Bill Steffen's Winter Forecast

The Winter Forecast – Shovel Ready

Get it? Bill says this winter's forecast for West Michigan is 'shovel ready'. Is that *gasp* a 'dig' at Barack?

Now, what is the economic dynamic here? Bill mentions plowing services and such, and some enhanced potential for ice. So...more economic activity, or less?

Teachers...and hefty salaries...

A good friend posted this...

"Teachers' hefty salaries are driving up taxes, and they only work 9 or 10 months a year! It's time we put thing in perspective and pay them for what they do - babysit! We can get that for minimum wage. That's right. Let's give them $3.00 an hour and only the hours they worked; not any of that silly planning time, or any time they spend before or after school. That ...would be $19.50 a day (7:45 to...... 3:00 PM with 45 min. off for lunch and plan-- that equals 6 1/2 hours). Each parent should pay $19.50 a day for these teachers to baby-sit their children. Now how many students do they teach in a day...maybe 30? So that's $19.50 x 30 = $585.00 a day. However, remember they only work 180 days a year!!! I am not going to pay them for any vacations.

LET'S SEE.... That's $585 X 180= $105,300 per year. (Hold on! My calculator needs new batteries).What about those special education teachers and the ones with Master's degrees? Well, we could pay them minimum wage ($7.75), and just to be fair, round it off to $8.00 an hour. That would be $8 X 6 1/2 hours X 30 children X 180 days = $280,800 per year. Wait a minute -- there's something wrong here! There sure is!
The average teacher's salary (nation wide) is $50,000. $50,000/180 days = $277.77/per day/30 students=$9.25/6.5 hours = $1.42 per hour per student--a very inexpensive baby-sitter and they even EDUCATE your kids!) WHAT A DEAL!!!! Make a teacher smile; re-post this to show appreciation!!!"

I'd invite any commentary and economic analysis of this concept...

999 Sales Tax Calculator

A certain political candidate has proposed a revamping of the tax code.

It has been called a 'regressive tax', as most all sales taxes are. However, the revamp clears out a lot of the underbrush, and 'hidden' taxes that allow the proposed sales tax to actually LOWER the total tax paid.

999 Sales Tax Calculator

Class warfare...Karl Marx 101

Walter Williams provides a great contrast, allowing us to see the perverse, artificial dichotomy in how the mainstream media outlets cover stories, and the way our culture adopts those same views almost unconsciously. Class envy and warfare is the basis of Karl Marx's doctrine.  To gin up some unsatisfied views is like shooting fish in a barrel.  The Apostle Paul tells us to be content in all things.  Marx says the opposite.  Which one is right?

Check it out...http://newsbusters.org/blogs/walter-e-williams/2011/10/19/ever-notice-left-attack-wealthy-ceos-not-wealthy-liberal-celebrit

HOLY FLIRCKING SCHNITT!!!!!!! Actual quantum levitation demonstrated!

This is a REALLY COOL TOY...but what can we actually do with it?

Proves the point of which is more important and significant, Invention v Innovation.

The first is gee-whiz stuff (like the video, link is below), but the second is the lucrative, mass acceptance and use.  The real suspense in this drama is who/where will be the first to develop this amazing concept and apply it to general use utility.  Stay tuned...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Ws6AAhTw7RA#!

OBTW...guess who or where cell phones were 'invented'?

Competition, Part 2 CELL PHONES...are smart. So are other things...

Competition, the third thing that makes economics the basis of life as we know it.  Even monopolies are competing, competing to keep out the competition (and it is not without its own opportunity costs for the monopoly...but what could those costs be?  Hmmmmm....).

So, I present some examples of 'modern day' competition.  The challenge is to determine who benefits from them...
1. http://news.idg.no/cw/art.cfm?id=20850312-1A64-6A71-CE36C3DE0EA48BED

2. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/19/technology/bookstores-drop-comics-after-amazon-deal-with-dc.html?_r=2&src=recg

3. http://www.businessweek.com/news/2011-10-18/motorola-mobility-revives-razr-to-challenge-apple-s-iphone.html

4. http://www.tvkim.com/watch/1437/kims-picks-samsung-google-serve-ice-cream-sandwich

Competition, Part 1 GAME ON WAYNE!!!!!

Adam Smith brought us the concept of the 'invisible hand', in that if individuals are allowed to pursue their own self-interests, society will benefit.  That concept included the assumption of competition between suppliers, and competition between demanders.

The URL below gives a great demonstration of the invisible hand (of death).  And of course, I'd argue that society benefits.


http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/10/14/us-videogames-idUSTRE79D40J20111014

How much easier then to steal the opposing team's signals?

NFL is now 21st Century.  Using iPads as gamebooks.  How much time until the quarterback, and maybe the entire skilled player set has iTouches on their wrist bands?  Or heads-up displays inside their helmets' visors?

Can't wait.  Scarcity, Competition and Opportunity Cost are at it again.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/18/sports/football/ipads-replace-bound-playbooks-on-some-nfl-teams.html?_r=3&ref=technology

The "OCCUPY" movement, at it's best?

The Occupy this that and the other thing is pretty 'newsworthy' lately.  A lot of human debris seems to have cashed in their welfare checks and bought some funky camping gear and decided to hang out in various public property places to synergize their intellectual vapidity.  Yes, they're 'synergizing' all over the place.  And defecating on police cruisers, throwing trash everywhere, beating up some who may disagree with their communist views...

So, the BEST part is about 6 minutes in...this chick is so intellectually wasted.  "I would like to see a workers' government, where people that work, people that make the wealth of this country run this country."  Um...we have that now.  Then she says, "Labor creates wealth." which is straight out of Marx.  Seems to ignore Land, Capital and Entrepreneurship...  Of course the leprechaun who escaped the insane asylum just before her is pretty convincing also.  6:40 iPhone fiasco, '...it's helping me record...'  And the piece-of-work holding it has no CLUE about how this useful consumer good ever came to be, let alone came to be in her hand at that opportune time...

But the cynic in all of us discounts this video as being anything representative of the upstanding stalwart citizens who have taken to the streets to protest the inherent injustices in our representative republic...after all, the TEA PARTY produced this video.  And we all know THEY'RE NUTS!  (or are they? Hmmm...don't recall any of the Tea Partiers pooping on police cars, or throwing trash everywhere, or urinating in public, or beating up people who disagree with them at rallies, or being racist, or any of the behaviors we see in the Occupy crowd...)

Lest we forget, the numerous advances and discoveries made by the Marxist-socialist countries vastly outnumber those by the bourgeois capitalist west.  Anyone care to name a few?  Right.  No other country/system can kill so many of it's own citizens BETTER than the socialists!  Karl Marx can justly have lain at his feet the responsibility for the murders of tens and tens of millions of innocents.  Nice.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tuFQuEwJ5xI&feature=player_embedded

North Carolina Student Suspended for Facebook Comment Criticizing College « CBS Charlotte

North Carolina Student Suspended for Facebook Comment Criticizing College « CBS Charlotte

Freedom of Speech, guaranteed, right? Not necessarily. Can you recall where that 'guarantee' is expressly made? If so, I bet you also know the document you found it in was not intended to apply down to state and local gov'ts. So, was the college right, or not? What are the economic implications here? Will the P.T. Barnum axiom apply ("I don't care what the newspapers say about me as long as they spell my name right."), or will it turn away the marginal students who are also considering other institutions of higher education? Hmmm...

Click here... http://charlotte.cbslocal.com/2011/10/13/north-carolina-student-suspended-for-facebook-comment-criticizing-college/

The India pad 'solution'...hmmm...

It was recently revealed, " India introduced a cheap tablet computer Wednesday, saying it would deliver modern technology to the countryside to help lift villagers out of poverty."   As you read the article, ponder this.  TANSTAAFL.  MB ≥ MC  Gov't involvement in the economy.  Competition with others who already have equivalent resources, and may not make it to 'university' if those slots are filled by the new ones who received the cheap tablets paid for in part by the taxes from the ones already with resources.  Equity v Efficiency  Also, what of the infrastructure?  How will the tablet connect to the internet?  Will it connect?  Is the gov't paying to wire all the villages?  What use would a tablet be if it cannot be connected?  How will the poor villagers power their tablets?  Etc.

"If it seems too good to be true..."

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jkCXZtzqXX87-pXex2nn23lWFwkw?docId=87163f29232f400d87ba906dc3a93405

"Stealing" a free education...ridiculous

The link below will take you to a story about a single mother who sent her children to a better, safer school by using her father's address for enrollment.  She was convicted of a few felonies, 'grand theft'.  She is black, and the school she sent her girls to is pretty 'white bread'.  Being suspicious, the school system hired a private investigator to track the kids and see if they actually lived in the district, etc.

Please read and respond to it incorporating the principles of economics; scarcity, opportunity costs and competition.  Also, address the whole racism issue, AND the concept of compulsory public education and its 'free' distribution.

Right.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/01/26/938788/-Parenting-While-Black:-Ohio-Woman-Jailed-for-Stealing-an-Education-

If the NFL used the same rules Teachers used...

Fran Tarkenton makes an interesting point from an equity versus efficiency standpoint.  I provide the first paragraph.  But check the real article...


"Imagine the National Football League in an alternate reality. Each player's salary is based on how long he's been in the league. It's about tenure, not talent. The same scale is used for every player, no matter whether he's an All-Pro quarterback or the last man on the roster. For every year a player's been in this NFL, he gets a bump in pay. The only difference between Tom Brady and the worst player in the league is a few years of step increases. And if a player makes it through his third season, he can never be cut from the roster until he chooses to retire, except in the most extreme cases of misconduct..."


Read the whole article here... http://www.frantarkenton.com/component/content/article/54/327-reimagining-american-education

Barack Hussein Obama Mmm Mmm Mmm

Nice to see kids respecting authority on President's Day. Now if only the transcript were as easily found...