IRS Has No Love for Plug-In Conversions... It Should

For all the hype about hybrids and electric cars, the best way to reduce our carbon footprint is to make the cars we're already driving more efficient. But switching a vehicle to alternative fuels or getting a plug-in hybrid conversion is expensive, and the IRS, foolishly, doesn't cut you any slack for it.

Although the government provides tax breaks for hybrids and alt-fuel vehicles produced by major automakers, it doesn't provide any relief to those who make their existing cars greener. "There are no incentives for the 248 million vehicle owners in the United States to convert their vehicles into cleaner, greener plug-in hybrids," says Frank Kuchinski of Poulsen Hybrid, one of a growing number of companies doing such conversions.

IRS Has No Love for Plug-In Conversions. It Should | Autopia from Wired.com

It's these kinds of incentives that will make green auto technology more available to the masses. The first one to make a conversion really cheap will become extremely wealthy. In the meantime, we need a faster track to making substantial gains against global warming. There is a huge segment of the population that would love to be doing more to protect the environment, but they simply can't afford it. The cost of entry is too high. They aren't in the position to buy a brand new green vehicle. The already own, or are paying on, their existing vehicle. These folks are also not likely to plunk down, what would amount to a years college tuition for their kids, just to convert their existing vehicle. I'm betting a lot of these people would stomach a moderate rise in the gas tax if would go directly to covering conversion subsidies. I realize the capitalist in us all thinks we should get greener by everyone purchasing new vehicles, but it's not likely to happen any time soon. Applied for a loan lately?

Can the Kindle Replace Textbooks?

I've been a strong advocate of eliminating text books for years. Why do people always frame the discussion at the college level? Do you have any idea how much money is spent in our local school districts just buying and replacing textbooks?

The Kindle is a good idea, but it's not much more than an overpriced piece of crap. For $389 you could buy a laptop or tablet that would do all that and more. The Kindle can't highlight relevant text and it also has no means of making notations. It's just not practical for educational purposes. There are better approaches available today, but like the Kindle, they are hampered by outside forces.

One of the problems here is the entrnchment of the publishing and printing industries. Much like the music and movie industry, publishers are very set in their ways. They can see the world changing around them, but for some unknown reason, they are loathe to do anything about it. All one needs to do is examine the decline of the newspaper business and it's easy to see where publishing is headed. The educational publishing segment is perhaps the part of the industry that has buried their collective heads in the sand the deepest. Having a captive audience to dictate terms to, they have become so accustomed to their way they can't envision things working any differently.

I would rather see my tax dollars go to paying for IT employees to run the network at the school than pouring money down the drain on textbooks or useless things like the Kindle. In addition to the obvious benefits of replacing textbooks, every student would be learning valuable computer skills as well. Each school would aslo be perfectly set up to teach IT classes and computer repair classes. Adults displaced from their printing or paper mill jobs could be retrained at the schools to transition to tech jobs.

I'm very suprised that we haven't seen any of the computer manufacturers or software giants (ahem! Microsoft, Google, Apple, Dell etc...) step up to the plate and make school districts around the country an "offer they can't refuse" to put their products in the hands of every student in the country. Wouldn't this be the Holy Grail of marketing coups? Imagine the customer base you could build if you started grooming potential customers when they start school? One could easily envision a business model much like the cell phone industry. They subsidise the initial cost of the equipment to get you under their umbrella and the money is made by offering additional services and upgrades. A shrewd lobbyist could probably get the Federal government to kick in toward the cost of the equipment so the school district and the company aren't stuck absorbing the initial costs. We may have to trim the dfense budget or stop paying midwest farmers to not grow crops, but it would be a good use of Federal tax dollars.

If you want to look at the issue from another angle, consider the environmental angle. Think about the environmental impact of manufacturing and shipping millions of textbooks every year. If you look at the entire process from the lumberjack who cuts the tree to the bookstore clerk that delivers to the customer, there is an enourmous carbon footprint involved to distubute that book. Now consider the environmental impact of digital delivery and susequent updates. There's no comparison.

We can land spacecraft on Mars and bomb the crap out of anyone we see fit, but we're no closer to the promise of an interactive classroom than we were 15 years ago. I'm sure we'll continue on this un-eco-friendly path until we're out of trees and then some genius will come up with an idea to put a laptop in the hands of every student.

Report: A Kindle for college kids? Crave, the gadget blog - CNET

Federal Minimum Wage To Increase to $7.25

As you may know, the federal minimum wage will increase from $5.15 to $5.85/hour, which is a 70-cent raise. This will happen again in 2008 and 2009, which by the end will make the new federal minimum wage $7.25/hour by the end of 2009.
Of course, this is being touted as a victory for everyone making the current minimum wage of $5.85, but the reality is that in the long-term it won't mean much and it may even hurt the very people it intends to help. I know that a lot of people will refuse to listen or accept the idea of this, but I truely believe it to be the case and I've saw the evidence first hand while working a minimum wage job myself.

Federal Minimum Wage To Increase to $7.25

Yeah...pass it along to the consumer in the form of higher prices. We couldn't possibly take the hit out of our epotentialy growing corporate profits. God forbid some CEO can't afford to trade up his Hummer this year....and to those in the middle of the wage scale...shut up with your "relative worth crap"...you're already making a decent wage. Raising the standard of living for those at the bottom requires the rest of us to sacrifice. Let some business owners and CEOs live for 120 days on minimum wage, just like the Congessmen who had to live on food stamps. Apparently, you've been drinking the Chamber of Commerce Kool-aid that has had people believing this warped perspective for years. They even have you believing you've "seen it with your own eyes". This is Republican fuzzy math at its worst, and assumes a chain of events that is highly unlikely to happen, because at the end of the day, they still need someone to sweep the sidewalks and bag groceries whether it costs them $5.25 per hour or it costs them $10 per hour. I say put the minimum wage at a reasonable level and then tie it to Congressional pay raises!

High Taxes Deter Plant Expansion In Vermont

Business at Weidmann Electrical Technology in St. Johnsbury is booming. So much, the company is looking to expand its operations.

But that expansion will not take place in Vermont....

High Taxes Deter Plant Expansion In Vermont

This is the price we pay for wanting to regulate and tax everything to death in the name of being green. I'm sure there are hippies across Vermont jumping up and down in their bierkenstocks proclaiming victory...That's great, but tell that to the guy in the Kingdom who can't find a decent job!