I just discovered that California has created a follow-the-leader site called recovery.ca.gov to mimic the federal recovery.gov site.
Both sites, while boasting transparency, do as much to obfuscate and plain ol' brag as they do to reveal what's really going on.
When I visited the California site, I was struck first by how huge the image of Arnold Schwarzenegger is. I found it overpowering and tasteless, but that aside, what about the content of the site?
I went immediately to a link/PDF called "Funding for California in the First 30 Days." My breath was bated as I hoped to discover where and when the first wave of funding had been spent, but there was nothing like that in there. Instead, there was just a rundown of where the fed dollars will eventually go, along with a bunch of editorial comments that sometimes ring hollow.
Take this one entry about money for California's Community Health Centers. The explanation said that the $15.6 million allocated would go toward assiting 81,000 patients and creating 600 jobs. I quickly opened up the calculator on my desktop and divided $15.6M by 600 bodies and came up with the figure of $26,000, so either those jobs are mostly part-time and/or poorly paid, or there's a lot of hot air going on here.
Which one is it? Answer: Don't spend too much time on the site unless you have your AC unit cranked up.
Friday, March 20, 2009
Thursday, March 19, 2009
Which Companies Have the Most Cash on Hand?
The top one probably isn't too hard to figure out (think gas pump gouging), but here's a list of the top 15 firms in the U.S. in terms of hoarded cash:
- Exxon Mobil - (XOM) - Total Cash: $32.007 Billion
- Cisco Systems - (CSCO) - Total Cash: $29.531 Billion
- Apple - (AAPL) - Total Cash: $25.647 Billion
- Berkshire Hathaway - (BRK.A) - Total Cash: $25.539 Billion
- Pfizer Inc - (PFE) - Total Cash: $23.731 Billion
- Toyota Motor - (TM) - Total Cash: $23.151 Billion
- Microsoft - (MSFT) - Total Cash: $20.298 Billion
- Google - (GOOG) - Total Cash: $15.846 Billion
- Royal Dutch Shell - (RDS.A) - Total Cash: $15.188 Billion
- Wyeth - (WYE) - Total Cash: $14.54 Billion
- IBM - (IBM) - Total Cash: $12.907 Billion
- Johnson & Johnson - (JNJ) - Total Cash: $12.809 Billion
- Intel - (INTC) - Total Cash: $11.843 Billion
- Hewlett Packard - (HPQ) - Total Cash: $11.255 Billion
- Oracle - (ORCL) - Total Cash: $10.646 Billion
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
The Curious Case of Major League Baseball
Major League Baseball, or MLB, has enjoyed a federal antitrust exemption since 1922 due to a Supreme Court's ruling that the sport did not engage in interstate commerce. Quite curious because even back then, teams had to cross state lines to play each other, but the ruling has nonetheless stayed on the books, so to speak, ever since.
The ruling was reaffirmed in 1953 and again in 1972 in the Curt Flood case that did away with the infamous reserve (slavery) clause that MLB teams had used to keep its players in tow, underpaid and under wraps. In this latter case, however, at least the high court noted that the ruling of no interstate commerce was an "anomaly" but left it to Congress to deal with if it so chose.
Of course, Congress has wielded its antitrust bludgeon on quite a few occasions, most recently when dragging in owners, players and baseball executives to testify about steroids use.
Now, and here's another curious aspect, since baseball does not engage in interstate commerce, it technically doesn't fall under the FLSA (Fair Labor Standards Act) that regulates working hours, minimum wages, overtime day and child labor. (Of course, most states have similar or stronger laws on the books, so this may be a moot point.)
I guess that's how teams get away with working their batboys till the wee hours, right?
The ruling was reaffirmed in 1953 and again in 1972 in the Curt Flood case that did away with the infamous reserve (slavery) clause that MLB teams had used to keep its players in tow, underpaid and under wraps. In this latter case, however, at least the high court noted that the ruling of no interstate commerce was an "anomaly" but left it to Congress to deal with if it so chose.
Of course, Congress has wielded its antitrust bludgeon on quite a few occasions, most recently when dragging in owners, players and baseball executives to testify about steroids use.
Now, and here's another curious aspect, since baseball does not engage in interstate commerce, it technically doesn't fall under the FLSA (Fair Labor Standards Act) that regulates working hours, minimum wages, overtime day and child labor. (Of course, most states have similar or stronger laws on the books, so this may be a moot point.)
I guess that's how teams get away with working their batboys till the wee hours, right?
Health Care Reform: Denying Services to Cut Costs
I've been warning here all along about the Trojan Horse known as health care reform. In truth, there is no reform, just an expansion of the government option. Already, the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) has been reauthorized, replenished and renamed without the state part, so it's now just CHIP.
Dropping that "S" was actually highly significant because, under Obamacare, the feds are taking over, dude. Now, mind you, in some states a family can make up to $106,000 a year and yet qualify for subsidized health care for their children under CHIP.
Senator Jim DeMint, R.-S.C., points out that children growing up with "free" health insurance aren't going to want to have to fend for themselves when they grow up. So the logical thing to do, from a liberal's perspective, is just give everyone "free" health care.
'Cept it ain't free. It's rationed, and that's the word that should be substituted for "reform." What we're going through right now is more appropriately called "health care rationing."
Senator DeMint correctly points out in an opinion piece that $1 billion in the stimulus bill is going for comparative effectiveness research in the field of health care, a code phrase for figuring out how best to ration or eliminate expensive treatments and medicines.
The junior senator tells the chilling tale of a young woman who died at 23 because the rationers in Great Britain wouldn't authorize her to take an expensive test. Read about Claire Everett and her fate at the hands of Britain's cost cutters.
Dropping that "S" was actually highly significant because, under Obamacare, the feds are taking over, dude. Now, mind you, in some states a family can make up to $106,000 a year and yet qualify for subsidized health care for their children under CHIP.
Senator Jim DeMint, R.-S.C., points out that children growing up with "free" health insurance aren't going to want to have to fend for themselves when they grow up. So the logical thing to do, from a liberal's perspective, is just give everyone "free" health care.
'Cept it ain't free. It's rationed, and that's the word that should be substituted for "reform." What we're going through right now is more appropriately called "health care rationing."
Senator DeMint correctly points out in an opinion piece that $1 billion in the stimulus bill is going for comparative effectiveness research in the field of health care, a code phrase for figuring out how best to ration or eliminate expensive treatments and medicines.
The junior senator tells the chilling tale of a young woman who died at 23 because the rationers in Great Britain wouldn't authorize her to take an expensive test. Read about Claire Everett and her fate at the hands of Britain's cost cutters.
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
Personnel Concepts Ending Its Final Notice?
Rumblings have been emanating from Ontario, Calif., that Personnel Concepts may be going to bite the bullet and do away with its "Final Notice" marketing campaign.
FInal Notice has been both a boon and a bane to the company, as it's proven to be an effective tool in drumming up sales but also a source of complaints by those who say it looks too much like an official government document. (Which is why it works so well, no doubt.)
I've found a discussion of the topic over at another blog.
I guess we'll just have to wait and see.
(BTW, Personnel Concepts is the pioneer in the labor law compliance poster industry and still the industry leader.)
FInal Notice has been both a boon and a bane to the company, as it's proven to be an effective tool in drumming up sales but also a source of complaints by those who say it looks too much like an official government document. (Which is why it works so well, no doubt.)
I've found a discussion of the topic over at another blog.
I guess we'll just have to wait and see.
(BTW, Personnel Concepts is the pioneer in the labor law compliance poster industry and still the industry leader.)
Monday, March 16, 2009
WalMart Set to Cash in on the EHR Boom
You don't get to be the world's largest retailer without having some chops.
Evidently reading the Obamaic tea leaves during the 2008 campaign, WalMart set in motion a plan to market Electronic Health Record (EHR) computer systems to physicians, and in so doing has come up with a system that shaves 50 percent off the price of its competitors.
Using its Sam's Club operation, the Arkansas giant will pair Dell computers with software from eClinicalWorks and will throw into the mix installation, maintenance and training.
Cost will be $25,000 for the first physician in an office and $10,000 for each additional. Yearly upkeep fees will run $4,000 to $6,500.
Recall for a moment how the recent stimulus package (also called "porkulus" by many commentators) included $19 billion in subsidies for EHRs, and you'll see how savvy WalMart was in preparing for an upcoming opportunity.
With McDonald's, WalMart has also been about the only bright spot on the economic front since the Great Crash of September 2008 when Timothy Geithner and Hank Paulsen let Lehman Brothers go under (while paying the bonuses for AIG, Merrill Lynch and scads of other institutions they did decide to save), so you have to give the much-maligned (by Obama's very own supporters) company some credit.
“If Wal-Mart is successful, this could be a game-changer,” observed Dr. David J. Brailer, former national coordinator for health information technology in the Bush administration.
Like I said at the top, you don't get to be Top Dawg without having some chops--and using them to eat up your competition.
Evidently reading the Obamaic tea leaves during the 2008 campaign, WalMart set in motion a plan to market Electronic Health Record (EHR) computer systems to physicians, and in so doing has come up with a system that shaves 50 percent off the price of its competitors.
Using its Sam's Club operation, the Arkansas giant will pair Dell computers with software from eClinicalWorks and will throw into the mix installation, maintenance and training.
Cost will be $25,000 for the first physician in an office and $10,000 for each additional. Yearly upkeep fees will run $4,000 to $6,500.
Recall for a moment how the recent stimulus package (also called "porkulus" by many commentators) included $19 billion in subsidies for EHRs, and you'll see how savvy WalMart was in preparing for an upcoming opportunity.
With McDonald's, WalMart has also been about the only bright spot on the economic front since the Great Crash of September 2008 when Timothy Geithner and Hank Paulsen let Lehman Brothers go under (while paying the bonuses for AIG, Merrill Lynch and scads of other institutions they did decide to save), so you have to give the much-maligned (by Obama's very own supporters) company some credit.
“If Wal-Mart is successful, this could be a game-changer,” observed Dr. David J. Brailer, former national coordinator for health information technology in the Bush administration.
Like I said at the top, you don't get to be Top Dawg without having some chops--and using them to eat up your competition.
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