Month: December 2017

Investment Prospects For 2018

usissuescom Foreign Policy, GDP & Employment, Monetary Policy, Stocks & Commodities , , , , , , , , ,

By Alasdair Macleod – Re-Blogged From http://www.Gold-Eagle.com

Predicting the future is a mug’s game, and in financial markets we simply cannot know tomorrow’s prices. All we can do is make assessments of the factors that can be expected to influence them.

Economists’ forecasts today, with very few exceptions, are a waste of time and downright misleading. In 2016, we saw this spectacularly illustrated with Brexit, when the IMF, OECD, the Bank of England and the UK Treasury all forecast a slump in the British economy in the event the referendum voted to leave the EU. While there are reasonable suspicions there was an element of disinformation in the forecasts, the fact they were so wrong is the important point. Yet, we still persist in paying economists to fail us.

Continue reading →

The Certainty of Global Warming and Warmer, er Colder, Winters

usissuescom CAGW Alarmism , , ,

Re-Blogged From http://www.WattsUpWithThat.com

From the “children just won’t know what snow is” department and political cartoonist Rick McKee of the Augusta Chronicle. He drew this in 2014, but with all the scrambling by climate scientists to explain our current record cold snap, this is still germane today.

CONTINUE READING –>

Homes Gained $2 Trillion in Value This Year

usissuescom GDP & Employment, Stocks & Commodities , , ,

Re-Blogged From Newsmax

Your home may not have made the same gains as stocks or bitcoin, but it still was a robust year for the U.S. housing market.

The value of the entire U.S. housing stock increased by 6.5 percent — or $2 trillion — in 2017, according to a report from Zillow. All homes in the country are now worth a cumulative $31.8 trillion.

Image: Homes Gained $2 Trillion in Value This Year Under Trump, Zillow Says
(Mark Plumley | Dreamstime) Continue reading →

1 of Every 5 Fed Government Employees Has a 6-Figure Salary

usissuescom Taxes & Spending , , ,

By Rachel del Guidice -Re-Blogged From Liberty Headlines

Federal employees cost tax payers $1 million every minute…

The U.S. government pays employees a total of about $1 million per minute, according to a watchdog group’s report on the sprawling federal bureaucracy.

OTB_MappingSwamp

An image from the report. (Photo: OpenTheBooks.com)

Looking at 78 large agencies, the nonprofit organization OpenTheBooks.com found that the average salary of a federal employee exceeds $100,000 and that roughly 1 in 5 of those on the government payroll has a six-figure salary.

Continue reading →

Glaciers and Sea Level Rise

usissuescom CAGW Alarmism, Statistics , , , , , , ,

By Andy May – Re-Blogged From http://www.WattsUpWithThat.com

This is the seventh and last post in my series on the hazards of climate change. In this post we examine the effects of climate change on glaciers and sea level rise. The first six examined the effect of humans on the environment, the effect of the growing human population, climate change and the food supply, the cost of global warming, the effect of man and climate change on extinctions, climate (or weather) related deaths, and extreme weather and climate change.

Continue reading →

The Year That Was 2017

usissuescom Foreign Policy , , , , , , ,

Re-Blogged From Stratfor

We would not be doing our jobs correctly if we only forecast the year ahead. Quite simply, we must be rigorous in examining the past, and that means taking a hard look at how well we did in determining the major trends of the year gone by. In every respect, 2017 was particularly unique because of the questions — and alarmism — surrounding the inauguration of U.S. President Donald Trump. Would the world see a dramatic warming of U.S. relations with Russia that would leave many Western allies in the lurch? Would a massive trade war break out between the United States and China? Would the Iran nuclear deal be torn up? These were all questions we sought to address as we pondered the changing dynamics of the global system. What follows are some of our key deductions, alongside honest appraisals of what we got right and wrong.

The year 2017 opened with a new U.S. president, and alarmism about the path Donald Trump would take.

Continue reading →

HELP! I need a Selenium guru.

usissuescom Discussion Categories , , , ,

   By Bob Shapiro

I need some help.

I’m writing some business software for myself in JAVA. One piece, written in Selenium, connects to my bank’s web site, to automate the Bill Pay function.

It was working – and then my bank changed their web site to load using Javascript. So now my Selenium piece is broken, and I’ve spent a couple of weeks trying to fix it, to no avail.

If any of you is a Selenium guru, if you can fix it for me I’ll pay you for your time and give a big thank you.

Please contact me at Bob@US-Issues.com and I’ll send specifics.

Thanks in advance.