Inflation highest in almost 40 years
Prices for American consumers are rising at their fastest annual rate since June 1982.The consumer price index (CPI) rose 6.8% in the year to November according to the latest figures…
Half of the U.S. population has had Covid-19
The CDC estimates about half of the U.S. population had had Covid-19 from Feb 2020 to Sep 2021. Source: Estimated COVID-19 Burden | CDC An OHSU model, updated monthly since…
Study finds automated license plate readers are ineffective
“Analyzing sixteen years of stolen vehicle numbers from Piedmont, California—a “super user” of ALPRs—this report finds no statistical evidence that ALPRs have deterred motor theft. Moreover: There is an absence…
Omicron travel bans make no sense
I made this chart on Nov 30th Dec 1st, and it is up to date as of that day. As of Dec 3, there are 38 countries with confirmed cases,…
I switched to Microsoft Edge browser – and I like it
For a long time I used Mozilla Firefox. Firefox has noticeable impacts on the battery life of my notebook computer so I eventually switched to the Chromium-based Brave browser. Several…
New blog: Travel and Global Thinking
I started a new blog on travel topics – the layout, appearance and content is very different from this blog. You can check it out here: Travel and Global Thinking…
Gravity-based utility scale electric “battery” systems
Image by ELG21 from Pixabay
The job age discrimination problem and contemporary worker shortage
Many people over age 50-55 were furloughed or cut in layoffs during the pandemic. Many have found it difficult to obtain a new, relevant job related to their experience and…
Amazon’s Fake Review problem
What percentage of reviews on Amazon are fake? According to the 2018 findings on Amazon, the category of products that recorded the highest rate of fraudulent reviews (64%) was the…
Risk of high inflation
A friend just emailed: The M2 money supply is up by over +39% since the start of the pandemic. We’ve got excess cash, demand and insufficient supply leading to higher…