From the Record:
Three years later, shore’s housing market feels effects of Sandy
Maureen and Bill Craft put “backbreaking” work and thousands of dollars into fixing their Little Egg Harbor Shore home after it was flooded during Superstorm Sandy, but Maureen now says if she had to do it over again, she’d walk away.
Meg Huber spent thousands of dollars to repair her tiny Ocean Beach cottage after the storm, but now fears she and her husband will have to sell the home because they can’t afford to elevate it.
Rick Guglielmo despaired after the storm, but it allowed him to buy a beachfront property at a reduced price in Ortley Beach.
The three are among the thousands of property owners whose lives changed when Sandy sent floodwaters surging across the Jersey Shore. Three years after Sandy hit, the storm is just a memory along most of the coast. But in Ortley Beach, Mantoloking, Manahawkin and other hard-hit areas, the effects of the storm are still obvious in the mix of new homes, derelict cottages and empty lots.
…
Amid the buzz of construction, the Shore is coming back, but it’s going to take a few years to return fully — and it will be a different Shore. Many of the small, affordable cottages that squatted on the sand have been elevated or replaced by new, taller buildings, constructed to withstand hurricane waters and winds.“The old beach bungalow is basically gone. The Shore has changed,” said Lee Childers of Childers Sotheby’s International Realty in Normandy Beach, which has six offices at the Shore.
The people at the Shore also have changed. Faced with the financial or emotional cost of repairs, many longtime homeowners are selling their properties..
“There are a lot of people out there who can’t afford to rebuild,” said Ed Walters of the ReBuild division of Barnegat-based Walters Group, which has constructed more than 200 houses to replace those destroyed in the storm. “A lot of those properties are coming on the market and people are buying them. There’s going to be a changeover of people selling and new people coming in to all these areas.”
…
“These quaint little bungalows — they’re cute, but people want to bring friends and family to the beach,” Walters said. “That’s one of the biggest gripes. Everybody was sleeping in sleeping bags. … It’s just not practical to have a home one foot off the ground. It’s inevitable that it’s going to flood.”
Mudville.
Hey Punkin
You want to put on your superhero mask this morning and rally for the lower 50%?
Attack the agencies that put in place the new shore building codes that effectively price them out of shorehouses, many times places that have been in families for generations.
Who do you think occupies bungalows in Ocean Beach, the 1%ers?
The damage caused by well meaning government actions far outweigh in the aggregate the damage wrought by all the evil moguls combined.
Homes that were in families for generations don’t need to be raised or updated. These generally don’t have mortgages, thus don’t require flood insurance. Why anyone would bother with flood insurance on one of those little cape/bungalows is beyond me. If mother nature decides she wants to take it down, isn’t that just cost-of-entry to living at the shore? That’s a risk you’ve got be to be willing to accept. If you can’t afford to rebuild, doesn’t that just mean you couldn’t afford the shore house in the first place? Most beach houses that I’ve rented or visited, have a quality of contents so poor they make a garage sale look like better homes and gardens.
I’m all for getting rid of flood insurance for beach properties anyway, since I don’t think the government should be in the business of insuring someone else’s luxury. Otherwise, cap it at a reasonable lifetime maximum. Once max is hit, provide a provision for eminent domain/buyout and teardown.
Or, allow a borrower to secure the loan on the shore property using a non-flood property. You want $500k to buy a beach house, but can’t afford the insurance? Than secure it with your primary residence in Haughty BC. If the house gets washed away, and you walk, they take the house-still-standing.
Let them stay then, but they are responsible for all costs when their home is destroyed by a flood. I think that’s the issue here, beach property is expensive to own and maintain. No one is trying to push them out on purpose, but at the same time, no one wants to keep paying for the damage when their property is destroyed. Yes, the result is the poor are pushed out, and the wealthy take over. If you really want to do something about it, stop worrying about the regulation, and instead focus on creating good jobs so that these people can afford to live there. Imo, that’s the biggest factor for people leaving, their crappy pay is pushing them out, not the regulations. They sell the property because they need the money, never mind having the cash to fix it up.
leftwing says:
November 2, 2015 at 7:48 am
Hey Punkin
You want to put on your superhero mask this morning and rally for the lower 50%?
Attack the agencies that put in place the new shore building codes that effectively price them out of shorehouses, many times places that have been in families for generations.
Who do you think occupies bungalows in Ocean Beach, the 1%ers?
The damage caused by well meaning government actions far outweigh in the aggregate the damage wrought by all the evil moguls combined.
“focus on creating good jobs so that these people can afford to live there”
Yes, but Punkin, whoever creates those good jobs is going to be much more well off than the employees he employs. You’ll create another 1%er!!!! The horror!
If the flood insurance doesn’t get you the new property tax will .With Monmouth county going to yearly assessments to market value it’s killing long time residence .Avon ,Belmar has seen many 1% era come in and build the summer home of their dream while pushing assesments skyward ……many are trying to stop the new program ,but you might as well try to stop a supertanker because the political connected are making a killing reassessing yearly .
I found your site very beautiful and distinguished too. Thank you for your good work and continue.
You have it all backwards. The 1% is being created from the elimination/shipping of jobs. You don’t get to the 1% today by creating good jobs, you get there by eliminating them. Yes, this is what I fight against every single day. It’s hard to listen to people like you that support this and are okay with this.
leftwing says:
November 2, 2015 at 8:36 am
“focus on creating good jobs so that these people can afford to live there”
Yes, but Punkin, whoever creates those good jobs is going to be much more well off than the employees he employs. You’ll create another 1%er!!!! The horror!
8 – You don’t even know what you’re fighting for…or who you’re fighting.
You are witnessing the impact of extreme income inequality. This is why I rally against it, I am able to see the longterm damage it does to our society.
mrdenis says:
November 2, 2015 at 8:42 am
If the flood insurance doesn’t get you the new property tax will .With Monmouth county going to yearly assessments to market value it’s killing long time residence .Avon ,Belmar has seen many 1% era come in and build the summer home of their dream while pushing assesments skyward ……many are trying to stop the new program ,but you might as well try to stop a supertanker because the political connected are making a killing reassessing yearly .
“You don’t get to the 1% today by creating good jobs, you get there by eliminating them”
You’re head is so far up your arse there is no daylight.
“You are witnessing the impact of extreme income inequality. This is why I rally against it, I am able to see the longterm damage it does to our society.
mrdenis says:
If the flood insurance doesn’t get you the new property tax will”
So mandatory flood insurance and rising property tax bills are a result of income inequality? Sorry, heading to the bathroom to start a discussion with the mirror.
The fact that these people have way more money then the rest, has no impact on the rising prices and making it unaffordable for the rest? The rise in property value assessments has nothing to do with people tearing down low cost properties and replacing them with high value properties?
“So mandatory flood insurance and rising property tax bills are a result of income inequality? Sorry, heading to the bathroom to start a discussion with the mirror.”
I feel bad for those that are struggling to rebuild after Sandy, but I think they knew the risks when they decided to take up residence on the shore. I do wish them the best of luck with recovering from the damage however.
There’s a democrat running for mayor in my town. As far as I can interpret from her flier, her two main issues are:
She thinks commercial development has been too high in the town (in the past couple of years our town of 42,000 has added a new car dealership and a CVS, and there is a Whole Foods coming).
She criticizes that a 24-hr Quick Chek with gas station is being allowed to open in the face of “community outrage”. On Route 22.
Personally, I’m in favor of more rather than less businesses operating in town, and I’m in favor of having more 24 hour gas stations, which NJ’s state democrats have created a shortage of via the ban on self-service and the high labor costs that entails.
Homes that have been in families for generations…..
See NOLA after Hurricane Katrina
People living in a home that they probably wouldn’t qualify for a mortgage
I feel bad for them but do we or the govt need to solve for those circumstances?
Yes, blumpkin..your extreme blogging will change the world and Bernie will be the saviour of America. Perhaps you should choose local fights bc only those will reshape this country over the long haul. As for 1% and the shore, when I lived in Brigadoon, my neighbor was blue collar as could be, even worked for Westfield Dept of Public works. He used to go to work at 7am then park his car at home most of the morning. Work? Not so much. His wife’s blue collar family owned nice vacation shore house in LBI for three generations. My dad, who holds a MS in engineering from Columbia and worked his a!$ off as president in marine manufacturing, could hardly afford to buy something decent in LBI for our family now in his retirement (3 BDs+). He did well too. Sure he could technically do it but it would eat a lot of resources coupled with his primary. If my old neighbor still owns that house after Sandy and was compensated handsomely then there lies the problem. Govt. does everything to make sure people are never impacted by their own generational laziness and bad financial risk. Pick your fight wisely. I hate generational entitlement particularly. There is a lot of your 1%.
“The fact that these people have way more money then the rest, has no impact on the rising prices and making it unaffordable for the rest? The rise in property value assessments has nothing to do with people tearing down low cost properties and replacing them with high value properties?”
No.
None of that has anything to do with insurance or property taxes.
Property taxes rise because YOUR government spends more. Period. In fact, when I was on our Board of Adjustment during the knockdown aughts there was robust debate around town about zoning to ban these knockdowns altogether. The typical trade was buy a 1960s ranch for $750k or so and build new a 5br/ba 6,000 sq ft behemoth that regularly traded mid-$2m or so. Assessments were pretty spot to values.
The Town Committee, Planning Board, and Board of Adjustment undertook a study. It revealed 72 knockdowns in the prior 24 months. Taking the $1.75m value differential on each house and multiplying it by 72 yielded $126m of new taxable base. At 2%, the new houses provided $2.5m to the Town it would not otherwise see.
The conclusion was that the Town could not afford to zone away knockdowns because it would have to get that $2.5m somewhere, ie. by taxing the current (less wealthy) residents more.
No, Einstein, banging up a huge new house drives *that* person’s property taxes up and should *reduce* the aggregate property tax burden for everyone else, provided your government doesn’t treat the new revenue as windfall and fritter it away, as usual.
I recently was looking at prices of NJ shore homes and was SHOCKED at how many towns now had multi million dollar new homes. It was a big surprise to see town after town w/ this situation. Looks like its only now for the one percent in certain areas.
Mmmmm fritters
Flooding comments section of articles and voting for Bernie Sanders = Fighting income inequality.
Affordable beach house is such a f@cling oxymoron it’s silly.
It was all fun and games and no one cared until it hit’s home.
’60 Minutes’ Blames The Pharmaceutical Industry For America’s Heroin Epidemic
Sunday evening, 60 Minutes correspondent Bill Whitaker went to Columbus, Ohio, to understand America’s heroin epidemic. The drug is becoming cheaper and easier to get, he argues, and its stigma is vanishing. But his reporting places much of the blame for the addictions and deaths he documents on opioid pain pills. People become addicted to the pills, and than switch to heroin because it is cheaper.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/matthewherper/2015/11/01/after-investigating-americas-heroin-epidemic-60-minutes-indicts-the-pharmaceutical-industry/
Whatever happened to personal responsibility?
I for one am tired of the shore cry babies. I have a home with large trees. When a tree falls does fema step in and help no. I’m left on my own to have it removed. They get their beaches replaced annually do I get my trees grimes for free annually ? These shore guys are spoiled. Pay the price to fix it yourself or sell to someone that can afford it. I also agree with grim – most of these homes are pieces of shot for the prices they want you to rent in the summer. I rather fly to myrtle for a week than stay at a dump down the shore
No, Einstein, banging up a huge new house drives *that* person’s property taxes up and should *reduce* the aggregate property tax burden for everyone else, provided your government doesn’t treat the new revenue as windfall and fritter it away, as usual.
The whole purpose is to reward the Assistant Deputy to the Assistant Police Chiefs Deputy Assistant Lieutenant a 8% raise to the tune of $215,000 annual salary.
[25] Fast Eddie
Think we have a winner. Yours and your neighbor’s property taxes going up and the subsequent squander of it is what the military calls “collateral damage”.
FKA [26],
Let the peasants eat cake. :)
22 – At least Heroin users are generally non-aggressive and just want to pass out.
Read about the history of amphetamines in this country and their use in the military….
They were also prescribed to bored housewives in the 50’s and 60’s.
What’s given to children for ADHD isn’t all that different either.
Top off your research by googling “faces of meth”.
Now, is it any wonder we have mass shootings in the world today?
How many towns closed school all this week?
http://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2015/10/complex-academic-writing/412255/
30- Article has a point. What is the purpose of writing? To communicate, right? So what is the purpose of writing in such a complex way that nobody understands what you are saying?
“Will this kind of interest in communicating about research by some academics help change status-quo academic writing? “Believe it or not,” when compared to their peers in other parts of the world, “U.S. academics are probably the most open to the idea of accessible language,” says Bosley. “I gave a presentation in France and academics there flat out told me that academics shouldn’t write to express, they should write to impress.” Bosley says bucking tradition and championing the clear-writing cause would be to an academic’s advantage, to a university’s advantage, and certainly to the public’s advantage. “Here in the U.S. at least we’re seeing some academics acknowledge this reality.””
Libturd,
What happened to personal responsibility is that the intellectuals who dominate our schools were trained on the ideas of B.F. Skinner and John Rawls.
Skinner said that people have no free will. So they need geniuses like him to “condition” them to do what he thinks they should do.
Rawls expanded on Skinner to say that since you cannot determine your birth characteristics, and you have no free will after you are born, then everyone “deserves” exactly the same thing.
These are the assumptions that underlie the modern left.
Sorry its in German but this guy is testing the autopilot mode on a Tesla. He shaves and makes a quick snack o
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uX4ykJV7zmw
FKA,
The Tesla enthusiasts are vying to be the first person who kills themselves by leaving everything to a beta version of Tesla’s autonomous driving.
I expect a major accident, possibly with a death this year, from at least one of the Musk-worshippers.
Broke down and purchased a new leaf blower, the walk behind type. I have one day and one day only to get my leaves done, so I need 150 MPH and 1200 CFM to get it done, last year was several days of raking, I am too cheap to pay someone and I just don’t have days and days worth of daylight to get it done. Screw the environment too, it isn’t California complaint they don’t sell them.
WTF, kind of laws are these, and how soon before they show up here?
http://www.losgatosca.gov/2059/Leaf-Blower-Ordinance
Was at a b-day party yesterday, neighbor was going on and on about common core math.
I did not know this was such a hot topic, but I guess I will get sucked into it as well. here is a short video explaining the issue.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M_sTr1PR6Po
He is the man, he is really trying to help humanity.
“his offices overlooking Lake Washington, just east of Seattle, Bill Gates grabbed a legal pad recently and began covering it in his left-handed scrawl. He scribbled arrows by each margin of the pad, both pointing inward. The arrow near the left margin, he said, represented how governments worldwide could stimulate ingenuity to combat climate change by dramatically increasing spending on research and development. “The push is the R&D,” he said, before indicating the arrow on the right. “The pull is the carbon tax.” Between the arrows he sketched boxes to represent areas, such as deployment of new technology, where, he argued, private investors should foot the bill. He has pledged to commit $2 billion himself.
“Yes, the government will be somewhat inept,” he said brusquely, swatting aside one objection as a trivial statement of the obvious. “But the private sector is in general inept. How many companies do venture capitalists invest in that go poorly? By far most of them.”
RELATED STORY
Bill Gates’s First Job
Gates is on a solo global lobbying campaign to press his species to accomplish something on a scale it has never attempted before. He wants human beings to invent their way out of the coming collision with planetary climate change, accelerating a transition to new forms of energy that might normally take a century or more. To head off a rise in average global temperatures of 2 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels—the goal set by international agreement—Gates believes that by 2050, wealthy nations like China and the United States, the most prodigious belchers of greenhouse gases, must be adding no more carbon to the skies.”
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/11/we-need-an-energy-miracle/407881/
37- What’s this rags, Gates calling out flaws in the free market for fixing problems. I thought left alone, and the free market solves all in the most efficient manner, what happened?
“On why the free market won’t develop new forms of energy fast enough:
Well, there’s no fortune to be made. Even if you have a new energy source that costs the same as today’s and emits no CO2, it will be uncertain compared with what’s tried-and-true and already operating at unbelievable scale and has gotten through all the regulatory problems, like “Okay, what do you do with coal ash?” and “How do you guarantee something is safe?” Without a substantial carbon tax, there’s no incentive for innovators or plant buyers to switch.
And for energy as a whole, the incentive to invest is quite limited, because unlike digital products—where you get very rapid adoption and so, within the period that your trade secret stays secret or your patent gives you a 20-year exclusive, you can reap incredible returns—almost everything that’s been invented in energy was invented more than 20 years before it got scaled usage. So if you go back to various energy innovators, actually, they didn’t do that well financially. The rewards to society of these energy advances—not much of that is captured by the individual innovator, because it’s a very conservative market. So the R&D amount in energy is surprisingly low compared with medicine or digital stuff, where both the government spending and the private-sector spending is huge.”
Maybe the crazy right wingers will actually take climate change seriously since it’s coming from Gates mouth. He understands it well, for example the notion that electric cars will save us.
“On whether we should all be driving electric cars:
People think, Oh, well, I’ll just get an electric car. There are places where if you buy an electric car, you’re actually increasing CO2 emissions, because the electricity infrastructure is emitting more CO2 than you would have if you’d had a gasoline-powered car.”
Wait for it! Is bill gates advocating that the private sector can’t do it alone. That is has to be combination of the govt and private sector. They both serve a roll, too bad some idiots are obsessed with making the govt so small, that the govt will not be able to function in a way that will benefit our species.
“On why, considering the level of debate in the presidential campaign, he thinks this kind of investment is imaginable:
Well, the success of the United States in medical research is really incredible. I mean, it’s phenomenal. We spend $30 billion a year of government money, and the private sector goes out and comes up with new drugs. It’s an industry that the U.S. is by far the leader in—creating wonderful jobs, great miracle cures—and that is working super, super well, but we spend more than all other countries put together. And the U.S. lead in health technologies, including drugs, is gigantic, just like the U.S. lead in digital technologies is gigantic.
In the case of the digital technologies, the path back to government R&D is a bit more complex, because nowadays most of the R&D has moved to the private sector. But the original Internet comes from the government, the original chip-foundry stuff comes from the government—and even today there’s some government money taking on some of the more advanced things and making sure the universities have the knowledge base that maintains that lead. So I’d say the overall record for the United States on government R&D is very, very good.
Now, in the case of climate change, because there’s so many possible solutions, it’s not like the Manhattan Project. I don’t think anyone’s saying, “Hey, pick just one approach, and pick some ranch in New Mexico, and just have those guys kind of hang out there.” Here, we want to give a little bit of money to the guy who thinks that high wind will work; we want to give a little bit of money to the guy who thinks that taking sunlight and making oil directly out of sunlight will work. So there’s dozens of those ideas, and there’s enabling technologies for those ideas. That’s the kind of thing that we should be funding more of.”
BOOOM!!!!!!
From Bill Gates mouth, not mine. He said the exact same thing that I said about the public and private debate. He says the same damn thing that you guys rip me for. RAGS and everyone else that jumps on me on this blog, please read that last paragraph. Now stop thinking that privatizing everything will MAGICALLY make everything better and more efficient. That is a complete fallacy that you are pushing on people.
“On the surprising wisdom of government R&D:
When I first got into this I thought, How well does the Department of Energy spend its R&D budget? And I was worried: Gosh, if I’m going to be saying it should double its budget, if it turns out it’s not very well spent, how am I going to feel about that? But as I’ve really dug into it, the DARPA money is very well spent, and the basic-science money is very well spent. The government has these “Centers of Excellence.” They should have twice as many of those things, and those things should get about four times as much money as they do.
Yes, the government will be some-what inept—but the private sector is in general inept. How many companies do venture capitalists invest in that go poorly? By far most of them. And it’s just that every once in a while a Google or a Microsoft comes out, and some medium-scale successes too, and so the overall return is there, and so people keep giving them money.”
Gates has been pu$$y whipped by his wife and buddy Warren into becoming a pinko over the last 10 years.
No profit in developing breakthrough energy sources? Rockefeller made a bit on his breakthrough of oil. Put a dent in the whalers and wood choppers profits. His comment is arrogant and historically ignorant.
[35] juice
From my limited experience, Los Gatos was always that way. Never heard of the place until an MHC student picked me up at a concert there in the early 80’s. She was typical Cali tree-hugger but gave me some of my more epic JJ-esque experiences.
The only arrogance is in the denial of your response.
Ragnar says:
November 2, 2015 at 2:25 pm
Gates has been pu$$y whipped by his wife and buddy Warren into becoming a pinko over the last 10 years.
No profit in developing breakthrough energy sources? Rockefeller made a bit on his breakthrough of oil. Put a dent in the whalers and wood choppers profits. His comment is arrogant and historically ignorant.
I was sure the FATCA diaspora would have abated by now, and I do believe it did.
https://www.federalregister.gov/quarterly-publication-of-individuals-who-have-chosen-to-expatriate
So why do we continue to set records for wealthy fleeing the US?
Rags, just look at how govt you complain about helped create the world you live in and profit from. Amazing how you totally throw out govt’s role in your good life. Almost all energy, which is what makes the world go, has been the result of govt. Oh no, it can’t be! The big bad govt actually serves an important role in your life?
“On the centrality of government to progress on energy, historically:
Everyone likes to argue about how much the shale-gas boom was driven by the private sector versus government; there was some of both. Nuclear: huge amount of government. Hydropower: mind-blowingly government—because permitting those things, those big reservoirs and everything, you can’t be a private-sector guy betting that you’re going to get permitted. People think energy is more of a private-sector thing than it is. If you go back to Edison’s time, there wasn’t much government funding. There were rich people funding him. Since World War II, U.S.-government R&D has defined the state of the art in almost every area.”
[46] pumpkin
“Nuclear: huge amount of government. Hydropower: mind-blowingly government”
Interestingly, the left has always been against both of these.
Punkin would say that North Koreans have no basis to complain about their government. After all, the North Korean government does everything for them! Without their dear leader, they wouldn’t have their annual clothes ration and their one bag of rice per month. Anyone who dares to imagine a superior alternative via free exchange is an ungrateful enemy of the people.
46 – Troll
Its amazing how a low level finical adviser, who see’s no reason to advance himself in his chosen career, is an vocal expert in Macro and Micro Economics, Government Policy, Sociology, and now Energy.
Why exactly haven’t you made your own organization and taken over the world with all your spare time?
46 – Troll
Do you even understand what “energy” is?
What the difference between Nuclear, Coal, Oil, Natural Gas, Wind, and Hydro is in regards to generating electricity (at the macro level)… and why photovoltaic is the only oddball of the group?
News from my world:
“The federal budget deal could speed the lingering death of old-fashioned defined-benefit pension plans, in which employers reward years of service by providing a guaranteed stream of retirement income.
The deal could affect any pre-retiree in a former employer’s pension plan by increasing the per-head premiums that plan sponsors must pay to the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. If it goes through, every person in a plan will get more expensive in the stroke of a pen.
Employers are concerned about the extent and uncertainty of future pension liabilities, and are trying to shed them. The proposed increase in the budget legislation would push even more pension plans to manage costs any way they can, including reducing participant head count, said Alan Glickstein, a senior retirement consultant with Towers Watson.
The budget deal calls for a 22 percent hike, spread out over three years, in flat-rate single-employer premiums paid to the PBGC, which acts as a backstop to a company’s pension liability should the company become insolvent. Those premiums will already have risen from $31 to $64 from 2007 to 2016; by 2019 they will reach $78.
An increasingly common way companies get rid of those liabilities is by letting participants take their pension all at once, as a lump sum based on the present value of their future benefit. After strong years for such offers in 2013 and 2014, the activity rose dramatically in 2015, said Matt McDaniel, who leads Mercer’s U.S. defined-benefits risk practice.
. . .
An Obama administration official said “the proposed premium increases are necessary to ensure that PBGC will be able to pay retiree benefits when pension plans fail.”
Seems that, just like bank M&A, I got into a line of legal work at its apex.
Anyone who has traveled the world and contrasted the state of mostly private-run electricity and fuel companies in the developed world with the state-run electricity and fuel operations in some of the developing world would realize how ignorant it is to wish for greater state involvement in power.
Private (though unfortunately highly regulated) firms make up the vast majority of investment in developed world power, which makes it a virtual afterthought to pawns like Pumpkin, who thinks electricity and fuel just show up magically, like the sun everyday, thanks to his “consumer demand”. He should try running a computer without a UPS in rural India or Africa, (where private companies have to supply backup diesel generators to make up for failing government infrastructure) or pumping his own gas in Venezuela (where a government monopoly and price controls lead to constant shortages).
[51] redux,
I predict that in 7-10 years, there will be no more defined benefit plans in the U.S. They are simply so incredibly expensive compared DC plans, they won’t be worth it. Even the multiemployer plans will be wound down although not as fast.
Comrade,
ZIRP is killing defined benefit pensions. Hard to make 8% target returns when a big asset class is doomed to return 3% or less. Squeezes them into equities and alternative assets searching for returns. Which then drives up their prices and then serves to drive down their future returns as well.
@conradhackett: US deaths (2013)
Tobacco 437k
Alcohol 29k
Opioids 16k
Heroin 8k
Cocaine 5k
@Salon:
“Conservatives will find a way to collectively avoid the truth”: Expect the GOP to get more extreme after 2016 loss
@cillic11:
Ayn Rand, Rand Paul and Paul Ryan walk into a bar. The bartender serves them tainted alcohol because there are no regulations. They die.
re # 55 – The 1998 tobacco settlement under the Clinton administration was perhaps one of the most egregious things the Democrats have done for big business in this country. The unprecedented future legal protection that was granted insures those 1/2 million or so will continue to die every year.
Pssst, don’t tell the global warmers but Antarctic ice is still growing.
57-
What bar? It closed due to too many rules and regulations.
re: # 59 – Al Gore lied, the Polar Bears are going to be fine?
61-An inconvenient truth.
Yes, polar bears are doing fine, as these professional forecasters predicted:
http://www.forecastingprinciples.com/index.php/polar-bear-population-forecasts
The same professional forecasters, knowing forecasting principles, and using no fancy (unreliable) climate models, have predicted temperatures much more accurately than Al Gore’s model.
http://www.theclimatebet.com/
[54] rags,
Which is one reason I think they will be gone. Better to kill them off now before the liabilitities get worse. I can easily see a PBGC funding deal that is a one-and-done where PBGC gets funding to pay off all underfunded liabilities and then effectively goes out of existence, at least for multiemployer. No one is creating DB plans anymore anyway so the rest will just run down and out, and PBGC will be shuttered in our lifetimes.
[57] anope
Time to borrow a new joke. That one’s getting tired.
Woops:
Long Island man returns from Florida to find his home destroyed — because his town said so
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS /
Phil Williams left his home in December. When he came back in August, he learned he had no home.
A Long Island man who left his pricey house for eight months, so he could recover from surgery, came back to find he didn’t have a house anymore — because his town demolished it in his absence.
Now Philip Williams, 69, is suing the Town of Hempstead for giving him the worst homecoming imaginable.
“Nothing was left. It was gone,” the distraught Williams told CBS News York, standing in the empty lot that once held his home.
“Everything I have, or had, is gone.”
His furniture, jewelry and other prized possessions all disappeared along the house, he said.
The 1,570-foot home was valued at $423,072, according to the real estate site Zillow.
Williams said he left Long Island in December for a knee surgery, and stayed there for months to recover. While he was gone, he wasn’t getting any of the mail coming to his home — so he never knew about his town’s plan to take down his home in May.
Hempstead destroyed the house as part of its efforts to eradicate “zombie homes” — but didn’t know its M.I.A. owner was just living elsewhere.
Hempstead officials ordered the destruction of Phil Williams’ house (l.), leaving an empty field in its place.
Town officials told Newsday they considered the seemingly abandoned home dangerous, and made every attempt possible to let Williams know about the impending wreckage.
But Williams said the town’s snail mail wasn’t enough.
“Somebody could have called me, somebody could have notified me and said, ‘Hey, listen, here is what’s going to happen,” he said.
“But the town, they took everything, it’s just gone.”
Williams and his attorney did not return requests for comment.
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/long-island-man-leaves-home-finds-destroyed-town-article-1.2420651
[55] anope,
I’m confused. Doesn’t your side want to legalize heroin and coke?
Ahh, yes, let’s use countries that the rest of the world has pretty much blocked out of trade as examples of how govts fail their people. I know they are dictatorships, but a serious question. If either one of these countries were buddy buddy with America, would the economic situation of those places improve?
Ragnar says:
November 2, 2015 at 2:54 pm
Punkin would say that North Koreans have no basis to complain about their government. After all, the North Korean government does everything for them! Without their dear leader, they wouldn’t have their annual clothes ration and their one bag of rice per month. Anyone who dares to imagine a superior alternative via free exchange is an ungrateful enemy of the people.
I was halfway hoping that tesla crashed and the german guy got the butter knife through his neck.
Amazing how people attack the individual rather than the argument when they have no response. I’m happy with my life. My spare time is spent learning constantly which is how a financial analyst is so well rounded in various fields that most don’t even have a rudimentary understanding of.
A Home Buyer says:
November 2, 2015 at 3:00 pm
46 – Troll
Its amazing how a low level finical adviser, who see’s no reason to advance himself in his chosen career, is an vocal expert in Macro and Micro Economics, Government Policy, Sociology, and now Energy.
Why exactly haven’t you made your own organization and taken over the world with all your spare time?
Anon and Pumpkin wash up on a desert island.
They die, shocked that their “consumer demand” doesn’t create the food, water, and shelter they need to survive.
Key words to focus on here….developed and developing world. Do you think this has anything to do with what you are talking about?
“Anyone who has traveled the world and contrasted the state of mostly private-run electricity and fuel companies in the developed world with the state-run electricity and fuel operations in some of the developing world would realize how ignorant it is to wish for greater state involvement in power.”
Wording is a beautiful thing, you use bs to get over on people. This paragraph is full of bs. It should read, employers are only concerned about themselves and how they are going to suck out even more profit out of their workers when they can no longer lower the pay or ship the job. So you take the workers future retirement as payment.
“Employers are concerned about the extent and uncertainty of future pension liabilities, and are trying to shed them. The proposed increase in the budget legislation would push even more pension plans to manage costs any way they can, including reducing participant head count, said Alan Glickstein, a senior retirement consultant with Towers Watson.”
#36 Common Core is the final step in making American children complete idiots. Forget about what happens when your reasonable intelligent child questions the method and the teacher – then it’s time for sit-down with Mommy and Daddy as they explain how your child being able to see through the nonsense is a detriment to both herself and society. This is followed by a conversation between parents and child – either they tell her the truth or you parrot the party line. We are doomed.
Don’t you think Bill Gates would be smart enough to know if climate change is a faux? Why is he going all in trying to get human society to save themselves? Why would he put so much effort into this if he didn’t really think there was an issue facing mankind?
I’m sorry, you guys are really sick to think that the planet is not changing and we should not be doing all we can to understand it and create options in case sh!t hits the fan. Instead, you guys would just rather ignore it and wait to see what happens. Simply brilliant.
76-
Pumps, Gates being smart in one field (computers), doesn’t necessarily make him smart in another (climate science).
Re: 76 – pumps Gates still flys in his private jet and has a bigger carbon footprint than a dozen families. The solution to global warming is a non-starter ,mainly because the eradication of half the population will cause a few wars and a one child policy might be unenforceable.
Time for Pumpkin to remember his vow to leave this board forever. I don’t think he even honored his vow for a whole weekend. Definitely no longer than one of his “work”days.
Wow, John Cleese apparently read Pumpkin’s comments on this board and made a video to explain his reaction to his claim to a “well rounded” learning in “various fields” beyond his low-achievements in financial analysis and landlording. https://youtu.be/wvVPdyYeaQU
Troll,
Then answer my other questions in the post you ignored, right after the BS one you felt the need to respond to.
You want to talk energy. Then stop grandstanding and Talk. Without copy and paste please.
Or better yet, give me your analysis of pension systems you still owe me when you were off babbling about that lost cause.
But I’ll settle for energy for now, because that is my cup of tea.
Don’t you think Bill Gates would be smart enough to know if climate change is a faux? Why is he going all in trying to get human society to save themselves? Why would he put so much effort into this if he didn’t really think there was an issue facing mankind?
I’m sorry, you guys are really sick to think that the planet is not changing and we should not be doing all we can to understand it and create options in case sh!t hits the fan. Instead, you guys would just rather ignore it and wait to see what happens. Simply brilliant.
Don’t you think Steve Jobs would opt for traditional effective treatment instead of alternative medicine when faced with death? I have extensive background in Geological Sciences, Chemistry, and Physics. The climate change claims are overblown. It’s happening, no doubt. The consequences are way overblown and borderline hysterical.
Ayn Rand, Rand Paul and Paul Ryan walk into a bar. The bartender serves them tainted alcohol because there are no regulations. They die.
Because that happens.
Did you read that interview? I think he has firm grasp when it comes to energy and climate science. Bill Gates is not the type to push an issue he knows nothing about.
You can jump around and scream climate change is not real all you want. The world is always changing, why you would not want to study and understand this change is beyond me. Let’s just be idiots and ignore it because we hate al gore and the left. Let’s think trying to study the climate of the only planet we live on is a waste of money and a scam developed by the left. Let’s ignore that 9 out of 10 scientists have come to the conclusion that the climate is changing, but embrace the one scientist out of 10, who is payed by the likes of the Koch brothers, as the way to go.
I have one question, if al gore and the left were never associated with climate change, would you still hold your same ignorant position? Better yet, if the republican party embraced climate change, how many of you would be on board?
Alex says:
November 2, 2015 at 6:04 pm
76-
Pumps, Gates being smart in one field (computers), doesn’t necessarily make him smart in another (climate science).
Did you read that interview? I think he has firm grasp when it comes to energy and climate science. Bill Gates is not the type to push an issue he knows nothing about.
And you base your opinion on his credentials because he sounds smart?
Gullible gourd,
I did read the article, he’s just parroting the topic de jour. His solution? Wait for it…more and bigger government, more taxes , more regulation.
I’d have more respect for him if he put his money towards more immediate environmental issues, like deforestation of the world’s rain forests.
Not this “pie in the sky” nonsense, which is nothing more than another stealth tax and regulation scheme.
It’s fun watching the anonunists can abolishing their own for thoughtcrime
http://www.cnn.com/2014/10/06/showbiz/raven-symone-gay-labels/index.html
Yes, I understand what energy is. As for your other question, I honestly don’t know what you are asking Are you talking about the negative by-products produced? Are you asking about the amount of energy it takes to produce as opposed to what you get out? Maybe I am an idiot, but I have no idea what you are asking, and I’m not an expert in the field of energy.
All I know is that fossil fuels are not the long-term option for our energy needs. They are dirty, unsustainable, and due to their finite nature, there will come a time when they become too expensive. I am almost certain that fusion will be the energy source of the future.
So please enlighten me as to what I’m missing with your question.
A Home Buyer says:
November 2, 2015 at 3:05 pm
46 – Troll
Do you even understand what “energy” is?
What the difference between Nuclear, Coal, Oil, Natural Gas, Wind, and Hydro is in regards to generating electricity (at the macro level)… and why photovoltaic is the only oddball of the group?
http://news.sciencemag.org/physics/2015/10/feature-bizarre-reactor-might-save-nuclear-fusion
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/26/technology/start-ups-take-on-challenge-of-nuclear-fusion.html?_r=0
Rags, what do you have to say about this guys argument against your hero?
“”That cursory glance would assign that threat to BIG GOVERNMENT, which threatens all humans, wealthy or not. Communism and its Evil Twin Naziism killed hundreeds of millions, while Capitalism has saved billions.”
Or, capitalism has helped kill hundreds of millions all by itself. Who supported Hitler in his rise to power? Why, big companies! Could he have managed to do what he did without them? Of course not. Who did he fight — and lose to? Communists, every bit as much as us. Don’t get me wrong — I think that Communism is moderately stupid — it is yet another mythology, the notion that optimal economics and social order is SIMPLE. I also think that unrestrained Capitalism is moderately stupid. Obviously you’ve missed out on most of the economic history of the United States, so things like depressions and the company store and the negative consequences of supermonopolies on things like human freedom escape you, but do try to bear in mind that sufficiently large corporate structures become shadow governments in their own right. Power goes with money, and power AND money’s first duty to itself is to defend itself at all costs. Without a strong government to keep the “capitalism” playing field level and the most powerful players in check, we’d have, well, we’d have the Fed.
Gee, somehow Big Government in the US seems to actually be RUN by those same Capitalists you admire so much.
I grew up loving Ayn Rand as much as you obviously do, but it is worth remembering that Ayn Rand — after smoking 2 packs a day for most of her life — relied on social security and medicare when sure, she got cancer and would have had to spend herself down to poverty to get treatment otherwise. It’s easy to argue against the need for a social network — nobody likes paying for anything they don’t need — until they need it, when SUDDENLY it makes sense.”
91- That’s the dagger in the heart, huh? So true.
“Gee, somehow Big Government in the US seems to actually be RUN by those same Capitalists you admire so much.”
Troll,
Then just tell me how electricity is made from say, coal.
But I get the feeling you don’t care. You read an article which said we need new forms of energy production and that is all you need to know about the subject.
I’m not an expert on energy and I really don’t understand what you are getting at. Are you implying that they all come down to a simple process of heating up water? I’m seriously confused.
A Home Buyer says:
November 2, 2015 at 9:28 pm
Troll,
Then just tell me how electricity is made from say, coal.
But I get the feeling you don’t care. You read an article which said we need new forms of energy production and that is all you need to know about the subject.
94- I do believe we need new sources of energy. This guy does a great job of explaining why.
““As a chemist I am in favor of not using hydrocarbons for producing electricity if there are better alternatives. The stuff is too useful for things like plastic.”
Gail, it is worth noting that, as a physicist, I agree with pretty much everything you say (with one modest exception). Not just in this reply, in your other reply on the population problem. I grew up in India (my father worked for Ford Foundation) and most Americans simply have no idea what they’re talking about when they attempt to minimize Malthus or argue for unconstrained procreation. Yes, the best way to defeat Malthus is to civilize the world and make it uniformly wealthy, but we’re at least decades if not a hundred years from managing that trick, and cheap, inexhaustible, uniformly distributed energy resources are a NECESSARY (and probably sufficient, over time) condition for managing it. Fission-based nuclear is itself at best a bridge technology in the long run, at least as far as proven e.g. thorium or uranium reserves is concerned, and not even that long a bridge if it becomes as common as it probably should be.
One thing nobody here seems to want to address is: What is the human species going to do for energy in the year 3000? In the year 2500? In the year 2100? The answer to this seems to be tightly linked to what we choose to do right now. In the year 3000 we will not be burning coal, or oil, or natural gas. The interglacial will almost certainly be over, and all of these resources will have run out. We will be starting up a (probable) 90,000 years of ice age, with no gas, no oil, and a vast reduction of arable land.
There are precisely two basic sources that could credibly be supplying enough energy to sustain a meaningful civilization at that time, at least as far as I can see (with more knowledge about energy than most). Nuclear fusion, presuming that we have mastered it at an economically feasible level, and solar. Sure, there will be dribs and drabs from hydro, geo, maybe wind, but the only reliable non-fossil fuel sources present in sufficient abundance to run the planet a thousand years from now with sustained, uncollapsed civilization (a high rate of energy consumption, in other words) in between are Deuterium (and other fissionables, perhaps) and insolation from the sun. Biofuels are solar fuels, by the way. Wood is a solar fuel. Hemp and other fast-grow crops are solar fuels. Whale blubber is a solar fuel. Even oil and coal are solar fuels, although they are OLD solar fuels, not sustainably renewed.
Oh, and the sun itself runs on fusion. So really, there is only one basic source — fusion, although it would be nice to be able to bring the fusion source down to earth instead of having to deal with its indirect collection and redistribution.
Solar is, of course broad — it encompasses many technologies. It isn’t just solar cells, it is solar updraft towers, it is solar heaters and solar heat engine generators, it is biofuels. It isn’t just one KIND of solar cell — the kind of solar cell that ultimately proves to be best may not have been invented yet. It might end up being bioengineered and not toxic at all, and by their nature, the toxic kinds of solar cells are pretty much 100% recyclable with very little loss of toxic compounds. Similarly, we may or may not have discovered or figured out how to mass-implement a sustainable energy storage mechanism, but there have been and continue to be pretty significant advances in this at e.g. MIT and elsewhere.
As several Northerners have noted, solar is far from perfect, although IF WE HAD THE WILL TO DO SO we could no doubt provide 100% of the energy per capita consumed in the US right now to every human alive on earth inside fifty years. We could accomplish this without even all that much sacrifice; it would be paying for itself completely in the not too long run. To get the energy from the sunny south or southwest US up to the cold dark northeast and Canada would be a pain in the ass, no doubt, but again this is the sort of problem that engineering and discovery are likely to solve, if we start putting enough energy and money into looking for the solution. For example, using equatorial electricity to make high energy density hydrocarbons and shipping THEM might actually be feasible if we can’t do better with very high voltage transmission lines, if we don’t invent a way to transmit it down a superconducting wave guide with minimal loss per thousand miles.
I don’t think that this is an either/or question, as many here seem to do. Solar actually is a good complement to fossil fuels and is already an economic win — even unsubsidized, a straight up win — in much of the Southwest. I don’t think it is necessary to burn MORE fossil fuels as an “in your face” to AGW fans just because they are wrong — expensive silliness at best — or to pretend that solar is much worse than it is to make burning stuff look better by comparison. Realistic common sense appraisal of alternatives plus the VISION to start researching and engineering a steady state world-spanning energy system will serve everybody better than EITHER of the religious dogmas that seem to dominate climate/energy discussions.”
Wow, lots of dumb being thrown around in here today. I think Alex wins the Billy Madison award for this nugget.
“Pumps, Gates being smart in one field (computers), doesn’t necessarily make him smart in another (climate science).”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wKjxFJfcrcA
So all those lawyers trying cases in patent law, should just stop, because there is no way they can have any understanding of anything outside of the field of law.
Yes lawyers are intellectuals too. Although I will admit, a few in here are fighting that premise!
#78 Juice
“Re: 76 – pumps Gates still flys in his private jet and has a bigger carbon footprint than a dozen families. ”
Reaching for the liberal limousine fallacy, shows you don’t have an argument to debate the point with.
#82 Ben
Don’t you think Steve Jobs would opt for traditional effective treatment instead of alternative medicine
No, the record is quite clear, he bought his way to the top of the liver transplant list.
#72 Rags
“Anon and Pumpkin wash up on a desert island.
They die, shocked that their “consumer demand” doesn’t create the food, water, and shelter they need to survive.”
No they die because, they can’t eat the plants as the plants contain M0nSatn0 patent and therefore violate their patent rights.
96-
Hey Max, next time you’re in need of surgery, look up the nearest computer geek, I’m sure he’ll fix you up real good.
#52 Rags
” He should try running a computer without a UPS in rural India or Africa”
Last time I was in V1etnam, the “G0d DAM C0mmun1sts” were managing to keep the lights on quite nicely.
#100 Alex
When the surgeon is working robotically, I’ll be sure to High Five him!
#47 Tin Pot McCarthy
“Interestingly, the left has always been against both of these.”
So where does my pro nuclear stance leave me?
#28 D-Fens
“22 – At least Heroin users are generally non-aggressive and just want to pass out.”
Unless they need money for a fix in which case they will mug you and rob you. Did you ever watch “Trainspotting”?
#22 FKA
Written under a “nom de plume” so as always, you have to question the reliability.
P.S. The article is pure Poetic Justice when you think about it!
25 Fast Eddie
Salaries to the police department are sacred and not to be touched.
After all, they are the enforcers and those with with money need them to enforce the laws on the deadbeats. Essentially a paid army.
Which is why Christie only picks on teachers. He does not need them for anything, they are just a nuisance. He needs the police to surround and arrest the unruly teachers…..
Fast Eddie says:
November 2, 2015 at 10:59 am
No, Einstein, banging up a huge new house drives *that* person’s property taxes up and should *reduce* the aggregate property tax burden for everyone else, provided your government doesn’t treat the new revenue as windfall and fritter it away, as usual.
The whole purpose is to reward the Assistant Deputy to the Assistant Police C
106. Christie began a town hall by asking the crowd if they felt six figures was too high for police to be earning. So, yeah he is also about alienating cops.