Tag Archives: economy

Business/Economics, Opinion, U.S.

What Economic Recovery? Obama spouts the neccesity of higher education, but Middle Class is now officially unable to pay for it

“We’re seeing further differentiation in incomes, with the rich get richer and the poor getting poorer. Meanwhile, the middle class often claims they’re too wealthy to get student aid, yet too poor to afford college.”-Mark Kantrowitz,  FinAid.org and FastWeb.com

President Barack Obama is constantly stumping for higher education as a way to recover the U.S. economy, the problem is most people in the United States can’t afford to go.

According to a CNN/Money report (based on the findings of the College Board), tuition and fees have skyrocketed 130% in the past 20 years, while incomes for the majority of U.S. workers have stayed relatively the same.  By the way a recent IRS report says the same thing about U.S. incomes.

In 2008 median income was $33,000, when adjusted for inflation that means the average person was making $400.00 less than in 1988 (I knew I wasn’t crazy).

In 2008 tuition and fees averaged $6,500 per year, which is 130% more than what they were in 1988.

What happened to financial aid?  Obama ran for president partly on a promise to make more federal aid available.  Didn’t happen.  According to the College Group, the maximum federal aid (which includes loans, which should not be considered “aid” ’cause you have to pay it back) has remained stuck at 1992 levels; only $23,000  (by the way that “aid” is limited, so if you don’t get a ‘four year degree’ in ‘four’ years, which is actually the reality for many, you don’t get anymore federal “aid”).

Two trends have developed as a result: Families hell bent on their kids getting worthless degrees (I have one, from Idaho State University) are getting deeper into debt (isn’t that part of our country’s economic problems?).  The other bigger trend is that people are delaying entry into college, or just saying “forget it, it ain’t worth it”.

Here’s a sobering thought: According to Mark Kantrowitz, the cost of higher education is such that many of today’s college students will still be paying their student loans when their children are college age!  That is a sure sign that college is no longer “worth it”!

 

Business/Economics, Idaho, U.S.

What Economic Recovery? Arby’s Sold

Wendy’s/Arby’s Group sold off its Arby’s restaurant, for $430 million.  The new owner is Atlanta based Roark Capital Group.

Earlier in the year it was announced that if Arby’s sales didn’t improve, the fast food restaurant would be sold.  The former Wendy’s/Arby’s Group still holds 15% of Arby’s stock.  The CEO, Roland Smith, says they can now focus solely on the better performing Wendy’s fast food chain.

Smith says that any closing of Arby’s stores will involve those already slated to be closed, which will happen as leases expire.  The deal with Roark Capital Group will result in changes for Arby’s, including a name change.

I can tell you that here in Chubbuck, Idaho, the Arby’s store has the lowest customer traffic of any of the national chain fast food restaurants.

 

Fukushima

Strontium 90 in ground water & Pacific Ocean

For the first time, Tokyo Electric Power Company says strontium 90 is contaminating ground water, and the Pacific Ocean.

Water samples that were taken on 16 and 18 May, 2011, are positive for strontium.  Sample testing takes three weeks for results.

Three ocean inlets were tested on 16 May.  The lowest reading was 53 times safe limits.  The highest, 240 times, was taken at reactor 3 inlet.

Ground water samples were taken on 18 May.  The highest reading was 6,300 becquerels per liter near reactor 2.

Strontium 90 is created during nuclear fission. It has a half life of 29 years and causes bone cancer.

Business/Economics, U.S.

What Economic Recovery? Proof that it’s gotten worse since Obama became President

The following list is not necessarily blaming Obama for the economic problems, it’s just showing how things have gotten worse since he became President.

1: In January 2009, the official U.S. unemployment rate was 7.6 percent. Today it is 9.1 percent.

2: When Barack Obama took office, the number of “long-term unemployed” in the United States was approximately 2.6 million. Today, that number is up to 6.2 million.

3: When Barack Obama first became president, the average price of a gallon of gasoline in the United States was $1.83. Today it is $3.79. This also affects the price of almost everything else that we buy.

4: In April 2009, the average U.S. household spent approximately $201 on gasoline. In April 2011, the average U.S. household spent approximately $369 on gasoline.

5: According to an article in the Daily Mail, the cost of a Memorial Day cookout was 29 percent higher this year than it was last year.

6: When Barack Obama was sworn in, there were nearly 32 million Americans on food stamps. Today, there are more than 44 million on food stamps.

7: According to the U.S. Census, the number of children living in poverty has gone up by about 2 million in just the past 2 years.

8: When Barack Obama took office, the U.S. national debt was 10.6 trillion dollars.  Today it is 14.3 trillion dollars.

9: The federal government has borrowed 29,660 more dollars per household since Barack Obama signed the economic stimulus law two years ago.

10: During Barack Obama’s first two years in office, the U.S. government added more to the U.S. national debt than the first 100 U.S. Congresses combined.

11: The combined debt of the major GSEs (Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and Sallie Mae) has increased from 3.2 trillion in 2008 to 6.4 trillion in 2011.  Thanks to George W. Bush, Barack Obama and the U.S. Congress, U.S. taxpayers are standing behind that debt.

12: Under Obama, the U.S. trade deficit continues to grow. The trade deficit was about 33 percent larger in 2010 than it was in 2009, and the 2011 trade deficit is expected to be even bigger.

13: Only 66.8% of American men had a job last year. That was the lowest level that has ever been recorded in all of U.S. history.

14: Just since August, 2 million more Americans have left the labor force.

15: In 2010, more than a million U.S. families lost their homes to foreclosure for the first time ever, and that number is expected to go even higher in 2011.

16: The U.S. real estate crisis just continues to get worse. During the first three months of this year, less new homes were sold in the U.S. than in any three month period ever recorded.

17: The U.S. dollar has fallen by 17 percent compared to other major national currencies since 2009.

18: Faith in the U.S. dollar and in U.S. Treasuries is rapidly declining.  The mainstream news is not reporting on it much, but right now the Chinese are rapidly dumping U.S. government debt. That is not a good sign.

19: When Barack Obama first took office, an ounce of gold was going for about $850. Today an ounce of gold costs about $1500.

20: Americans seem to be more pessimistic about the economy than ever.  According to a brand new poll, 61 percent of Americans believe that they will not return to their “pre-recession” lifestyles until at least 2014.

Source: The American Dream

Business/Economics, U.S.

What Economic Recovery? U.S. Investor Markets about to crash

1: According to The New York Post, nearly all of the major Wall Street banks are planning huge layoffs….

“Barclays Capital, Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase and Morgan Stanley currently are among those financial institutions either weighing staff cuts or actually paring payroll.”

2: A new CNBC article claims that a “negative feedback loop” has “taken control” on Wall Street.  Essentially what is happening is that bad economic news is creating an “environment of pessimism” which creates even more bad economic news, etc. etc.

3: OPEC has announced that oil production levels will not be raised. This is likely to spook the financial markets and cause the price of oil to go up even higher in the coming weeks. The last time U.S. energy expenditures were over 9 percent of GDP was back in 2008 and at that point the economy rapidly plunged into a very deep recession. For the first time since 2008 we have reached the 9 percent figure again, and many on Wall Street fear that this could lead to bad things.

4: QE2 will be wrapping up at the end of June, and many on Wall Street had been counting on yet another round of quantitative easing. Over the past couple of days, however, it has started to become clear that is just not going to happen – at least for now. In fact, Pimco’s co-chief investment officer, Bill Gross, is telling investors that for the Fed it will “be difficult to initiate a QE3.” But without artificial stimulation the U.S. economy may start really struggling again, and Wall Street knows this.

5: Moody’s recently warned that it may downgrade the debt ratings of Bank of America, Citigroup and Wells Fargo. Bank stocks were on the cutting edge of the financial collapse of 2008, and it looks like that may happen again this time.

6: Faith in the U.S. dollar continues to decline. Back on April 18th, Standard & Poor’s changed its outlook on U.S. government debt from “stable” to “negative” and warned that the U.S. could soon lose its AAA rating. China has been very busy dumping short-term U.S. government debt and there does not seem to be a lot of people (other than the Federal Reserve) that are eager to buy U.S. Treasuries right now.

7: U.S. consumer confidence is already lower than it was back in September 2008 when Lehman Brothers collapsed. Consumer spending makes up approximately 70 percent of the U.S. economy and Wall Street is watching this number closely.

8: A whole slew of bad economic news has been pouring in lately. Mike Riddell, a fund manager at M&G Investments in London, recently pointed out to CNBC some of the data points that have been particularly alarming….

“US house prices have fallen by more than 5 percent year on year, pending home sales have collapsed and existing home sales disappointed, the trend of improving jobless claims has arrested, first quarter GDP wasn’t revised upwards by the 0.4 percent forecast, durables goods orders shrank, manufacturing surveys from Philadelphia Fed, Richmond Fed and Chicago Fed were all very disappointing.”

9: A whole lot of folks in the financial industry have been warning about the next financial collapse lately. For example, economist Nouriel Roubini recently made the following statement….

“I think right now we’re on the tipping point of a market correction. Data from the U.S., from Europe, from Japan, from China are suggesting an economic slowdown.”

10: According to a new CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll, 48% of Americans believe that it is either “very likely” or “somewhat likely” that the United States will experience a “depression” within the next 12 months. Needless to say, Wall Street is highly influenced by the overall mood of the nation.

Source: The American Dream

 

Business/Economics, Idaho

What Global Warming? Idaho Potato farmers running out of time, cool weather adding to Global Food Crisis

It’s June 11, and potato farmers in Ashton, and Driggs, Idaho, have been hoping for warmer, dryer weather.  They can’t plant potatoes in wet, cold ground: “This season has been especially hard because every time we are about to get into the fields for a couple days it rains us out. It takes sometimes five to 10 days to dry up in good enough shape in preparation for planting.”-Dennis Fransen, potato seed farmer

Potato seed farmers are at the bottom of the potato farming chain.  Commercial potato farmers rely on the seed farmers for their new crop.  Bigger potatoes are sent to the commercial farmers to grow even bigger.  The small potatoes are kept for ‘seed’ for the next planting.  This year, because of the wet, cool weather it looks like most of the seed crop will be the small type, that commercial farmers don’t want.

 

Idaho, International

What Global Warming? Cooler weather delays East Idaho road construction, What Economic Recovery? Lack of funds will reduce Idaho road construction

“Every time we tried to schedule something, we had a storm come through. With the temperature and the moisture, you just can’t do it.”-James Orner, Idaho Transportation Department

Temperatures are finally warming up in eastern Idaho, and ITD officials hope to get ongoing road construction finished, and start new ones.

But just as the weather is warming up for ITD, funding is running out: “In the next few years, we’re going to see a rapid decline in the amount of construction that’s going to be available because there’s less funding available. With gas prices going up, people are driving less, and it’s affecting our revenues.”-Corey Krantz, Idaho Transportation Department

Funding for ITD comes, in part, from state gas taxes.    

Fukushima

Fukushima Daiichi radiation levels continue to climb, workers exposed to high levels!

Stabilization work at Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant has been temporarily halted, once again, because of high radiation levels.

Reactor 3 began emitting levels above 100 millisieverts per hour.  The government raised the safe limit from 100 to 250 millisieverts per hour, but workers at the damaged nuke plant refused to implement the higher limit.

Tokyo Electric Power Company sent nine workers into Reactor 3 on 10 June 2011.  TEPCo said they are trying to limit workers to just 9 millisieverts per hour.  After only 20 minutes the radiation levels far exceeded the original 100 millisieverts limit!

High radiation levels have made stabilization work almost impossible.  TEPCo has acknowledged that it will take much longer to get the plant under control.

Two workers have tested positive for as much as 678 millisieverts of radiation.  The National Institute of Radiological Sciences confirmed the exposure.  The two men were in the control rooms of reactors 3 & 4, when Reactor 1 blew up on 12 March 2011.  A third man is undergoing testing.

Fukushima

Cesium contamination building in Japan, tea harvests contaminated!

In Shizuoka Prefecture, about 300 km (186 miles) away from the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuke plant, cesium contamination has continued to build up.  Now tea production has been halted.

On 10 June 2011, cesium levels on tea leaves hit 679 becquerels per kilogram.  The official limit is 500 becquerels.  The local government ordered a halt to tea shipments.  Tea is Shizuoka Prefecture’s main industry.

Last month cesium levels were 460 becquerels.  The latest readings show cesium is continuing to be spewed by the Fukushima Daiichi nuke plant.

 

 

Fukushima

Strontium 90 more widespread than first thought!

Japanese Science Ministry has finished a survey of Fukushima Prefecture.  They were looking for evidence of strontium 90, they found plenty.

Strontium 90 is created during nuclear fission.  It has a half life of 29 years, and can cause bone cancer.

Samples were taken at 11 locations, all 11 tested positive.  The furthest location from the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuke plant, that tested positive, is Fukushima City at 60 km (37 miles) away.  The highest reading was 250 becquerels per kilogram, at Namie City.