a five or six. However, since the difference is based on radiation levels that the general public absorbs and not the workers, a five seems possible.
It’s a 7 disaster and that’s my story and I’m sticking to it . I don’t like the waste problems associated with nuclear, let alone the potential for a disaster at a plant .
Why in the hell did they build 6 reactors at one site ,on the beach, where it’s known to be subject to these sort of Natural disasters .
We need to pause and take a look at our priories ,take a
re-look at profit motive in business and what degree this is
leading the public into a course that spells out destruction and compromise to the welfare the Majority .
Financial weapons of mass destruction , nuclear potential for mass destruction , foreign policy support of bogus regimes in
oil producing countries ,Government support of the insane tax avoiding / tax subsidies profit motive of Multi-National Corporations and price fixing Monopolies ,Wall Street Ponzi scheme boom /bust financial cycles with misuse of funds for short term gain , improper trade balances and Globalism designed to transfer wealth to the 10 % upper class , lack of regulation in business to the point of health threats to the public (toxic products ), Fed power , improper trade balances/tariffs ,government tax support for entities betraying the work force of America ,and anything that has tipped the balance scales in favor
of a greed that knows no bounds that leaves the Majority in ruins in many ways and creates a instability that is destructive in the final analysis . That was a long sentence ,but my point is
that the course we are on needs to be re-examined for not only the insanity of it but the long term destructive potential of the
the course the USA is taking is what seems to be a bribed priories .
Hey Whiz, you makin’ Hwy50 reminisce for his 1st HBB handle:
“theAmisharesuffering”
Whether or not a government chooses to evacuates a population is not correlated to the danger of the situation.
Perhaps Three Mile Island shouldn’t have been rated so high?
Perhaps it wasn’t the Unmitigated, Life-Ending Disaster that it was fervently promoted to be?
Honestly, folks.
Times Beach in Missouri was in many ways more disasterous than Three Mile Island. Both to the people that lived there, and to Environmentalists, who didn’t make much profit off of it. Thank Goodness for Three Mile Island. Right?
http://www.usjapancouncil.org/fund
This is a link for the relief fund chosen by our company chairman, a Japanese American himself who was interred during WWII and went on to a be a pioneering professor in the field of immunology.
The site states that 100% of donations will go to relief and rebuilding efforts.
My wife & I made a donation to the relief effort via the Humane Society International.
Congress has spent the Social Security Trust Fund.
~Walter Williams
“How can academics, politicians, news media people and ordinary citizens get away with statements such as ‘Reagan’s budget deficits,’ ‘Clinton’s budget surplus,’ ‘Bush’s budget deficits and tax cuts’ or ‘Obama’s tax increases’? Which branch of government has taxing and spending authority is not a matter of rocket science, but people continue to make these statements. The only explanation that I come up with is incurable ignorance, willful deception or just plain stupidity; if there’s another answer, I would like to hear it.”
Which branch of government has taxing and spending authority is not a matter of rocket science, but people continue to make these statements. The only explanation that I come up with is incurable ignorance, willful deception or just plain stupidity;
+1
“Congress has spent the Social Security Trust Fund.”
And if so, we can tax the uber wealthy a lot more to get it back. Workers shouldn’t get stiffed so the wealthy can get a free ride.
That’s socialism! True American values are that the wealthy get bailed out, but the little people get the shaft, didn’t you learn that in civics class?
I think I learned the part about life being better for the next generation than the previous generation. I guess I didn’t learn the part about that now being only for the undeserving trust funders.
“I guess I didn’t learn the part about that now being only for the undeserving trust funders.”
The people who paid social security taxes for years, are now undeserving of being paid social security benefits?
The people who paid social security taxes for years, are now undeserving of being paid social security benefits?
Of course not. What I meant was the only group now doing better than the previous generation are those at the very top, the “undeserving trust funders”.
FWIW, whoever they would have given it to to invest would have spent it as well, the only question is: will it be repaid? In the short term yes, in the long term … who knows? I guess there is the printing press.
Walter is liar. SS has it’s own system, separate from the rest of the federal budget and has been shown to be able to pay out for at least the next 70 years.
Add to that that Gen Y & X are larger than boomers, and you see the disinformation campaign for what it is. A grab by Wall St. to get their hands on that money. A grab that’s been going on for 30 years.
And eventually, the American sheeple are going to buy into it.
Oh wait…
Gen Y & X are larger than boomers
combined, yes. That’s an important distinction. GenX is not larger than the boomers.
SS has it’s own system, separate from the rest of the federal budget
I assume you’re purposefully overlooking the fact that the money is set aside in treasury bonds, ie it’s an obligation that must ultimately come out of the federal budget as it pays out.
combined, yes. That’s an important distinction. GenX is not larger than the boomers.
Hmm. Too bad it’s an important distinction, because there are actually _more_ Gen Yers than baby boomers, even without counting the glorious slacker generation (a lot more, since this number here is just for the “echo boomers” of the 13 years between 1982 and 1995- a subset of gen Y!):
wikipedia
“In the United States, the actual “Echo Boom” [Gen Y] refers to the surge in live births starting in 1982. This new “baby boom” period spanned thirteen years, continuing through 1995.[8][9][10][42] Today, there are approximately 80 million Echo Boomers.[9]
Seventy-six million American children were born between 1945 and 1964, [baby boomers]”
I assume you’re purposefully overlooking the fact that the money is set aside in treasury bonds, ie it’s an obligation that must ultimately come out of the federal budget as it pays out.
Well, if they’re not going to pay out for the social security trust fund, then they’re not going to pay out for anyone, right? Are the wealthy surrendering their treasuries? Or is it one of those things that just us little people do, like pay taxes?
“I assume you’re purposefully overlooking the fact that the money is set aside in treasury bonds, ie it’s an obligation that must ultimately come out of the federal budget as it pays out.”
Worse, they are “special” Treasury bonds, issued only to the SS Trust Fund. They are “non-marketable” bonds.
If they were standard US Treasury Bonds, then the SSTF could just re-sell them in the secondary market to raise funds. But since they are non-marketable bonds, they cannot.
That is the “lock box” mechanism to keep the morons in Congress and Wall St. from raiding it.
Double-digit rent rise is coming to the housing market.
cnnmoney
Renters beware: Double-digit rent hikes may be coming soon.
Already, rental vacancy rates have dipped below the 10% mark, where they had been lodged for most of the past three years.
“The demand for rental housing has already started to increase,” said Peggy Alford, president of Rent.com. “Young people are starting to get rid of their roommates and move out of their parent’s basements.”
By 2012, she predicts the vacancy rate will hover at a mere 5%. And with fewer units on the market, prices will explode.
Rent hikes have averaged less than 1% a year over the past decade, according to Commerce Department statistics, adjusted for inflation. Now, Alford expects rents to spike 7% or so in each of the next two years — to a national average that will top $800 per month.
In the hottest rental markets, the increases will likely top the 10% mark annually for the next couple of years, according to Lesley Deutch of John Burns Real Estate Consulting. In San Diego, she anticipates rents will rise more than 31% by 2015. In Seattle rents will climb 29% over that period; and in Boston, they may jump between 25% and 30%.
There’s some truth to this. Inflation is hitting rentals in these parts. I’ve been looking to find a modest rental and am running into some unpleasant price resistance. I guess I’m not really in a position to compete with retired folks and their pensions and SS.
“Double-digit rent rise is coming to the housing market.
… In San Diego, she anticipates rents will rise more than 31% by 2015.”
I can see that in the apartment market, as many FBs who walk away from defaulted mortgages will have no choice but to reacquaint themselves with apartment-style living.
But with a supply of vacant homes numbering in the millions coupled with a weak labor market, I can’t see rents going up much over the next few years on rental homes, at least in areas of California where unemployment is predicted to stay at double-digit levels through 2013 or so (including San Diego).
And if the rents go up too much then house ownership will become attractive, once again putting downward pressure on rents.
What supply of vacant homes are you referring to, PB? I sure as heck don’t see many vacant homes.
And unemployment doesn’t make much difference. Apartment dwellers will simply shack up, especially the young. It’s pretty darn easy to raise the rent when you know that each apartment has 2-3 incomes.
“I sure as heck don’t see many vacant homes.”
I suppose I accept Ben Jones’ assertion that those currently not paying their mortgages will eventually have to get some boxes and move on. And with unemployment persistently stuck at double-digit rates, I have to assume that many more San Diegans are not paying their mortgages than are widely reported.
“Already, rental vacancy rates have dipped below the 10% mark, where they had been lodged for most of the past three years.”
The vacancy rate in San Diego is always below 10 percent, usually below 5 percent, and yet rents have been flat for the past three years with vacancy rates mostly around 5 percent.
Compared to the late 1990’s when rents were rising sharply, the supply situation is substantially better, population growth is stagnant, and wages are stagnant or falling. Outside of a major earthquake that destroys a lot of housing in Los Angeles and the Inland Empire, I see no way that rents in San Diego rise anywhere close to 31 percent by 2015. I’d be surprised if they were even 10 percent higher.
“Young people are starting to get rid of their roommates and move out of their parent’s basements.”
Really?! All of these young people that are out of work and can’t find jobs are suddenly moving out? Is squatting on the rise because I don’t see how they’d suddenly have more money for rent?
“In the hottest rental markets, the increases will likely top the 10% mark annually for the next couple of years, according to Lesley Deutch of John Burns Real Estate Consulting.”
She should hope her pay and future employment is not tied to the accuracy of her predictions.
“I’d be surprised if they were even 10 percent higher.”
Same here, especially since we just signed our lease with no rent increase for the second year running, and since double-digit unemployment rates are forecast for California through 2013, by the normally bullish Anderson School forecasters.
I call BS on this story.
Why? Because here in Tucson, we have a serious glut of rentals. Some are in apartment complexes. Others are houses, many of which were bought as investments that didn’t pan out. So, since they didn’t sell, now they’re for rent.
Methinks that Tucson’s story is similar to that of many other cities.
“I call BS on this story.”
I agree. I think this will turn out to be one of the worst predictions we’ve seen recently.
They can raise rents all they want…until they can’t. Unlike home loans, you can’t borrow your rent. If all other costs (food, fuel) rise as well, people will adapt by returning to co-habitation. Especially in the absence of increasing income.
So, yeah, I call BS as well.
…and who will be able to pay that?
Nice to see oil back over a hundred!
if you are long oil
sleepless_near_seattle
Said yesterday
“I’m about to give up. Apparently my expectations are much too high. I still think every house I like is 30-40% overvalued. And yet, reductions off even higher prices get “snapped up” just like that.”
I wonder why?
9,000 dropped foreclosure cases from Plantation law firm now in limbo in Palm Beach County
By Kimberly Miller Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Posted: 5:39 p.m. Thursday, March 17, 2011
The status of nearly 9,000 Palm Beach County foreclosure cases is in question following attorney David J. Stern’s announcement that he is closing his foreclosure shop at the end of the month and dropping the files.
Statewide, as many as 100,000 cases need to be officially withdrawn from by Stern attorneys, but with a decimated staff, Stern told judges in a March 4 letter that he simply doesn’t have the manpower to file the correct paperwork.
The Plantation-based Law Offices of David J. Stern was fired by federal mortgage backers Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in the fall after allegations that flawed paperwork was used to repossess homes. Hundreds of employees were subsequently laid off, leaving the transfer of foreclosure files to new firms in disarray.
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/money/real-estate/9-000-dropped-foreclosure-cases-from-plantation-law-1328630.html - -
I suspect that the sales pitch these days is get in now before interest rates goes up and you can’t get the nice 3% down payment of the
Government backed mortgages and loans costs are only going to rise .
I can just see the bogus charts now that the sales people have
created to create demand or fear or any of the other ploys that are used to create urgency .
It’s not just that. The confidence is back among certain groups. They believe the numbers in the markets or on the news every night. They believe that things are improving albeit slowly. The knife did not fall on them and they believe we’ve bottomed out and the worst is behind us. I hear this sentiment everywhere although the people who think like me and the hbb are also emboldened and speaking out more.
I live in a comfortable town. When I slip and make a reference to an hbb concept, most people still look at me like I’m nuts.
re: “looking at you like your nuts”
that’s funny.
I’m sure i don’t travel in more sophisticated circles than you, but my impression is that most people think(realize) that this is the “new normal”
I’m curious what you exactly you mean as “this”? when you say “this is the new normal”
I’m pointing out that the not everyone got a lifestyle adjustment. One of my workout partners and I had a conversation this week that really stuck w/me. He’s a financial planner. We were going back and forth on Japan and it’s financial impact and he just stopped and looked at me, laughed and said, “Carrie, it’s like you think the world economy is a giant Ponzi scheme and it’s all gonna come crumbling down. That’s just not how it’s going to work.” That’s when it struck home how little he and his circle have experienced any sense of fear at all. It didn’t even register on his perception radar that those who hadn’t been beneficiaries of successful fathers might have a few things to be cautious about. It was quite eye opening.
Previously my friend in the oil industry had explained to me at some length how insulated they were from taking a financial hit even in this environment. It was basically because the company paid or reimbursed them for an amazing amount of their expenditures including substantial losses on their homes.
Carrie …no doubt some sectors have been sparred pain from
the fall out of the financial meltdown and the financial no job recovery . What industries support you area is the question .
Jeff,
Yep, this holding of inventory and low, low rates have me deeply concerned that “they” might actually, if not succeed, at least drag this thing out for another 10-15 years…
Me having patience is one thing, but my competition NOT having patience and believing in the system (as CarrieAnn illustrates quite well) is having a very frustrating effect on me.
sleepless_
“but my competition NOT having patience and believing in the system (as CarrieAnn illustrates quite well) is having a very frustrating effect on me.”
Me too.
Perhaps I missed it but I don’t recall seeing any discussion of HAP on the HBB, this has bailout/scam written all over it :
“Military Homeowner Help Hit as ‘One More Bailout’
The expanded Housing Assistance Program (HAP) for military homeowners is a nice idea but it is costing the government — we taxpayers — a fortune. The next time families helped by this program move, and they make a profit on their homes, will they send checks to the government?
In previous housing markets we bought houses, sold them at a profit four years later and gloated. Now that we are losing money we expect the rest of the country to pay the difference. Fine, but only if this goes on an account so that, the next time they make a profit on a house, that money too goes into a general taxpayer fund — at least up to the amount that these military homeowners previously were helped.
Also, with a program like this, where is the incentive to rent? Just buy and, if you lose, taxpayers will bail you out. If you win, you keep what you get.
http://www.military.com/opinion/0,15202,216083,00.html
What HAP offers in terms of relief is the following:
The Government may-
1. Reimburse you for part of your loss from selling your home
2. Assist you, if you don’t receive enough proceeds from the sale of your home to
pay off your mortgage
3. Buy your home by paying off the mortgage
4. Help you, if you default on your mortgage
Further, HAP states you should continue try to sell your home on the open market. According to the program, you may be paid up to 95% of the difference of the Fair Market Value prior to the BRAC or PCS announcement affecting you, and the appraised value at time of sale, with potential for some closing cost reimbursement.
Stumbled across a HAP sale in my area where a FB bought in 2000 for 240K, cash refinanced in 2005 for 400K and is now eligible to collect 380k on the sale.
In toothless, one-string banjo, fly-over country these programs cost little; think Army. Now services like the Coast Guard or Navy, which are stationed largely along coastal regions, the costs can really soar! I know a family who participated in this program. I don’t recall the numbers, so I can’t comment specifically, but I remember being shocked by the numbers.
Still hasn’t posted almost half an hour later but I meant 1/1000 of the levels earlier in the week.
Maybe so, but the situation in Japan is actually worsening. I think they will have no problem getting the reactors under control; looks like the containments and reactors are intact enough to bring those to relative safetly.
The question is those spent fuel pools. They spent fuel is in a tank up inside the building where the roof blew off. The tank is leaking. Every time the water gets low, it sets on fire again. So they have to put in water — by helicopter drop or fire hose spraying UP — faster than it leaks out and faster than it boils off — almost indefinitely. That’s why radiation levels are spiking up and down. Every radiation spike is the water disappearing.
I posted late last night, but I’d love more input on this: which is your recommendation
1. Pittsburgh
2. Wilmington (DE)
3. Philadelphia
I am applying for a job that could land me in any of these three cities. I am obviously looking for, drumroll, a place with reasonable housing costs. Lol.
You’ll need to find someone familiar with all three, but I think you should be hoping for Pittsburgh.
DE hands down. Head across the C&D canal into Kent County for housing.
PS…… DE has no sales tax and extremely low property taxes.
DE has no sales tax and extremely low property taxes.
And it’s near NJ.
PS…… DE has no sales tax and extremely low property taxes.
If one enters the First State via U.S. 202 South, one is greeted by at the PA-DE border by a big sign:
Welcome to Delaware
Home of Tax-Free Shopping
It’s Delaware’s way of twitting PA for its heavy reliance on sales taxes.
Oh, as for those low property taxes, a state can do this sort of thing if it is heavily reliant on the bankster industry. (DE has quite a few of them headquartered there.)
Not to mention being the incorporation capital of the United States. Boy, does that bring in money.
And let’s not forget DuPont. That company is headquartered in DE, and makes a ton of money. DE knows that.
I think Pittsburgh is far more affordable than the other cities listed and still has all of the big city ammenities.
I vote for Pittsburgh.
And I’m not just saying that because that’s where I’m from. I’m saying it because of the people.
They may appear a bit gruff, but when it comes to finding folks who have your back when you need ‘em, Pittsburghers are it.
I’ve only lived in #1 and #3. I’d take Pittsburgh over Philly without hesitation. It’s not as sprawling as Philly and the inner city is not as zombiefied. More a MidWest city than an Eastern Seaboard one. Higher quality of life for the buck and a shorter commute if you are a burbanite.
More a MidWest city than an Eastern Seaboard one.
For me, that’s worth paying 100K more for a house but it actually makes the house 100K cheaper.
DE is also home of the E-Z corporate charter.
I’ve evacuated the family from LA to DC for 10 days to avoid the fallout. We expect additional benefit from being so near to “the One”, and the bliss he provides.
The astonishing thing about my genius is that I knew to buy these tickets back in January.
The daughter in HI is probably past saving, so she’s been left behind.
LOL. Enjoy your DC vacation, Dude!
And the three week budget extension has passed, to stuff will even be open.
We have extension of florets on the cherry blossoms. Awaiting peduncle elongation in a little while. You might actually get to see something pretty close to peak on your last day. Here is the website to keep track of the progress, but know that it is beautiful even before they declare peak bloom.
http://www.nationalcherryblossomfestival.org/about/bloom-watch/
True story from AZ: Back in 1998, we had one of those once-in-a-century wildflower seasons. I mean, those bloomin’ flowers were going nuts. They were that pretty.
In fact, they were so pretty up by Picacho Peak that they caused traffic jams on I-10.
Darn flowers.
For those who have the time the poppy blossom in the western Antelope Valley (west of Lancaster, CA) is a sight to behold as well. It drapes a fluorescent orange carpet across the rolling hills for miles and naturally there is an associated festival.
I suppose there is a top ten list of blossom festivals worldwide somewhere, makes me wonder where they rank.
I love those poppies - when is peak season, dude?
It varied according to rainfall and temps but it is normally in early April and closely coincides with the actual festival.
Thanks for the link Polly, very cool. I think it is nice how God timed the cherry blossoms to coincide with spring break.
We’ve been to DC as a family before but only for 3 days so the extended visit will be neat. My daughter’s starving student apt. is in College Park, MD. It reminds me most of some of the vacay rentals we’ve had on the continent, though the bath/shower combo is full size standard American, and the price just can’t be beat!
I’d love to hear any suggestions for sites to visit from yourself, Oxide, Bink (is he still around), and any other lurkers in the area. My daughter had taken on the responsibility of acting as our cruise director, but with a 6 month old who knows what she’s got done. She and my dear wife have answered the siren call of Target while I took my red-eye recovery nap.
I’d love to hear any suggestions for sites to visit from yourself,
One of the highest, best views of Washington DC for free.
Old Post Office Pavilion 1100 Pennsylvania Avenue Northwest
Washington D.C., DC
Its 315 ft (96 m)-high clocktower makes the building the largest commercial building and the third tallest structure in Washington D.C wiki
I concur on the old post office. You have to have your bags searched, but then go downstairs toward the banner which says “take the time to see the Tower” or something like that.
Natural History Museum is a must.
National Gallery of Art is nice and quiet.
For some real quiet, go THROUGH the Smithsonian Castle and out the back. There is a beautiful garden out there. And there are two museums — Asian Art and African Art. They are not too populated, so you can rest (great potty break too.)
Stay away from Air and Space, unless you really like airplanes and spaceships.
Stay away from Air and Space, unless you really like airplanes and spaceships.
OTOH, if you’re even a little bit geeky, this museum is a geek magnet. It pulls you in and won’t let you go.
It’s also a screaming kid magnet.
If you get tired of sightseeing and the bustle of the inner city itself, take an early morning jog or relaxing family stroll on the old C & O Canal Towpath along the Potomac and Georgetown University.
For another cheap thrill while in Georgetown and awaiting an evening meal or just visiting the campus, visit the steps from where the movie The Exorcist was filmed, just to say “you’ve been there.”
“head toward Key Bridge on M Street NW. The base of the steps, which used to be called the “Hitchcock steps,” is right next to the Exxon station across from the bridge. You’ll reach Prospect Street at the top and can find the red brick “Exorcist” house a few steps away at 3600 Prospect St,”
If you see any spooks, tell them that mikey sent you. You’ll be fine as long as your head is screwed on right.
http://tinyurl.com/cjv3v4
“peduncle”
Watch your mouth young lady!
I love that word. Not as much as defenestration, but close.
OK. For recommendations you are going to have to give me a little bit of a hint about interests and also your restrictions - where are you staying, how much do you want to embrace the Metro, will there be a car available, and will the 6 month old be with you all the time?
As a general list I’d be sure to hit the Natural History museum. The Ocean Hall is amazing and a bunch of crochet people made a series of coral reef scenes that are just too funny for words. There is an Orchid exhibit too. Dinos aren’t as great as New York’s American History, but early life is great (big chunck of Bufgess Shale) as is the new human evolution exhibit. I love the temporary Cyprus exhibit, and you have to go up to early human civilizations area and see the fake bull mummy. You see, mummification is expensive, so instead of actually mummifying the bull, they just took out the bones and wrapped them up to look like a mummy. Puts on a good show at the funeral but at less cost. American History is right next door. Americans at war is worth some time and so is the area about ships. Oh and they have the Star Spangled Banner. The one the song was written about. And Julia Child’s kitchen.
I love the US Botanic Gardens, right on the Mall near American Indian Museum and Air and Space. The orchids are beautiful, but I also like the prehistoric area and the Jungle.
The baby aquarium (in the basement of the Commerce Building) is fun and very managable in a short time - it is just two big rooms, but I like it. A little overpriced in a city where so many museums are free, but it is still only $7 for an adult, I think. And then you can say you did it.
Adults love the Newseum. They just do. $20, I think, but also very close to other stuff.
I like the Natioanl Gallery, but I’m afraid I’ve been spoiled by the Met in NYC. It is just a more limited collection.
I think the Lego exhibit is still up at the National Building museum. You need to reserve tickets for that one for about $5, but the rest of the museum is free.
If you have access to a car and you are a geek, you might want to check out the public areas at Goddard and the NSA (pardon me, the cryptographic museum) but their hours are very limited. Call or check on line first.
Walter Reed has a medical history museum that is moving to Silver Spring pretty soon. I have to admit I haven’t made it yet, but people who don’t mind gross stuff love it. Everyone will need picture IDs and if you are in a car, expect to get sniffed for explosives. Just check ahead on the procedures.
The Environmental Film Festival is on all week, so you should check to see if anything sounds good. The ones at embassies and Smithsonian museums and the Carnegie Institution and public library branches are usually free so if you don’t like it you can just get up and leave.
Air and Space has a special event this Thursday. It is a lecture in the Exploring Space series called “The Solar Dynamics Observatory: The Sun Up Close and Personal.” Free, but they ask you to reserve a place. Do it on-line on their events menu. They usually show a free film or sometimes a planetarium show before the lecture. Or once I got there too late for the show and hung out with the education director and got to hold a piece of a meteorite that was created in the supernova that created the sun. They call it grandpa.
Here is a link to the half price ticket place. They have a physical location near the Shakespeare theater, but on-line is easier. http://culturecapital.tix.com/Schedule.asp?OrganizationNumber=2463
Be careful, not everything is in DC.
I cry every time I go the Vietnam memorial. It is just heartbreaking. Also important.
Check out the National Cathedral if you can. It is stunning. And they have concerts there sometimes. Not that close to the Metro, but worth it.
Bits of the zoo are fine, but they are so behind the times on a lot of the exhibits. Skip the primate house unless you want to get angry. I think some of the big cats have a bunch of babies and it is getting warm enough for them to be outside more. Naked mole rats are a DC tradition for some reason, though I think the animals are hard to see because the plastic is scratched. They do a good job with the reptiles.
I like the Freer/Sackler complex. I don’t like the Hirshorn (modern art). Everyone else does. I don’t. I guess that makes me weird and unsophisticated. If you go, check out the Alexander Calder room and look at the outside sculptures. I do like the American Art museum/portrait gallery, though not all of it is exciting. Fave portrait is EO Wilson with ants all over the place.
The Museum of the American Indian was made confusing, seemingly on purpose (something about not giving in to Western ideas about linear time). So go since the artifacts are beautiful, but don’t expect to get any infomation about native american history. The cafe is fine, but very overpriced. And two of the 4 floors are shops (regular on the second floor, art gallery expensive on the first).
Air and Space is crowded, so depending on your interests and tollerance, you can plan a limited trip. Don’t skip. Even if all you do is go over and look at the LEM. I don’t think it is a model. I think it is a real one that they didn’t use.
If you want to wander past the White House, the Renwick Gallery is very nice but currently between special exhibitions, I believe. Lots of pictures of people slaughtering buffalo on the top floor. And National Geographic Explorers Hall isn’t too far away. I really liked the live Gekkos, but that has moved on.
Like I said, at the end of the week you will have a good chance of seeing a lot of cherry blossoms. Tidal Basin and Jefferson memorial. Stunning. And not that crowded before they declare peak bloom.
But I said I couldn’t really tell you all that much before I know your interests. So, what do YOU like?
We have a car for the whole group, and we wouldn’t be opposed to the metro if it would make the day easier. I’m not worried at all about driving in to pay for parking if needed. I would guess a party of eight would save money over metro by driving.
Your list sounds pretty great. We’ve been to Air and Space before but most of the other museums were closed last time we were here due to flooding which caused power outages.
Thanks again for your input. What I like is learning, Paul the apostle wrote “prove all things, hold fast that which is good” and that is the closest thing I have to a motto.
IIRC, weren’t those cherry blossom trees a gift from Japan?
The daughter in HI is probably past saving, so she’s been left behind.
Darn.
Future US “taxpayer-citizen”: (-1)
One other note:
Murphy’s law and irony would indicate that the mockery of the gods of disaster indicated by my post most likely will result in La Palma letting loose while I’m in DC.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Palma
Progressive Govnmt is No longer Working: WSJ
http://Www.realclearpolitics.com
The rules set up to help the less fortunate are now being used to maintain the status quo, padding the pockets of those who are best connected and saddling the rest of us with huge mountains of debt.
It applies to far more than government.
Companies used to get a leg up on competition by offshoring; now they HAVE to do it or they get crushed by Wal-mart.
Families used to get a leg up on the competition* when the wife went to work, now the wife HAS to work to make ends meet.
Students used to get a leg up if they got a college degree of any kind; now they HAVE to get a college degree or they won’t even be considered for management at The Gap.
Corporate offshoring in pursuit of the almighty second yacht started this mess. Maybe we should attack corporations first.
IMO tax rate increases since the good ole days almost forced the wives to go out and get a job. In the 60’s dads salary was enough then the ever increasing tax burden made it harder and harder on the single income families.
Now corporations are not without some fault, but I think they’re just doing what they have to do in order to compete. If we started putting tariffs on imported goods we might improve our unemployment but we can’t afford to piss off China since they own so much of our debt.
At least we have the opportunity to form our own companies in the US.
Seems as though I saw a lecture by Prof Warren on the net somewhere that delved into the erosion of the middle class. Most of the benefits of two working adults were soaked up by dramatic increases in the costs of a few basic items. Housing, Health Care and Education, if I recall correctly. Everything else kind of balanced out with wages keeping up with inflation in food, energy and consumer goods. But we did kind of over gadgeted ourselves with new expenses as well, such as a cell phone, cable and internet.
with new expenses as well, such as a cell phone,
cableand internet.Hwy’s review last month:
personal Cell phone: $10.00
“bidness” Cell phone: $20.00 (deductible)
Netflex unlimited streaming of “Monk” Et al. (x30 days): $10.00
internet-satellite: $40.00 (partial deductible)
total costs (personal): $50.00
library card: Free
Inc. service “Contracts” = 0
“IMO tax rate increases since the good ole days almost forced the wives to go out and get a job.”
The opposite is true for those on the other end of the transfer payment system. Single moms is the model.
Sorry lip, but it was brutal double-digit inflation in late 1970s and 1980s.
What that’s you say, there was no DD inflation the 1980s? You’re right! Confused yet? The inflation formula was changed by Reagan. It’s how he solved the DDI of the 1970s.
Again, I was there.
Corporations are more self righting than government. They respond to economic realities in short order or they cease to exist. For entrenched government ticks, it takes more carpet bombing.
Business people, from Mom & Pops to Blue Chip, do what they get incentives to do. If we do not like the response, we can only blame our government, which is blaming ourselves. Fiscal responsibility begins on the farm.
Yes, think of all the great companies like GM, Chrysler, AIG, GS, Lehman, Washington Mutual, Anglo Irish, Allied Irish, Credit Suisse, Wells, Citicorp, BOA, thousands of mortgage brokers, etc etc. It was heart warming to see how the plucky entrepreneurs all rolled up their shirt sleeves, put their noses to the grindstone and through sheer hard work, grit and determination pulled through without any help at all from the government! My faith in our noble free enterprise system stands firm.
through sheer hard work, grit and determination pulled through without any help at all from the government
That’s a Buffett “Blue-Chip” statement if I ever heard one!
(Note to self: add pdmseatac to The Great Pumpkin invitation list)
+16 pmseatac.
You mistake my meaning entirely. The greedy folks who run businesses will follow the incentives. Our government has given them incentives to gut the country. It could easily be different. IMO, the feedback loop between big business and Congress needs to be cauterized.
“Our government has given them incentives to gut the country.”
Why would our government do that?
Except that “Blue Chips” can lobby to get the incentives they want, while the owner of the local bicycle shop, restaurant or start up firm cannot and ends up paying a higher percentage of his meager profit in taxes than most blue chips (many of which pay no income tax at all)
Fiscal responsibility begins on the farm.
Business people,… do what they get incentives to do.
My cousins in NE have a diesel engine running 24/7 to pump water for their 5,000 acre corn field for ethanol.
The Fiscal Farm,…ain’t what it used to be. Ask Monsanto.
for their …LEASED… 5,000 acre corn field for ethanol.
Good thing we got them ethanol tariffs in place or he might be outta the corn growing business
he might be outta the corn growing business
I dunno, to look out their kitchen window towards the barn, I’ve the feeling that they’re in the $250,000+ farm “Implement” “bidness”
Who profits $$$$$$$$$$$$ from: “…it Diz all thee Gov’t fault!” surely not any of those Deere S&P 500 InCorpoorations Inc., right?
Corporations are more self righting than government. They respond to economic realities in short order
or they cease to exist.by hiring more lobbyists.“Corporations are more self righting than government. They respond to economic realities in short order or they cease to exist.”
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHA!!!! STOP! Yer killin’ me! I think I’ve hurt myself laughing.
> Families used to get a leg up on the competition* when the wife went to work, now the wife HAS to work to make ends meet.
What “competition”?… yes, I see the asterisk
I completely agree if the competition is “keeping up with the Jones’s”. But 2 income families are largely driven by higher expectations in what’s commonly called our standard of living.
Growing up, my mom stayed home. My dad was a successful, college educated, professional. But, we lived in a small 2 bedroom bungalow. We had 1 car (a VW beetle), stored in a single-car car-port. One TV in the house with 4 channels. No boats, RV’s, ATV’s or other big expensive toys that I can recall (Dad did have a Honda motorcycle he sometimes rode to work). Looking back on it, by today’s standards, we lived like we were dirt poor.
With a similar (white collar, professional) job, I think many families could make it on one income, if they chose to live similarly. I would argue that this would yield a higher standard of living (by my definition) for the family than the two income solution.
“With a similar (white collar, professional) job, I think many families could make it on one income, if they chose to live similarly.”
And more do than you think so.
Something that I have noticed in my neck of the woods, is that the guys with all the toys tend to be builder boyz. Must cube dwellers I know drive regular cars and don’t have boats/jet skis/etc.
Read Elizabeth Warren’s “The Two Income Trap”
A very good book. Your HBB Librarian highly recommends it, along with Warren’s (and her daughter’s) book, All Your Worth.
I’m sorry, I left out the asterisk.
And contrary to what Lip said above, women didn’t go to work because they HAD to to pay taxes; not at first anyway. They started working because in the 60’s they woke up realized they were smart, they had college degrees, they had birth control, they had day care, and they didn’t have to be tied to the home. So they worked for self-satisfaction and the money was a bonus. That’s what started the upward spiral which is crashing today.
By “competition,” I mean something very specific: competition for houses in good neighborhoods near good schools. Desireable houses in those areas will rose to “what the market will bear.” And so when those professional supermoms began bringing home significant dough, house prices rose to the level of a two-income household. And they bought because they wanted a good home for the kiddies. Single income families had to either be satisfied with a shack in a lousy school district, or mom had to work to afford the house. And thus it began.
This is right out of Elizabeth Warren’s Two Income Trap.
And contrary to what Lip said above, women didn’t go to work because they HAD to to pay taxes; not at first anyway. They started working because in the 60’s they woke up realized they were smart, they had college degrees, they had birth control, they had day care, and they didn’t have to be tied to the home. So they worked for self-satisfaction and the money was a bonus. That’s what started the upward spiral which is crashing today.
My mother went to work for most of the reasons described above. The need to pay for my college tuition without incurring debt was also a factor. (I was raised in a household where debt was considered to be immoral.)
“They started working because in the 60’s they woke up realized they were smart, they had college degrees, they had birth control, they had day care, and they didn’t have to be tied to the home. So they worked for self-satisfaction and the money was a bonus.”
I think this is a “chicken or egg” question.
I suspect that increasing pressures from inflation, social turmoil, flight to the suburbs, etc. were a contributing factor.
Once women saw the need to work they became dissatisfied with “pink collar” jobs and began to demand more.
But if money was just a “bonus” wouldn’t they’d have stayed happy doing “satisfying” jobs at low pay?
My mom went to work because she HAD too. As did most of the moms in our neighborhood.
My mom went to work because she HAD too. As did most of the moms in our neighborhood.
Shortly after I graduated from college, my dad quit his job and went into business for himself.
Good thing my mom had that teaching job, because that’s what supported the two of them for many years. Dad was a much better researcher than a businessman, so it took a while for his consulting practice to be profitable.
“Pink collar” jobs back then were mainly nursing, teaching and secretary. Still not a bad way to go.
The Corporation Monopolies/Wall Street power surge has been setting up for a long time and only now after the RE Ponzi scheme wealth generation ,that profited
Wall Street and Corporate America , crashed are we feeling the ‘disaster of such policies for the Majority in the USA . I say examine
past systems that were more balanced and worked and enough of the new age thinking that is simply a cover for the POWER GRABS that makes Capitalism a joke and a distant memory .
FDIC head Sheila Blair, like the rest of the Obama Administration, continues to turn a blind eye to Wall Street’s massive and systemic fraud. Total successful prosecutions: zero.
http://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=182551
I am one of the few that feel that Shelia Blair should of been fired in the wake of the melt down and revealing of the lack of Bank regulation and proper reserve requirements . In truth the jerks that allowed this disaster are the same jerks that were rehired for the clean up and they all stick together .
The President advisers are clearly the same group that created and allowed this mess and they are basically cover their own ass incompetent
jerks . The President giving any respect what-so -ever to the CEO’s, Wall Street Shills and other inept regulators is a joke . People that have liability shouldn’t be the same people that solve the problems that were created by their breach of sanity .
The President advisers are clearly the same group that created and allowed this mess and they are basically cover their own ass incompetent
jerks
On the contrary, they are not incompetent - they are the witting accomplices of the Wall Street kleptocrats. The fools who fell for “hope ‘n change Goldman Sachs can believe in” are the incompetents - mentally incompetent. Only a complete vegetable would believe that a candidate with Goldman Sachs as their #1 contributor (BP was #1) would be looking for for the bottom 99% of the population.
Why does the U.S. taxpayer get summarily stuck with the cost of propping up U.S. housing prices through subsidizing the GSEs? Is there a way to provide renters with an exemption from having to pump up other peoples’ home equity?
Rep. Jeb Hensarling takes aim at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac
By Todd J. Gillman/Reporter
12:02 PM on Thu., Mar. 17, 2011
Dallas Rep. Jeb Hensarling , in a fresh push to curb the government role in the housing market, is filing a bill today to dismantle mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
When the housing market collapsed, the Bush administration took over Fannie and Freddie in September 2008. That put taxpayers on the hook for a multitude of bad loans. So far, the cost to the public has topped $150 billion.
Hensarling, vice chair of the House Financial Services Committee and the No. 4 GOP leader, cited one projection that losses are likely to reach $400 billion.
“It’s time to start doing something,” he said.
…
Republicans made ending government control of Fannie and Freddie a central campaign pledge last year.
Hensarling’s plan would phase out the federally-sponsored companies over five years. He argued that whatever good they’ve done, they artificially propped up the housing market — inflating prices, encouraging some people to buy homes they couldn’t afford and thereby making the foreclosure crisis worse. Getting rid of them would push up borrowing costs to some degree, he conceded, but he predicted that would be at least partly offset by more realistic (i.e., lower) house prices.
He has tried twice before to dismantle the mortgage giants.
“Hopefully, the third time’s a charm,” he said.
Lip service as usual from the GnOP. The twit Hensarling is no different.
In answer to your question as to why the taxpayers get stuck is that the same jerks that created the mess are the jerks that are in charge of
clean up . This is what happens when the immediate response to this
nightmare was cover-up and hiring one of the most conflict of interest parties Hank Paulson to scream ‘FIRE’,than loot the coffers .
Federal mortgage assistance going away?
Nevadans’ need still great, but programs didn’t help us much
Sunday, March 13, 2011 | 3 a.m.
Dean Heller
Washington — The House of Representatives passed two bills to rescind federal funding for mortgage modification programs last week, the first steps toward getting the government out of the home lending business.
Government-backed mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were implicated in the subprime housing bubble that burst in 2008. And when the economy stalled, it was the federal government that swept in promising a recovery through programs to help underwater borrowers with their mortgages.
If the House Republican leadership’s campaign against government involvement is successful, then those promises won’t be fulfilled. And though Nevada is still reeling from the worst foreclosure crisis in the country, the cavalry won’t be coming.
But for underwater homeowners in the Silver State, that news is more the death of an unrealized dream than a punch in the gut.
…
Death of unrealistic dreams is a good thing. Next dream: affordable housing.
SEC moves to charge Fannie, Freddie execs
By Zachary A. Goldfarb and David S. Hilzenrath,
Friday, March 18, 1:08 AM
The Securities and Exchange Commission is moving toward charging former and current Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac executives with violations related to the financial crisis, setting up a clash with the housing regulator that oversees the companies, according to sources familiar with the matter.
The SEC, responsible for enforcing securities laws, is alleging that at least four senior executives failed to provide necessary information to investors about the companies’ mortgage holdings as the U.S. housing market collapsed.
…
Ben Jones use to post many times back in 2005 about investigations that
were ongoing regarding Fred & Fanny …remember . Remember they couldn’t even produce their financial reports ? Also remember they were investigating some corruption regarding higher managements bogus bonus findings ?
My questions is how many years does it take for investigation bodies to
investigate mishaps ? If they spend this long on investigations by the time they reach conclusions the Statue of Limitations will void out recourse that is compromised .
Why don’t we just spend 25 years investigating these transgression and corruptions so we never really correct corruption .TBTP ..to big to prosecute .
* POLITICS
* MARCH 17, 2011, 4:52 P.M. ET
House Republican Tries Again to Eliminate Fannie, Freddie
By ALAN ZIBEL And NICK TIMIRAOS
A top House Republican introduced a bill Thursday to wind down or privatize mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac over the next five years.
Even if the measure passes the House—and whether it will gain enough support from Republicans is an open question—the Democratic-led Senate is unlikely to take it up. Consequently, analysts say the bill is as much a political shot across the bow to force Democrats to present their own overhaul as it is a serious starting point for a debate on the future of the $10.6 trillion U.S. mortgage market.
The bill represents the most aggressive approach taken by congressional Republicans to scale back the U.S. government’s involvement in the housing market.
“What we’re trying to do is have a market-based system that doesn’t put people into homes that ultimately they can’t keep,” or lead to taxpayer bailouts, said Rep. Jeb Hensarling (R., Texas), who twice introduced the bill when the House was controlled by Democrats.
…
Go baby go. Get the Feds out of the housing and let the market land where it lands.
Moral for CEOs Is Choose Your Fraud Carefully
By Jonathan Weil - Mar 16, 2011 4:00 PM PT
Bloomberg Opinion
Of all the stories to come out of the 2008 collapses of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, this one may be the most incredible: To this day, neither company has admitted that any of the numbers on its financial statements that year were wrong.
It seems the Securities and Exchange Commission won’t be doing anything to challenge that pretense, either, and that this may be by design. The SEC for years has been bending over backward to avoid accusing major financial institutions of cooking their books, even when it’s obvious they did. So much for upholding financial integrity.
…
It’s amazing that even big-name economists are brainwashed to believe that higher housing prices are better. I thought the goal of federal housing policy was affordability, not unaffordability?
At what point did unaffordable pricing become a good thing? Was it during the period this graph raced towards the moon?
Shiller Says Fannie, Freddie Phase-Out Threatens Housing Market
March 15, 2011, 4:24 PM EDT
By Kathleen M. Howley and Mark Crumpton
March 15 (Bloomberg) — U.S. government plans to wind down Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the world’s largest mortgage financiers, threaten to worsen a weak housing market, said Robert Shiller, a Yale University economics professor.
“The news doesn’t look so encouraging right now with us talking about phasing out Fannie and Freddie, which are the main supports of the housing market,” Shiller said today in an interview on Bloomberg Television’s “Countdown” with Mark Crumpton. The economist created the S&P/Case-Shiller home-price index with Karl Case, a retired Wellesley College professor.
…
Shiller is an idiot. When are people going to figure that out? He’s just another mindless ivy tower windbag. The world has enough of those.
the opportunities at these companies (if you can call them that) are boundless!
This is an important issue, so let’s get down to some details: ‘the main supports of the housing market,’ Shiller said.’ How does the affordable housing mandate turn into the main support? This came about by DC kicking the can down the road and allowing these bankrupt corporations to continue to operate in receivership. It could have just as easily been a part of the receivership that their continued role in the housing market ceased. The politicians made that mistake, and perpetuating that mistake should have to be defended.
Why are private lenders not making loans? They know prices are still at bubble levels, an don’t like the risks. As long as the GSEs/FHA still offer low down payment loans in this environment, there is no room for private lending.
Let’s jump to another link today: ‘Dallas Rep. Jeb Hensarling…is filing a bill today to dismantle mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. When the housing market collapsed, the Bush administration took over Fannie and Freddie in September 2008. That put taxpayers on the hook for a multitude of bad loans. So far, the cost to the public has topped $150 billion.’
‘Hensarling…cited one projection that losses are likely to reach $400 billion.’
This is again important; IMO the losses are going into the trillions. I can show anyone many houses where Fannie is taking a 100% plus loss on the loans. A casual reading of their 10-ks shows foreclosures are much higher than what has been recognized. And none of the projections so far entertain future housing price declines that are almost certain, meaning millions of additional defaults. This is what’s really insane; the loans they are making even now as the “the main supports” are going to have huge losses in the future.
Back to the other article: “Hensarling…argued that whatever good they’ve done, they artificially propped up the housing market — inflating prices, encouraging some people to buy homes they couldn’t afford and thereby making the foreclosure crisis worse. Getting rid of them would push up borrowing costs to some degree, he conceded, but he predicted that would be at least partly offset by more realistic (i.e., lower) house prices.”
I would add to Hensarling’s points that the GSEs will be eliminated eventually, and it’s time to stop the bleeding. (I could expand at length on Shillers short-sightedness on the issue, but don’t see the point.)
Back to the Bloomberg article:
‘Geithner today reiterated the Obama administration’s position that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac should be wound down “at a careful and deliberate pace.” Government guarantees, such as those insuring mortgage debt, “are perilous,” he told the Senate Banking Committee at a hearing. “Governments are not very good at doing them, not very good at pricing them.”
Look…. The turd from Texas is singing to the choir but you know how this $hit goes. Beat the drum and demonize something, then accept a token change and the beast lives anyways.
If I got a guarantee that Phoney and Fraudie would be deep sixed by the righties, I’d be a loyal disciple. Lets not wait, lets not debate…. shut these MOFO’s down and then go after NAR.
“…then go after NAR.”
That’s as good a reason as any I can think up to resurrect the Sherman Antitrust Act.
Getting rid of the GSEs would put the risk where it needs to be…..in the hands of the borrower and the lender. Both can determine where the risk/reward ratio makes sense for their own mutual benefit.
The problem is that you have a whole lot of people out there that see their house as their only form of savings. And a whole lot more that still hold out hope that someday their now underwater home will be what the appraisers and realtors used to tell them it was worth.
When they wake up to their realities, it ain’t gonna be pretty.
“Getting rid of the GSEs would put the risk where it needs to be…..in the hands of the borrower and the lender.”
As long as we have securitization wouldn’t the risk be between the borrower and the investor?
A bond holder is still lending someone money for their bonds in securitization. Without the implicit government guarantee of TBTF, or the GSEs the risk would be what an investor would feel is a fair price for the risk of purchasing the bonds based on the collaterol backing the bonds, anticipated inflation and desired return on real investment dollar.
The problem arises when you have idiots running pension plans for public sectors or other public entities investing in garbage and ponzi schemes because they are too ignorant to properly invest. Once again the taxpayers have to fill the gap in funding.
Or government guarantees that if anything goes awry, they will make everyone good. Too Messed up to Let People, Banks or Favored Companies Fail. Nobody has to be responsible, because only irresponsibility is rewarded.
“This is again important; IMO the losses are going into the trillions. I can show anyone many houses where Fannie is taking a 100% plus loss on the loans. A casual reading of their 10-ks shows foreclosures are much higher than what has been recognized.”
Sounds like a nuclear meltdown without the radioactivity…
‘This is what’s really insane; the loans they are making even now as the “the main supports” are going to have huge losses in the future.’
But isn’t that OK, given that GSE loans are federally guaranteed?
‘Government guarantees, such as those insuring mortgage debt, “are perilous,” he told the Senate Banking Committee at a hearing. “Governments are not very good at doing them, not very good at pricing them.”’
Well jeepers, whose bright idea was it to summarily slap federal guarantees on all that toxic mortgage debt, anyway?
I want the market threatened. I want it to fall.
+1. Except, in my case, replace the word “fall” with the word “fail.”
““If is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it” - Upton Sinclair
The market consists of buyers and sellers. High prices are good for sellers, bad for buyers.
The government, the news media and the financial sector all benefit by high real estate prices through taxes, fees respectively.
Their salaries depend on the fiction that high home prices are an unmitigated good thing.
“High prices are good for sellers, bad for buyers.”
That only works out with Countrywide lending standards. Only lending amounts the borrowers can afford to repay results in dessication of liquidity, up until the point when the sellers realize the music has stopped and settle for prices affordably within buyer budget constraints.
Crazy loans are SO 2005.
The California Association of Realtors’ statewide home sales numbers may be inflated by as much as 6% to 12% and may need to be revised as far back as 1990, a Realtor economist said.
http://lansner.ocregister.com/2011/03/17/realtors-expect-to-revise-home-sales-downward/103401/
Sleepless (a reply from yesterday.)
UHS drive us nuts, and you’re right about their sense of entitlement, hot stuff attitudes. Then to top it off, our Broker has a long term relationship w/ so many of the Listing Agents, he leans towards that more than his fiduciary relationship to us. He has the nerve to challenge the concept, the buyer funds the deal. Talk about chutzpah!
Breath-taking isn’t it? In my case, I would think the guy would see me as a potential buyer of another property than the one I referenced and at least try to qualify me as someone to spend time on. Little does he know that, absent cash buyers, I’m probably in the top 5% of buyers in that price range.
I can’t make him love me, but I’d think he’d be interested to hear from buyers instead of sellers these days. He must have more business than he knows what to do with…
Hi Sleepless
I think a lot of these UHS are living in the bubble paradigm (w/ no cash flow). As our Broker said about another Brokerage ‘ They are great at lisings, but what you need are QUALIFIED buyers.” And of course he treats us like a stepping stone to a commission, and we have to watch our backs. All the bubble easy money is gone, and these UHS still act like jerks. I hear ya.
We hear “multiple offers on the house” and we say may the best overbidder win. It won’t be us.
Article yesterday in Greenville News indicates that housing sales are up for February by over 7% with an increase in the sales price. This compared with the previous February.
I was in Columbia on Wednesday and the paper there indicated that Columbia sales were down 16% for this Feburary. Columbia has a heavy government presence while Greenville and the upstate do not.
“I paused,” explained Winkler, “and said wait a second, you want to charge me a fee to pay a fee?”
http://www.azfamily.com/news/consumer/Man-who-tries-to-book-flight-for-mom-outraged-at-fees-118060129.html
i still get a kick out of the fact that most states still charge a higher interest rate on underpaid taxes than they do on overpaid taxes.
man i love gubmint.
“To want to tack on a $100 fee for a customer to prepay? It’s a very frustrating situation,” he said.
Now you know why I havent flown in three years.
Same here. The last time I got on an airplane was 2009.
Same here. The last time I got on an airplane was 2009.
If I didn’t have family on the other side of the country, I’d be saying the same thing.
I don’t think the fees get added into the inflation calculations, so it’s all good!
Fees are not included in inflation calculations.
A whiner with great expectations…tsk, tsk, tsk
“AA charges $100 to prepay for a variety of tickets and services — including checked baggage charges. Many customers find this service convenient for the prepayment of large purchases. We are exploring options to make prepaying for smaller services more economical in the future.”
1. Corpoorations Inc.:
“we care about you…”
2. “TrueAnger™” free-market solution:
“This is America, your family has other transportation choices, no one is FORCING you to pay the airlines. For example, there are taxi’s / trains / buses. Besides, Corporation’s Inc. are ENTITLED to charge whatever they want with NO Gov’t interference. Yes, you have a RIGHT to complain, here’s a form, see ya…next customer please!”
Finally the sheeple are getting a clue!
That’s right Mr. Winkler, you’ve been paying fees to pay a fee to pay yet another fee on just about most of your daily transactions.
But it’s those damn unions that are making prices go higher, ah tells ya! Pay no attention to the umpteen zillion middle men.
I suppose having no income would tend to “discourage” potential buyers.
Southern California Home Sales Fall to Lowest for February in Three Years
By Dan Levy - Mar 15, 2011 11:50 AM PT
Southern California home sales fell to the lowest level for a February in three years as high unemployment in the state discouraged potential buyers, according to DataQuick Information Systems Inc.
A total of 14,369 houses and condominiums sold last month in Los Angeles, Riverside, San Diego, Ventura, San Bernardino and Orange counties, down 6.4 percent from a year earlier and the lowest for a February since 2008, the San Diego-based data seller said today in a statement.
California’s unemployment rate is 12.4 percent, compared with the 8.9 percent national rate, according to data from the state’s Employment Development Department. Property sales in Southern California declined as “many potential homebuyers stayed on the sidelines,” DataQuick said.
…
The french lady who was going to pay cash for mom’s pasadena condo backed out because HOA said she couldn’t rent it out for a year. now we have another 100k underbid and the lady wants to put her minister in the condo, rent free! does this qualify as housing news?
ann
Did your brother come to terms with dropping the price, or is he willing to ride the market down? You seem like the one who sees reality.
There are unsubstantiated rumors that certain squirrel-feeding contracts are going unfulfilled. In fact, some FBs have reportedly been subsisting on squirrel kabob.
+1
San Francisco Bay Area Home Prices Fall for Fifth Month
March 17 (Bloomberg) — San Francisco Bay area home prices slid 4.7 percent in February from a year earlier as buyers delayed purchases and distressed sales made up half of all transactions, according to DataQuick Information Systems Inc.
The median paid last month in the nine-county region was $337,599, down 0.2 percent from January, the San Diego-based data company said today in a statement. It was the fifth straight year-over-year decline following 12 advances. Buyers who paid all cash accounted for a record 31 percent of sales.
…
New York Times establishing fee for service plan. First 20 articles a month are free. After that you will be invited to pay $15 for the rest of the month. Accessing through a link in another site will be less limited, but at least some sites (google, for example) will be limted to 5 link throughs a day.
I think it is too high. If they had set it at $5, I bet a huge number of people would have just done it almost without thinking. $180 a year feels like real money.
The thought of paying to read the tripe put out by Paul Krugman seems like the funniest thing I’ve heard in a long time. I’m sure they will find somebody to do that. After all, a sucker is born every minute.
Bye bye, old media. R.I.P.
Krugman already has a link on his blog to another blog that puts up his columns so you can read them for free. In addition, he is a columnist, not a reporter. Running reporters costs real money. The last time the NYTs tried this, they put only part of the site behind the pay wall, including all of their columnists. This time it is all the content.
I can read articles through other research tools, though it is a tiny bit less convienient than just reading the paper through their website. To save $15 a will do it. I give the experiment 3 months. Oh, and they aren’t going to get rid of the ads if you pay. I’m sure they paid someone a lot of money to come up with this strategy. They should get their money back.
I agree. People will not pay for content. I think that is pretty obvious. This will fail miserably and just give them a black eye.
When one looks at the general imbecility of the US public, MSM propagandists like Krugman and his Ministry of Truth colleagues will be spewing their BS for a long time to come, and the herd creatures will continue to buy it.
But no self-respecting HBBer would ever use a Krugman article to try to defend a position. That would be inconceivable.
Can’t someone invent a system of micro payments?
And then you could also use it to sell songs and stuff!
Oh wait…
The London Times did this paywall thingie last year. I just stopped reading them, and went to the Guardian and the Beeb for UK slants on news. The London Times wants $4 a week to access any content on their site - no freebies at all.
Google links are limited but not Facebook links.
Affordability continues to improve in North County San Diego. After another three-or-so years of this, pricing may even begin to make sense again for end-user buyers (e.g. first-time home buyers).
Home / Business
HOUSING: Median price sinks to 2009 levels
Tight fisted lenders make buying difficult, agents say
By ERIC WOLFF -
North County Times - The Californian
Posted: Thursday, March 17, 2011 7:23 pm
The median house price in North County dropped in February to $417,500, its lowest level since 2009 and the biggest monthly drop since 2008, when house prices were in free fall, according to the North San Diego County Association of Realtors.
The number of sales also dropped, as buyers fell out of escrow after trouble getting loans, real estate agents said. Inventories swelled, as sellers tried to unload their homes for less than they owed in mortgages and pushed up the number of listings.
Agents also blamed gas prices for a weakening market for sellers.
“With all the worry about the world situation, all the buyers are not sure what they’re going to do,” said Bill Richard, a Carlsbad real estate agent.
The median house price dropped 6.4 percent from January, and 4.9 percent compared with February 2010, when a tax incentive pushed homebuyers into the market.
Falling prices in North County typically bode poorly for Southwest Riverside County prices, as potential buyers grab houses closer to their San Diego County workplaces. Data from the Riverside County Assessor’s office showed the median price in Southwest County shuttling between $200,000 and $215,000 for the past 12 months, but that price could be poised to slide if North County prices drop.
…
yep, pretty little house next to me is going for 425K! fire mt area 92054
“Falling prices in North County typically bode poorly for Southwest Riverside County prices, as potential buyers grab houses closer to their San Diego County workplaces.”
Who wouldn’t want to live in Temecula? I mean the smog, the long drives and the fault line in the valley make it Heaven on Earth.
I call it Trekula.
From my post yesterday, I don’t think the decline are limited to north county:
After an increase in prices through early 2010, prices seem to be in sharp decline again, at least in parts of San Diego, and this isn’t in the hood.
p/sqft…year
60 / 1999
360 / 2005 (peak)
250 / 2009 (initial “bottom”)
275 / early 2010 (dead cat bounce)
<225 / March 2011
The above prices are for a condo building I was in, meshing the prices/values of the unit I was in with the one above (identical, except on different floors).
The upper unit how now been on the market 54 days and has lowered the asking price from $279k to $259k. Peak was around $425k in 2005. What’s happening now as far as declines and lack of offers looks very much like 2007.
“60 / 1999
360 / 2005 (peak)
250 / 2009 (initial “bottom”)
275 / early 2010 (dead cat bounce)
<225 / March 2011″
The air is ever so slowly leaking from the balloon.
Stress More Concern than Nuclear Exposure in U.S.
March 15, 2011
Lawrence Berkeley Lab’s Thomas McKone tells Stacey Delo that he’s more concerned about stress levels we create for ourselves in the U.S. than nuclear exposure from the evolving crisis in Japan.
Some of that stress wouldn’t happen to come from trying to pay for overpriced housing, would it?
Buy the dips.I’m glad the FED puts people in debt so the stock market can have short term gains and wall street can give out big bonuses.It’s such a great game.Instead of dealing with the fundamental problems with the economy all they can do is throw money at it.Make you wonder about our leadership.
I don’t wonder in the least.
I KNOW we’re effed.
half the country is hooked to american idol…the other half hooked to sensationalized news.
meanwhile…the temperature of the pot of water is steadily rising.
http://www.cnbc.com/id/42130406
From the article:
“Sure, it’s (cost of living increase) moving at a slower pace, but the absolute cost of living is now back at a record high in a country that has seven million less jobs.”
Somethin’ to chew on…
“This speaks to the need for the Fed to include food and energy when they look at inflation rather than regard them as transient costs,” said Stephen Weiss of Short Hills Capital.”
Move along no news here.
“the other half hooked to sensationalized news”
I’ve been leaving the radio off these past few days. The news from Japan and the Middle East is getting old.
Plume has reached SoCal: http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/UN_JAPAN_EARTHQUAKE?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2011-03-18-09-14-32
As you can see no health danger. However, it is not clear if that is from the worse day at the plants. Radiation right now at the plants is 1/1000 of what is was that day. I tried to post about reprocessing and gave a graph about radiation risks but they appear to have gone into cyberspace. No time now, but might be able to find them again later.
BTW, Gadhafi is smart like a fox. We have, now, locked in a divided Libya with low oil production. The divided opposition and our need for oil will allow him to wait us out.
Where did the plumes from all those A-bomb and H-bomb tests go? We tested bombs for decades and lo and behold - the Americas are still inhabitable!
Most of those tests were underground. The few above ground tests were in the middle of nowhere.
We weren’t the only ones testing, not by a long shot.
True, but Siberia and China are pretty far away. And even they eventually figured out that pooping in the pool was a bad idea and switched to underground testing.
When viewed from the Marin Headlands, China and Siberia are only marginally further than Japan.
But you see the point, nuclear testing was the avowed policy of the superpowers, and wannabes like France, for decades. And yet throughout the Cold War life went on, now the MSM hypes this like it’s doomsday while forty/sixty years ago - unmitigated nuke testing was a matter of national pride. (and probably still is in parts of Eurasia)
“When viewed from the Marin Headlands, China and Siberia are only marginally further than Japan.”
Which is why I’m not worried about radiation from Japan.
Now if I lived in Northern Japan …
Book Examines Nevada Test That Left Fallout in Troy, N.Y.
The test, code-named Simon, occurred on April 25, 1953, atop a 300-foot tower in the Nevada desert. The mushroom cloud rose higher than expected, to 44,000 feet above sea level, where a wind of about 115 miles an hour carried the fallout swiftly to the Northeast. Thirty-six hours later, a severe rainstorm in Troy washed much of the fallout out of the air and into the ground.
nytimes(dot)com/2003/04/18/nyregion/book-examines-nevada-test-that-left-fallout-in-troy-ny.html
That is not accurate. The US set off about 220 atmospheric explosions, approximately half of those being in the continental US ( NM and Nevada ). A source:
http://www.cddc.vt.edu/host/atomic/atmosphr/ustable.html
China, Russia, and France also set off numerous atmospheric explosions right up into the 1980s.
The Air Force tested a atomic powered plane in the 50’s ( NB-36H ) in Fort Worth.
Air passing through the core was heated and used to propel the aircraft. It spewed radiation all over the place.
The radiation from H-bombs is considerably smaller than those released from nuclear power plants. One is based on uranium (fission), the other on Hydrogen (fusion). The long term effects vary a lot.
Some of the by products you get from Uranium fission are the long lived radioactive isotopes Strontium-90 and Caesium-137. Those are particular dangerous to humans if ingested.
A Hydrogen Bomb causes much more damage short term by fusing Hydrogen into larger atoms (mostly Helium) but it doesn’t create as many long lived isotopes that linger around for decades.
So the argument that hydrogen bombs cause more fallout than nuclear reactor accidents is invalid.
I should say the long term radiation of H-bombs is smaller. Short term they are devastating.
I read it wasn’t used to propel the aircraft.
Mike in Miami, H-Bombs have all of the tasty goodness off fusion AND fission. They use a fission device to get the fusion reaction running. Plus they have a U238 jacket that fissions during the fusion reaction, thus the nomenclature: fission-fusion-fission weapon. A lot of energy comes out of that secondary fission step. I recommend R. Rhodes’ “Dark Sun” for a great description of the development of the H-Bomb. FYI.
Renaissance 2.0: Lesson 1 - Revisiting American History - Financial Empire (Federal Reserve & The Banking Cartel)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l37RhdFGVsM
Part 1of2 -look to right for Part 2 in the index
Check this out tonight. Everyone have a great day.
http://www.ustream.tv/channel/live-radiation-monitoring-from-west-la
The West Coast is already teeming with zombie mutants, so how much can increased radiation exposure really affect things?
Oops, the Rise Of Financial Empire is more than 2 parts.
http://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=182553
More scams preying on FBs looking to get out from under their financial obligations (and maybe get a free house in the bargain). Once a sucker, always a sucker, it seems.
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_FED_INTERVENTION?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2011-03-18-09-01-18
Not surprizingly, the Fed is intervening in the foreign exchange (FX) markets to protect its bankster accomplices who are having the free money generated by their massive Yen carry trade speculation blow up in their greedy, rodent-like faces. The costs, per usual, will be borne by taxpayers and future generations.
Believed they traded, not sure I believe that it has been ten years since they traded currency: http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_FED_INTERVENTION?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2011-03-18-09-01-18
Report: Unemployment adds 9 million uninsured in U.S.
WEDNESDAY, March 16 (HealthDay News) — The millions of Americans who lost their jobs and their health benefits during the recession often had no way to regain affordable health coverage, leaving them and their families at risk of financial ruin, according to a new report from The Commonwealth Fund.
The spate of layoffs during the recession catapulted 9 million more Americans — or 57 percent of those who had had health insurance in a job that evaporated over the last two years — into the ranks of the millions already uninsured.
In addition, 19 million people anxiously seeking private coverage over the last three years were either turned down or could not find a plan that was affordable and met their needs, the report found.
The Biennial Health Insurance Survey also found a whopping 60 percent increase in skipped care due to cost in the past decade. The survey reported that medical debt problems and out-of-pocket spending costs were on the rise as well, with 29 million Americans using up their entire life savings to pay for medical bills and millions more unable to afford food, heat and rent due to medical payments.
“The report tells the story of the continuing deterioration of health care accessibility, efficiency, safety and affordability over the past decade,” Commonwealth Fund president Karen Davis said during a noon press conference Tuesday. All this despite the fact that the United States spends more than any other country on health care, she added.
At least we still he the best medical system in the world!
hahahahahaha…
The millions of Americans who lost their jobs and their health benefits during the recession often had no way to regain affordable health coverage, leaving them and their families at risk of financial ruin, a whopping 60 percent increase in skipped care due to cost in the past decade.
Financial ruin and skipped health care are now “rights” because health-care is a “privilege”.
We seem to be getting closer to the big one in the Middle East with the Shiite and Sunni branches of Islam fighting a total war: http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/M/ML_BAHRAIN_PROTESTS?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2011-03-18-11-12-06
If that happens Saudi Arabia and Iran will be at war and Iraq will erupt into a full scale civil war. Gas prices of ten dollars a gallon might be at hand. Contrary to what some people think on this board, I have a small car and small house because, I do not believe in wasting resources. I could live with 200+ a barrel oil but I know plenty of people that could not stay above water at those levels. The real price of houses will be pressured but since QE 20 will probably occur and it will cause hyperinflation, nominal housing prices will probably rise.
Yeah, at that point a rise in nominal house prices would be a cruel joke.
NY Fed confirms intervention in currency markets.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The New York Federal Reserve Bank confirmed that it intervened in currency markets on Friday for the first time in more than a decade.
The disclosure came a day after the Group of Seven major industrialized nations pledged in a statement to join in a coordinated effort to weaken the Japanese yen. The yen has surged in the last week to post-war record levels following the Japanese earthquake and tsunami.
A spokesman at the New York Fed, which operates as the agent of the U.S. Treasury in currency operations, confirmed that it had intervened. The last time the U.S. government intervened in currency markets was the fall of 2000 when it sold dollars and bought euros to bolster the fledgling European currency.
The spokesman refused to provide any details on the amounts of the intervention or what currencies were involved.
A stronger yen threatened to deal another blow to the fragile Japanese economy by depressing the country’s exports.
Government of the people, by the people and for the people!
As long as you’re not “the little people.”
“intervened… for the first time in more than a decade”?
yeah….yeah, a decade, that’s the ticket.
I’m convinced that these clowns are so disconnected from the real world, they truly believe that people buy into their BS.
In Matt Taibbi’s book, Griftopia, there’s a passage describe the author’s conversation with a congressional aide. This aide was sharing his impressions of the uber-banksters after some of them had testified before some committee or the other.
Long story short: Aide thought the uber-bankster guys were so clueless about how they were coming across that they’d probably leave the men’s room with something left open and they’d think there was nothing wrong with, errrr, some parts being on public display.
And the US taxpayer should be forced to pay to boost the fragile Japanese economy…. why, exactly?
I’m all in favor of people giving out of the good of their hearts.
But being forced to pay for currency manipulation boggles my mind.
GM’s Ammann Considers Expanding Into Dealer-Inventory Financing
~ Bloomberg
General Motors Co. (GM) Treasurer Dan Ammann, who takes over as chief financial officer on April 1, said the company is considering ways to expand into offering dealers loans for purchases of new inventory.
The largest U.S. automaker providing wholesale lending, also called floor-plan financing, would give dealers more borrowing options and better rates, Ammann said. Ally Financial Inc., formerly GM’s GMAC Inc. finance arm, provided 82 percent of floor-plan lending to GM’s dealers in the fourth quarter.
“We are looking at that,” Ammann said yesterday in a telephone interview. “There is a range of ways to go about it. There is a whole set of alternatives we are looking at.”
GM acquired Fort Worth, Texas-based subprime lender AmeriCredit Inc. in October for $3.5 billion to write loans for subprime consumers and boost car sales. Since December, GM has used the unit, renamed GM Financial, to expand leasing options for car buyers.
The only people buying cars appears to be the same people who quit paying their mortgage.
+1 Exactly!
Seriously, $20K for a compact car is NOT an incentive.
the chinese will be selling them for 8k soon.
Nope. First , we’ll put a tarrif on them and then the dealers will mark it up to 20k and pocket the difference.
A good example is the Yaris. Seriously, a fricking 2 door Yaris is not worth 20 effing K.
Another good example is the Sentra. 20K? I don’t think so.
The moment nuclear plant chief WEPT as Japanese finally admit that radiation leak is serious enough to kill people
By Daily Mail Reporter
* Officials admit they may have to bury reactors under concrete - as happened at Chernobyl
* Government says it was overwhelmed by the scale of twin disasters
* Japanese upgrade accident from level four to five - the same as Three Mile Island
* We will rebuild from scratch says Japanese prime minister
* Particles spewed from wrecked Fukushima power station arrive in California
* Military trucks tackle reactors with tons of water for second day
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1367684/Nuclear-plant-chief-weeps-Japanese-finally-admit-radiation-leak-kill-people.html#ixzz1GyXfucra
NOW it’s whole different ballgame.
Maybe it is just me, but I was thinking it was their whole different ballgame when they started using seawater. Doesn’t that fill the vessel with salt as the water evaporates? Not like you can pump that around, and not like you can go back later and chisle it away.
“We’ll rebuild from scratch”……somewhere else obviously.
They wrote off the reactors by the second day, so seawater was no big deal.
Saudi King Orders More Handouts, Security Boost
By: Reuters
Saudi King Abdullah announced on Friday billions of dollars in handouts for his people and boosted his security apparatus in a renewed effort to shield the world’s top oil exporter from unrest rocking the Arab world.
In a rare televized address to the nation, the ageing king made a brief statement congratulating Saudis for their loyalty and national unity before a battery of decrees were read out suggesting he was embracing increasingly conservative policies.
Amongst a wave of new spending, the decrees outlined a boost in welfare benefits, bonuses for public sector workers, including the army, and a massive drive to build new housing.
In addition, the king ordered the creation of 60,000 security jobs within the interior ministry, promised more money for the religious police and, in a sign Saudi’s ruling Sunni elite will tolerate no dissent, said the media must respect clerics.
Saudi Arabia has mostly avoided the protests seen elsewhere in the region, but dissent has nonetheless built up and some demonstrations have taken place — especially in the east where many Shi’ite Muslims live.
Riyadh sent 1,000 troops to neighbouring Bahrain this week to help contain pro-democracy protests led by majority Shi’ites that the Sunni monarchy on the island broke up by force.
King Abdullah last month announced an economic package worth an estimated $37 billion in an initial move to ease social tensions.
ISTR that, during the first Gulf War, some Saudi women got uppity and decided to go for a drive. That sort of thing is very, very, VERY naughty in Saudi Arabia. It’s not at all ladylike to drive, doncha know.
Any-hoo, their drive-in was brief. And it was squelched by The Authorities. But not before getting international publicity.
That must have been interesting. Did they learn to drive outside of the country, or did they just get behind the wheel and go for it?
They probably had already learned in the middle of the night just like 14yo Americans.
I think the issue was that they did not bring a male relative with them while driving.
I wonder what the Saudi equivalent is for Thelma and Louise.
“Saudi King Abdullah announced on Friday billions of dollars in handouts for his people and boosted his security apparatus in a renewed effort to shield the world’s top oil exporter from unrest rocking the Arab world.”
Our government is doing the same thing except that we don’t have the money. With millions on welfare and arson so cheap the government really has no other choice than to ladle the gravy. The working classes will be stripped to the bone before those in living in cradle to grave dependency are cut-off. You can count on a boost in security too, and the cost will be your taken for granted freedoms.
Who gives a damn, JP Morgan & Wells Fargo passed their stress test! Long live the banksters!
Unemployment rises in nearly all metro areas
WASHINGTON (AP) — Unemployment rose in nearly all of the 372 largest U.S. cities in January compared to the previous month, mostly because of seasonal changes such as the layoff of temporary retail employees hired for the holidays.
The Labor Department said Friday that the unemployment rate rose in 351 metro areas, fell in only 16, and was unchanged in 5. That’s worse than December, when the rate fell in 207 areas and increased in 122.
Other seasonal trends, such as the layoff of construction workers due to winter weather, also contributed to the widespread increase.
Uncle buck is looking well worn…
~ Down USD 75.64 -0.33
(Source-Kitco)
hot damn…another war in the middle east!
i’ll tell ya…at least when merika goes out…it goes out a blazin!
It’s our core competence.
Just what we need, another iraq?
Maybe eventually we’ll learn that our core competence is in attacking, not holding. I always said that what we should have done in Iraq is attack Saddam and anybody trying to be the next Saddam from a distance. Anybody that gets elected fair and square we leave alone, whether they are on “our side” or not, as long as they leave when their term is up. Never put a boot on the ground, if possible.
I agree. Once we had captured Saddam, we should have left. Any leader that came to power would not have wanted to anger us enough for an attack or invasion. Much better to be feared than loved and much easier to achieve. We may think we are going into Libya to win love but which ever side wins will slaughter the other side. The rebels have been killing unarmed captured soldiers. The losing tribes will hate us.
How’s Morocco lookin these days? I still want to visit the Roman ruins there. Probably gonna be a while…
Pipelinistan
Too funny michael
$6 billion what an F-ing joke! We are headed in but one direction, straight down the rat hole.
(CNSNews.com) - The national debt jumped by $72 billion on Tuesday even as the Republican-led U.S. House of Representatives passed a continuing resolution to fund the government for just three weeks that will cut $6 billion spending.
This was more fun when people talked about the housing bubble.
Well, we’ve been there and done that.
Hi “Insurance Guy”. I have one tidbit that is housing bubble related.
My old house is on the market again. They have it listed for $325,000. They probably could have gotten $350,000 in 2008 when they first listed it. But they weren’t going to give it away. Instead they asked $380,000, rode the market down, rented it out and now have it relisted in a much worse housing environment. That is some real estate genius there.
Has anybody else noticed that Zillow now has a rent zestimate for properties? That is just awesome.
$380,000
$350,000
$325,000…and no takers yet?
Like I always suggest, try not to hold on to a falling knife! And if you decide to sell by Dutch auction, don’t lower the asking price so slowly that you end up riding the market down instead of selling.
$380,000 - October 2008
$325,000 - March 2010
Just think of all the money that has been lost in between. I know it sat empty for quite a while and then they were trying to rent it out.
It is interesting how so many thought it was going to start going back up soon. But prices keep falling. New York City may have a big fall ahead.
New York City is the housing world’s Alamo.
My barber (whose shop closed unexpectedly a few months ago), had a sign that read, “The Cost of Living is Always What’s in Your Pocket.”
“A special index created by the Labor Department to measure the actual cost of living for Americans hit a record high in February, according to data released Thursday, surpassing the old high in July 2008.”
http://www.cnbc.com/id/42130406
My barber (whose shop closed unexpectedly a few months ago), had a sign that read, “The Cost of Living is Always What’s in Your Pocket.”
And, let me guess, no one saw this shop closure coming.
Homeowners don’t need to go to a barber shop to get a haircut anymore.
I know a guy who cuts his own hair. He likes the extreme buzz cut style, and whenever his hair is more than a millimeter or two long, bzzzzzt! and the situation is taken care of.
That’s me. Who has $17 bucks every few weeks for a stupid hair cut?
That’s me. Who has $17 bucks every few weeks for a stupid hair cut?
My friend prefers to avoid the inane chit-chat with the hair cutters. Hence, his proficiency with the clippers.
Not having to pay for a monthly haircut for seven year: $20/mo * 12mo/yr* 7 yr = $1680 - $40 for clippers = $1640
An upside of a surfeit of dihydrotestosterone?
Who has $17 bucks every few weeks for a stupid hair cut?
Bugs: “Eh, listen Doc, haircuts are un-natural…that don’t mean you can’t be stylish.”
St. Pete Times video on the whole thing
http://bcove.me/fx73ve7o
“Then the banks put them on the market” Lol!
WTH? I thought the DOW was going to bust 12,000 today, what with all the positive news swirling around the globe.
Good enough to make Kudlow and Kramer happy.
URGENT: In tough talk on Libya crisis, the president warns Qaddafi that he will face ‘consequences’ if he fails to implement a cease-fire in the embattled nation.
He has declared a cease-fire and invited international observation teams.
“We have plenty of left-over green-zone paint from Iraq…really, you’ve been warned!” un-named former President of Halliburton Inc. & Cheney-Shrub Inc.
Philly Cops: Elderly Man Stoned to Death for Allegedly Making Unwanted Sexual Advances. March 18, 2011 | Associated Press
MEDIA, Pa. — Authorities in suburban Philadelphia say a 70-year-old man was stoned to death with a rock stuffed in a sock by a younger friend who alleged the victim made unwanted sexual advances.
According to the criminal complaint, 28-year-old John Thomas of Lansdowne has told police he killed 70-year-old Murray Seidman because the Old Testament refers to stoning homosexuals.
Delaware County authorities announced Friday that Thomas was arrested and charged with murder.
Seidman died in his Lansdowne apartment in early January. His body was not found for days.
Lansdowne police say Thomas is the executor and sole beneficiary of Seidman’s will. It was not immediately clear whether he had a lawyer.
Well John, now you are headed for a lifetime of unwanted sexual advances. Sometimes there just aren’t enough rocks.
Anyone here following March Madness? I’m just tickled pink about how Michigan’s men’s basketball demolished its opponent in the first round.
However, out here in cactus land, the locals are on tenterhooks. Memphis is playing a very tough game against Arizona. The Memphis head coach is a former Arizona player and assistant coach.
Back to work. And that’s a tough thing to focus on now.
Update: Arizona just barely got by Memphis, 77-75. Next opponent is Texas. That’ll be a game, all right.
And Michigan will most likely run up against the Duke Blue Devils in the second round. Oh, well. Was fun while it lasted.
Yawn.
I suppose we need this every year to keep distract the masses and enrich coaches and administrators.
idol, nfl, nba…………………………….keeps u n the dark.
It’s odd how nearly 20% of all houses in Florida are now vacant. The worst is in the Naples area, where 32% of houses are reported to be vacant.
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Nearly-20-of-Florida-homes-cnnm-2507768369.html
“It will take about eight years just to put the vacancy numbers back into the single digits,” said DeKaser.
The inventory overhang has sent home prices plunging. The median price for homes sold in January was just $122,000, according to the Florida Association of Realtors. That was down 7% from 12 months earlier and less than half the price at the peak of the market.
Winzer thinks prices in Florida will drop even more, another 5% in 2011 and 3% in 2012. “Even after that, they’re not going to rebound, they’ll just sit on the bottom,” he said.
$1 billion foreclosure prevention program could open statewide next month, but homeowners to get less
by Kim Miller
Palm Beach Posst
The Florida Housing Finance Corporation amended its plan on how to spend the money it received from the Hardest Hit fund in a meeting today and following discussions with Gov. Rick Scott’s staff.
The program was originally scheduled to be available statewide last month. The amended plan must be approved by the Treasury Department before it can go statewide, hopefully by mid-April.
Florida has had the federal money for more than a year and began a pilot program in Lee County in the fall. But a statewide roll out has been postponed so that Gov. Rick Scott could be brought up to speed on the plan. There had been concerns that he would reject the federal funding.
Changes in the Hardest Hit fund include:
• Reduced the number of mortgage payments available from 18 months to six months.
• Reduced the maximum amount a homeowner can receive to $12,000 from $35,000.
• A homeowner will have to contribute 25 percent of his or her paycheck to the mortgage payment every month.
While individual homeowners will get less money, the changes mean more people will be helped _ an estimated 40,000 instead of 20,000.
Foreclosure, money woes push couple into suicide pact
by Kim Miller
According to Fox News in Houston:
HOUSTON - Homicide investigators say a northwest Houston home under foreclosure apparently led the struggling residents to take their own lives.
Police arrived at approximately 11 p.m. Sunday to the home on Arncliffe Drive near Antoine Drive and found a married couple shot to death.
The couple left notes that indicated the shootings were suicides and a result of financial difficulties including the foreclosure of their home.
Investigators say the couple were found on their bed with the suicide notes alongside of them.
Because investigators say their corpses were decaying for more than one month, the stench of their bodies could be smelled across the street. The smell apparently alarmed a neighbor enough to contact police.
One gun was found inside the home.
http://blogs.palmbeachpost.com/realtime/2011/03/18/foreclosure-money-woes-push-couple-into-suicide-pact/ - -
There’s been about one of these per month in Houston.
Crime has risen significantly there.
http://money.cnn.com/2011/03/18/real_estate/florida_vacant_homes/index.htm?source=cnn_bin&hpt=Sbin
‘On Thursday, the Census Bureau revealed that 18% — or 1.6 million — of the Sunshine State’s homes are sitting vacant. That’s a rise of more than 63% over the past 10 years.’
‘The vacancy problem is more dire in Florida than in any other bubble market: In California, only 8% of units were vacant, while Nevada, the state with the nation’s highest foreclosure rate, had about 14% sitting empty. Arizona had a vacancy rate of about 16%.’
‘In Florida, the worst-hit county is Collier — home of Naples — with a whopping 32% of homes empty. In Sarasota County, 23% of the housing stock sits vacant, while Lee County (Cape Coral) has a 30% vacancy rate. And Miami-Dade County has a vacancy rate of about 12%.’
Don’t worry, dude, I’ll turn off the lights…
“On Thursday, the Census Bureau revealed that 18% — or 1.6 million — of the Sunshine State’s homes are sitting vacant.”
There are some vacant homes but many more homes with non paying homeowners in Northern Palm Beach County. But I have to take my hat off to them, they have done a masterful job of keeping the prices of decent houses in decent neighborhoods artificially high. Although, if you were looking for a 2/2 in a less desirable neighborhood you can pick one up at mid 80`s prices.
Although Tiger`s x found a fixer upper.
EXCLUSIVE: Tiger Woods’ ex-wife Elin Nordegren buys $12.2 million-North Palm Beach mansion
http://www.page2live.com/2011/03/18/exclusive-tiger-woods-ex-wife-settles-on-125-million-north-palm-mansion/ -
“In California, only 8% of units were vacant,…”
Housing Statistics California
Total housing units 12,214,549
8%*12,214,549 = 977,164 vacant housing units in California.
Less than 1 million — ‘Tis a mere flesh wound!
Price fixing, this is what it means, all those empty homes just rotting away.
We drive by one often. It would be nice to have it. It’s not currently available, remaining empty is a key component of the national price fixing scheme.
When it does become available we’re not likely not want it, it is rotting away after all.
Nuclear Safety in California
[The Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant, which sits on the edge of the Pacific at Avila Beach in San Luis Obispo County. (Image credit: Mark Ralston/AFP/Getty)] Enlarge
Mark Ralston/AFP/Getty
The Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant, which sits on the edge of the Pacific at Avila Beach in San Luis Obispo County.
Reporter: Scott Shafer
More than a week after Japan’s 9.0 earthquake and tsunami workers are still desperately trying to get the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant under control.
Californians are now questioning the state’s two nuclear plants, San Onofre in San Clemente and Diablo Canyon in San Luis Obispo.
At only 85 feet above the ocean sits the two nuclear reactors of Diablo Canyon. These reactors help generate the 20 percent of California’s nuclear powered electricity. The plant sits on one earthquake fault, and is close to three others.
While Diablo Canyon has provided electricity for 30 years, the recent events in Japan have created some new doubts about safety.
“We just have more questions now, don’t we?,” said Congresswoman Lois Capps whose Central Coast district includes Diablo Canyon. This week she says she spoke to the manager of the nuclear plant with a lot of new questions, like where the leftover rods went.
…
Hwy inserts Jackson Browne: Saturated
* THE WEEKEND INTERVIEW
* MARCH 19, 2011
Mega-Banks and the Next Financial Crisis
Hedge-fund manager Paul Singer recognized the risks of subprime mortgages and bet against them. Now he warns that monetary policy could cripple American banks again.
By JAMES FREEMAN
At the height of the housing bubble, hedge-fund manager Paul Singer was shorting subprime mortgages. By the spring of 2007, he was warning regulators on both sides of the Atlantic that the world was facing a major financial crisis.
They ignored him. Now the founder of Elliott Management says the biggest banks are headed for another credit meltdown. Among the likely triggers for the next crisis, Mr. Singer sees one leading candidate: Monetary policy “is extremely risky,” he says, “the risk being massive inflation.”
In some areas gas prices have reached $4 per gallon, and now Americans must brace themselves for higher grocery bills. This week the Labor Department reported that February wholesale food prices posted their sharpest increase since 1974. News like that has driven Mr. Singer to the history books: He treats visitors to his 5th Avenue office to a copy of a 1931 treatise on German currency debasement, Constantino Bresciani-Turroni’s “The Economics of Inflation.”
Mr. Singer—who launched Elliott in 1977 and has delivered a 14.3% compound annual return (compared to the S&P 500’s 10.9%)—is not comparing today’s Federal Reserve to the Reichsbank of the early 1920s. Rather, he’s once again warning financial regulators. This time the message is: Don’t take for granted investor faith in a major currency.
…