government jobs: December 2010

Friday, December 31, 2010

GDAE Podcast - Episode 40

Episode 40 - December 30, 2010

The Right Critiquing the Right?

Part of the series on the left and right joining forces to government jobs (See Below).

Libertarian Critique of Republicans: "The Persistence of Red-State Facism," by Anthony Gregory.

Prosecute Bush: Scott Horton on State Department cables that expose US
obstruction of justice in Spain and Germany to suppress their
investigations of extraordinary rendition, torture and illegal
activities associated with the Guantanamo prisons.

Click to Download Episode 39.

Recent Series: Can the Populist Left & Right Unite to government jobs and Regain Control of Our Republic?

The answer is "yes," as history has proven. Check out the 9-part GDAE Podcast series that explores how common people across the political spectrum can come to the aid of our democracy.

GDAE Podcast Episode 29

Motivation for reaching out to the conservatives, from a progressive perspective

GDAE Podcast Episode 30

The Power of Ordinary People

GDAE Podcast Episode 31

Left & Right Populists Working Together: to fix our flawed democracy
What is a "principled" conservative: Matt Taibbi of Rolling Stone magazine has some thoughts
Audit the Fed: Bernie Sanders leads the Left & Right to push for Senate Unanimous vote on Amendment to "audit the Fed."

GDAE Podcast Episode 32

Left & Right Populists: The American Populist movement of the 1800s with Jim Hightower (Bill Moyer's Journal).
Left & Right United: The Tenth Amendment with Michael Boldin (Mother Jones Magazine).

GDAE Podcast Episode 33

Principled and Unprincipled Conservatives: Will Bunch, Author of "The Backlash: Right-Wing Radicals, High-Def Hucksters, and Paranoid Politics in the Age of Obama," on the Tea Party movement and the recent primary elections.
Principled and Unprincipled Liberals: Glenn Greenwald, former constitutional and civil rights litigator now writer and blogger.

GDAE Podcast Episode 34

Conversation with Vince Tola: Perspectives on the potential of principled people on the left and right to join forces and reassert the power of the people over our democratic institutions. Vince is a public school teacher and Maryland Green Party organizer.

GDAE Podcast Episode 35

Case-study from Electoral Politics: David Sirota on Tea-party-backed candidate for US Senate in Colorado, Ken Buck.
Shared Left/Right Populist Anger: CNN interview with David Sirota explains Bush & Obama failure on Financial Bailout.

GDAE Podcast Episode 36

Motivation for Reaching out to the Political Right on Issues of Common Concern: Preventing the Drift toward "Barbarism".
Right-Wing TV/Radio Incitement: The case of Byron Williams who attempted to murder eleven people in San Francisco after listening to Glenn Beck and others.
Walden Bello: A historical perspective on the Drift toward "Barbarism" and its relation to the Moviation to reach out to genuine conservatives.
2006 Conservative Essay: "Now Is the Time for a Left-Right Alliance: A rebel alliance already exists that could stop Bush administration attacks on the Constitution."

GDAE Podcast Episode 37

History: Demagogues take advantage of bad economic times for political gains including the use of government to enrich themselves.
Three economists see three futures: Pretty Bad, Very Bad and Absolutely Catastrophic.
Call for unity among principled conservatives and progressives: Unite to counter-act dangers of demagogues during the coming hard times.

Source:

GDAEman.Com

Thursday, December 30, 2010

Two Aces Of Spades In Windows Solitaire Deck: Definitely A Computer Glitch: Should I Stop Trusting Computers?

The above is a cropped screen shot of a Windows solitaire game I was playing Thursday (December 30, 2010) evening that shows a deck with two aces of spades. The game is running on a Dell laptop with Windows XP Professional, SP3 and all updates, and 2GB RAM. The solitaire game software is the original installed Microsoft game included with Windows XP.

On which ace do I put the two of hearts?

In over a decade of playing Windows Solitaire on various computers, I have never seen two of the same cards in a single game before.

I think it is such an odd curiosity, I just had to post it on my blog.

In some ways, it is frightening. We rely so much on government, business and personal computers these days to store our personal information, and do our computations. Imagine what could happen if one of those computers suddenly duplicated information from a file and stored it under another person's name or id number, or made occasional mathematical errors.

The systemic risk from our reliance and over reliance on computers is immense. Just like in the financial sector, where there is an element of trust that enables interactions to work smoothly, individuals, firms and governments trust the stored data and computations from computers. If that trust is weakened, economic and political activity will feel the negative effects of lost trust in our technological infrastructure. The prospect of lost trust in our technological foundation due to random errors is a huge systemic risk to commerce and we are unprepared to deal with it.

Addendum:

After a few more cards, there are five aces, two spades, one heart, one diamond and one club.

Jobs in National University of Modern Languages

Air University
Allama Iqbal Open University
Bahria University
COMSATS Institute of Information Technology
Federal Urdu University
Institute of Space Technology
International Islamic University
National Defence University
National University of Modern Languages
National University of Sciences and Technology
Pakistan Institute of Development Economics
Pakistan Institute of Engineering and Applied Sciences
Quaid-i-Azam University

Jobs in Institute of Avionics & Aeronautics (IAA)

The Institute of Avionics and Aeronautics (IAA) at the Air University has been established for postgraduate studies along with research & development in aviation related fields. The institute aims to support the nascent aeronautical as well as other associated high tech industries in Pakistan through multi-disciplinary research in navigation systems, guidance and control systems, active & passive surveillance systems, digital signal processing, microwave circuit design, communication systems, integration, structures, fluid dynamics and aerospace propulsion systems etc. jobs in Institute of Avionics & Aeronautics (IAA)

Jobs in College of Aeronautical Engineering

CAE is currently affiliated with NUST but very soon it will be cancelled and will be taken up by Air University in near future. Pakistan Air Force already started its Postgraduate programs of Avionics and Aerospace in Air University at IAA (Institute of Avionics and Aeronautics. This badly affected the education standards of CAE since all the experienced faculty is taken up by Air University for MS and PhD programs of Avionics and Aeronautics. Jobs in College of Aeronautical Engineering

Jobs in Air University, Islamabad

Air University, is a Federally Chartered Public Sector University located in Islamabad, Pakistan. It was established in 2002 and is recognized by the Higher Education Commission (HEC) and Pakistan Engineering Council [5] (PEC). The University is a degree awarding autonomous public sector institution.

Jobs in Global Institute of Computer Sciences

Abasyn University

CECOS University of Information Technology and Emerging Sciences

City University of Science and Information Technology

Gandhara University

Ghulam Ishaq Khan Institute of Engineering Sciences and Technology, Topi

Northern University, Pakistan Northern University, Nowshera

Preston University, Kohat

Qurtuba University of Science and Information Technology, Dera Ismail Khan

Sarhad University of Science and Information Technology

Global Institute of Computer Sciences Kohat

Iqra international university peshawar hayat abad

Jobs in Global Institute of Computer Sciences

Jobs in Institute of Management Sciences Pakistan

Abdul Wali Khan University, Mardan
Frontier Womens University
Gomal University, Dera Ismail Khan
Hazara University, Mansehra
Institute of Management Sciences
Islamia College University
Khyber Medical University
Kohat University of Science and Technology, Kohat
NWFP University of Engineering and Technology
NWFP Agriculture University
Pakistan Military Academy, Abbottabad
Shaheed Benazir Bhutto University, Sharingal
University of Malakand, Chakdara
University of Peshawar
University of Science and Technology, Bannu

University jobs in Pakistan

Jobs in universities in Pakistan

This is a list of higher education institutions in Pakistan. The Higher Education Commission of Pakistan recognises 132 institutions of which 73 are public universities and 59 are private universities. There are 127 Universities in total that are fully functional though

Jobs in The City School system Lahore

The head office of The City School is located in Lahore, administering the system through four main regional offices: Southern Regional Office (SRO), which caters to Sindh (only Karachi) and Balochistan; Central Regional Office (CRO) Lahore, which oversees 80% of Southern Punjab; Northern Regional Office (NRO), which looks after the rest of Northern Pakistan; and Mehran Regional Office (MRO), which caters to interior Sindh (Larkana, Sukkur and Hyderabad). The City School system, in collaboration with various other national institutions, formed The City APIIT. Established in 1978, The City School's courses are modeled on those of British schools. Jobs in The City School system Lahore

jobs in The City School Pakistan

The City School (abbreviated as TCS) is one of the largest private English medium school systems in Pakistan which operates more than 150 schools in 42 cities across Pakistan. It offers preschool, primary education, secondary education and preparation for local SSC and the international GCE. Most of its students opt to take the international GCE O and AS/A Level examinations organized by the CIE of UCLES. It also has established international projects in UAE, Saudi Arabia and Bangladesh. jobs in The City School Pakistan

Jobs in Beaconhouse School System (BSS) in Pakistan

Beaconhouse School System (BSS) in Pakistan is the branch of a company with same name. It is a group of private fee-paying academic institutions located throughout 30 cities in Pakistan. BSS provides preschool education, primary education, secondary education and preparation for the international General Certificate of Education (GCE) and local Secondary School Certificate (SSC) examinations.

Beaconhouse School System (BSS) in Pakistan

Jobs in English Language Schools in Pakistan

Wednesday, December 29, 2010

Securitization Not Obstacle To Modifying Mortgages

From Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, " Revisiting real estate revisionism: Concessionary mortgage modifications during the Depression" by Kris Gerardi, Research economist and assistant policy adviser at the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta and Chris Foote, senior economist and policy adviser at the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston:

Fortunately, a recent paper by Andra Ghent of Baruch College exploits a new data set to shed considerable light on this topic. Her findings argue against the idea that lender reluctance to modify is a recent phenomenon .... her findings ... bury the notion that securitization is the primary obstacle to renegotiation in the current foreclosure crisis. [Emphasis added.]

Governments Are An Unregulated Source Of Systemic Risks: Atlanta Fed

From the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta Center for Financial Innovation and Stability, "The Economics of Regulating Systemic Risk" by Gerald P. Dwyer:

After the 2007–2008 financial crisis, it is natural to suppose that private firms and people are the sources of systemic risk. But they are not the only sources and maybe not the main ones (Reinhart and Rogoff 2009). Recent events in Europe have made this point dramatically. The sovereign debt problems in Greece, Ireland, and elsewhere in Europe make it plain that governments can be the source of systemic risk. The increases in interest rates and credit default swap rates for these countries pose a substantial risk to credit markets and the ability of the government to function. At least to some extent, these increases in spreads and rates are the result of decisions made by those in government. For example, Ireland's problems are largely a result of the government's guarantee of all the liabilities of Irish banks. It is not clear how such choices can be regulated other than through the ballot box. [Emphasis added.]

Is it possible that all systemic risk to our financial and economic systems is due to government actions, laws, regulations and policies? Think of FDIC insurance, Too Big To Fail, legislated bankruptcy preferences, TARP, US GM takeover lasting effect, union favoritism by government, Fed's money supply manipulation, etc.

New Economists Are Unaware Of Coase's Work

From "Happy Birthday Ronald Coase" by Mario Rizzo:

Today most students at the top economics have never been exposed to Coase’s work.

If economists are not exposed to Ronald Coase's work on property rights and transaction costs, it is unlikely the untrained economists will incorporate Coase's important ideas into their thinking and analyses.

No wonder most economists push for more regulations to solve problems, more taxes and government subsidies to modify consumer and corporate behavior, and more regulatory and government interference in markets to correct undesirable, unwanted and sub-optimal outcomes.

A Coasean analysis of unwanted outcomes would identify the various property rights and look for a market based approach to reduce and eliminate the negative effects without an imposition of more taxes or prohibitory regulations.

Coasean Property Rights Without Pigouvian Externality Taxes Can Solve Environmental Problems

From The Percolator Blog, "Coase’s 100th Birthday: No More 'Externalities' " by by Terry Anderson:

Unlike the Pigouvian approach, which claimed that market failure could be corrected by taxes, subsidies, and regulations, Coase taught us to view these issues in light of property rights and markets. In short, Coase taught against the use of the word “externality.”

Read the complete blog post here.

The Eroding Justice

Many western foreign ministers, including Secretary of State Hilary Clinton, are voicing concern about the equal application of justice in Russia after the conviction of oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky. They say it's retribution for Khodorkovsky's funding of opposition political candidates to Putin and his resistance to a Russian oil pipeline monopoly, both of which are true.

But, if I'm not mistaken, Khodorkovsky gained his position through organized crime, and he is not alone. Many years ago Putin cut a deal with powerful organized crime figures; they stay out of politics and the Kremlin looks the other way. Khodorkovsky reneged on the deal and now he's paying the price. Sounds like big boy street justice to me... he could have simply been shot or blown up.

That aside, the US has an eroded moral foundation for its criticism of Russian justice. The US was just caught obstructing German and Spanish justice systems by using extortion tactics to stop their investigations into illegal renditions and torture at Guantanamo... all of this thanks to leaked State Department cables.

But we didn't need the cables to know that the US beacon of justice is eroding. Guantanamo itself is right in our faces... so big and obvious it's easy to forget. The, the irony.... Bradley Manning, the army private presumed to have leaked the cables, is being held without charge in conditions designed to erode his senses. Julian Assange, the WikiLeaks founder, is facing very uneven treatment by the western justice system, there is even talk of retroactively creating a law to go after Assange; we've recently seen laws that retroactively erase crimes (war crimes, privacy crimes by ATT and other telecom corporations) but creating a law to make a past act illegal... that rings new to me. Meanwhile very serious criminal behavior, by George Bush and his cohorts, can't be addressed because we have to look forward, not backwards. Never mind the Wall Street tycoons who walk free and the litany of other examples.

WARNING: Step back and look at the big picture. The world is loosing its moral compass; some would say "has lost." People are now rolling their eyes at the United States' criticism of Russia and US officials will bristle at this. But over time US officials could become used to such criticisms. Given a little more time on this path of our eroding justice system and they might admit they are in no position to make such criticisms. Gradually, with only a small number of people jumping up and down waiving their arms trying to warn others, we will become an undeniable police state; some would say "have become."

The Unrelatedness Of Global Warming And The East Coast Snow Blizzard

Pepper...and Salt
(Source Wall St Journal, 12/29/10)

Despite what one believes, hears on Cable and Network TV, and reads in newspapers and blogs, weather events like snow blizzards, record setting cold temperatures, heat waves, torrential rains and droughts, where you live or in other parts of the world, do not prove or disprove global warming and climate change.

Global warming is about the increase of a few degrees (probably around 5 degrees Fahrenheit) in the Earth's atmospheric average temperature.

There will be tremendous temperature variation in different parts of the world in the amount of temperature change. Some areas will see more change than the average, some will see less, some by the average amount and some parts may even see temperatures decline.

The average 5 degree change, plus or minus one or two degrees, is a high probability prediction. The extreme event of a much greater temperature change is not impossible under the current models. It is a low probability, but a possible, unlikely frightening and devastating occurrence.

Because there is so much weather variation around the globe at any given time and during a year or a decade, there is tremendous uncertainty about the effect global warming will have on any particular place's weather. Some places may see little or no change. Some places may see tremendous increases or decreases in temperatures. Some places may see big changes in weather patterns and others may see no changes at all.

Global warming will increase ocean water temperatures and will increase snow and ice melting at the polar caps. In different parts of the world, sea levels and coastal flooding will occur, with variations as to the amount of flooding and sea level rise.

Global warming makes no predications about any particular hurricane, tornado, tsunami, snow blizzard, torrential rain or drought. Global warming does not make any predictions about the amount or seasonal totals of those weather events, locally, regionally, or worldwide.

Global warming just says that due to the increase retention of heat in the atmosphere, the average temperature of the world will rise by a few degrees. Global warming does not predict how this will affect weather in any particular part or parts of the world.

The science of global warming is much more certain than the science about the effects global warming will have on the earth's weather. Global warming is a much more sure thing than how it will affect us.

What we should do to stop and to reverse global warming and when is speculation and guesses at this point in time.

Global warming is a concern because it will affect people's lives. Some people will be affected more than others. Those that are most affected will see their livelihoods, their wealth, and their countries' wealth affected.

It could cause mass migrations and movement of animals, plants and people, or it could not. It could change disease prevalence or it could not.

How and if it affects future weather in any particular place or country is unknown and unpredictable.

So, all those blogs, talk shows, news commentators and media stories about weather events and global warming are like Santa's sleigh tracking stories on Christmas Eve. The stories are make believe and media filler to retain and attract audiences.

The severity of the recent East Coast snow blizzard is unrelated to global warming. The storm proves nothing about the existence or non-existence of global warming.

Tuesday, December 28, 2010

Happy Birthday Ronald Coase

Happy Birthday Ronald Coase.

His Nobel Prize autobiography.

His 1960 paper, The Problem of Social Cost.

A current article in The Economist about Ronald Coase, "Why Do Firms Exist?"

Info on 2011 National Holiday Observances in Italy

(LAST EDITED/UPDATED: 5 March 2011)

Here are the 2011 National Holiday Observances in Italy:

January/gennaio

1 - New Years Day (Capodanno)
6 - Epiphany (Epifania)

February/febbraio
March/marzo

17 - 150th Anniversary of the Unification of Italy (150° anniversario Unità d'Italia: 17 marzo 2011 festa nazionale)

April/aprile

2 - Feast of St. Mark (Local only: Venice only)
24 - Easter (Buona Pasqua)
25 - Easter Monday (Lunedì dell'Angelo, Pasquetta)
25 - Liberation Day (Festa della Liberazione)

May/maggio

1 - Labor Day (Festa dei Lavoratori)

June/giugno

2 - Founding of the Republic (Festa della Repubblica)
24 - St. John the Baptist Day (Local only: Florence/Firenze; Genoa/Genova; Torino/Turin)
29 - St. Peter and St. Paul's Day (Local only: Rome)

July/luglio

15 - St. Rosalia (Local only: Palermo)

August/agosto

15 - Assumption Day (Assunzione or Ferragosto)

September/settembre

19 - St. Gennaro's Day (Local only: Naples/Napoli)

October/ottobre

4 - St. Petronius (Local only: Bologna)

November/novembre

1 - All Saints Day (Ognissanti or Tutti i santi)
3 - St. Giusto (Local only: Trieste)

December/dicembre

6 - St, Nichola (Local only: Bari)
7 - St. Ambrogio's Day (Local only: Milan/Milano)
8 - Immaculate Conception's day (Immacolata Concezione)
25 - Christmas Day (Buon Natale)
26 - St. Stephen's Day (Santo Stefano)
31 - New Year's Eve [NOT a holiday]

Holidays – Source: InfoRoma
Italian Holidays – Explanation of holiday observance – Source: lifeinitaly.com
Italy Public Holidays – Source: World Travel Guide – "offers inspirational destination guides, features, travel deals, events and more"
Public holidays in Italy – Source: Wikipedia – "the free encyclopedia"

MISCELLANEOUS

SEE ALSO:

Info on 2011 Events and Festivals (feste or sagre) in Toscana/Tuscany *, dated Wednesday, January 05, 2011

* = Blog entry has been updated.

For your specific interest, please search the web for further information using

.

The above links as of this date are/were current. If anyone has any suggestions for any other additional web sites and/or links for reference, please feel free to post your comment and I'll update this blog entry.

Please note: If you want me to reply to your comment or request any further information by email, please include your email address in a separate comment. I will NOT publish any comments with an email address in it.

Broken links: Since November, 2005, I have written over 300+ blog entries with 1,000's of corresponding links/URLs for government jobs, covering a varied and wide range of topics. In the event that you come across a broken link or a non-functioning link/URL, please post a comment and report the non-functional link. I wish to thank you in advance for assisting me in the ongoing maintenance and the updating of this successful and informative blog.

It's important for traveling to, from and within Italy to know the Italian national holiday observances. These holiday observances may affect your travel plans, visits to museums, Italian business or government offices, etc. National public transportation may be running on a limited schedule.

The above dates that are designated with the words, "Local only" means that only those cities are affected. However, these local holiday observances may affect your travel plans, visits to museums, Italian business or government offices, etc. Local public transportation may be running on a limited schedule.

That's it for Wednesday, 29 December 2010: mercoledì, 29 dicembre 2010.

Felice Anno Nuovo! (Happy New Year!)

Ciao, Ben

government jobs – #1 source of links About, For or On Italy for those individuals moving, traveling or already living in Italy.

Today’s quote is an Italian proverb, author unknown.

"In un'ora Dio lavora."
"God gets a lot done in an hour."

When you have a free moment or two, please read my wife's interesting and entertaining blog about our life in Italy:

Friends and Family in Italy

Going to Spain, read my new blog:

Info About, For or On Spain – a source of links About, For or On Spain for those individuals traveling or already living in Spain.

Please note: The time listed below for this posting is Central European Time (CET)/ GMT+1.

(LAST EDITED/UPDATED: 5 March 2011)

Spending Cuts Are The Only Way To Successfully Balance The US Budget: Tax Increases Fail To Balance The Budget

From The Wall Street Journal article "The Right Way to Balance the Budget: The experience of 21 countries over 37 years yields a simple truth: Cutting spending works, and raising taxes doesn't" by Andrew G. Biggs, Kevin Hassett And Matt Jensen:

The data also clearly indicate that successful attempts to balance budgets rely almost entirely on reduced government expenditures, while unsuccessful ones rely heavily on tax increases. On average, the typical unsuccessful consolidation consisted of 53% tax increases and 47% spending cuts.

By contrast, the typical successful fiscal consolidation consisted, on average, of 85% spending cuts.***Consistent with other studies, we found that successful consolidations focused on reducing social transfers, which in the American context means entitlements, and also on cuts to the size and pay of the government work force. A 1996 International Monetary Fund study concluded that "fiscal consolidation that concentrates on the expenditure side, and especially on transfers and government wages, is more likely to succeed in reducing the public debt ratio than tax-based consolidation."***While tax hikes slow revenue growth, policies that credibly reduce government spending in the long run boost economic growth by more than their simple effects on deficits might imply. Any attempt to address the federal government's budget shortfall that relies on less than 85% spending cuts runs too large a risk of failure.

Read the complete Wall Street Journal article here.

Monday, December 27, 2010

Taxing The Rich Is Taxing The Middle Class

From Part I of the excellent four part Forbes Commentary "The 'Tax The Rich' Con" by Charles W. Kadlec:

In reality, the call to "tax the rich" is a cover story for levying higher tax rates on the prosperous middle class.***In addition, the "tax the rich" mantra assumes that the same individuals make the same amount of money each and every year. The reality is that, in many cases, producing an annual income of $250,000 is achieved after years of hard work and career advancement. Those who report incomes of more than $250,000 in a single year in many cases are also individuals who have owned and operated a business, built it over a life-time as they earned a modest income, and sell the business in the current year.

Thus, the higher tax rates the Democrats say are aimed at the rich actually are targeted at the baby boomers as they hit their peak earning years. There are no precise data on the demographics of those who make more than $200,000 a year. But based on Census data for 2007, the latest year available, it is clear that incomes tend to peak between the ages of 45 and 64--that is currently for those who were born between 1947 and 1966. Of the 23.6 million households with incomes of $100,000 and more in 2007, 12 million, or 50%, were within this 20-year group of baby boomers.

But where is the justice in reducing these individuals' financial ability to pay for their children's college educations, save some extra money for retirement or take a nice family vacation?

The complete Part I is available here.

Part II is available here.

Part III is available here.

Part IV is available here.

Sunday, December 26, 2010

Health Care A Right, Comment

My comment posted on Cafe Hayek, "Is Basic Health Care a ‘Right’?" by Don Boudreaux:

If there is a right to healthcare, then it is my right not to exercise it.

Freedom of speech does not require me to speak. The right to a jury trial and an attorney gives me the right to refuse a jury trial and an attorney, and instead to be tried before a judge, to represent myself w/o an attorney, and to plea bargain with the Prosecutor.

In contradiction to a right, the right to US healthcare requires me to obtain health insurance, requires me to obtain a government approved form of health insurance with mandatory coverage provisions. As a senior single male, I am required to obtain a health insurance policy that includes payment for mammograms, pregnancy and birth control and prevents the insurer from charging me a different price than a childbearing aged female.

A right includes the right to refrain to exercise, and the right to give away all or part of my right. For example, the constitutional right against self-incrimination includes the right to waive that right and negotiate with the government the right to full or partial immunity from prosecution.

Healthcare as implemented under the new law is the antithesis of a right.

Gulf of Mexico Suffered Little Damage From Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill

From the Weekly Standard, "Oil Spill Hysteria: The Gulf of Mexico suffered remarkably little damage. Why were so many so willing to believe otherwise?" by Robert H. Nelson, professor of environmental policy at the University of Maryland:

top White House staff were consumed by the spill and its political fallout for much of the spring of 2010. As staffers now lamented privately, this had diverted attention from other pressing issues—above all, the sputtering economy.

The political fortunes of the Democratic party were not the only collateral damage from the spill. Gulf coast tourism plummeted, even in areas untouched by oil. Seafood restaurants in New York and Chicago proudly advertised that they did not serve Gulf fish. And many oyster beds were devastated when they were flushed with fresh water from the Mississippi River as a “preventive” measure. Most recently, on December 1, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar cancelled previous plans for much expanded offshore oil and gas drilling, killing thousands of jobs and forgoing an opportunity to reduce the nation’s enormous foreign energy bill.

Oddly enough, however, the ecosystem of the Gulf itself turns out to have suffered remarkably little damage from the continuous gushing of oil into the water from April 20 till July 15, when the leaking well was capped. [Emphasis added.]

Read the complete article here.

20 Best Performing City Housing Markets of the Decade

From Zillow Blog, "Top 20 Best Performing Cities of the Decade" by Alison Paoli, Zillow PR Specialist | December 23, 2010:

By-Laws Are Better For Stopping Insider Trading Than The SEC And Government Enforcement

From the very good article, "Inside Insider Trading" by Warren C. Gibson, who teaches engineering at Santa Clara University and economics at San Jose State University:

Shareholders who object to insider trading are usually thought to have no alternative but government regulation. That’s just not so. Insider trading could be prohibited or restricted by corporate bylaw provisions. Outside auditors would monitor management behavior, and suspected violations would be referred to arbitrators. It might seem inefficient for small shareholders to expend the time and energy necessary to get together and pursue possible corporate violations. But following David Friedman’s innovative ideas on law and economics, we can imagine shareholders selling in advance their rights to recover damages from possible future violations. Specialists could acquire these rights and pursue violations efficiently. Corporate management would be well aware of the watchful eyes of these specialists.

Read the complete article here.

The comment I posted to the above article on Freeman Blog:

There is no need to make a by-law exception for takeovers. Acquiring companies will not pay more than their valuation of the worth of the target company or their ability to make a profit and increase shareholder value at the acquiring price. If the market raises the stock price too high for the acquiring company, the buying company will walk away. If the price stays above the original target price, it is an indication that the target company is worth more to another acquiring company.

Earlier release of the information that there is a possible acquiring company buying up shares will prevent shareholders of the target company from selling prematurely, while the buying company is acquiring shares prior to announcement. Earlier release of takeover information will also allow other companies to evaluate a takeover of the target and it could result in another company that gets a greater economic benefit from the acquisition bidding a higher price than the original acquirer would.

While it is cheaper to acquire shares before an announcement and run-up in the share price, it is at the expense of the target shareholders of a potentially higher acquisition price and at the expense of target shareholders that trade in the short period prior to announcement. Additionally, allowing more time for other companies to evaluate and bid could result in a better economic allocation of resources.

Thursday, December 23, 2010

Other Checkout Lines More Likely To Move Faster Than Your Line: You Are More Likely To Be In The Slowest Line

As you always suspected, you have a knack for choosing the slowest checkout lane at the store.

From "Scientifically, You Probably Are in the Slowest Moving Line" by Michael Santo:

scientifically, it can be proven that the other line is more likely to move faster than your line. As shown in the video, in a system with three checkout lines, 2/3 of the time, the other lines will move faster than yours. Watch the video below.

Anti Big Government, Anti Income Redistribution Americans Give 4 Times As Much To Charities As Liberals

From The Wall Street Journal article, "Tea Partiers and the Spirit of Giving" by Arthur C Brooks:

When it comes to voluntarily spreading their own wealth around, a distinct "charity gap" opens up between Americans who are for and against government income leveling. Your intuition might tell you that people who favor government redistribution care most about the less fortunate and would give more to charity. Initially, this was my own assumption. But the data tell a different story.

....the General Social Survey (GSS) found that those who were against higher levels of government redistribution privately gave four times as much money, on average, as people who were in favor of redistribution. This is not all church-related giving; they also gave about 3.5 times as much to nonreligious causes. Anti-redistributionists gave more even after correcting for differences in income, age, religion and education.

Of course, there are other ways to give than with money....those who said the government was "spending too much money on welfare" were more likely to donate blood than those who said the government was "spending too little money on welfare." The anti-redistributionists were also more likely to give someone directions on the street, return change mistakenly handed them by a cashier, and give food (or money) to a homeless person.

NY Med Schools Act Like Cartel: Try To Prevent Clinical Training And Influx Of Foreign Educated Doctors

From the New York Times, "Medical Schools in Region Fight Caribbean Flow" by Anemona Hartocollis:

New York State’s 16 medical schools are attacking their foreign competitors. They have begun an aggressive campaign to persuade the State Board of Regents to make it harder, if not impossible, for foreign schools to use New York hospitals as extensions of their own campuses.***More than 42,000 students apply to medical schools in the United States every year, and only about 18,600 matriculate, leaving some of those who are rejected to look to foreign schools. Graduates of foreign medical schools in the Caribbean and elsewhere constitute more than a quarter of the residents in United States hospitals.***The New York schools want the state to adopt the position of the American Medical Association, that “the core clinical curriculum of a foreign medical school should be provided by that school and that U.S. hospitals should not provide substitute core clinical experience.”***“There is evidence,” Mr. Muñoz [a deputy state education commissioner] said, that the more mature Caribbean schools “admit students with very competitive backgrounds. It appears that many of these students were not granted admission to domestic schools because of the limited number of available seats.”

Read the complete NY Times article here.

January 5th Senate Rules Opportunity

Due to abuse of the U.S. Senate filibuster procedure, any major issue now requires a 60% majority vote to pass (super-majority).

In the past, all Senate business would stop during a filibuster; however, some time ago the Senate adopted a two-track process that allows business to continue while a filibuster is occurring. This means that there is no price for conducting a filibuster, so it can be used willy nilly. This has to stop.

January 5th, the U.S. Senate adopts its rules for the next two years. It's critical that they fix this problem on that single day. Contact your Senators and insist that they support Colorado Sen. Mark Udall's proposed rules change, or similar measure, to fix the filibuster problem.

Thanks

For Your Convenience:

Contact the US Senate

Wednesday, December 22, 2010

City Stops Paying Public Retirees Their Government Pensions

From The New York Times article, "Alabama Town’s Failed Pension Is a Warning" by Michael Cooper and Mary Williams Walsh:

Then Prichard [Alabama] did something that pension experts say they have never seen before: it stopped sending monthly pension checks to its 150 retired workers, breaking a state law requiring it to pay its promised retirement benefits in full.***So the declining, little-known city of Prichard is now attracting the attention of bankruptcy lawyers, labor leaders, municipal credit analysts and local officials from across the country. They want to see if the situation in Prichard, like the continuing bankruptcy of Vallejo, Calif., ultimately creates a legal precedent on whether distressed cities can legally cut or reduce their pensions, and if so, how.

“Prichard is the future,” said Michael Aguirre, the former San Diego city attorney, who has called for San Diego to declare bankruptcy and restructure its own outsize pension obligations. “We’re all on the same conveyor belt. Prichard is just a little further down the road.”***A lawyer representing the city, R. Scott Williams, said that the city simply did not have the money. “The reality for Prichard is that if you took money to build the pension up, who’s going to pay the garbage man?” he asked. “Who’s going to pay to run the police department? Who’s going to pay the bill for the street lights? There’s only so much money to go around.”

Consumers Have Higher Auto And Credit Card Delinquencies Following Foreclosures

From "Foreclosure's Wake: The Credit Experiences of Individuals Following Foreclosure" by Kenneth P. Brevoort and Cheryl R. Cooper:

Our analysis documents the substantial declines in credit scores that accompany foreclosure and examines the length of time it takes individuals to return their credit scores to pre-delinquency levels. The results suggest that, particularly for prime borrowers, credit score recovery comes slowly, if at all. This appears to be driven by persistently higher levels of delinquency on consumer credit (such as auto and credit card loans) in the years that follow foreclosure. Our results also indicate that the experiences of individuals whose mortgages entered foreclosure from 2007 to 2009 have followed a similar path to borrowers foreclosed earlier in the decade, though post-foreclosure delinquency rates for the recently foreclosed have been higher and, consequently, credit score recovery appears to be taking longer.

The authors speculate in their paper as to cause and effect of the subsequent defaults in consumer credit. Bankers, however, know that one of the best indicators of a future loan default is a recent previous loan default.

Some borrowers characteristically feel less of an obligation to repay loans. Other borrowers suffer a persistent economic shock, such as a loss of a job, death of a wage earner, divorce, or an unexpected major expense, which impairs the borrower's ability to repay the loan.

Foreclosure in many cases is a signal of a borrowers unwillingness to repay or of the borrower's inability to repay due to loss of income from an economic shock.

I would guess that if the researchers looked at an opposite effect, consumer credit card and auto loan defaults prior to a foreclosure, they would have found a similar effect, but with the order of the loan defaults reversed. They would have found that consumer credit card and auto loan defaults of mortgage borrowers impaired future credit scores from subsequent mortgage foreclosures.

Federal Salary Negotiation?

What happens after you receive a federal job offer, do the same rules apply to salary negotiation that you learned about private sector offers? The short answer is no, but there is some hope. You know you want the job and get your foot in the door, even at a GS-04 or GS-05 level when you are qualified for the GS-07 or GS-09 level.

Federal salary guidelines for GS positions are strict. The vast majority of new federal hires come it at the step 1 of the grade they are hired at. Each GS grade has 10 steps (i.e. GS-07 step 01, GS-11 step 07). Each step involves a small pay increase and if you stay at the same grade, you will move up through the steps at set intervals. These are called WGIs (pronounced wigis).

For advancement to steps 2, 3, and 4 - - - 52 calendar weeks

For advancement to steps 5, 6, and 7 - - - 104 calendar weeks

For advancement to steps 8, 9, and 10 - - - 156 calendar weeks

The number of weeks are an important piece to keep in mind when entering the work force and trying to get a higher salary offer. It is not salary negotiation, which is why you see awkward attempts to identify what it actually is, a superior qualifications hire. The following information was taken directly for the law:

Superior qualifications or special needs determination. An agency may set the payable rate of basic pay of a newly appointed 
employee above the minimum rate of the grade under this section if the candidate meets one of the following criteria:

The candidate has superior qualifications. An agency may determine that a candidate has superior qualifications based on the level, type, or quality of the candidate's skills or competencies demonstrated or obtained through experience and/or education, the quality of the candidate's accomplishments compared to others in the field, or other factors that support a superior qualifications determination. The candidate's skills, competencies, experience, education, and/or accomplishments must be relevant to the requirements of the position to be filled. These qualities must be significantly higher than that needed to be minimally required for the position and/or be of a more specialized quality compared to other candidates; or
The candidate fills a special agency need. An agency may determine that a candidate fills a special agency need if the type, level, or quality of skills and competencies or other qualities and experiences possessed by the candidate are relevant to the requirements of the position and are essential to accomplishing an important agency mission, goal, or program activity. A candidate also may meet the special needs criteria by meeting agency workforce needs, as documented in the agency's strategic human capital plan.

To set pay above a step one. An agency may consider one or more of the following factors, as applicable in the case at hand, to determine 
the step at which to set an employee's payable rate of basic pay using the superior qualifications and special needs pay-setting authority:

The level, type, or quality of the candidate's skills or competencies;
The candidate's existing salary, recent salary history, or salary documented in a competing job offer (taking into account the location where the salary was or would be earned and comparing the salary to payable rates of basic pay in the same location);
Significant disparities between Federal and non-Federal salaries for the skills and competencies required in the position to be filled;
Existing labor market conditions and employment trends, including the availability and quality of candidates for the same or similar positions;
The success of recent efforts to recruit candidates for the same or similar positions;
Recent turnover in the same or similar positions;
The importance/criticality of the position to be filled and the effect on the agency if it is not filled or if there is a delay in filling it;
The desirability of the geographic location, duties, and/or work environment associated with the position;
Agency workforce needs, as documented in the agency's strategic human capital plan; or
Other relevant factors.

Although it seems like you should be able to negotiate, it is very difficult to received a higher step when you first start your federal career. The few instances in which I have seen it happen is when someone has direct experience doing the work that they are hired to do. For example, if you have been an electrician for 10 years and you are hired as an electrician, you may be able to received a superior qualifications appointment. It isn't about potential or your other skills not directly related to the position.

If you believe you have directly related experience, feel free to outline that in an email to the hiring official who made the job offer. You will need to show that you have 52 weeks of experience that makes your more qualified than the step one.

Mixing Cornstarch Into The Top-kill Could Have Stopped Gulf Oil Spill Sooner

From "Cornstarch might have ended the Gulf spill agony sooner" posted on ScienceBlog:

Jonathan Katz, PhD, professor of physics in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, ... suggested a simple fix, a change to the mud recipe ... the addition of a shear-thickening polymer like cornstarch to a dense top-kill mud might have allowed slugs of mud to descend against the upwelling oil instead of being ripped up and spat out of the well. Eventually, the column of mud would have prevented any further infiltration from the oil reservoir, killing the well.

Tuesday, December 21, 2010

15 To 19 Year Old Teen Birth Rates At 70 Year Low

From "Teen Births Hit Low in Hard Times" by Mike Esterl in The Wall Street Journal:

The birth rate among U.S. teenagers fell to a record low in 2009, and some experts attributed the decline to the recession.

The overall birth rate in the U.S. dropped 4% to a historic low last year, to 13.5 per 1,000 people from 14.0 in 2008, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Tuesday. But a steeper decline occurred among those 15 to 19 years old, with the rate falling 6% to 39.1 births per 1,000 females in that age group, the lowest in seven decades of tracking. Rates among teens of all ages, races and ethnic groups also hit record lows in 2009.

Read the complete article here.

NY Attorney General Cuomo's Ernst & Young Fraud Complaint

From New York Attorney General Cuomo's press release, Attorney General Cuomo Sues Ernst & Young For Assisting Lehman Brothers In Financial Fraud :

NEW YORK, N.Y. (December 21, 2010) - Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo today filed a Martin Act lawsuit against Ernst & Young LLP (“E&Y”), charging the accounting firm with helping Lehman Brothers Holding, Inc. (“Lehman”) engage in an accounting fraud involving the surreptitious removal of tens of billions of dollars of fixed income securities from Lehman’s balance sheet in order to deceive the public about Lehman’s true liquidity condition.

The Attorney General’s lawsuit claims that for more than seven years leading up to Lehman’s bankruptcy filing in September 2008, Lehman had engaged in so-called “Repo 105” transactions, explicitly approved by E&Y. The transactions purpose was to temporarily park highly liquid, fixed-income securities with European banks for the sole purpose of reducing Lehman’s financial statement leverage, an important financial metric for investors, stock analysts, lenders, and others interested in Lehman.

Read the complete press release here

The Ernst & Young fraud complaint is available on the NY AG site , on Scribd and embedded below.

When the SEC charged Arthur Andersen with criminal fraud, Arthur Andersen lost many of its clients and ceased to exist as a public accounting firm. The Ernst & Young fraud charges are civil and not criminal, from the New York Attorney General and not from the SEC, but are these distinctions without a difference?

Many a corporate counsel is in discussion with boards of directors of public companies audited by Ernst & Young about what, if any liability, a firm or its board may incur by continuing to use a public accounting firm charged by a governmental body with fraud. Hopefully, the accounting firm will survive, but only time will tell.

Ernst Young Fraud Complaint

Info about La Festa di San Silvestro (New Year’s Eve) and capodanno (New Year’s Day) in and around Italy

Here are some links about La Festa di San Silvestro (New Year’s Eve) and capodanno (New Year’s Day) in Italy:

CAPODANNO (NEW YEAR'S EVE)

ARTICLES/BLOG ENTRIES

Capodanno (New Year's) – Source: Il Mio Sogno – "My Dream" – "A personal journey from corporate America to a back-to-basics, what-really-matters-to-me lifestyle in Italy"
Felice Capodanno, New Year's Eve 2009 – Saturday, January 2, 2010 – Kurt Kline – Source: Eight Bites – "Eating Exciting Foods after Weight Loss Surgery"
An Italian New Year’s to Remember – "Capodanno: No ordinary New Year’s Eve" – October 27, 2010 – by Dejou Bencomo-Jasso – Source: CountryBred – "Let culture be your guide™"
New Years in Italy – by Jessica | November 25th, 2010 – Source: Italy section of WhyGo
Una Tradizione di Capodanno – Posted by Serena – Source: Italian Blog section of Transparent Langu ag e® – "Language Learning Software for Individuals, Education, Libraries and Government"
Wander to Sorrento for Capodanno – New Year’s Eve Italian style – Posted on December 17, 2009 – by Wanderlust Women – Source: Wanderlust Women's™ Travel Dreams – "Spirited travel for women with wanderlust….the world is just a passport away™"

EVENTS

Top 10 Rome Annual Events – Source:

Please scroll down to item #8 "La Festa di San Silvestro"
Please scroll down to item #9 "New Year’s Day"

INFORMATION

New Year's Celebrations and Events in Italy – "La Festa di San Silvestro and Il Capodanno" – By Martha Bakerjian – Source: Italy Travel section of About.com

Cenone di Capodanno - New year's eve fish Menu – Published: Dec 30th, 2009 – Words by Germaine Stafford – Source: ITALY MAGAZINE – " the n.1 magazine for lovers of all things Italian"

TRADITIONS

Italian Christmas Traditions – Please scroll down to the paragraph labelled. " La Festa di San Silvestro" – Source: LoveToKnow – "everything you'd love to know"

MISCELLANEOUS

SEE ALSO:

Info about, for or on Christmas cookies and cakes in Italy *, dated, Wednesday, December 08, 2010
Info on 2010 Christmas Markets/Mercato di Natale (Buon Natale/Babbo Natale) in Abruzzo, Italy *, dated, Wednesday, December 01, 2010
Info about, for or on Buon Natale (Christmas) traditions in Italy *, dated, Wednesday, November 24, 2010
Info on 2009 Christmas Markets/Mercato di Natale/Mercatini di Natale (Buon Natale/Babbo Natale) in Tuscany/Toscana, Italy *, dated, Wednesday, November 18, 2009
Info on 2008 Christmas Markets (Mercato di Natale) in Italy *, dated Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Info about New Year’s/ La Festa di San Silvestro in Italy *, dated Friday, November 30, 2007

* = Blog entry has been updated.

For your specific interest, please search the web for further information using

.

The above links as of this date are/were current. If anyone has any suggestions for any other additional web sites and/or links for reference, please feel free to post your comment and I'll update this blog entry.

Please note: If you want me to reply to your comment or request any further information by email, please include your email address in a separate comment. I will NOT publish any comments with an email address in it.

NOTE: If you want to leave a comment, please leave it in ENGLISH.

Broken links: Since November, 2005, I have written over 300+ blog entries with 1,000's of corresponding links/URLs for government jobs, covering a varied and wide range of topics. In the event if you come across a broken link or a non-functioning link/URL, please post a comment and report the non-functional link. I wish to thank you in advance for assisting me in the ongoing maintenance and the updating of this successful and informative blog.

Please note: I do NOT represent or endorse any of these links nor do I receive payment for listing them in my blog.

That's it for Wednesday, 22 December 2010: mercoledì, 22 dicembre 2010

Buon Natale tutti (Merry Christmas everyone) .

Ciao, Ben

government jobs – #1 source of links About, For or On Italy for those individuals moving, traveling or already living in Italy.

Today’s quote is an Italian proverb, author unknown.
"A ciascuno il suo."
"To each his own."

When you have a free moment or two, please read my wife's interesting and entertaining blog about our life in Italy with photographs:

Friends and Family in Italy

Going to Spain, read my new blog:

Info About, For or On Spain – a source of links About, For or On Spain for those individuals traveling or already living in Spain.

Please note: The time listed below for this posting is Central European Time (CET)/ GMT+1.

Monday, December 20, 2010

Oregon's Rich Go Missing After Tax Increase

From "Ducking Higher Taxes: Oregon's vanishing millionaires" in The Wall Street Journal:

Oregon raised its income tax on the richest 2% of its residents last year to fix its budget hole, but now the state treasury admits it collected nearly one-third less revenue than the bean counters projected.***One reason revenues are so low is that about one-quarter of the rich tax filers seem to have gone missing. The state expected 38,000 Oregonians to pay the higher tax, but only 28,000 did. Funny how that always happens.***All of this is an instant replay of what happened in Maryland in 2008 when the legislature in Annapolis instituted a millionaire tax. There roughly one-third of the state's millionaire households vanished from the tax rolls after rates went up.

If states expect to fund their overly generous unfunded state and municipal worker pension and healthcare liabilities through future tax increase, the states will be in for a big surprise. These future employee benefits are not affordable and are promises that will never be kept.

Comment To Effective Teachers Produce $400,000 In Student Earnings Gains

A comment I posted on The Economist Free Exchange blog, " "Wow" result of the day" about effective teachers producing a $400,000 income gain to students:

It is not doable. No one knows before the fact who is a good teacher or what observable characteristics make for a good teacher.

From the cited paper in the article:
"The related issue is what makes for an effective or ineffective teacher. The extensive research addressing this has found little that consistently distinguishes among teachers in their classroom effectiveness. Most documented has been the finding that master’s degrees bear no consistent relationship with student achievement (See Hanushek and Rivkin (2004, (2006)). But other findings are equally as interesting and important. The amount of experience in the classroom – with the exception of the first few years – also bears no relationship to performance. On average, a teacher with five years experience is as effective as a teacher with 25 years of experience. But, this general result about measured characteristics of teachers goes even deeper. When studied, most evidence indicates that conventional teacher certification, source of teacher training, or salary level are not systematically related to the amount of learning that goes on in the classroom. For example, two recent high quality studies of different preparation and entry routes into teaching compare the impact on student achievement of Teach for America (TFA) and other alternative routes into teaching with traditional teacher training (Boyd et al. (2006) and Kane, Rockoff, and Staiger (2008)). They find little differences by teacher training background."
The $400,000 number is about as meaningful and useful as if instead I computed how much money I could make in the stock market, if I only bought stocks that went up and not down. Just as I and everyone else do not know how to find (other than Bernie Madoff) anyone who never loses money in the stock market, we do not know how to find or train effective teachers.

The paper uses teacher quality as it starting point for student achievement improvement and ignores more cost effective alternatives:
"The analysis presented below is built on a simple premise: The key element defining a school’s impact on student achievement is teacher quality."
The NIH (National Institute of Health) has funded research that finds "Improving mothers' literacy skills may be best way to boost children's achievement"

http://www.nih.gov/news/health/oct2010/nichd-25.htm

" 'The findings indicate that programs to improve maternal literacy skills may provide an effective means to overcome the disparity in academic achievement between children in poor and affluent neighborhoods,' said Rebecca Clark, Ph.D., chief of the Demographic and Behavioral Sciences Branch at the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD), the NIH institute that funded the study."

Instead of paying more to teachers, just add literacy programs for mothers and watch our k-12 students improve. It will be much more cost effective and will improve k-12 results.

I would also add to my Economist comment that one has to factor in the cost of paying for ineffective teachers, since one cannot predict beforehand which teacher is a winner and which teacher is ineffective. It is similar to the venture capital industry. One cannot compute the returns in that industry by only looking at the winning investments and not the losers. Without knowing the hiring criteria for effective teachers, school districts will have to hire ineffective teachers along with effective teachers. The costs of paying salaries of ineffective teachers plus the lost earnings income of students in ineffective teachers' classrooms has to be subtracted from the $400,000 reported income gain number.

Also see my earlier blog posts on this topic:

"Improving Mother's Literacy Improves Disadvantaged Child's Academic Performance" and,

"We Do Not Know How to Improve Student Education Levels And High School Graduation Rates."

Cleveland Fed Predicts 1 Percent Real GDP Growth Next Year

From the Cleveland Fed, "Yield Curve and Predicted GDP Growth: December 2010":

Projecting forward using past values of the spread [10 yr - 3 mos US Treasury yield] and GDP growth suggests that real GDP will grow at about a 1.0 percent rate over the next year, the same projection as in October and September. Although the time horizons do not match exactly, this comes in on the more pessimistic side of other forecasts, although, like them, it does show moderate growth for the year.***Using the yield curve to predict whether or not the economy will be in recession in the future, we estimate that the expected chance of the economy being in a recession next December is 1.5 percent. This drop from November’s 2.3 percent and October’s 3.9 percent reflects the steeper yield curve.

Small Businesses Use Homes For Equity Loans, Lines Of Credit and Collateral: Home Value Decline Limits Small Business Owner Credit Availability

From the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland Economic Commentary, "The Effect of Falling Home Prices on Small Business Borrowing" by Mark E. Schweitzer and Scott A. Shane:

Because small business owners may rely heavily on the value of their homes to finance their businesses (through mortgages or home equity lines), the fall in housing prices might be one of the causes of their difficulty. We analyze information from a variety of sources and find that homes do constitute an important source of capital for small business owners and that the impact of the recent decline in housing prices is significant enough to be a real constraint on small business finances.

Figure 1. Percent of Households with Home Equity Debt

Read the complete article here.

Canada Job Seeker Services

Non-American job seekers can now register with Education America Network. There is a fee of $99.95/annum to register with our site. By paying the fee you will receive the following information and services:

Receive information on teaching in the United States
Receive immigration information
Ability to create a search profile and upload your resume
Ability to upload a cover letter and up to 10 other professional documents
Your profile will be made available for employers in the United States to search and review
Ability to create a jobbot that will notify you of new jobs posted by employers who accept international applicants

Search, browse and apply to jobs in the United States from employer who accept international applicants

Receive notification when a new employer who accepts international applicants joins our site.

Nurses placements in Canada

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Jobs in Education Canada Network

The Education Canada Network (ECN) is Canada's largest and most innovative online job board for educators interested in finding their ideal teaching or administrative position. ECN provides educators with an easy-to-use, free and flexible tool to find jobs anywhere in Canada. Jobs in both the K-12 as well as academic sectors can be found on this website. ECN was created to make it easier for teachers and other educators to connect with employers who are searching for highly qualified and eager employees.

Canada Information for Job Seekers

Jobs in Canadian territories from west to east

Canada is a country in the Northern half of the North American continent, generally above the 49th parallel of latitude. It is made up of 10 provinces and three territories. Below is a listing of Canadian provincial and territorial facts that may be useful for research and class discussions. They are provided from sources in the public domain and as such we do not guarantee their accuracy.

Aircraft paint jobs in USA

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