Top Stories

The Michigan Messenger going forward

By Staff Report | 11.16.11

I am writing today to announce the closure of the Michigan Messenger. After four years of operation in Michigan, the board of the American Independent News Network, has decided to shift publication of its news into a single site, The American Independent at Americanindependent.com. This is part of a shift in strategy, towards new forms [...]

Colorado-based abstinence program provided false and misleading information to Michigan students

HIV-AIDS-small
By Todd A. Heywood | 11.16.11

An abstinence-only presentation provided to numerous school districts in Calhoun and Eaton Counties in October of this year provided false and misleading information to students about HIV, experts allege.

Class action lawsuit filed against MERS over unpaid taxes

foreclosure
By Todd A. Heywood | 11.15.11

Two county registers of deeds filed a class action lawsuit Monday on behalf of Michigan’s 83 counties alleging that the Mortgage Electronic Registration Services owes millions of dollars in property title transfer taxes.

Schuette fights important mercury regulations

epa_logo
By Eartha Jane Melzer | 11.14.11

Despite evidence of the impact of mercury on children and public health, Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette last month joined with 24 other state attorneys general in filing a lawsuit to scuttle new EPA regulations that would reduce mercury emissions from power plants.

U.S. House passes another unemployment extension

By Ed Brayton | 12.17.09 | 7:26 am

The U.S. House of Representatives passed a large defense spending bill that included an amendment that would extend federal unemployment insurance benefits even beyond the bill passed a few weeks ago and contains other provisions that may help in this bad economy. The Detroit Free Press reports:

The $636-billion defense bill passed by the House includes several provisions that could help jobless Michiganders, among them a measure that extends from nine to 15 months the period the federal government will pick up 65% of the cost of continuing COBRA health care coverage for the unemployed. It also moves a Dec. 31 deadline for losing your health insurance to qualify for the payments to Feb. 28 of next year.

The legislation also extends enhanced unemployment benefits through the end of February. Last month, Congress approved legislation adding 14 weeks of unemployment benefits for anyone whose other benefits run out by the end of this year but the provision in the defense budget means a person whose benefits run out by Feb. 28, 2010, qualify for the additional coverage – as well as six more weeks in high unemployment states like Michigan.

The Senate should take up this bill in the next couple weeks. There is also talk of a much longer six-month unemployment extension being passed later this year.

Comments

  • Pete_Murphy

    Unemployment, both in the U.S. and the world as a whole, marches ever higher because the field of economics doesn't account for the relationship between population density and per capita consumption.

    Following the beating the field of economics took over the seeming failure of Malthus' theory, economists adamantly refuse to ever again consider the effects of population growth. If they did, they might come to understand that once an optimum population density is breached, further over-crowding begins to erode per capita consumption and, consequently, per capita employment.

    And these effects of an excessive population density are actually imported when a nation like the U.S. attempts to trade freely with other nations much more densely populated – nations like China, Japan, Germany, Korea and a host of others. The result is an automatic trade deficit and loss of jobs – tantamount to economic suicide.

    Using 2006 data, an in-depth analysis reveals that, of our top twenty per capita trade deficits in manufactured goods (the trade deficit divided by the population of the country in question), eighteen are with nations much more densely populated than our own. Even more revealing, if the nations of the world are divided equally around the median population density, the U.S. had a trade surplus in manufactured goods of $17 billion with the half of nations below the median population density. With the half above the median, we had a $480 billion deficit!

    If you‘re interested in learning more about this important new economic theory, then I invite you to visit my web site at http://PeteMurphy.wordpress.com.

    Pete Murphy
    Author, “Five Short Blasts”

  • Pete_Murphy

    Unemployment, both in the U.S. and the world as a whole, marches ever higher because the field of economics doesn't account for the relationship between population density and per capita consumption.

    Following the beating the field of economics took over the seeming failure of Malthus' theory, economists adamantly refuse to ever again consider the effects of population growth. If they did, they might come to understand that once an optimum population density is breached, further over-crowding begins to erode per capita consumption and, consequently, per capita employment.

    And these effects of an excessive population density are actually imported when a nation like the U.S. attempts to trade freely with other nations much more densely populated – nations like China, Japan, Germany, Korea and a host of others. The result is an automatic trade deficit and loss of jobs – tantamount to economic suicide.

    Using 2006 data, an in-depth analysis reveals that, of our top twenty per capita trade deficits in manufactured goods (the trade deficit divided by the population of the country in question), eighteen are with nations much more densely populated than our own. Even more revealing, if the nations of the world are divided equally around the median population density, the U.S. had a trade surplus in manufactured goods of $17 billion with the half of nations below the median population density. With the half above the median, we had a $480 billion deficit!

    If you‘re interested in learning more about this important new economic theory, then I invite you to visit my web site at http://PeteMurphy.wordpress.com.

    Pete Murphy
    Author, “Five Short Blasts”

  • rambo_123

    Every one of us has a dream of owning a HOUSE.We relentlessly work towards this.We all dream of beautiful Home with some space for our picturesque garden.After owning a dream home one should go for a comprehensive homeInsurance to protect oneself.These days of bad Economic conditions/increased unemployment one should take ahome insurance.

Categories & Tags: |