Sadly, there are a good number of automotive workers in Michigan that have 20 years of experience, but there is little hiring of those with their skill set. Simply put, 99 weeks could be used to re-train some workers, but two years of lost time when you are 50+ is not easy.

I dare say that if there is a case for 99 weeks of unemployment, the situation in Michigan is a good place to start. What are all the automotive workers to do now that the jobs have shifted to foreign land? I could even go with 5 or 6 weeks for every year of employment. If someone has been in the industry for 20 years, that would give then a little over 2 years to shift. For those who are age 25, and have not been in any one industry too long, would not get as much, nor have they paid in as much. I have seen too many automotive suppliers go bankrupt, some were simply waiting for General Motors or Chrysler to pay owed cash.

Extending jobless benefits clears Senate hurdle
Bill would expand unemployment checks to maximum of 99 weeks
Why not just make it 2 years?

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/extending-jobless-benefits-clears-senate-hurdle-2009-10-27

http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2009/10/home-buyer-tax-credit-to-be-extended.html

“Top Democrats in the Senate have reached an agreement to extend the soon-to-expire $8,000 tax credit for first-time homebuyers, Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd said Tuesday.”

http://www.cnbc.com/id/33493223?__source=CNBC|SM|FB|10272009

http://www.nasdaq.com/aspx/stock-market-news-story.aspx?storyid=200910271532dowjonesdjonline000493&title=us-senators-near-deal-on-extending-home-buyer-tax-credit

BTW, as to their site, I had an install issue with Windows 7, and I think the site has really gone downhill. It was much more difficult to navigate.

Short term treasuries, no more than a year, deposits in local credit unions or regional banks with solid balance sheets. Spread it around to several institutions. Cash at home, in a safe spot. No stocks, no real estate, no gold, no debt.

Your “return” as it were is in falling asset prices, everything from houses, to boats, to cars, etc. For example, there is a particular boat I want. Typically in the $100K range, I’m seeing nice examples for $70K. Still waiting, though- it will, unfortunately, get “better.”

However, as a developer, I have worked with both Microsoft and Mac platforms. Windows platforms are definitely rich and featureful, no doubt. It’s just that sometimes the features and Microsoft “customizations” to standard software libraries, such as say, simple network socket communications, are poorly tested with non-Microsoft platforms, and so sometimes (note I say sometimes) software using Microsoft libraries don’t integrate well. We’ve of course, found all sorts of ways around this, but it is painful. Moreover, the MSDN documentation is very poorly arranged, with DOS articles jumbled in with .NET articles and sometimes Windows 16-bit articles returning as the top search results when looking for “sockets” in MSDN.

Thank God for Google however. They’ve kind of done Microsoft’s dirty work for them, so to speak, as far as indexing MSDN articles on the web. Of course, I’ve moved on and develop using Java and lots of open source. And yes, it is better, for me at least. (Again, I am aware that Microsoft has actually embraced open source more and more, and their new stuff is really good, like say, the gaming stuff, the Mono project and their stuff with dynamic languages, that stuff is solid and Microsoft is taking a huge step in the right direction there, IMHO).

Anyways, I digress.

I don’t really get the second point either. With Word 2003 I used to have to look at help each time to do a mail merge. With 2007 it’s intuitive, so I didn’t even have to look at help the first time.

Well, FWIW, the Mac Spotlight feature DOES index your personal files and that’s why it IS better than the Windows search feature, today. I can type “Office” and the search will come up with the exact icon I want to click on every time in a matter of seconds.

Moreoever, the “Help” feature on the Mac actually works, and in most situations, it will actually do it for you, and the fix will actually work! When was the last time Windows Help EVER was actually helpful.

BTW, to do that you just hit the start button, type in a word, and wait a second or two. It can also work for Internet favorites.

Ask M/S if the DOD is a good gauge….LOL….l’m sure they would say no and infuriate a major customer

And don’t think this problem doesn’t exist with larger operations. I still have not forgiven Adobe for shutting down the Acrobat authorization server. The terms unilaterally changed, yet Adobe is still in business, so it’s not quite the same as a bankruptcy. What can one do?

Tell that to the DOD that Refused to Use VISTA Because their S/W Wouldn’t Run On IT

LOL

I was suggesting a reduction of $2,000 a month for four months.

Oct. 26 (Bloomberg) — Senate leaders are negotiating to extend and gradually reduce an $8,000 tax credit for first-time homebuyers through 2010, Senator Bill Nelson said.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada and Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus of Montana, both Democrats, may seek to add the extension to legislation extending unemployment benefits that may be debated as early as this week, according to Regan Lachapelle, an aide to Reid.

β€œWe should be able to extend that later this week,” Nelson told reporters traveling with President Barack Obama on Air Force One to a speech in Jacksonville, Florida.

Lawmakers are under pressure by real estate agents, mortgage brokers, and homebuilders to extend the $8,000 credit before it expires Nov. 30.

Anyway, would you call that a problem with Vista, or a problem with WordPerfect? Me the latter, since Ive not run into that in the past with Vista (although I have had programs in earlier versions of Windows that worked better installing from hard drive).

What’s amazing is that Microsoft managed to design a bug into Vista that keeps a version of WordPerfect from loading that was released 3 years after Vista! ;-)

I’m still very happy with my Cash For Clunkers purchase, even if it is going down in value. The starter on my other clunker, the one I didn’t trade in, didn’t crank the motor over as fast as it should the other day, so I have been driving the new vehicle until I get the starter replaced. If the new vehicle has a problem, I can just call Onstar and have it towed, if necessary. Since I generally drive junk, having a spare vehicle has been my contingency plan. The new vehicle has been driven about 2,500 miles, however. I’m specifically keeping it below the 1,000 miles average per month that the bumper-to-bumper warranty covers so I can get the full 36 months out of the bumper-to-bumper portion of the warranty. The major components are covered by the 100,000/5 year warranty, but that won’t be an issue if I have used it less than 36,000 miles after 3 years.

From a costing point of view, I am targeting 1,000 miles per month. Significantly more will accelerate the expiration of the bumper-to-bumper warranty. Significantly less will result in inefficient use of the asset–why keep it if it isn’t being used enough.

I am not fooling myself, however, into thinking that I am making big money, even if I did realize some “instant equity” from the $4,500 Obama cash.

In my experience, now you usually see the instant equity line used in conjunction with “priced below assessed value.” I suppose that’s a better spin in the mind of the agent than “value dropping so fast assessor can’t keep up.”

As to the AMS’s apple analogy, I think it has merit to a point, but I think that windows has something going for it that the real estate agent’s product for sale doesn’t have. IMO, the apple/windows issue can be summed up like this: Having an installed base that developers will write for is more important than having a better machine and OS. The installed base issue is a barrier that Apple failed to get over in the 1980’s and early 1990’s when it didn’t license it’s technology and allow cheap clones to compete for market share to increase it’s installed base. Apple had a better product, just like BETA was better than VHS, but once you lose the installed base by a significant margin you’ve lost a good deal of the utility of your product and created a huge barrier in the battle over market share. The barrier exists for reasons that aren’t inherent in your product but exist in the environment it is purchased and used.

The irony is that even though the Mac is probably a better product and Windows might suck, it doesn’t necessarily make the Mac a better choice to meet the needs of the buyer. I personally think its an example of how markets can in a sense be inefficient in that the best product doesn’t win and the market doesn’t always provide the optimal result for the market participants. IMO its similar in some ways to barriers to entry caused by monopoly or perhaps to free rider effect issues which unregulated markets ignore when considering issues like the cost of pollution.

It seems the language of housing is changing.

“Instant Equity”

I sure have not seen that claim nearly as much lately. In fact, I was trying to think back to the last time I actually saw the claim… The concept of “instant equity” was the most absurd. Even if there are some listings/agents who still make these claims, certainly the quantity and percentage are way down, at least from my unscientific sampling.

I still see that claim on a few listings, and on a few listings it’s sorta kinda true. But that instant equity has a good shot of disappearing in an instant..Maybe they ought to try ” Instant equity:: Just Add Water”.

“Instant Equity”

I sure have not seen that claim nearly as much lately. In fact, I was trying to think back to the last time I actually saw the claim… The concept of “instant equity” was the most absurd. Even if there are some listings/agents who still make these claims, certainly the quantity and percentage are way down, at least from my unscientific sampling.

Remember when all the newspaper reporters kept reporting how great the Real Estate Market was in their publication full of real estate based advertising?

Edit–oh, I see that’s exactly what you did.

Apple has totally lost all of my respect with their BS ads.

Ok, maybe I am being a bit too imaginative, but I hear a discussion between a buyer and real estate agent when I watch this. The Real Estate Agent is in that snazzy suit.

Think of all the real estate agents that have said the same things over and over the last couple of years, even when the problems were and are clearly present.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gk4FIIkKXdw

Buyer: Hello, I’m a buyer.

Agent: Hello, I’m a real estate agent.

Agent: β€œHey buyer, did you hear the good news? Affordability has improved, and all the past problems in the market have been fixed.

TRUST ME.”

Buyer: β€œI feel like I’ve heard this before.”

…
…
…

Agent: β€œThis local market is different, TRUST ME.”