The US dollar's value internationally has continued its long downward slide, with the dollar hitting a new low versus the Euro and the Canadian dollar reaching parity ($1US=$1CA) with the dollar. Scroll to the bottom of the Kitco site and you will find currency charts indicating the relative value of a dollar.
What does this mean? Imports will gradually become more expensive and American exports should gradually decline in price - if you assume that the dollar falls evenly against all currencies. This helps certain locales, much like my hometown of Rouses Point, as it enables Canadian consumers to come to the US and spend Canadian dollars at no discount against American dollars. I remember a time when there were sign posting specials to Canadian customers - the Canadian dollar would be accepted at a 35% discount instead of the 39% market rate.
Of course, the Chinese government has still not allowed the yuan to float freely against the dollar; the yuan remains roughly equal to 13 cents. But who needs fair trade when you're hamstrung by a giant country with a dictatorial streak and nuclear weapons?
That's what I thought.
-rl
September 20, 2007
September 19, 2007
Reports of my demise were unsubstantiated...
Wow, that was an extended absence from the blogosphere, but I'm back and ready to roll.
Georgia is home to 24 of the fastest growing counties in the United States, mostly counties in the northern half of the state.
From Georgia Public Radio:
I wonder how the halfbacks are feeling after the heat of this past August...
I've added a link to the UGA Hillel blog.
Not much else for the time being.
-rl
Georgia is home to 24 of the fastest growing counties in the United States, mostly counties in the northern half of the state.
From Georgia Public Radio:
Blue Ridge Mountains Growing Fast
September 19, 2007 - 3:15 PM
By Ashley Horn - Rome, GA
Georgia has 24 of the nation’s fastest growing counties, the majority in North Georgia near the Blue Ridge Mountains.
Fannin County in the heart of the Blue Ridge Mountains has grown the most. This is mainly because of so-called "half-backs," or Northerners who moved south to Florida and are purchasing a second home half way back.
Kristen Gunia is Fannin County Director of Development. Gunia, who is from the North, said that living in the Blue Ridge Mountains is a geographical compromise between North and South.
“We are a fairly moderate climate all year round, in the 60’s and 70’s. We do have some snow but very little and so its kind of an ideal midpoint location where they can get out of the heat but not have to go back to the snows and some of those things either,” Gunia said.
Most owners don’t live in Fannin county full time, so there is plenty of time for the economy to adjust to the growth, said Gunia.
I wonder how the halfbacks are feeling after the heat of this past August...
I've added a link to the UGA Hillel blog.
Not much else for the time being.
-rl
August 28, 2007
Interesting stats
In case you haven't noticed, it's been a scorcher of a month down here in Athens. We had several streaks of 100+ degree highs and dryness that would make the Sahara go "you camel-drivers are dry!"
I'm not generally one to get on my global warming horse in a public setting, but when you look at August (and the rest of the year, for that matter), you might begin to wonder...
13 of 26 recorded days (so far) with temperatures at or above 100 degrees.
Record highs set on 9 separate occasions, with a streak of 5 consecutive record-setting highs.
3 days where the average temperature for the day did not go below 90 degrees.
21 of 26 days days where the low temperature did not go below 70 degrees.
The average monthly high temperature to date: 99.6 degrees.
The average daily mean temperature to date: 86.3 degrees.
No measurable rainfall recorded until August 16.
Less than 1 inch total rainfall record in the whole month until August 26.
Stats retrieved from: NOAA
That and winter existed for the total of a day, not that I'd expect it to be around much longer down here, the point remains... this year has been warm, to say the least. Last year was warm in Ohio, especially when the A/C was down in the Learn and Earn office.
Who I am to say, though. W would tell me that I'm no climatologist and that I have no scientific credibility and he'd be right. But I do notice patterns and the pattern is that it's hot, hotter than I remember growing up, oh so not-that-long ago. So maybe that's something to notice.
But I'm no climatologist.
-rl
I'm not generally one to get on my global warming horse in a public setting, but when you look at August (and the rest of the year, for that matter), you might begin to wonder...
13 of 26 recorded days (so far) with temperatures at or above 100 degrees.
Record highs set on 9 separate occasions, with a streak of 5 consecutive record-setting highs.
3 days where the average temperature for the day did not go below 90 degrees.
21 of 26 days days where the low temperature did not go below 70 degrees.
The average monthly high temperature to date: 99.6 degrees.
The average daily mean temperature to date: 86.3 degrees.
No measurable rainfall recorded until August 16.
Less than 1 inch total rainfall record in the whole month until August 26.
Stats retrieved from: NOAA
That and winter existed for the total of a day, not that I'd expect it to be around much longer down here, the point remains... this year has been warm, to say the least. Last year was warm in Ohio, especially when the A/C was down in the Learn and Earn office.
Who I am to say, though. W would tell me that I'm no climatologist and that I have no scientific credibility and he'd be right. But I do notice patterns and the pattern is that it's hot, hotter than I remember growing up, oh so not-that-long ago. So maybe that's something to notice.
But I'm no climatologist.
-rl
August 11, 2007
July 29, 2007
Learn and Earn: A post-mortem on that adventure
Today is the one-year anniversary of my termination from Ohio Learn and Earn. I'm pretty sure that the non-disclosure period has expired. When I was terminated from the Learn and Earn campaign for this post I was required, along with the other 2 office managers, to sign a non-disclosure agreement and as I've said, I believe the non-disclosure period has lapsed.
With that said, it's time for news from the office, and I mean beyond how our toilets were usually brimming with feces and urine, how soap was never available, how I paid a worker $300 out of my pocket because the company wouldn't, and how many unscrupulous people we employed.
Working for Ohio Learn and Earn was one of the most stressful periods of my still young life. From the time I began office work until the point of my termination, I put in 100-hour work weeks, frequently not arriving home until 1-2 AM after having arrived there at 8AM, seven days a week. I find myself torn between hating it and not hating it: I surfed the internet freely for hours on end, fell asleep in the office on a couple occasions, read a lot, but at the cost of nearly losing my girlfriend and my best friend. We hired any schmuck off the street, registering them to vote, making sure they had a driver's license and a social security number. I filled out their I9s and W4s, made them sign on the dotted line, and passed the information along to campaign HQ in Columbus. Interviews were cursory: Could you walk up to people and make sure that they were registered to vote and make them sign a petition? Are you an American citizen? A resident of the state of Ohio? If you can answer yes to all three of these questions, you can work for Ohio Learn and Earn.
My employment began in May of 2006, around the time I should have graduated from BW, at the Cleveland office, located on St. Clair Ave. just outside of downtown. I help my boss, MVS, open up the office. My position was of a team leader, getting paid $15/hr to oversee people petitioning and petitioning myself. Every day for roughly 3 weeks I would drive from Munroe Falls to Cleveland to carry around my clipboard, ask for signatures, and coordinate our groups. Given how I wasn't terribly proficient at gathering signatures, my time with the Learn and Earn campaign nearly came to an early end and maybe that would have been for the best.
But I took a transfer to the Akron office, at that time located on Exchange Street. The first day in Akron took me to Youngstown - and I now gather that's where it should have ended. We sent people from the Akron office all over the Southeastern tier of the state, from Youngstown to Cadiz, in addition to local places like Fairlawn and Highland Square. My new boss, AC, seemed to take to me much more than MVS. A position in admin opened soon after I arrived - and the place was a wreck. The office holder prior to me had records everywhere and people weren't getting paid.
People, working for a campaign that was supposed to espouse "progressive" values, managed to not get paid. I went down to Columbus for one weekend to sift through all of the files from the office and compare them against records at headquarters. Slowly people managed to get paid, but some sores still laid open. After three weeks of one petitioner - who had quit - not being paid, after every angry phone call received and pleading phone call made to correct the error, after every "the check is in the mail" response I got on this woman's behalf, I took $300 of my own money and paid her for the hours she had worked in the pay cycle. An employee, who I will only ID as Steve, had similar issues. Entire days were missing out of his payroll when there was documented proof of his working. On my last day Steve told me not to worry about them and that he was hiring a lawyer. On multiple occasions, AC was forced to call the police and have them resolve issues with angry employees. These people were angry.
Rightfully so.
I was angry for them.
Following a comment I had left on Plunderbund, officials at Ohio Learn and Earn followed a link to this blog and found the previously mentioned post. I didn't try too hard to justify them keeping me, by that time I was too exhausted to have any fight. I accepted being terminated and on the last day, signed the non-disclosure agreement. I packed up all of my personal office supplies into the back of the car and I left Ohio Learn and Earn not wanting to deal with politics for a long time, at the very least.
I got a call immediately after the election from a coworker, JD. He had continued working in the Akron office after petitioning had been completed and did actual campaign work for Ohio Learn and Earn as an internship w/ U of A. He appeared on a Cleveland-area news channel to inform the burden of Learn and Earn: campaigners had not been paid after the election, the office was closed up, and a sign... that the check was in the mail.
Such was Learn and Earn.
The check's in the mail.
-rl
With that said, it's time for news from the office, and I mean beyond how our toilets were usually brimming with feces and urine, how soap was never available, how I paid a worker $300 out of my pocket because the company wouldn't, and how many unscrupulous people we employed.
Working for Ohio Learn and Earn was one of the most stressful periods of my still young life. From the time I began office work until the point of my termination, I put in 100-hour work weeks, frequently not arriving home until 1-2 AM after having arrived there at 8AM, seven days a week. I find myself torn between hating it and not hating it: I surfed the internet freely for hours on end, fell asleep in the office on a couple occasions, read a lot, but at the cost of nearly losing my girlfriend and my best friend. We hired any schmuck off the street, registering them to vote, making sure they had a driver's license and a social security number. I filled out their I9s and W4s, made them sign on the dotted line, and passed the information along to campaign HQ in Columbus. Interviews were cursory: Could you walk up to people and make sure that they were registered to vote and make them sign a petition? Are you an American citizen? A resident of the state of Ohio? If you can answer yes to all three of these questions, you can work for Ohio Learn and Earn.
My employment began in May of 2006, around the time I should have graduated from BW, at the Cleveland office, located on St. Clair Ave. just outside of downtown. I help my boss, MVS, open up the office. My position was of a team leader, getting paid $15/hr to oversee people petitioning and petitioning myself. Every day for roughly 3 weeks I would drive from Munroe Falls to Cleveland to carry around my clipboard, ask for signatures, and coordinate our groups. Given how I wasn't terribly proficient at gathering signatures, my time with the Learn and Earn campaign nearly came to an early end and maybe that would have been for the best.
But I took a transfer to the Akron office, at that time located on Exchange Street. The first day in Akron took me to Youngstown - and I now gather that's where it should have ended. We sent people from the Akron office all over the Southeastern tier of the state, from Youngstown to Cadiz, in addition to local places like Fairlawn and Highland Square. My new boss, AC, seemed to take to me much more than MVS. A position in admin opened soon after I arrived - and the place was a wreck. The office holder prior to me had records everywhere and people weren't getting paid.
People, working for a campaign that was supposed to espouse "progressive" values, managed to not get paid. I went down to Columbus for one weekend to sift through all of the files from the office and compare them against records at headquarters. Slowly people managed to get paid, but some sores still laid open. After three weeks of one petitioner - who had quit - not being paid, after every angry phone call received and pleading phone call made to correct the error, after every "the check is in the mail" response I got on this woman's behalf, I took $300 of my own money and paid her for the hours she had worked in the pay cycle. An employee, who I will only ID as Steve, had similar issues. Entire days were missing out of his payroll when there was documented proof of his working. On my last day Steve told me not to worry about them and that he was hiring a lawyer. On multiple occasions, AC was forced to call the police and have them resolve issues with angry employees. These people were angry.
Rightfully so.
I was angry for them.
Following a comment I had left on Plunderbund, officials at Ohio Learn and Earn followed a link to this blog and found the previously mentioned post. I didn't try too hard to justify them keeping me, by that time I was too exhausted to have any fight. I accepted being terminated and on the last day, signed the non-disclosure agreement. I packed up all of my personal office supplies into the back of the car and I left Ohio Learn and Earn not wanting to deal with politics for a long time, at the very least.
I got a call immediately after the election from a coworker, JD. He had continued working in the Akron office after petitioning had been completed and did actual campaign work for Ohio Learn and Earn as an internship w/ U of A. He appeared on a Cleveland-area news channel to inform the burden of Learn and Earn: campaigners had not been paid after the election, the office was closed up, and a sign... that the check was in the mail.
Such was Learn and Earn.
The check's in the mail.
-rl
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