Dem predicts Rep takeover
Bits ‘n Pieces
By Bob Robinson
Oct. 10, 2010
In this issue…
Feds help create jobs in China
Millionaires get unemployment benefits
Dem pollster says Reps will take November
From Newsmax…
Federal Light Bulb Ban Creating Jobs in China
A federal law banning ordinary incandescent light bulbs has already had a negative effect on the American economy — GE has closed its last major bulb producing factory in the United States, creating job opportunities in China.
Legislation enacted in 2007 orders the phase-out of incandescent light bulbs beginning with the 100-watt bulb in 2012 and ending with the 40-watt light in 2014. These bulbs cannot meet efficiency requirements dictated by law.
Compact fluorescent lights (CFLs) are the least expensive alternative. But the manufacture of CFLs is “labor intensive and too expensive to be done at U.S. wage rates,” according to a report from The Heartland Institute, which estimates that domestically produced CFLs would be 50 percent more expensive than bulbs manufactured in China.
So instead of retrofitting its plant in Winchester, Va., to produce CFLs, GE closed the plant in September and laid off 200 workers.
CFLs are already being manufactured in China, and increasing American demand will no doubt create new jobs there.
As the Insider Report disclosed earlier, while CFLs use about 75 percent less energy than incandescent bulbs and last far longer, they cost significantly more, take longer to turn on, can flicker, and contain small amounts of highly toxic mercury, which creates problems for users when they break or need to be disposed of after they burn out.
“Environmental activists and their allies in Washington were either too ignorant of basic economics to see these job losses coming, or they were simply too callous to really care,” said Heartland Institute science director Jay Lehr.
“Either way, compact fluorescent light bulbs in the real world fail to live up to environmental promises, unnecessarily subject American households to toxic mercury, produce poor-quality light, and are sending American workers to the unemployment line.”
And Sam Kazman, general counsel for the Competitive Enterprise Institute, said: “If the new energy-saving technologies being pushed by government are really that good, then we don’t need government to mandate them. And if they are being mandated, that’s a sure sign that they’re not very good.”
Three Republican members of Congress - Joe Barton, Marsha Blackburn and Michael Burgess - have introduced a bill that would repeal the ban on the incandescent bulb.
The three said in an article on The Daily Caller: “The unanticipated consequence of the ’07 act - layoffs in the middle of a desperate recession - is what sometimes happens when politicians think they know better than consumers and workers.”
From Newsmax…
3,000 Millionaires Get Unemployment Benefits
With the economy plunging into recession in 2008, nearly 3,000 American millionaires collected jobless benefits that year, according to Internal Revenue Service data.
The IRS said 2,840 households reporting at least $1 million in income in 2008 collected a total of $18.6 million in unemployment benefits. Of those households, 806 had incomes over $2 million and 17 had incomes over $10 million.
“It’s a larger number than I would have expected, but people at any income level can lose their jobs,” Alan Viard, resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, told Bloomberg.com.
In addition, 8,011 households reporting income between $500,000 and $1 million claimed jobless benefits totaling $52.8 million in 2008. No IRS numbers are available yet for 2009.
Unemployment benefits are insurance, so the program is not need-based and anyone who loses a job is entitled to compensation.
A year earlier, 2007, “so few millionaires collected jobless benefits that the IRS said it refused to publish the data for fear their identities could be detected in violation of confidentiality laws,” Bloomberg reported.
Overall, 9.5 million taxpayers received $43.7 billion in jobless benefits in 2008.
The federal government has helped pay unemployment benefits beyond the 26 weeks paid for by the states, but federal aid is scheduled to expire in November.
From Newsmax…
Democratic Pollster: GOP Poised to Seize House and Senate
Republicans are on the brink of pulling off a landslide "of potentially epic proportions" that would bring them control of both Houses of Congress and a majority of governorships, Democratic pollster and Fox News commentator Douglas Schoen says.
In an exclusive Newsmax interview, Schoen says he now sees several indications that matters are going from bad to worse for Democrats in this election cycle.
He points to a RealClearPolitics.com analysis that now shows Republicans picking up a net gain of nine seats in the Senate, which would deadlock the upper chamber 50 to 50. And polls show several other GOP candidates, including Carly Fiorina in California and Dino Rossi in Washington state, remain within striking distance, he says.
Read the full story at…
http://www.newsmax.com/Headline/gop-polls-lead-democrats/2010/10/08/id/373121?s=al&promo_code=AF37-1
Have a great day and feel safe and secure. Big Brother watches over us.
Watch for more Bits ‘n Pieces as they occur. Good stuff? Bad stuff? You decide.
Bob Robinson is the retired editor of The Daily Advocate, Greenville, Ohio. If you wish to receive notification of his comments, opinions and reports when they are posted, send your email address to: opinionsbybob@gmail.com. Feel free to express your views.
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