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Feb 29, 2012
Why the Environmental Movement Is Not Winning | | AlterNet
More bad news: U.S. water bills to triple | Washington Examiner
http://washingtonexaminer.com/politics/washington-secrets/2012/02/more-bad-ne...
Those Sleeping Pills May Be Killing You - Slashdot
US Wants Natural Gas As Major Auto Fuel Option - Slashdot
EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson, Testimony Before the U.S. House Committee on Energy and Commerce
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16 dead after blast at China chemical plant
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Woman charged with burning 3,500-year-old tree..yep she was high
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Army Unveils First Military Fuel Cell Fleet
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Elocal Infographic Shows How Much Water Your Home is Wasting
From spending five extra minutes in the shower to leaving the faucet running while you do the dishes, you most likely waste more water in your home than you think you do. While fresh water is a renewable resource, we consume clean, usable water at rates faster than it can be replenished. Elocal compiled information from a variety of experts to put together a very informative infographic about residential water consumption in the United States, highlighting the fact that the average U.S. family uses 127,000 gallons of water every year!
Read the rest of Elocal Infographic Shows How Much Water Your Home is Wasting
Feb. 29 US: OSHA GHS Adoption Moves Forward to Federal Register
From prweb.com:
OSHA’s revised hazard communication standard passed the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) review. The updated standard incorporates the principles of the Globally Harmonized System (GHS) which aims to standardize the classification and labeling of chemicals and related hazard communication. Benefits of OSHA’s updated HCS include reduced time and costs involved in meeting multiple regulations for hazard communication, improved comprehension and understanding of health and environmental hazards, facilitation of trade by removing barriers created by various health and safety requirements, and reduction of duplicate material testing.
The OMB approved the standard through the final ruling stage as “consistent with change.” The consistent with change status signifies that the draft rule had been modified in the course of the review, but was determined to be consistent with the executive order and all applicable requirements. However, it is not yet known the extent of the changes, whether they are substantive or inconsequential. Now in the Final Rule stage, the last step is for the rule to be published officially in the Federal Register thus setting the effective date for the transition period. The timing of publication to the register is not known at this time.
IBM cuts more than 1,000 U.S. workers - Computerworld
Bill Gates on Insanity and Energy R&D - ScienceInsider
The U.S. government is "crazy" when it comes to funding for energy research and development, according to high-tech titan Bill Gates. "It's crazy how little we are funding this energy stuff," Gates today told an audience at a U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) conference near Washington, D.C. "Funding for energy [research] in the U.S. is underfunded by a factor of two."... nearly an hour, Gates discussed energy challenges with DOE Secretary Steven Chu in an informal "fireside chat" moderated by John Podesta, former chief of staff to President Bill Clinton and now chair of the Center for American Progress, in Washington, D.C .
Gates's call for increased spending on energy R&D echoed recommendations he made late last year as a member of a blue-ribbon panel of U.S. business leaders convened by the Washington-based American Energy Innovation Council. That group noted that the U.S. government spent about $5 billion on energy research in 2010, compared with about $30 billion for medical research and over $80 billion for defense R&D.
It is "likely that underfunding is delaying the rate of progress," in developing new, cleaner energy technologies, Gates argued.
Health Habits, Worldwide [Daily Infographic]
Kilzer for Daily Infographic,
Across countries, whole grains are considered to be the top healthy food, and is consistently in the top three health food purchased by region. Other popular health foods are yogurt, iodine enhanced salt and low cholesterol butter or margarine. World inhabitants looking to loose weight are quick to change their diet, which is important for weight loss, and is followed by exercise. And while over 50% of the world percieves themselves to be over weight, the highest percentage is in North America. North Americans need to change their diet, start exercising and begin to see themselves more positively. See large chart Via
The Myth of “Baseload” Power
In this way of thinking, the “baseload” power demand is met with big generators like old coal and nuclear plants that don’t turn on and off very well. To accommodate electrical needs above the “baseload,” smaller, more responsive plants are used that can more easily follow the demand. Makes sense, right?
The problem with this idea is that it’s not how the electrical grid actually works. In reality, the grid isn’t one uniform pool of power demand, but a huge, sprawling, interconnected web of transmission lines of various sizes and capacities, dotted with producers and users of power. More like this:
The whole thing is controlled by an “independent system operator,” whose job is to make sure the system works right and everyone gets the power they need as cheaply and reliably as possible. This means constantly turning production up and down at various plants and using various mechanisms to manage flow.
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Feb 28, 2012
Very scary char... More than 40% of Americans aren’t working.
Plug into any power outlet with ELVIIS smart EV-charging system - GizMag
No one is on google+... Yeah, Facebook wastes the most time, money and energy
shortformblog: A somewhat different take on the thing we reblogged earlier, but it shows two very interesting things: First, Tumblr and Pinterest are timesucks in equal measure, and second, nobody’s actually hanging around Google+ once they sign up.
The Shocking Truth About Defibrillators - IEEE Spectrum
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Yet despite the enormous investment in these AEDs, the death rate from sudden cardiac arrest is no better than it was 20 years ago. It still kills more Americans than lung, breast, and prostate cancers and AIDS combined. Worldwide, it kills about 7 million people a year.
So what’s going wrong? Are too many AEDs badly designed or prone to malfunction? Are they just not numerous enough to be found and used in time? Or are there other reasons they aren’t saving lives, reasons that would render public AEDs a waste of money?
First, a primer on the problem. Sudden cardiac arrest is not a heart attack. In a heart attack, blood can’t flow properly to the heart but the muscle itself keeps beating, so sufferers typically remain conscious. In cardiac arrest, the heart’s pumping mechanism—an electrochemically choreographed affair—becomes deranged, so that the many motions of the various parts no longer work together to pump any blood. With no blood flowing to the lungs or brain, victims rapidly lose consciousness.
Everything Not Nailed Down Being Bought... 2008 may be here
ZeroHedge: When in doubt - buy. When in doubt what - everything. As the chart below shows starting with the open of the US market, literally everything has been bought: stocks, bonds, crude, gold, and 'logically', the VIX. It took the market virtually no time to remember that when trillions in liquidity are being injected into the market in 2008
Antidepressants Are Useless, Pushed on Public Anyway | Natural Society
Mars Chocolate launches 1.258MW solar garden in North America | PV-Tech
Mars Chocolate, North America, has announced the installation of a solar garden at its Henderson chocolate factory, providing 100% of the factory’s electrical energy. The solar garden features 2,112 ground-mounted solar panels on 4.4 acres. Mars claims its installation as the largest by a food manufacturer in Nevada.
The installation generates 1,258MW of zero-emission electricity each year, offsetting 867 metric tons of greenhouse gases - the equivalent of removing approximately 170 vehicles from the road. The project will generate enough energy for 115 Nevada households use annually.
Redfield ethanol plant to convert to butanol plant | BioFuelsChat
A South Dakota corn ethanol plant will soon begin producing a fuel additive with a wider variety of uses.
Tom Hitchcock, chief executive of Redfield Energy, said the 50 million gallon-per-year plant is teaming with Englewood, Colo.-based Gevo to convert the facility in Redfield to a 40 million gallon-per-year butanol plant using the same 18 million bushels of corn a year.
Hitchcock said each gallon of butanol contains more energy than a gallon of ethanol.
“You use the same amount of corn to get a more valuable product,” he said.
South Dakota legislators this week approved extending a 20-cents-per-gallon tax incentive forethanol plants to facilities that produce butanol, and the bill is expected to be signed by the governor. But because the statewide program is capped at $4 million, Hitchcock said, the benefit to the Redfield plant actually amounts to about a penny a gallon.
Obama's Favorite Algae Company - Forbes
President Obama’s reference to algae in his Thursday energy speech drew flak over the weekend from Newt Gingrich, who called it “weird” before calling algal biofuel “a terrific concept.” But Obama had political reasons to promote algae in Florida, the sunny, swampy, politically-volatile state he carried in 2008.
The Obama Administration has already sunk $25 million into a Florida company—Algenol Biofuels—that is building an algae biorefinery using a patented technology that promises to streamline the process of extracting ethanol directly from algae.
Yale Environment 360: Denmark Offers Best Conditions for Clean Technology Growth, Report Says
Beyond Cap and Trade, A New Path to Clean Energy: Yale Environment 360
Feb 27, 2012
AWESOME Job opening as admin. assistant at The Green Team please pass on!
Bradley Blaeser
President The Green Team (of Wisconsin, Inc.)
414-335-4349
Feb 26, 2012
Putting 1 million tonnes of CO2 a mile under Illinois... A horrible gamble that costs trillions and does not work.
Also the executive director of the International Energy Agency, is supporting that $2.5 to $3 trillion should be invested in carbon capture and storage (C.C.S.) projects from 2010 to 2050, or 6 percent of the overall investment needed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, according to the International Energy Agency.
The agency recently unveiled a roadmap at the Carbon Sequestration Leadership Forum in London to give policymakers and industry leaders milestones and steps for reducing emissions. The roadmap includes plans to build 100 C.C.S. demonstration projects by 2020, and increase that to 3,100 projects by 2050. Read full from EcoSeed
Nevermind that:
- Only five C.C.S. projects are operational
- Managing buried CO2 may be as bad or worse than atomic waste that has put nations nuclear energy program in the hole over 90 Billion
- As a carbon sink C.C.S. all but meaningless.
- C.C.S. Raises the energy consumption of a coal plant by an average of 32 percent
- A carbon capture and storage infrastructure requires HUGE infrastructure consisting of pipelines that rivals the existing oil and gas network.
- We have way to produce abundant energy with less than 10% CO2 foot print we do now (decades old tech).
'We Won't Pay': Greece's Middle Class Revolt against Austerity - SPIEGEL ONLINE
BP faces billions in fines as Gulf oil spill trial nears | NOLA.com
Phone-based scanner detects harmful bacteria - GizMag
Did Santorum just give Obama an endorsement?
PETA killed over 95% of its animals in 2011
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http://times247.com/articles/peta-kills-over-95-percent-of-its-animals
Gasoline Prices Are Not Rising, the Dollar Is Falling - Forbes
http://www.forbes.com/sites/louiswoodhill/2012/02/22/gasoline-prices-are-not-...
Wyoming House advances doomsday bill
http://trib.com/news/state-and-regional/govt-and-politics/wyoming-house-advan... NOTE: They must have read, The Coming Collapse of the American Republic, by Robert A. Hall
USGS Measures Fallout from Fukushima in US NADP Precipitation Samples
Press Release- Following the disaster, radioactive iodine and radioactive cesium were detected in precipitation samples collected in the U.S. at NADP sites.
National Atmospheric Deposition Program (NADP) sites where USGS measured 137Cs in precipitation samples
Dot size represents relative deposition amounts. Fallout amounts measured in precipitation by USGS provide a clearer picture of fission-product wet deposition across the USA.
Detectable quantities of Iodine-131, Cesium-137 and Cesium-134 were observed at approximately 20% of the NADP locations where precipitation was sampled between March 15 and April 5, 2011. Radioactive iodine and cesium are often some of the largest contributors to human radiation doses after an accident at a nuclear reactor.
Fallout amounts measured in precipitation by NADP were similar to amounts measured by other organizations, which were determined to be well below any level of public health concern.
Methods and results of the study are documented in USGS Open-File Report 2011-1277. The data are interpreted and compared to measurements of others in an article published in Environmental Science and Technology, March 6, 2012. A list of frequently asked questions (FAQs) pertaining to the study is available via the link provided below.Open-File Report 2011–1277
Fission Products in National Atmospheric Deposition Program Wet Deposition Samples Following the Fukushima Dai-Ichi Nuclear Power Station Incident, March 8 - April 5, 2011. U.S. Geological Survey Open-File Report 2011-1277, 2011, 34p., Gregory A. Wetherbee, Timothy M. Debey, Mark A. Nilles, David A. Gay, and Christopher M.B. Lehmann.
Environmental Science and Technology
Wet Deposition of Fission-Product Isotopes to North America from the Fukushima Dai-ichi Incident, March 2011, Environmental Science and Technology, doi:10.1021/es203217u, March 6, 2012, Gregory A. Wetherbee, David A. Gay, Timothy M. Debey, Christopher M.B. Lehmann, and Mark A. Nilles.
Feb 25, 2012
‘Invisible’ Lung Disease Called A Death Sentence By Doctors... kills as many people as breast cancer.« CBS Dallas
It’s strikes most over 50. But nobody even knows what causes it.
“This year, there will be probably 40,000 people that die from breast cancer – a terrible disease there will be over 40,000 people that die from pulmonary fibrosis.
Vick, who’s social media savvy, hopes awareness sparks research. Because he knows no one would want to walk in his shoes.
“I want to be an advocate. I want to raise awareness,” he said.
Solyndra now faces environmental, health and safety problems - Washington Times
The full extent of the potential environmental problem at the leasedSolyndra facility remains unclear. Officials at iStar say in court papers that they were not given the keys to the premises until this month, thoughSolyndra stopped making its lease payments in September when it filed for bankruptcy protection in Delaware.
“There may be at the premises based on the materials the debtor has left behind, which consist, in part, of open containers of unidentified chemical waste and lead processing machinery,” iStar attorney Karen Bifferatowrote in a recent court filing.
Photographs attached to the iStar court filing provide an inside look atSolyndra’s stripped-down facility after the company hauled away whatever equipment might fetch money at auction.
In one picture, two large blue drums are filled with a black substance with no secure lids and covered instead with clear plastic wrap. Another photograph shows a yellow drum about the size of a large garbage can containing a yellow-brown gooey substance.
Yet another picture shows a large machine with a metallic tube coming from the top and another tube from the side. Both tubes display the words “lead exhaust.” A smaller sign on the front of the machine says “toxic” next to what appears to be a small skull and crossbones. A large structure outside the facility has the words “Argon Refrigerated Liquid” on its side.
Court filings from the landlord also describe a high temperature oven assembly that is connected to an outside collection system, all of which are contaminated with lead.
“It is not yet known if the lead contaminated equipment at the iStarpremises poses an imminent health problem, and since iStar only recently obtained access … it is in the process of having the lead contamination investigated,” the landlord stated in court papers.
At a bankruptcy hearing Wednesday, Ms. Bifferato said the landlord is worried that it will be stuck with “a big mess with potential environmental problems,” including Environmental Protection Agency violations.
Micro- and Mild Hybrids Power a $6.9 billion market for energy storage
Green Car Congress: CoolPlanet BioFuels claims conversion yield of 4K gallons gasoline per acre biomass
CoolPlanet BioFuels, a start-up developing technology to convert low-grade biomass into high-grade fuels including gasoline, and carbon that can be sequestered (earlier post), claims it has achieved a conversion yield of 4,000 gallons gasoline/acre biomass in pilot testing using giant miscanthus, an advanced bioenergy crop.
On an energy basis, that yield is about 12 times greater than current corn ethanol production levels, the company noted.
These test results are based on nearly optimal crop growth conditions and demonstrate what is possible in a good growing season. Under more routine growing conditions, we estimate yields of about 3,000 gallons/acre should be achievable throughout the Midwest by selecting the proper energy crop for local conditions.
—Mike Cheiky, Cool Planet’s founder and CEO
The giant miscanthus was developed at the University of Mississippi and provided from a high yield plot by Repreve Renewables. Other advanced bio-energy crops, such as sorghum and switch grass, can provide similar annual yields using this new process.
Agricultural waste from food crops can also produce up to 1,000 gallons of gasoline/acre using this new technology.
New Polymer Could Increase Capacitor Storage And Discharge Rate
I don’t think there is enough talk about the potential for capacitors to change the electric vehicle field, though companies like Maxwell Technologies and Ioxus are making major progress on capacitor technology. If this research pans out though, it could reshape electric vehicle technology, and help EV’s overcome a potentially devastating design flaw. And while battery technology definitely has performance potential, capacitors have even more capacity to develop fast, fun, and efficient electric cars.
Source: Science DailyThough electric cars are still in their infancy, already many people are seeing the potential for performance in the instant torque of electric motors. It’s not the motors that are the problem though; the batteries just can’t keep up. That is why some companies believe that capacitors, not batteries, are the future.
But capacitors face their own challenges, like lower energy density. But new research has uncovered a polymer that increases capacitor energy storage seven-fold, as well as the pace at which capacitors can discharge, making them ideal for performance vehicles.
Researchers at North Carolina State University have found that a polymer known as PVDF enables capacitors to store and discharge as much as seven-times as much energy as current capacitor technology. Unlike batteries, which use chemical reactions to produce electricity, capacitors use lots of separate electrical charges that can be charged and discharged quickly. The problem is that in general they cannot store as much energy as larger batteries, though they can provide enough short-term power for some serious performance.
Dr. Vivek Ranjan was the first to find that capactiors which contained the polymer polyvinylidene fluoride, or PVDF, along with another polymer called CTFE, could store a lot more energy than conventional capacitors. Other researchers ran a simulation at the atomic level, and found that the atoms within capacitors containing these two polymers performed a “synchronized dance”, flipping from polar to non-polar, discharging energy with very little electrical input.
Gas Prices... Classic Gary Varvel
There are a variety of reasons for gas prices increasing. But it wasn’t so long ago, the fault was easy to find.
Please read and follow Varvel at: http://blogs.indystar.com/varvelblog/2012/02/22/gas-prices-4/
New Avenue For MRSA 'Superbug': Pigs - Slashdot
Why Tesla Cars Aren't Bricked By Failing Batteries - Slashdot
Where Next-Generation Rare Earth Metals May Come From - Slashdot
Cars Emit More Black Carbon Than Previously Thought - Slashdot
America has already lost a decade of economic progress | The Economist
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http://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicdetail
Court rules visitors to national forest don't have to pay a fee
Ending poverty, not adding tests, is solution to school woes | Mercedes Olivera Columns - News for Dallas, Texas - The Dallas Morning News
before you vote, look at a few statistics since Barack Obama became the president of the United States.
Hey folks, it's election time... and yes, with the help of newt, perry and santorum, Obama is starting to look like the only logical choice again.
But, before you vote, look at a few statistics since Barack Obama became the president of the United States.
In February 2009, President Obama was very confident that his economic policies would turn the country around within a year. He said, and I quote, 'A year from now, I think people are going to see that we're starting to make some progress. If I don't have this done in three years, then there's going to be a one-term proposition.'
Well where are we after three years?
#1 Today there are 88 million working age Americans that are not employed and that are not looking for employment. That is an all-time record high.
#2 ... the percentage of unemployed Americans that had been out of work for more than 52 weeks was less than 15%. Today, it is above 30%.
#3 There are 1.2 million fewer jobs in America today.
#4 When Barack Obama first took office, the number of "long-term unemployed workers" in the United States was approximately 2.6 million. Today, that number is sitting at 5.6 million.
#5 The average duration of unemployment in the United States is hovering close to an all-time record high.
#6 ...worker health insurance costs have risen by 23 percent.
#7 ...the average price of a gallon of gasoline in the United States has increased by 90 percent.
#8 ...home values in the United States have declined by another 13 percent.
#9 ...new home sales in the U.S. set a brand new all-time record low in 2009, they set a brand new all-time record low again in 2010, and they set a brand new all-time record low once again during 2011.
#10 ...the number of Americans living in poverty has risen by more than 6 million.
Gallup Finds Unemployment Climbing to Nine Percent in February | CNSNews.com
(CNSNews.com) – Unemployment in the U.S. rose to nine percent in mid-February, up from 8.3 percent a month earlier, according to a new Gallup survey. The polling company said this suggests that it is “premature” to assume the economy will not feature prominently in the 2012 election season.
Gallup figures typically provide an indication of what the government will report at the end of the month.
“The U.S. unemployment rate, as measured by Gallup without seasonal adjustment, is 9.0% in mid-February,” Gallup said in its mid-month unemployment survey, released on February 17. “The mid-month reading normally reflects what the U.S. government reports for the entire month, and is up from 8.3% in mid-January.”
$6 Gas This Summer — U.S. Economy Falls Off Cliff (NYSEArca:USO, NYSE:XOM, NYSE:CVX, NYSE:COP, NYSE:BP, NYSEArca:XLE, NYSEArca:UGA) | ETF DAILY NEWS
And at $6 per gallon, US consumers will not only experience a touch of Europe without leaving the comforts of their own homes, the drain on another flat-lined metric—household income—could inject additional life to the anti-Obama tide of disenchantment this election cycle.
“March is now on the way, and we are seeing very high prices for gasoline at the pump,” Leeb told King World News. “ . . . we are continuing to see higher prices for gasoline and it may even hit record highs. In fact, I think they will hit record highs and we will see a minimum of $6 per gallon gasoline in the United States this summer.”
As geopolitical tensions between the West and Iran reach fresh highs, some in the business of managing money reckon that soon the oil price (NYSEArca:USO) could reach fresh highs as well, with the added help of a runaway printing press operator at the helm of the Fed, Ben Bernanke.
One 40-year money manager veteran Robert Fitzwilson, founder of Portola Group, anticipates the possibility of oil trading up from the present $80 to $100 range, to a new range, above the record price of $147 per barrel, set during the summer of 2008.
Along with Leeb, Fitzwilson believes the proverbial ‘perfect storm’ between two reliable catalysts for higher oil prices are about to clash hard this year. Those catalysts include a Middle East war (this time with Iran) and the Fed’s unofficial policy of encouraging sidelined money to take on risk at near-zero borrowing costs.
“Regardless, the secular forces almost ensure that the price of energy is going higher,” Fitzwilson told Eric King of KWN. “With this [ultra-loose monetary policy] as a backdrop, we have the Fed mandating that they are going to try to get the stock market higher and improve the economy by printing money. You can’t have that happen without demand for oil increasing.
“So, both from a monetary perspective and a supply/demand perspective, the price of oil has to go higher and has to go higher in a substantial way. $170 to $250 a barrel oil would not surprise me.”
The compression of generations – 25 million adults live at home with parents because they’re unemployed or underemployed. The crushing cost of a college education today.
Where have the young adults gone?
Without a doubt many young adults, those between the ages of 25 to 34 have moved back home (or never left home) because of the recession:
Source: Census
Part of the trend is unmistakable in that much of the growth has come from men. This is likely due to industries like construction taking a brutal hit once the housing market went bust. However the trend has also occurred with females if we go back to the early 2000s. There are a variety of reasons for this compression of generations. This is common in other parts of the world but certainly is a new phenomenon here in the US. In Italy it is common for men to live at home well into (and beyond) young adulthood but how well will this go in the US?
It doesn’t seem like much of this is by voluntary choice:
“(TIME) Nearly 25 million adults live at home with their parents because they’re unemployed or underemployed, they’re trying to pay off student loans or save money to buy a place, or for any number of other reasons. While calling mom and dad your “roommates” may be a smart financial move, it’s the kiss of death for a healthy dating life. Trulia’s survey found that only 5% of unmarried adults would be open to dating someone who lived with their parents.”
This might also explain a massive slowdown in the first time homebuyer market since many purchase their first home between the ages of 25 to 34. It is tricky to purchase a home when people are working low-wage jobs or simply not working at all. The massive amount ofstudent debt also hangs above many from moving into another major debt purchase. As the above data highlights living with your parents might be good for your pocketbook but it might be difficult to woo a potential partner when living at home for many reasons. Yet this also delays the need for a home since there is little need for larger spaces when you are single. Without a doubt the trend of young adults living at home has increased:
EPA funds University of Hawaii marine debris research project / Agency providing $15,000 to further
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Fed Writes Sweeping Rules From Behind Closed Doors - WSJ.com
The Federal Reserve has operated almost entirely behind closed doors as it rewrites the rule book governing the U.S. financial system, a stark contrast with its push for transparency in its interest-rate policies and emergency-lending programs.
While many Americans may not realize it, the Fed has taken on a much larger regulatory role than at any time in history. Since the Dodd-Frank financial overhaul became law in July 2010, the Fed has held 47 separate votes on financial regulations, and scores more are coming. In the process it is reshaping the U.S. financial industry by directing banks on how much ...
Debt ceiling: Doomsday may come sooner than expected - POLITICO.com
Lawmakers on Capitol Hill had hoped that last summer’s deal to end the nasty fight over lifting the debt ceiling would ensure the issue wouldn’t resurface until at least 2013.
But the Bipartisan Policy Center said Friday that the debt-limit doomsday could come earlier than that.
Analysts from the Bipartisan Policy Center projected that the United States will hit its $16.4 trillion debt ceiling between late November 2012 and early January 2013 due to lower-than-expected corporate tax revenues and the recent extension of the payroll tax holiday.
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http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0212/73260.html