December 17, 2013
In the old days, folks fretted (or dreamed) about the effect of computerized automation in factories and ATMs replacing bank tellers.
According to a recent McKinsey report:
Physical labor and transactional tasks have been widely automated …
Now, advances in data analytics, low-cost computer power, machine learning, and interfaces that “understand” humans are moving the automation frontier rapidly towards “knowledge work”..
Developments in how machines process language and understand context are allowing computers to search for information and find patterns of meaning at superhuman speed.
Here are a couple of examples …
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Posted in Disruptive Innovation, NetTrax, Predictive Analytics | Leave a Comment »
December 15, 2013
President Obama is clearly perplexed on why the dogs aren’t eating the ObamaCare food.
He’s trying to give people a better “product” … and they just don’t get it.
What the heck is going on?
Well, shoving the roll-out snafus aside, much of the answer lies in good old behavioral economics.
Last week we talked “loss aversion” and the “endowment effect”.
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Today, let’s look at the “developers curse” …
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Posted in Behavioral Economics, Cognitive behavior, Cognitive biases, ObamACA, ObamaCare | Leave a Comment »
December 13, 2013
Hot off the presses …
A Pew Research analysis of survey and census data concludes that that “today’s young women are the first in modern history to start their work lives at near parity with men.”
That’s good news.
Specifically, in 2012, among workers ages 25 to 34, women’s hourly earnings were 93% those of men …. that’s up from about 85% in 2000.
The bad news is that there’s still a 7% gap.
And, that’s despite the fact that “women in the younger age cohort were significantly more likely than their male counterparts to have completed a bachelor’s degree — 38% versus 31% in 2013.”
At least the trend is right.
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Posted in Compensation - Pay, Gender equality, inequality | 1 Comment »
December 12, 2013
OK, I.m a control freak.
There, I said it.
Along the way, somebody passed along a memorable observations:
“You can’t control everything that happens to you, but you can always control the the way you respond to it.”
Fast forward.
A couple of night’s ago, I was watching a replay of an Ohio State football game..
The announcers said that Urban Meyer – OSU’s head coach — preaches the E+R=O principle to his players … even has them wear wristbands.
Say, what?
I ran and googled E+R=O
Answer: Event + Response = Outcome
Hmmmm … sounds familiar.
And, there’s more …
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December 11, 2013
According to the head of California’s largest medical association “seven out of every 10 physicians in California are rebelling against the state’s ObamaCare health insurance exchange and won’t participate”. Source
Why?
Simple economics: the reimbursement rates are too low.
ObamaCare Exchange reimbursement levels appear to mirror Medicare & Medicaid rates.
And, for example, Medicaid only reimburses doctors 72 cents out of each dollar of costs.
You can’t make it up in volume.
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Similarly, some high profile hospitals – e.g. Sloan-Kettering, Cedars Sinai – are opting out of the Exchange programs.
Why?
Reimbursements rates are too low.
Most conservative pundits are saying that the shrinking doctor & hospital networks will force ObamaCare to its knees … since people will revolt when they can’t use “their” doctors or the best hospitals.
Further, O’Reilly, et. al., have been saying “… and there’s nothing Obama can do about it.”
I beg to differ Mr. O’Reilly …
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Posted in Doctors & Physicians, ObamaCare | 1 Comment »
December 10, 2013
President Obama is clearly perplexed on why the dogs aren’t eating the ObamaCare food.
He’s trying to give people a better “product” … and they just don’t get it.
What the heck is going on?
Well, shoving the roll-out snafus aside, much of the answer lies in good old behavioral economics.
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Let me explain …
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Posted in Behavioral Economics, Cognitive behavior, Cognitive biases, ObamACA, ObamaCare | 2 Comments »
December 9, 2013
From the “you can’t make this stuff up” file …
Last year a fried filed his NJ income tax return using Turbo Tax,
Based on the TurboTax calculations, he filed for a refund of $2,582.
A few weeks later, the State sent him a refund check for $3,556.
Not quite Power Ball, but a nice surprise.
Now, a few months later, the story takes an odd twist …
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December 6, 2013
Interesting chart from B of A – Merrill Lynch posted on Business Insider …
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Bottom line: Smart money is getting out of the stock market at an increasing rate … dumb (err, “individual”) money is trending back in.
And, the hedgers are, well, hedging.
Caveat investor.
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December 5, 2013
Some interesting nums from Gallup …
Based on recent polling, about 1 in 3 Americans are “not familiar” with ObamaCare-ACA.
Thefolks who are least likely to be familiar with the law are youngsters and DEMOCRATS … i.e. Obama’s prime constituency.
Go figure
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And, digging deeper, the numbers get even more interesting …
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December 4, 2013
A couple of weeks ago, the Administration decided that ObamaCare need to be rebranded and remarketed since, in the words of CNN: “The name Obamacare – and the much maligned URL HealthCare.gov – have become associated with digital failure and government disorganization.”
Ouch.
In my post Rebranding ObamaCare … I suggested a new name: ObamACA™ … hoping that the name would catch traction and I could bag some royalties.
No such luck (so far).
Still, as a recovering marketer, I’m interested in the question: Would it help the administration sell the law if they ditched the ObamaCare name.
Source: Kaiser Health Foundation
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Well, it turns out that Gallup has already polled on the question …
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December 3, 2013
Flashback AMSers: Remember Dewey the Cat?
Sure, you do … a blockbuster cat book that tried to ride the long tail to riches.
Anita Elberse, the HBS prof who wrote the Dewey case has a new book out called “Blockbusters”.
Here are a few snippets from a WSJ review of the book…
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Posted in Blockbusters, Books & Publishing, Long Tail, Music | 1 Comment »
December 2, 2013
As a recovering IT guy, I couldn’t resist.
Sunday morning I linked to HealthCare.gov …. mostly, I just wanted to see if the site was up & alive.
The landing page populated quickly.
So, I decided to play the “find a glitch” game … the kinda thing I’d do when IT teams would come to demo a new system for me.
It took less than 5 seconds … and I didn’t have to leave the home page
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Here’s what I did.
I certainly didn’t want to apply for anything, so I just ran the cursor over the “See plans in your area” section of the landing page.
Note that the cursor turned into a hand, indicating a live hyperlink.
I clicked and nothing happened,
Clicked again, nothing happened.
Then I clicked the “See plans now” and got linked to a process for taking a peek at plans.
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In tech terms, the hyperlink “hotspot” is wrong … either the apparent link where I originally clicked should be removed … or a single hotspot should extend over the entire “See plans” wording.
OK, I concede that this is a minor glitch.
But, it’s like the drill sergeant checking the back of shoes during inspections – figuring that if the backs are polished, so are the fronts.
Makes me wonder: Is anybody really testing this stuff?
I warn students: Make sure that the first slide in your pitch is error free – no typos, no arithmetic errors, etc. – otherwise, your credibility gets tarnished right out of the blocks.
That applies to web site landing pages, too.
I wonder how many folks will click like I did and conclude that they still can’t shop plans without registering?
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Update
Apparently the glitch was fixed overnite … there is a revised landing page this morning.
Which raises another question: how will site returnees react when the sit looks different each time they visit?
Gotta cause some folks some angst re: security issues.
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Posted in HealthCare.gov, ObamACA, ObamaCare, Web Site Design | Leave a Comment »
November 29, 2013
Gone viral on the net …
Thanks to KZ for feeding the lead
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Posted in Bumper stickers, Wealth redistribution, Work Ethic | 1 Comment »
November 28, 2013
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November 27, 2013
Man, even I want to stop dwelling on ObamaCare (or as I like to call it, ObamACA™ )
But , it’s a gift to bloggers that keeps on giving … and, this is BIG !
Last Saturday, the NY Times published an argument defining article titled; Don’t Dare Call the Health Law ‘Redistribution’
I assumed that it would be a typical NYT pro-Obama pitch about how ObamaCare wasn’t a redistribution of wealth … that it was simply a well-intended effort to improve the wasn’t a redistribution of wealth … that it was simply a well-intended effort to improve the health care system by providing universal insurance coverage.
To the contrary.
The article put in black & white the “truth” that, at it’s core, ObamaCare is a wealth distribution scheme with both winners and losers.
OMG, they said it.
Not “like it, keep it with lower premiums” but “winners & losers”
Here are the killer quotes ….
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November 26, 2013
After a couple of years of his saying that he liked the name ObamaCare … since he’s Obama and he cares … the President has indicated that he thinks that ObamaCare –– which is now being lumped with brands like Edsel and New Coke – needs to be rebranded and remarketed.
As a recovering marketer who is always willing to lend a hand, here’s my re-branding nomination:
Pronounced “Obama – ka.”
A clever twist, right?
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P.S. Note the trademark TM above my nominated brand name … I’m hereby establishing what the IP attorneys call a “first use” to claim the rights to the name.
Maybe I can make some dough off this mess … to help defray my new, higher health insurance premiums.
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Posted in intellectual Property, ObamACA, ObamaCare, Trademarks | 1 Comment »
November 26, 2013
Seriously, here’s the link to a Senate prepared graphic of the ObamaCare organization structure and processes … and a summary listing of the bill’s key provisions.
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Take a quick glance at the flowchart and ask yourself: ”Think this will work?”
The bill’s laundry list special interest provisions caught my eye …
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November 25, 2013
One of the ballyhooed ObamaCare features is the end of lifetime caps on payouts.
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While the provision has obvious benefits for folks who encounter humongous medical bills, it strikes me as having a scary semblance to the “insurance” that AIG and others were selling against mortgage-backed securities and their derivatives.
Let me explain …
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November 22, 2013
Well, nothing much since Match.com reportedly works. … at least for some people.
But, below is a clever analogy.
Everybody knows that the Administration reported that slightly over 100,000 people signed up for ObamaCare via the infamous exchanges in October.
But, not everybody is aware that those numbers may be a bit inflated.
Megan McArdle, writing in Bloomberg, nailed it:
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November 22, 2013
“Does your health plan give you access to INOVA’s 4,000 physicians and 5 of the best hospitals in the region?”
That’s the question posed in the mailing I got yesterday …. with a specific reference to the “health plan exchanges” and a strong recommendation to “check your plans” to keep your doctors since “You deserve choices, You deserve the best”.
English translation: “You might be be able to keep your doctor either. Period.”
I expected “narrow networks” to be the next wave of ObamaCare angst, … but, I expected it to build slowly as folks discovered that their doctors aren’t participating in the new & improved ObamaCare-compliant plans.
Apparently, some docs are taking the cut in reimbursement rates personally.
Surprise, surprise, surprise.
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November 21, 2013
Yesterday’s post recapped articles from the NYT and WSJ that made a common, largely unrecognized point:
The expansion of “free” and near-free healthcare to approximately 15 million currently uninsureds (out of about 45 million uninsured citizens) is – to a large extent – being funded by the working middle class.
Case in point: the net insurance premiums paid after subsidies on the Obama Exchanges.
Using the Kaiser Foundation subsidy calculator , I picked off the net premiums for single, non-smoking 25 year olds across a range of incomes … and calculated the net premium as a percentage of income.
Here are the fundamental takeaways …
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November 20, 2013
I don’t often cite the NYT … here’s an exception.
click to read article
One of the best recaps of the ObamaCare issues with some emphasis on the redistributive effect … not from rich to poor … but from the working middle class to the poor.
My opinion: The web site was the detonating device … the crush of the middle class – in the labor & insurance markets — is the bomb that’s about to go off as folks realize the implications of the law.
As the WSJ puts it today:
Americans are beginning to understand that the essence of the Affordable Care Act is that millions of people are being conscripted to buy overpriced insurance they would never choose for themselves in order to afford Mr. Obama monies to spend on the poor and those who are medically uninsurable due to pre-existing conditions.
The ObamaCare exchanges (will likely) devolve into refuges for those who are medically uninsurable.
Having assumed the job of subsidizing these people, the federal government should do so honestly and openly and efficiently.
Redistribution is a popular idea as long as you’re filthy rich … or when it’s somebody else’s money being redistributed.
When it’s your money, it loses some of its sheen … especially if you’re living paycheck-to-paycheck with little money to redistribute.
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November 20, 2013
According to the Washington Post, the Obama administration brought in McKinsey to independently assess how the federal online health insurance enrollment system was developing.
And, McKinsey nailed it, “issuing a clear warning that the Oct. 1 launch was fraught with risks.”
This risk assessment was delivered to senior White House and Department of Health and Human Services officials in four briefings between March 28 and April 8.
“But with many of the project’s shortcomings now glaringly obvious, the report appears prescient in many respects”
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November 19, 2013
A couple of numbers have gotten a lot of press coverage in the past couple of days …
The 2014 target enrollment for the Exchanges … 7 million.
The number of cancelled individual policies … 5 million.
The latter (5 million) is referred to by administration spokespeople as a “small sliver”.
The former (7 million) is generally positioned as a big, potentially unreachable number.
Gee, are 5 million and 7 million really that different?
Got me thinking and drove me to the official CBO estimates to do some digging re: ObamaCare numbers.
A couple of interesting points from the chart …
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November 18, 2013
A couple of numbers have gotten a lot of press coverage in the past couple of days …
The 2014 target enrollment for the Exchanges … 7 million.
The number of cancelled individual policies … 5 million.
The latter (5 million) is referred to by administration spokespeople as a “small sliver”.
The former (7 million) is generally positioned by pundits as a big, potentially unreachable number that could sink ObamACare
Gee, are 5 million and 7 million really that different?
Got me thinking and drove me to the official CBO estimates to do some digging re: ObamaCare numbers.
Let’s highlight a couple of the numbers …
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November 15, 2013
A couple of killer quotes from today’s WSJ editorial …
More and more it seems obvious that the vast majority of the politicians who pushed the bill in the House and Senate never read it.
They didn’t know what was in it.
They had no idea.
They don’t understand insurance.
They’re in politics, a branch of showbiz.
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Some of them would have tried to read it, but it was 2,000 pages of impenetrable paragraphs — real word-clots, word-slabs — accompanied by long lines of swimming numbers.
Comprehensive bills are never comprehensible ones — they are meant to lack clarity.
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You can sort of think you know what you’re saying when you say things like, “When each local exchange module launches it will reflect a national weighting of ‘invincibles’ and ‘ancients’ that will stabilize prevailing market realities while providing broader access not only to the poor but to those who currently have non-grandfathered or insufficient plans. So in the end it’s win-win for everyone.”
Say, what?
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Most of them had no idea what they were voting for.
They’re as surprised as anybody at what’s happened.
And it’s not only because so many of them are idiots.
They believed what they were told
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November 15, 2013
Yesterday, the stock market soared to a new high, again.
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Why, given a sluggish economy and DC disarray, is the stock market still moving higher??
Easy.
Let’s start by taking a stroll down memory lane ….
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Posted in Finance & investing, Financial Models, Ken - Misc., Stock Market, Supply of Money & Common Stock Prices | 1 Comment »
November 14, 2013
Conventional wisdom, summarized by the WSJ, is that”ObamaCare’s financing won’t work unless “young healthies” … pay through the nose for coverage … via the individual mandate.”
The Obama administration estimates that 2.7 million people between the ages of 18 and 30 need to buy health insurance through the federal and state marketplaces to offset the health care needs of older, less healthy Americans.
The 18-26 age group is the lowest user of care.
For example, the average male sees a physician only six times between the ages of 21 and 35.
But, ObamaCare now limits insurers to charging the sickest seniors no more than three times the amount they charge their youngest customers.
Since an average 64-year-old uses six times as much health care as 19-year-olds, young healthy enrollees have to pay considerably more than the cost of their own care.
So, the Administration is pulling out all stops to get young healthies enrolled.
But, there are some flies in the ObamaCare ointment …
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November 13, 2013
Here in the U.S., we just whine about high prices.
Not so in Venezuela.
According to USA Today, the Venezuelan government cracked down on soaring inflation by sending troops into appliance stores to slash prices.
Venezuelan bargain-hunters rushed Daka — an electronics chain similar to BestBuy –after the socialist government ordered a military “occupation” of the company’s five stores to force the company to charge customers “fair” prices.
Things got pretty ugly …
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November 12, 2013
Last week, President Obama said that he is “sorry that some Americans are losing their current health insurance plans as a result of the Affordable Care Act”, despite his promise that no one would have to give up a health plan they liked.
His supporters say: “See, he’s stepping up to his false assurances”.
His detractors say: “He’s saying he’s sorry to see people in that situation, but doesn’t fess up to his oft-repeated mis-direction that everybody can keep their doctors and health insurance plans if they like them.”
Pick your side on that one.
I just want to use Obama’s declaration as a philosophical launching point for what makes a good apology.
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A couple of months ago, I posted some research that proved it’s good business for companies to apologize to customers they’ve wronged — that an apology goes way further than, say, a discount on the next purchase.
I also made a passing reference to how important apologies are in personal life, too.
Following the links in the original article, I stumbled on these “8 simple principles” for making a meaningful apology …
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November 11, 2013
No, that’s not me in the picture … at least not the top one.
I was interviewed by Adweek … asked to comment on 2 ads for Craftsman tools … one ad from the 1970s, another from current day.
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A clip from the current ad is above … below is a snap from the old ad.
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Among my classic Homa-isms nailed in the article were…
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November 8, 2013
Loyal readers know that I’m no fan of ObamaCare.
That said, here’s a field report that even I find laughably far-fetched.
My wife went shopping at Costco and decided to price check our dogs’ meds.
Here’s what she discovered …
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November 7, 2013
The common wisdom is that the ObamaCare insurance exchange needs healthy young people to subsidize the older, less healthy enrollees … otherwise, policies offered on the exchanges will go into a premiums’ death spiral.
I’m not so sure.
Here’s my thinking …
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Posted in Adverse selection, ObamaCare | 2 Comments »
November 6, 2013
According to the Gallup Daily tracking poll, the President’s approval rating has dropped below 40%.
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Here’s the demographic drill down …
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Posted in Obama, Obama - Promises Made & Kept, ObamaCare, Polls & Surveys | 1 Comment »
November 5, 2013
Something caught my eye, buried deep in the weeds of the chatter re: the ObamaCare web site fiasco.
Forbes had an early-on article theorizing that a major cause of the web site problems was the Feds insistance that folks shouldn’t see potentially shocking list prices, but rather should input a lot of their private data so that they can be flashed a net price – after government subsidies.
That’s old news … and, you can believe it or not.
Here’s the passage that got me thinking:
The core problem stems from “the slate of registration systems [that] intersect with Oracle Identity Manager, a software component embedded in a government identity-checking system.”
The main Healthcare.gov web page collects information using CGI Group technology.
Then that data is transferred to a system built by Quailty Software Services.
QSS then sends data to Experian, the credit-history firm.
Hmmm
Experian – one the 3 major credit bureaus.
Why get a private sector credit bureau involved?
At first, I thought the Feds might have stumbled on a borderline brilliant idea …
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November 4, 2013
Have you ever really looked at the EOB (“Explanation of Benefits”) that you’ve gotten from your health insurance company after getting medical care?
I hadn’t … just threw the letters into the file … or wastebasket.
But, the ObamaCare launch has heightened my interest … and recently, unfortunately, I’ve been able to gather some personal empirical data points.
Here’s the first part of my story …
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November 3, 2013
If you thought you had a bad week … scroll down.
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November 1, 2013
Feds say that “economy continues to recover … as indicated in the drop in the unemployment rate to 7.2%”.
Hmmm.
Great chart from Wall Street Daily:
Conclusion: Apparent improvements in the unemployment rate continue to be mostly a reflection of a declining labor force participation rate … more and more folks dropping out of the labor force and staying home.
Frustrated by dim jobs’ prospects or satisfied with the government safety net programs .. or both?
Draw you own conclusion.
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Posted in Employment - Jobs, Labor force participation rate (LFPR), Unemployment | 2 Comments »
November 1, 2013
Even Jon Stewart was flabbergasted when HHS Sebelius said she didn’t know how many people had enrolled on the ObamaCare exchanges.
Zillions of site hits, but no idea how many orders were placed.
Sounded fishy to just about everybody, right?
Any online marketing program – and, no doubt about it, this is a marketing program — tracks orders by the minute, hour, day, week, month, campaign duration.
Now, CBS reports that HHS has been getting real-time reporting … and a daily dashboard that includes, well, enrollments.
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So, why would Sebelius and the CMS head lie about not knowing the numbers?
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October 31, 2013
I guess that since it’s Halloween, Rasmussen felt obligated to put that question to a broad sample of Americans.
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37% said that gov’t workers would outperform zombies.
Blacks are more than twice as likely as whites and other minority Americans to believe the government workers would do a better job than zombies.
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37% said that zombies would outperform gov’t workers … a tie.
Men are more likely than women to think zombies would do a better job running the country.
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26% called it a “push”.
Happy Halloween !
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Tags: Halloween
Posted in Government Employees, Polls & Surveys, Zombies | Leave a Comment »
October 31, 2013
The government shutdown was jolting to Congressional (and GOP) already low ratings.
Pundits were projecting a big positive bump for the President.
That was an eternity ago.
You know, a couple of weeks.
Then the spotlight turned to the ObamaCare fiascos … the web site mess and the loss of Obama-guaranteed health insurance policies.
Worm turned.
Latest NBC-WSJ poll reports an all-time low Presidential approval rating of 42% … down 5 percentage points from earlier in the month … and. down 10 percentage points from January.
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What’s driving the drop?
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October 30, 2013
Flashback to February 2008 …
To counter Hillary’s snark that he was all words and no substance – Candidate Obama gave a moving speech re: how much words matter.
The punch line:
“I’m running for president of the United States of America … because the American people want to believe in change again. Don’t tell me
words don’t matter!” Transcript
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So, why would I bring that up today?
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Tags: Don't tell me that words don't matter, words matter
Posted in Obama, Obama - Promises Made & Kept, ObamaCare | 3 Comments »
October 30, 2013
Let me be very specific …
Yesterday, Marilyn Tavenner — head of CMS (Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services), responsible for “systems integration” for Healthcare.gov and other ObamaCare applications – said flat out:
“The system working albeit slower and less accurately than hoped.” CNN
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Hmmm.
First reaction, except for speed and accuracy … what is there?
Teased, I couldn’t resist temptation.
So, I broke down and went to Healthcare.gov.
Here’s what I got …
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Tags: CMS, Healthcare.gov
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October 29, 2013
“I learned about it the same way you did … in the newspapers.”
Say, what?
The list of the President’s “news to me, too” is growing: Fast & Furious, IRS targeting, ObamaCare system snafus, NSA spying, Healthcare Insurance cancellations, etc.
It’s reached the point that even hardcore supporter Jon Stewart is asking: “What exactly does he know?”
Here’s a Stewart skit explaining how President Obama is kept out of the loop regarding spying and health care.
click to view
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The routine would be funnier if this stuff wasn’t such serious business.
MUST READ: The WSJ’s recap of what Obama has claimed ignorance of … The Unbearable Lightness of Obama
The president didn’t know the NSA was spying on world leaders, but he’s found time for at least 146 rounds of golf.
Call Mr. Obama’s style indifferent, aloof or irresponsible, but a president who governs like this reaps the whirlwind—if not for himself, then for his country.
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Posted in NSA - Spying, Obama, ObamaCare | 1 Comment »
October 29, 2013
During the 2010 State-of-the Union address, Rep. Joe Wilson of SC shouted “You lie” when Pres. Obama was going through a list of what ObamaCare would and would not do.
First, let’s all agree that Wilson’s outburst was completely inappropriate for the venue.
That said, how does the substance of his shout out stack up?
Let’s start with a softball and then advance the story …
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Tags: Rep. Joe Wilson
Posted in Obama - Promises Made & Kept, ObamaCare | 1 Comment »
October 28, 2013
Everybody knows that Amazon’s free shipping program has been a resounding success.
So much so. that the company has announced that it will be moving the minimum qualifying order up from $25 to $35 … inducing shoppers to fill their carts fuller or switch to the highly profitable Amazon Prime program.
The free shipping program’s success was highly predictable based an an apparently inadvertent “matched market test” that Amazon did.
Early-on, Amazon launched free shipping on $25 orders in the U.S. and sales skyrocketed.
In the UK, Amazon launched “nominal shipping” (think, 99 cents) for orders totaling the equivalent of $25.
Sales increased … but only by a fraction of the U.S. sales gain.
Proof-positive of the “power of free” … and evidence an equally important dynamic: there’s a big difference between “free” and “almost free” … when you slip a price on something – even a small one, people recoil.
Now, what’s the link to ObamaCare?
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October 28, 2013
Loyal readers know that I really like Peggy Noonan.
Even when I disagree with her views, I enjoy her writing.
Noonan was a strong 2008 Obama supporter … not so much any more.
She wrote a really good editorial re: ObamaCare in last Friday’s WSJ.
Worth reading in its entirety … here are a couple of snippets …
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Posted in Noonan, Peggy, ObamaCare | 2 Comments »
October 25, 2013
The bruhaha re: the ObamaCare systems implosion overshadowed the belated September jobs report.
To get you up to date …
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Nonfarm employment increased by 148,000 in September … analysts were expecting 180,000 … which is about the average for the past 12 months.
Source
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Importantly, jobs are being added disproportionately in services (think hotels & fast-food places) … not in manufacturing.
Source
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And, there’s more to the story …
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Posted in Employment - Jobs, Labor force participation rate (LFPR), Unemployment | 1 Comment »
October 24, 2013
First, for all of you youngsters, some background …
The “Mariel boatlift” was a mass emigration of Cubans who departed from Cuba’s Mariel Harbor for the United States in 1980.
The Mariel boatlift was precipitated by a sharp downturn in the Cuban economy which led to thousands of Cubans badgering the government to allow them to leave and seek asylum in the U.S.
Previously, the Communist government maintained closed borders – in and out. Citizens weren’t allowed to leave. Think, Berlin Wall.
Then, suddenly, the Cuban government announced that anyone who wanted to leave could do so, and an exodus by boat started shortly afterward.
At first, President Carter – reading the move as a humanitarian gesture – opened the U.S. borders to the emigrating Cubans.
Then, Fidel Castro seized the opportunity to load the boats with convicted felons from Cuban jails and patients from Cuban mental health facilities.
When Carter caught on, the Mariel boatlift was ended.
By that point, as many as 125,000 Cubans had made the journey to Florida.
Estimates vary widely re: what portion of the the exiles who made it to U.S. shores were hardcore criminals and very unhealthy patients.
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What’s the Mariel boatlift got to do with ObamaCare?
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Tags: Mariel Boatlift
Posted in ObamaCare | 1 Comment »
October 23, 2013
Noticed a couple of articles re: Amtrak’s record-breaking ridership …
Reportedly, Amtrak broke a number of records in fiscal 2013
In fiscal 2013, Amtrak hauled 31.6 million butts … forking out $2.1 billion in ticket revenue
More than a third of traffic was along the Northeast Corridor, between Washington, NYC and Boston.
- New York’s Penn Station was the busiest, with 9.6 million passengers.
- Washington’s Union Station was the second busiest station, with 5 million passengers.
- Philadelphia’s 30th Street Station was number three, with 4.1 million passengers.
So, who’s riding Amtrak, and how much are you paying paying for their rides?
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Posted in Amtrak, Trains - rail, Transportation, Travel & Entertainment | 2 Comments »
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