Don’t blame Gen X or the Millennials

From HousingWire:

Think Millennials are stalling the housing market?

For years now, everyone has been blaming the Millennials for stalling the housing recovery because of their reluctance or inability to purchase a home, but it may be the cohort right before them – the generational cuspers, or those born from 1978 to 1982 – who started this trend. This age group now has the lowest homeownership rate in decades. They’re best defined as not quite Gen-X, not really Millennials, but stuck somewhere in between.

Real Estate Economy Watch recently reported on a study conducted by Chris Porter, a senior manager with John Burns Real Estate Consulting. Porter discovered that Americans within the 30-to-34 age range now have the lowest homeownership rate of any similarly aged group that came before them.

Back in 2012, this same group had a 47.9% homeownership rate, which is 6.5 percentage points lower than what those five years older had achieved at the same point.

Oddly enough, it seems this crowd bought homes at a faster clip when they were younger, only to get caught in the subprime crunch. The same study shows this group recorded the highest homeownership rate for those in the 25-to-29 age category back in 2007, before the market crash.

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89 Responses to Don’t blame Gen X or the Millennials

  1. grim says:

    I propose we rename them the “Sucker Generation”

    In other news, it is Case Shiller Day!

  2. grim says:

    The single parent/ Deadbeat dad is all BS. In the republican He11 were I live (aka Northern Bergen County) there are plenty of single parents and deadbeat dads. The difference is the dads still pay the kids tutor bill while banging the trophy wife.

    Re-read the study – you missed the part about a second negative correlation as the % of single parent households in the neighborhood increases. It’s not only that being a single parent child is a disadvantage, it’s that living in a neighborhood with a high number of single parents puts you at a further disadvantage. The link between poverty and single mothers is not a novel concept, in fact, it’s the single greatest predictor of poverty. Some 42.2% of single mothers in 2010 were in poverty (Census Bureau), this is a number that is 3 times higher than the general population, and 4 times higher than married couples. Don’t mistake my position as toting the party line with regards to marriage, I lost my young republican membership card yesterday by saying I was pro-choice and for the distribution of free contraception.

    Secondly – there is clearly a wide difference between a child being born to a young unwed mother (god forbid in High School, which is the equivalent of a death sentence) and a child being part of a single parent household because of divorce, especially when there is sufficient income to pay alimony. A drop out mother with a kid will *NEVER* escape poverty, period. Spare me the cherry picked miracle stories.

    Sorry, but the two income trap has guaranteed that a young single mother will be poor, remain poor, and have a child that starting from such a disadvantaged position that in all likelihood they too will be poor.

    What is mind boggling about the situation is even the most idiotic people should have the capacity to understand this simple premise. Yet, they don’t care.

  3. 1987 Condo says:

    #2…again, this report is spot on. I spent 10 years working in Newark and I saw African American women coming to work each day as the sole support for their family. The talk of a husband or man was rare, and this was in the early 80’s.

    Later, in early 2000’s, while my father suffered Alzheimers, he was in an assisted living in West Orange. The African American women who worked there were useless on the night shift, always sleeping, etc when I checked in..why? Because that was their second 8 hour job that day, probably taking the us each way..they needed to work two jobs, probably each for $40,000 to make it here…I’d assume there were no bed time stories or much involvement in their kids school life, etc…vicious cycle….

  4. Fabius Maximus says:

    #2 grim
    You might as well say the 2nd correlation is the % of kids in rental properties. At the end of the day if the kid is living with Grandma who will beat them with a spoon for skipping school that kid has a chance. Also a big factor is that if the parents can actually understand the homework and have the time to sit down and help their kid, they will do better. The biggest issue today is that teachers teach to the test no more no less.
    And yes the word needs garbage men as well or as I like to put it. http://www.despair.com/potential.html

  5. Ottoman says:

    Wonder why some neighborhoods have so many single parent households? Could it be that Jim Crow is still alive and well in America. Of course forcing poor women to drive hundreds of miles and or spend several nights in a hotel room and take off work to get a legal and safe abortion might matter too.

    African Americans now constitute nearly 1 million of the total 2.3 million incarcerated population

    African Americans are incarcerated at nearly six times the rate of whites

    Together, African American and Hispanics comprised 58% of all prisoners in 2008, even though African Americans and Hispanics make up approximately one quarter of the US population

    According to Unlocking America, if African American and Hispanics were incarcerated at the same rates of whites, today’s prison and jail populations would decline by approximately 50%

    One in six black men had been incarcerated as of 2001. If current trends continue, one in three black males born today can expect to spend time in prison during his lifetime

    Nationwide, African-Americans represent 26% of juvenile arrests, 44% of youth who are detained, 46% of the youth who are judicially waived to criminal court, and 58% of the youth admitted to state prisons (Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice).

    5 times as many Whites are using drugs as African Americans, yet African Americans are sent to prison for drug offenses at 10 times the rate of Whites

    African Americans represent 12% of the total population of drug users, but 38% of those arrested for drug offenses, and 59% of those in state prison for a drug offense.

    African Americans serve virtually as much time in prison for a drug offense (58.7 months) as whites do for a violent offense (61.7 months). (Sentencing Project)

    African Americans represent 12% of monthly drug users, but comprise 32% of persons arrested for drug possession

    In 2002, blacks constituted more than 80% of the people sentenced under the federal crack cocaine laws and served substantially more time in prison for drug offenses than did whites, despite that fact that more than 2/3 of crack cocaine users in the U.S. are white or Hispanic

    http://www.naacp.org/pages/criminal-justice-fact-sheet

  6. grim says:

    At the end of the day if the kid is living with Grandma who will beat them with a spoon for skipping school that kid has a chance.

    Also a pretty damning statement on the moral degradation of the younger demographic. Thank God that Grandma is the only one that has some common sense left. Unfortunate that Grandma is not getting younger, and these demographics aren’t getting any wiser. I attribute this to an almost complete lack of accountability in today’s society. Everyone is a victim, especially the poor.

  7. Brian says:

    6 – Ottoman, you listed all the symptoms of a problem. What do you think is the cause?

  8. grim says:

    If we’re going to have a rational discourse on income equality and economic mobility in America – it can’t be focused on the tax payments of the top 5% of income earners. We need to accept that thousands of Americans, every day, make a conscious decision to become poor and by their own will eliminate any chance at economic mobility they might have.

  9. Essex says:

    “At the end of the game, the king and the pawn go back in the same box.” – Italian proverb

  10. 1987 Condo says:

    #9….your last sentence is so accurate…unfortunately, I don’t think most Americans making that decision really understand that ……they just figure it will work out….

  11. grim says:

    6 – The war on drugs was a failure, and is now more focused on maintaining it’s empire than actually solving a problem. Decriminalization of drug possession, federal legalization of marijuana, these are solutions. Redirect the drug war funds towards education, advertising, and abuse prevention.

    Realize, though, that legalization of marijuana will result in a significant negative impact to the underground economy of urban areas (an aggregate decline in income of approximately $150 billion annually). The poor will become poorer as a result. While these kinds of jobs and the associated incomes do not meet the traditional definitions, they are jobs and income nonetheless, and legalization will eliminate them. The legalized market would benefit a whole different set of individuals.

  12. njescapee says:

    In other news the Denver State Fair will host a joint rolling contest.

  13. AG says:

    Generation X bitchez!

    I say legalize everything. Heard mexico just legalized vigilantes. Now that is even better than the castle law.

  14. grim says:

    13 – The novelty will wear off in a few months.

  15. grim says:

    Just booked a one way ticket to Mexico City – I’m going to form the most bad ass gang of luchador vigilantes the world has ever seen. We’ll be so famous the narcocorridors will be singing about us.

  16. Brian says:

    They are mislabeled by the “big government” types. They are called “vigilantes” by the media but we’d call them militias in the US. We can’t have people taking care of themselves and their communities on their own now can we.

    I say good for them. The government and police forces weren’t able to protect them from the murderous cartels so they took matters into their own hands.

    14.AG says:
    January 28, 2014 at 8:40 am
    Generation X bitchez!

    I say legalize everything. Heard mexico just legalized vigilantes. Now that is even better than the castle law.

  17. WestJester says:

    My daughter is a millennial and wants very much to buy. She does not want to buy a traditional 3-2. She reads Mr Money Moustache, bikes to work, has paid off her student loans and is looking at houses in the midwest under 150k in the state capital where she works. She is not really interested in living in a standard nuclear family setting at present and neither do those of her acquaintances to whom I have spoken.
    Things appear to have changed since I was under 30.

  18. It’s prestigious here. If you can’t pay the freight, move to Indiana.

  19. Only the little people in Montklair have problems with guns, drugs and gangs.

  20. chicagofinance says:
  21. Brian says:

    Mexico legalizes vigilantes, nabs cartel leader

    http://news.yahoo.com/mexico-legalizes-vigilantes-nabs-cartel-leader-001339749.html

    MEXICO CITY (AP) — Mexico essentially legalized the country’s growing “self-defense” groups Monday, while also announcing that security forces had captured one of the four top leaders of the Knights Templar drug cartel, which the vigilante groups have been fighting for the last year.

    The government said it had reached an agreement with vigilante leaders to incorporate the armed civilian groups into old and largely forgotten quasi-military units called the Rural Defense Corps. Vigilante groups estimate their numbers at 20,000 men under arms.

    The twin announcements may help the administration of President Enrique Pena Nieto find a way out of an embarrassing situation in the western state of Michoacan, where vigilantes began rising up last February against the Knights Templar reign of terror and extortion after police and troops failed to stop the abuses.

    “The self-defense forces will become institutionalized, when they are integrated into the Rural Defense Corps,” the Interior Department said in a statement. Police and soldiers already largely tolerate, and in some cases even work with, the vigilantes, many of whom are armed with assault rifles that civilians are not allowed to carry.

    Vigilante leaders will have to submit a list of their members to the Defense Department, and the army will apparently oversee the groups, which the government said “will be temporary.” They will be allowed to keep their weapons as long as they register them with the army.

    The military will give the groups “all the means necessary for communications, operations and movement,” according to the agreement.

    The vigilante leaders, who include farmers, ranchers and some professionals, gathered Monday to discuss the agreement, but it was not yet clear for them what it would imply. It wasn’t known if the army would offer anyone salaries.

    Misael Gonzalez, a leader of the self-defense force in the town of Coalcoman, said leaders had accepted the government proposal. But the nuts-and-bolts “are still not well defined,” he added. “We won’t start working on the mechanisms until tomorrow.”

    Vigilante leader Hipolito Mora said in a television interview that the agreement also allows those who qualify to join local police forces. “The majority of us want to get into the police … I never imagined myself dressed as a policeman, but the situation is driving me to put on a uniform.”

  22. chicagofinance says:

    JJ How did you get this past HR at BOA?
    One boss has surprised his employees by handing out bonuses based on who could drink him under the table.
    An employee surnamed Zhang from Jinhua, Zhejiang Province, China, said that his boss placed a pile of money on the table saying that people would get their bonuses based on how much they drank.
    “Men were given 500 yuan ($82) for a shot of liquor, 200 yuan ($33) for a glass of red wine and 100 yuan for a beer. Women were given twice as much money for consuming the same amounts,” Zhang told the Global Times.
    “We worked hard all year only to learn our bonuses would be decided by our alcohol tolerance. It was absolutely unfair to people who can’t drink much.”
    The boss said that the company’s business success was rooted in employees being able to hold their liquor with clients.
    Many employees became drunk. Mr Zhang said those with high alcohol tolerance could pocket over 10,000 yuan ($16,000, while others had to settle for 1000 yuan ($160).
    “I couldn’t get a bonus if I didn’t drink, but it is bad for one’s health to drink too much. Everyone ended up drinking and some people vomited,” said Mr Zhang, who described the unusual bonus system as “unreasonable and inhumane.”
    Legal experts said there are no laws related to the distribution of year-end bonuses, which is determined at the discretion of employers.

  23. grim says:

    Knights Templar are a drug gang now? My, they’ve come a long way since the Illuminatus Trilogy.

  24. chicagofinance says:

    There are also many people in their mid-30’s that make the conscious decision to lose their job in their 40’s by making themselves eminently whackable to their employer by losing motivation and failing to keep their skills current.

    grim says:
    January 28, 2014 at 8:04 am
    If we’re going to have a rational discourse on income equality and economic mobility in America – it can’t be focused on the tax payments of the top 5% of income earners. We need to accept that thousands of Americans, every day, make a conscious decision to become poor and by their own will eliminate any chance at economic mobility they might have.

  25. grim says:

    She reads Mr Money Moustache

    Sounds filthy.

  26. Gotta go. Time to organize my vigilante gang.

  27. Juice Box says:

    Super Bust for NJ Hotels.

    As of Monday, rooms at the Hilton Meadowlands — less than a mile from the stadium — were still available for $386 a night, taxes included, for a three-night stay, according to its website.

    http://www.nj.com/super-bowl/index.ssf/2014/01/super_bowl_hotels_rooms_open_rates_drop_ahead_of_big_game.html#incart_maj-story-1

  28. Juice Box says:

    Saw a billboard this morning touting ganja in NJ, says it is safer than Alcohol or Football.

    http://ftw.usatoday.com/2014/01/super-bowl-billboards-advocating-marijuana/

  29. Juice Box says:

    re: Vigilantes in Mexico. We have people down in Mexico, tell us they are regularly robbed at gunpoint on mass transit. Gangs of bandits board and then rob everyone. Usually nobody gets shot, but they have to keep replacing their cell phones etc. Most don’t carry much with them, just enough money for the day, but have enough money on you not to piss-off the bandits a few pesos extra and a cell phone that is about it. They also will tell you they are convinced the police are part of the robbery schemes.

    Mexico is off my list of places to visit. I know of two people that nearly lost their lives down there. One was a vehicular accident and had to be medevaced to San Diego for facial surgery, other was a coworker who was assaulted with a steel bar in a robbery attempt gone bad. He won’t be wandering around Mexico City at night every again, he won’t go back that is for sure.

  30. Comrade Nom Deplume, Guardian of the Realm says:

    [7] grim,

    Yeah, but only until kiddie happens to tell a teacher that Grandma whacks her with a spoon for being bad. Teacher, who must report anything that even remotely sounds like abuse (or who doesn’t much like the parents and can rely on immunity), calls DYFS, and suddenly little Jennie is being scooped up to a foster home while the parents fight with DYFS to get her back.

  31. JJ says:

    She rides Mr Money’s Moustache?

    \grim says:
    January 28, 2014 at 9:19 am

    She reads Mr Money Moustache

    Sounds filthy.

  32. grim says:

    Is this the same DYFS that just lost $168,000,000 in NJ taxpayer dollars due to negligence?

    Suspect we might be better off disbanding DYFS, we can’t afford to bear the cost associated with the risk of misperformance.

    Shocked that police are not legally obligated to protect, however DYFS is.

  33. JJ says:

    My record is 40 beers in a day, which at 100 is not much, but once I had 23 shots once so at 500 would be great.

    BAC/Merrill did not listen to me when I told them to get out of subprime in 2002. I still have the report somewhere. I found whole no-doc NINJA loans in inventory on mobile homes in tornado zones.

  34. Statler Waldorf says:

    Chicago, the comments below that article are horrific. More troubling than kids not raised with a wooden spoon, are kids raised to serve as apologists for Nazis. Disgusting.

    http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/letter-to-family-from-notorious-nazi-leader-175838515.html

  35. chicagofinance says:

    I did Century Club Budweiser Shots in college ….got to number 99 and vomited because of too much foam.

    My cousin did Century Club bong hits …. I think some of them made it as far as 10 or 11, but everyone fell asleep.

    JJ says: January 28, 2014 at 11:44 am
    My record is 40 beers in a day, which at 100 is not much, but once I had 23 shots once so at 500 would be great.

  36. Libturd in the City says:

    Mexico City has always been dangerous. The rest of Mexico has always been a bit lawless as well. When I lived in Los Angeles back in 99, we used to go down to Rosarita or Ensenada about once per month. It was always necessary to keep the majority of your money in your sock and just a few bills in your wallet in case you got pulled over by the police. I was pulled over once for supposedly driving through a stop sign on the toll road (highway). The cop took whatever I had in my wallet. You don’t want to end up in a Mexican jail at any cost and you don’t want to lose your weekend budget either. There have always been cases in Mexico of tourists getting jacked. When you dig deeper, they are either drunk, flaunting their wealth or looking for trouble. Mexico is still plenty safe if you behave like a normal person.

  37. joyce says:

    (grim’s line) The government is much more efficient down there.

    Libturd in the City says:
    January 28, 2014 at 12:31 pm

    The cop took whatever I had in my wallet.

  38. Libturd in the City says:

    Century Club. That’s something I haven’t heard about in a while. Thanks for bringing back the memory of it. Damn, we’re all getting too old.

  39. Libturd in the City says:

    Sadly Joyce, wasn’t even sure if he was a real cop. He had a uniform, but hit patrol car was a dumpy old pickup truck with a removable flashing red light on top of the cab. Was there with Gator once and we decided to go to a desolate Pacific beach. Another entrepreneural local walked up to us and claimed the beach was his and that we could stay, but had to pay for parking. Much better to pay the $3 or so in pesos than to deny his payment. I ran into this in India a bit as well. Easier to just get robbed by merchants at the market than to negotiate prices down to Indian standards. My hosts hated it when the locals tried to take advantage of us light skinned folks. It’s hard to explain to them that the extra Rupee is how much I made in a few seconds of work back home. By the way, I never felt safer in impoverished conditions as I did in India. Outside of driving like loonies and completely disobeying traffic laws, everyone else seemed to mind their own business regardless of income level. Everyone was generally happy. I find the same thing in Mexico. Even the disabled kids selling Chiklets seem to be content.

  40. JJ says:

    there are only 1.5 ounces in a shot. 100 shots is only 150 ounces of beer.

    Heck I have two 24 ounce tall boys on the train ride to a jet game, and four more in parking lot and one or two more inside. That is well over 100 ounces.

    Bordy Barn and back when bars had nickle beer night I have seen infants, midgets and the elderly drink 150 ounces of beer.

    Heck one night me and my friend went to Jermanys Ale house back when they only served Coors one Thursday night and drank so much Coors stock rose 12% the next day!

  41. Libturd in the City says:

    “Heck one night me and my friend went to Jermanys Ale house back when they only served Coors one Thursday night and drank so much Coors stock rose 12% the next day!”

    He’s still got it.

    Unfortunately.

  42. Brian says:

    They charged those kids with unlawful posession of a weapon. I can’t believe they consider bb guns and pellet guns firearms in this state. That charge now comes with a manditory minimum of 3 years in prison.

    We had pellet guns and bb guns all the time when I was a kid. I didn’t bring them to school but charging those kids that way is really draconian. These idiots in the legislature are ruining people’s lives with these crazy laws on the books…

    35.Juice Box says:
    January 28, 2014 at 11:42 am
    Clot is this what you mean by Arm the Children?

    http://www.nj.com/hudson/index.ssf/2014/01/eight_guttenberg_grammar_school_boys_charged_with_bringing_pellet_guns_to_school.html

  43. joyce says:

    I can’t think of any particular thing in which mere possession thereof should be a crime.

    Brian says:
    January 28, 2014 at 1:11 pm
    They charged those kids with unlawful posession of a weapon. I can’t believe they consider bb guns and pellet guns firearms in this state. That charge now comes with a manditory minimum of 3 years in prison.

    We had pellet guns and bb guns all the time when I was a kid. I didn’t bring them to school but charging those kids that way is really draconian. These idiots in the legislature are ruining people’s lives with these crazy laws on the books…

  44. Brian says:

    46.

    Joyce, I did a lot worse than what these kids did when I was young and turned out just fine. They shouldn’t have brought them to school, but they certainly shouldn’t be charged as crimials either. I had a little break/action pellet gun and a slingshot when I was a kid. It’s a normal part of growing up.

  45. 1987 Condo says:

    Vernon council OKs $40K raise for mayor
    VERNON — Council members have approved giving the mayor of Vernon a $40,000 raise.

    Mayor Victor Marotta stands to earn $70,000 running the Sussex County community that is home to nearly 24,000.

    Monday’s 3-2 vote came 14 months after voters blocked a $20,000 pay increase.

    The New Jersey Herald reports at least one critic has said she’ll begin circulating petitions to force another township-wide referendum in November. Meanwhile, a judge next month will consider a motion that would block the pay raise pending the outcome of a lawsuit.

    Vernon changed from a council-manager form of government to a mayor-council form in 2010. A nearby town of that type pays its mayor $7,000.

    http://www.nj.com/sussex-county/index.ssf/2014/01/vernon_council_oks_40k_raise_for_mayor.html#incart_river

  46. chicagofinance says:

    JJ: #1 the shots were bigger than that; #2 you had to drink every minute for 100 minutes…..it isn’t the amount, it is the timeline…..I should have drank Piels instead because the Bud was so foamy….it would have been easy……I just needed to really get a good belch in…..

  47. chicagofinance says:

    Client was traveling in Seattle….I just got a gift box…..they hit a Used records store…I just got 12 random used maxi-singles of Depeche Mode…..

  48. chicagofinance says:

    Rammstein covered Stripped in 1998

  49. Libturd in the City says:

    I once took a shot from a pellet gun to my bare back. It hurt like hell and pierced my skin, though the pellet didn’t get lodged in, luckily. I hate those things. All my friends had wrist rockets. We used to kill pigeons and an occasional rabbit with them. Never shot anyone though. My folks would never let me own airguns or wristrockets anyway. Kids shouldn’t go to juvi, but some in-school suspension should do the trick. Maybe some community service too.

  50. Libturd in the City says:

    Do you still own a record player? I got rid of mine a few years ago.

  51. grim says:

    I got shot in the ass with a crossbow once – was loaded with an old style fountain pen. I still have the ink dot (tattoo) on my left ass cheek. I’ll gladly show it off, it has faded a bit in 25 years though.

    Being a kid today is just no fun anymore.

  52. Brian says:

    I will admit I shot my little brother in the butt with my pellet gun it while he was climbing a tree. Sorry bro…

  53. Brian says:

    Condo….I wonder about Vernon sometimes. It seems like such a corrupt mess. Not to long ago there was an article in the local paper about the assessor who was valuing her own property (and others I think) at lower than market value so they wouldn’t have to pay high property taxes.

  54. Juice Box says:

    In NJ you need a carry permit to possess even a BB pistol anywhere outside your home. Good Luck getting that, you need to be a cop.

  55. grim says:

    45 – Based on the comments, sounds more like these were airsoft guns, and not pellet or BB guns, which would make much more sense. I’m not sure where you could even buy a pellet handgun in NJ – but airsoft pistols? You can get them EVERYWHERE, there are entire stores dedicated to these things all over NJ.

  56. 1987 Condo says:

    I heard from a COSTCO employee while I was in the Wayne store last week that they are moving to the old Fortunoff site and will be adding a gas station…anyone hear anything about that?

  57. Libturd in the City says:

    Can you have them move the Clifton Costco to a better location? Man what a cluster-f it is to get in and out of there. By the way, I recently purchased their premade frozen burger patties in case I need to make dinner in a pinch. Wow, they’re pretty darn good and cheap.

  58. juice (35)-

    It’s the only way. Think of their development.

  59. Gimme a 30.06 in a duffel bag…

  60. Street Justice says:

    Sweeney and legislators push towns to share services and consolidate

    http://www.nj.com/times-opinion/index.ssf/2014/01/amick_sweeney_and_legislators.html

    The state’s lawmakers are saying the right things about the need to lower New Jersey’s highest-in-the-nation taxes on homeowners. Talk is cheap, though. The test will be whether state government finally takes effective action.

    One obvious way to reduce tax bills would be to encourage towns to merge. Princeton Borough and Township did it last year by referendum, and it resulted in a 4.7 percent cut in their combined municipal budget.

    But mergers are a tough sell; the Princetons tried and failed on three previous occasions, and the municipal matrimony they finally achieved was the first of any significance in this home-rule-loving state in more than 60 years. Many local government experts consider sharing public services, such as police, fire, public works, health and planning, to be a quicker route to property tax savings than outright consolidation. Gov. Chris Christie endorsed both approaches in his State of the State speech, in which he praised Princeton voters for achieving “more services, despite a smaller budget, and a reduction in municipal taxes.”

    A key player in the year ahead will be Vincent Prieto (D-Hudson), the newly minted speaker of the Assembly. Prieto notes that actions such as the 2 percent cap on municipal tax hikes imposed in 2010 have slowed their rate of increase, but pledges to make cutting the taxes themselves the top priority of the Democrats who control the lower house in the new legislative session.

    “It’s time to stop the property tax burden that is crushing the middle class and poor of this state, and I promise you: We will do that,” Prieto said at his swearing-in ceremony.

    His commitment is essential. What he hasn’t said yet, however, is whether he’ll endorse a bill sponsored by Senate President Steve Sweeney (D-Gloucester) that would, for the first time, bring real pressure on reluctant towns to combine major public-service functions. The Senate passed an identical measure in the last session, but it died in an Assembly led by then-Speaker Sheila Oliver (D-Essex) because of opposition by the public employee unions, which consider service sharing a threat to their members’ jobs.

    State government now distributes the bulk of its municipal aid regardless of whether the towns spend it in a cost-effective way or waste it by clinging to their own separate departments — by insisting, as Sweeney puts it, “on having their name on the truck.” Under his bill, towns that vote no in referendums on state-endorsed arrangements to share services with their neighbors would lose state aid in the amounts they would have saved.

    His objective in promoting service sharing, Sweeney has told the unions, is not to trim the ranks of ordinary municipal workers, but to eliminate surplus administrators — police chiefs, police captains, department directors — who draw the big salaries and benefits.

    Sweeney is the state’s foremost evangelist for service sharing. He’ll recite for you at every opportunity how much money local taxpayers in Gloucester and neighboring counties are saving through such jointly managed operations as police departments, jails, EMT teams and even purchases of highway salt.

    He gave his new bill the number S1 to show that it’s a personal priority for him, and he promises that the Senate will act on it quickly and that he’ll do his best to persuade Prieto and other Assembly Democrats to give the measure a fair hearing, consider the changes he has made to allay the unions’ fears, and approve it.

    If all else fails, Sweeney said, he has another plan in reserve. He’ll push to lower the 2 percent cap on annual property tax increases to zero. Exceptions still would be allowed for emergencies. He regrets not taking that route when the Legislature and Christie enacted the 2 percent limit.

    “How much quicker would we be seeing towns share services, if we had put the cap at zero,” he once told me. “They would have to conform. I thought at the time, ‘You have to be fair and reasonable,’ but now I see towns still refusing to share, or even to look.
    “I don’t have enough money to run my own government, let alone subsidize government that’s inefficient.”

    ——————————————————————————–

  61. anon (the good one) says:

    @AP: BREAKING: Authorities say injuries reported after shots fired at Hawaii school; lockdown in place.

  62. joyce says:

    If the only savings is 4.7% after a huge unwanted merger, other towns will not follow suit.

  63. Libturd in the City says:

    “The Senate passed an identical measure in the last session, but it died in an Assembly led by then-Speaker Sheila Oliver (D-Essex) because of opposition by the public employee unions, which consider service sharing a threat to their members’ jobs.”

    This is all you need to know from that article.

  64. joyce says:

    Eric Ferguson, 54, from Mooresville, N.C., was taking out the trash at his home last August when he was bitten on the foot by a snake. He drove himself to Lake Norman Regional Medical Center, where he was treated with anti-venom medicine.

    According to his bill, the hospital charged $81,000 for a four-vial dose of the medication.

    Shocked at the price tag, Ferguson told the Charlotte Observer he and his wife found the same vials online for retail prices as low as $750.

    http://news.yahoo.com/snake-bite-89000-162515519.html

    (market ticker commentary follows:)
    If you destroy the medical monopolies let’s assume whoever Ferguson gets the vials from charges $1,500 due to his urgency of need, a 100% mark-up.

    His cost would drop by 98.2%.

    Anyone else want to argue that we couldn’t take 80% out of our medical spending if we cut this **** out and started imprisoning the so-called “health care providers” that do this kind of thing?

    But for government-sanctioned force nobody — absolutely nobody — would get away with charging 50 times or more what something costs without someone else immediately entering the market and competing with them.

    You think it’s limited to this sort of thing? Nope. What’s a hospital charge for a basic and every-day use scalpel? I can buy 10 in a box, sterile and disposable, for under a buck a piece, and the seller is making a profit at that price (or they wouldn’t be selling them.)

    The people who are apologists for this crap, along with the practitioners and administrators, in any just society, would be sitting in federal prison right now as this behavior is a rank violation of the Sherman and Clayton acts, and absent their “special dispensation” they’d all have long since been prosecuted and convicted.

    IMPRISON THEM ALL TODAY.

  65. POS cape says:

    67

    That’s why I have a problem with donating my blood for free – the markup for the end user is probably similar to the robbery in your story.

  66. joyce says:

    POS cape,
    I’m not sure if it was you or another who brought up that topic a little while ago, but I used to regularly donate … no more.

  67. Painhrtz - Disobey! says:

    joyce i read that as Talking trash then bitten by snake, my first inclination was good for you jack wagon.

  68. grim says:

    I donated the other day, I’m a sucker.

    I’m also a registered marrow donor for Be The Match. I can’t imagine what the insurance bill is for a bone marrow transplant. I’d hop on a plane in an instant to do it. I’m sure my DNA isn’t sufficiently unique to ever get a call though. My DNA isn’t the kind they are looking for.

  69. Happy Renter says:

    [6] “Wonder why some neighborhoods have so many single parent households? Could it be that Jim Crow is still alive and well in America. Of course forcing poor women to drive hundreds of miles and or spend several nights in a hotel room and take off work to get a legal and safe abortion might matter too.”

    I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul.

  70. xmonger says:

    #45. When I was 13 I got shot in the face with a BB gun while playing basketball in Leif Ericson Park (Bklyn). I heard the much older punk who shot me start laughing…I ran over to beat his ass up and got my ass handed to me.

    I learned a couple of things that day: Some people suck and you need to time your fights wisely.

    Several years later, a much bigger me ran into this neighborhood punk. That day it was his turn to take home some notes.

  71. chicagofinance says:

    Check this out……great cover….
    Libturd in the City says:
    January 28, 2014 at 1:39 pm
    Do you still own a record player? I got rid of mine a few years ago.
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M4SmZkmLRjQ

  72. Michael says:

    67- Great post! The health industry is the biggest scam ever. It’s like an indirect tax. Companies have to throw so much money at yearly healthcare increases that it has pretty much taken away the companies ability to give decent raises. The Heath care system is pretty much a redistribution system. Robs the majority of the population to give to the few . These markups are insane and would be considered robbery in any other industry.

    Free market…..hate when I hear people talk about the free market. Why? Because it’s like a utopia. Wishful thinking to have a free market economy but it never has and never will exist. It’s 2014 and you still can’t shop around for surgery or a doctor….just sign here and bill whatever the f#ck you want. Yea, some free market.

  73. Ben says:

    You’d stop donating blood the second you see the salary of the CEO of the “non profits” that you are donating to. They turn around and sell your donation for an insane profit.

  74. Street Justice says:

    Booker all over the news and the papers pushing for federal extension of UE benefits.

  75. grim says:

    Yeah I posted the NPR bit a few weeks back – the one about blood arbitrage and the money being raked in by these “non-profits”

  76. grim says:

    Already buying votes for his presidential bid?

  77. Street Justice says:

    Pretty sure Obama will talk about it at length too.

  78. Street Justice says:

    WND EXCLUSIVE
    CAN STATE LIMIT SELF-DEFENSE TO INSIDE YOUR HOME?
    Another fight over guns looming for Supreme Court
    Published: 2 days ago
    BOB UNRUH
    About | Email | Archive
    Read
    15

    The U.S. Supreme Court, which in recent years ruled in the Heller case that the Second Amendment does protect an individual right to bear arms, and in the McDonald case that state’s cannot unreasonably restrict that right, now is facing another fight over guns.

    It involves the effective ban that New Jersey has imposed on those who feel the need for self-protection outside of their own homes.

    For example, officials in New Jersey ruled that a man who services ATM machines and carries large amounts of cash doesn’t need a handgun to protect himself. Likewise, a reserve deputy who “disrupts” criminal activity on duty is perfectly safe without a handgun while off-duty.

    In New Jersey, a request for permission to carry a handgun for protection has to be submitted to police, who have to approve it and forward it to a judge, who must issue the permit. And every permit must be justified, in that the judge must be convinced there is, in his or her own opinion, a need for self-defense.

    The Second Amendment Foundation recently asked the Supreme Court to review, and fix, that standard, because of the conclusion of the lower courts, who said, “It remains unsettled whether the individual right to bear arms for the purpose of self-defense extends beyond the home.”

    The arguments were prepared by attorneys Alan Gura (who won Second Amendment victories in the groundbreaking Heller and McDonald cases) and David Jensen, and is the most recent effort to bring a right-to-carry case before the high court.

    “The right to self-defense is sacrosanct,” said SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan Gottlieb, “yet has been disparaged and denied to all but an elite few in states like New Jersey. Individuals and families should not be deprived of the right to defend themselves and we intend to change that.”

    “This case could resolve the right to carry issue not only for New Jersey, but for the entire nation,” added Scott Bach, executive director of the Association of New Jersey Rifle & Pistol Clubs. “So far the U.S. Supreme Court has declined to hear the issue in other cases, but this case may be different due to the extreme nature of New Jersey’s law, which effectively denies law-abiding citizens their fundamental right to self-defense outside the home.”

    Read more at http://mobile.wnd.com/2014/01/can-state-limit-self-defense-to-inside-your-home/#K3TKbTy5hMQHcVHt.99

  79. Michael says:

    Interesting fact- In 1995, the avg American bra size was 34B. Today it is 36C.

  80. Grim says:

    Inflation

  81. Ben says:

    That guy bitten by the snake got ripped off. I’m pretty sure the hospital would have settled for $600 cash.

  82. grim says:

    Jersey’s in for some budget fireworks

    Where’s Christie?

  83. Fabius Maximus says:

    Clot,

    Get your Don McClean albums out!

    So Bye Bye Yohan Cababaye,
    Mikey drove you the airport to fly off in the sky,
    Those Mackem boys are just laughing so hard, saying
    This is how we watch the Toon die!
    This is how we watch the Toon die!

  84. chicagofinance says:

    clot got fat and has man tits…..

    Michael says:
    January 28, 2014 at 7:24 pm
    Interesting fact- In 1995, the avg American bra size was 34B. Today it is 36C.

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