Archive for the 'Economy' Category
The Contiguous United States Visualized by Distance to the Nearest McDonald’s
November 9th, 2011Via: DataPointed: To gauge the creep of cookie-cutter commercialism, there’s no better barometer than McDonald’s – ubiquitous fast food chain and inaugural megacorporate colonizer of small towns nationwide. … Behold, a visualization of the contiguous United States, colored by distance to the nearest domestic McDonald’s!
Most Store Honey Isn’t Honey
November 9th, 2011Via: Food Safety News: More than three-fourths of the honey sold in U.S. grocery stores isn’t exactly what the bees produce, according to testing done exclusively for Food Safety News. The results show that the pollen frequently has been filtered out of products labeled “honey.” The removal of these microscopic particles from deep within a […]
Fracking Industry Executives Suggest Military PSYOP Techniques to Peers for Dealing with Public
November 9th, 2011Click through for the audio recordings. Via: CNBC: Last week’s oil industry conference at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Houston was supposed to be an industry confab just like any other — a series of panel discussions, light refreshments and an exchange of ideas. It was a gathering of professionals to discuss “media and stakeholder […]
Berlusconi Promises to Resign
November 9th, 2011Via: AP: Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi conceded Tuesday he no longer had the support to govern and announced he would resign like his Greek counterpart, becoming the biggest political casualty yet of the European debt crisis. Berlusconi promised to leave office after Parliament passes economic reforms demanded by the European Union to keep Italy from […]
Olympus Admits It Hid Losses For Decades
November 8th, 2011Via: Reuters: Japan’s Olympus admitted on Tuesday it hid losses on securities investments dating back to the 1980s, bowing to weeks of pressure to explain a series of baffling transactions that have put the future of the firm in doubt. The revelations by the 92-year-old maker of endoscopes and cameras appear to vindicate ex-CEO Michael […]
China: Regime Admits 10% of Farmland Polluted with Heavy Metals
November 7th, 2011Considering the source, I’d start by doubling or tripling the estimate. Via: AFP: About 10 percent of China’s farmland contains excessive levels of heavy metals due to contaminated water and poisonous waste seeping into the soil, state media said Monday, citing a government survey. Pollution from heavy metals such as lead, mercury and cancer-causing cadmium […]
Property Prices Collapse in China
November 7th, 2011Via: Forbes: Residential property prices are in freefall in China as developers race to meet revenue targets for the year in a quickly deteriorating market. The country’s largest builders began discounting homes in Shanghai, Beijing, and Shenzhen in recent weeks, and the trend has now spread to second- and third-tier cities such as Hangzhou, Hefei, […]
Foxconn Wants to Build “Intelligent Robotics Kingdom” to Replace Human Workers with Robots
November 7th, 2011I love how they mention that this facility will create jobs! Yeah, 2000 jobs for people who are tasked with figuring out how to eliminate millions of other people’s jobs. This is definitely one for your Arbeit Macht Frei file folder. Via: Cnet: iPhone maker Foxconn aims to manufacture its own robots and automation equipment […]
50 Companies Team to Create Open Source EV
November 7th, 2011Via: Wired: The StreetScooter is a $7,000 EV with a 74 mph top speed and an 80-mile range. It relies on leased batteries and uses a heat pump for heating and air conditioning, and shipping company DHL has already ordered 3,500 of them — but the most interesting thing about the vehicle is how it […]
Most Unemployed No Longer Receive Benefits
November 7th, 2011What became of them? System D might be a partial explanation. Via: CNBC: The jobs crisis has left so many people out of work for so long that most of America’s unemployed are no longer receiving unemployment benefits. Early last year, 75 percent were receiving checks. The figure is now 48 percent — a shift […]
