Southwest buying AirTran for $1.4 billion  | ajc.com
Watch out Delta! With Southwest coming to Atlanta, my baggage has a choice. Fly for free or pay for baggage class. Let me think this over. Isn't free trade wonderful for the consumer?
Monday, September 27, 2010
Tuesday, September 7, 2010
How much is a billion? ... a trillion?
I just got an email that said a billion seconds ago it was 1959. It was an attempt to help us visualize a billion dollars. In defense of our current President, his administration and the U.S. Congress, I need to refute that. Not even close!
If my math is correct, there are 60 seconds in a minute, or 3,600 seconds in an hour, or 86,400 seconds in a day, or 604,800 seconds in a week. Since there are 52 weeks in a year, there are 31,449,600 seconds in a year. Dividing a billion 1,000,000,000 by 31,449,600 we come up with 31.8 years, so a billion seconds will take us back only to the late 70's. Not so bad, huh? (Yes, I'm figuring 360 days to a year to keep things simple. A US GAAP)
It's hard to believe that this email had been floating around for 3 decades. That was when a billion was a big number, when a five-figure salary meant you were doing o.k., when politicians began to talk in terms of "a billion here, a billion there, pretty soon you're talking some serious money".
Today, our people in Washington, DC (elected and appointed) think and speak in tens, or hundreds of billions. 10 billion seconds takes us back 321 years or 1688. Wasn't that when there was a revolution with the outcome that King James II was overthrown?
100 billion seconds will get you a ride back to 1205BC, the time of Amun, and Moses. Uh oh, a trillion seconds takes us back 32,150 years. Let's see, that would be 2010 - 32,150 = 30,140 BC. Can you say "Paleolithic"? Heck, some of us weren't even born then.
This is the number we need to think of on November 2. 30140 years Before Christ. ... and let's keep in mind that we're now talking multiples of Trillions. My head hurts.
Sorry, I have to go vote. Want a ride?
If my math is correct, there are 60 seconds in a minute, or 3,600 seconds in an hour, or 86,400 seconds in a day, or 604,800 seconds in a week. Since there are 52 weeks in a year, there are 31,449,600 seconds in a year. Dividing a billion 1,000,000,000 by 31,449,600 we come up with 31.8 years, so a billion seconds will take us back only to the late 70's. Not so bad, huh? (Yes, I'm figuring 360 days to a year to keep things simple. A US GAAP)
It's hard to believe that this email had been floating around for 3 decades. That was when a billion was a big number, when a five-figure salary meant you were doing o.k., when politicians began to talk in terms of "a billion here, a billion there, pretty soon you're talking some serious money".
Today, our people in Washington, DC (elected and appointed) think and speak in tens, or hundreds of billions. 10 billion seconds takes us back 321 years or 1688. Wasn't that when there was a revolution with the outcome that King James II was overthrown?
100 billion seconds will get you a ride back to 1205BC, the time of Amun, and Moses. Uh oh, a trillion seconds takes us back 32,150 years. Let's see, that would be 2010 - 32,150 = 30,140 BC. Can you say "Paleolithic"? Heck, some of us weren't even born then.
This is the number we need to think of on November 2. 30140 years Before Christ. ... and let's keep in mind that we're now talking multiples of Trillions. My head hurts.
Sorry, I have to go vote. Want a ride?
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Monday, September 6, 2010
Stimulus News. Lemons and some Lemonage
It's probably time you thought about becoming a landlord. Small scale or large, this is an opportunity for you to get in on some deals with positive cash flows from day one.
With the expiration of the homebuyer tax credit, home sales and resales dropped of a cliff across the nation. But there may be some lemonade to be made from these lemons. The withdrawal of that same stimulus will probably continue to boost demand for rentals this quarter and next as the number of people looking at home ownership subsides. Property prices should continue to hold at or near their record lows... for a while.
Even if the government's projections for jobs growth hold true, the projections for the national labor market suggest continued increase in the rate of unemployment and that will also add to the depth of the pool of renters. The continued retirement of "boomer" workforce are taking big numbers out of the workforce, and yet the rate of unemployment is not improving.
Add to this the halting of apartment construction, the apartment sector should be looking at notable occupancy gains. Projections for occupancy are running about 92-1/2% up a bit better than 1/2% over 2009. Really good news since it is the decrease in vacancy since 2007.
Yes, it's time to make some lemonade.
Saturday, September 4, 2010
Stephen Hawking Hawks his next book
Why God Did Not Create the Universe... the headline sure caught my eye. And look at the author, Stephen Hawking, who with Caltech physicist Leonard Mlodinow will have their new book on the bookshelves September 7.
I'm certainly not as intelligent as either man, but as I read the Wall Street Journal article I see nothing that disproves the existence of God, nor that God created the universe. I mean, what bigger bang could there be than "Let their be light" which ignited the light of uncountable suns. Einstein's statement that "the only thing incomprehensible about the universe is that it is comprehensible" seems to reinforce my understanding that God is, and God did, and God still does.
My real question is why the usually conservative Wall Street Jounal chose to put this, nothing more than an advertisement for a new book soon to be on Amazon and on the shelves at your local Books-a-Million, on the front page of their newspaper. Go figure...
I'm certainly not as intelligent as either man, but as I read the Wall Street Journal article I see nothing that disproves the existence of God, nor that God created the universe. I mean, what bigger bang could there be than "Let their be light" which ignited the light of uncountable suns. Einstein's statement that "the only thing incomprehensible about the universe is that it is comprehensible" seems to reinforce my understanding that God is, and God did, and God still does.
My real question is why the usually conservative Wall Street Jounal chose to put this, nothing more than an advertisement for a new book soon to be on Amazon and on the shelves at your local Books-a-Million, on the front page of their newspaper. Go figure...
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