5 posts tagged “economy”

We all know that paint is just as bad as batteries or used oil if it gets into the water table (latex isn't as bad as oil, but they are both pretty bad).  That is why I love the idea of a Swap Table.  Some communities are setting up places where you can take used paint and exchange it for other used paint from other people, or just leave it.  That way all the paint is getting used in the community and there is nothing that is going into the water table.  I also like this because it is a cheap/free way to get paint and make sure you're saving a little money in these harsh economic times.

I am glad (on one level) that gas prices are starting to drop because it will be less of a strain on so many Americans budget, but I am still happy that the gas crisis happened.  Yes it was hard, but look at the change it has brought on.  Now big car manufacturers are focusing on making smaller, cleaner and more fuel efficient cars that can even use alternative styles of energy.  I mean, I can't tell you how many freakin' smart cars I see these days and you know that wouldn't happen if this crisis didn't force the people of the world to make a choice and break free of their high gas consumption ways.  My only hope is that people never forget this so that conservation becomes a daily part of their existence.  Anyway it is nice to see gas dropping a little so that I can go back to affording other luxuries in my life.  Now for the real question, who were the jerks that made it go that high in the first place and what court can we try them in? 

A picture is worth a 1000 words, or in this case, more than a $1000.

Sad but true...

The big news of Friday was the unemployment numbers of 5.5% meaning that the country is well on its way to a recession and if inflation starts to pick up a depression.  This is not good since the consumer spending from the stimulus was supposed to create lots of jobs and bring the economy back into full swing.  It didn't.  Now democrats and republicans are calling for another stimulus package to try it again.  What I do I say to that?  Why do we need more stimulus if it didn't work the first time?  The truth of the matter is that, people don't want hand outs.  Roosevelt knew this and so did his chief economist Keynes.  Instead of hand outs, people want to be useful, they want to work.  This country has crumbling public works once again, I think it is time to put people to work in a new WPA that will get people out and about - working and earning their keep.  This will fuel the economy by injecting with jobs and people that have the confidence to spend again.  Then we can address the reckless credit and housing markets to make sure that something like this never happens again. 

So in England they have just decided that a judge can rule on the fairness of insanely high overdraft charges (hey don't we have those in the United States?).  Here is the article from the BBC.  This is great.  Too long have our banks tried to scam us out of our own money.  It's not enough that they make interest on loans and transfers but they need to bleed every customer of every penny - it's robbery.  I can only hope that this sentiment is going to start picking up steam in the US.  We have already started with restricting Credit Card companies, this is the next logical step.  Hey, maybe if people didn't lose all their money to the bank then they could spend it and we wouldn't be in an economic slump right?