Tuesday, August 31, 2021

Canada is doing better than the U.S.

In terms of Covid. Or, so says Wall Street on Parade. Canada reports that 66.3 percent of its population is fully vaccinated while the CDC is reporting that just 52 percent of the U.S. population is fully vaccinated.
 
Here are some quotes:
 
"As of this past Friday, August 27, the U.S. had 330 COVID-19 infections per 100,000 over the last 7 days, according to the Reuters COVID-19 tracker. Canada had 6.3 times fewer cases, reporting only 52 per 100,000 over the past 7 days. The U.S. stood at 62 percent of its prior peak of
cases on Friday while Canada stood at 32 percent of its prior peak."
 
"The U.S. and Canada confirmed their first cases of the virus within a week of each other in January of 2020. Both countries began vaccinating their population at roughly the same time, in December of 2020. The majority of shots in both countries came from the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines, which require two doses to be considered fully vaccinated. But the U.S. fell dramatically behind Canada in the early days of testing for the virus." 

“Canada was ahead of the North American curve on testing because its federal government once again made the right choices. In mid-March, Canadian federal authorities launched a large-scale testing procurement program aimed at ensuring the country could test early and often. By contrast, Trump put his unqualified son-in-law, Jared Kushner, in charge of the country’s testing ramp-up. Kushner proceeded to hype a Google testing website that didn’t exist and spearhead a drive-through push that, as of early April, had built a grand total of five testing centers across the entire country.”

"There was also a more disciplined approach to mask wearing and social distancing practiced in Canada this past summer. In Canada, the majority of the large concerts and music festivals were cancelled. But as we reported earlier this month, the Lollapalooza Music Festival at Chicago’s Grant Park from July 29 through August 1 packed an estimated 100,000 people into the event on each of its four days. Social distancing was non-existent and a large segment of those attending were not wearing masks."

September begins tomorrow

Will we remember it in December?
 

Saturday, August 28, 2021

Pete Seeger Plus

Peter, Paul and Mary

Joan Baez

Wear Your Mask

This directive is not new. It goes back over a hundred years - to the days of the Spanish Flu. It appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle on Oct. 25, 1918.

“Wear your masks. You may have a doubt as to their efficiency, but, at least you cannot see any harm in wearing them, while the mental attitude of precaution which they enforce upon you is a material assistance in driving out the disease.
 
“If every man, woman and child in the community will do all that is expected for a few days, then in a few days we ought to be given a clean bill of health and life resumed under normal conditions. Wear your masks. Take no chances.”

Monday, August 23, 2021

The Nuclear Dilemma

You gotta wonder

Okay, maybe 30-40% of the population are anti-vaxers. But, I'm surprised at the number of state authorities included in the movement. Let's look at some.

An Oregon school superintendent, Marc Thielman, is telling parents they can get their children out of wearing masks by citing federal disability law. Thielman said he is not anti-mask but is sensitive to parents’ concerns that face coverings can cause anxiety and headaches in children. This in a state that has broken its record for COVID-19 hospitalizations day after day, and cases among children have increased dramatically. Perhaps his opinion is based on the fact that he is running for governor.

In Louisiana the attorney general has posted sample letters on his office’s Facebook page for those seeking to get around the governor’s mask rules.

In Kansas a school board is allowing parents to claim a medical or mental health exemption from the county’s requirement that elementary school students mask up. They do not need a medical provider to sign off.

In California the state medical board is investigating a doctor who is handing out dozens of one-sentence mask exemptions for children in an attempt to evade the statewide school mask requirement. There is also a chuch pastor who has issued at least 3,000 religious exemptions to people with objections to the vaccine, which is becoming mandatory in an increasing number of places in California.

Do you understand why?

Thursday, August 12, 2021

Some 2020 Census Data


The census shows the US population currently stands at 331,449,281 - an increase of 7.4% over 2010's count. 

The number is the slowest since the 1930s during the Great Depression. But some regions are booming: the South grew fastest at 10.2%, the West was second fastest at 9.2%, followed by the northeast at 4.1%. 

The fastest growing state was Utah, which grew at a rate of 18.4% over the past decade. West Virginia was the fastest shrinking state with a rate of -3.2%. 

Is he all there?

I can't understand why the mayor of Nagoya, a Japanese city, bit into the gold medal of a Japanese softball player. But he did.

His 'lunch' reportedly prompted over 7,000 complaints to city authorities. They felt that he ignored Covid-19 restrictions and "lacked respect". He did apologize for his actions, "I forgot my position as Nagoya mayor and acted in an extremely inappropriate way," he said, adding that he wanted to pay for a replacement medal. 

Tuesday, August 10, 2021

Compare CEO pay to pay of typical worker

The Economic Policy Institute says the comparison is unbelievable. It found that CEO pay in the United States rose by a staggering 1,322% between 1978 and 2020, while pay for the typical worker rose just 18% during that same period. The institute notes that the CEO-to-worker-pay ratio was 61-to-1 in 1989. 

In 2020 top executives at the largest public firms in the U.S. were paid 351 times as much as the typical worker, with CEO pay measured by salary, bonuses, long-term incentive payouts, and exercised stock options. A CEO at one of the top 350 public companies in the U.S. was paid $24.2 million on average.


Could you beat him?

Saturday, August 07, 2021

I thought they were amateurs

Many Olympic medalists get paid, sometimes from the state, others by a field and track association. Singapore pays the most; it pays $1 million in local currency (roughly $740,000 in the United States) to those of their citizens who win a gold medal. A United States medalist receives $37,500 for gold, $22,500 for silver and $15,000 for bronze. Not all countries pay bonuses; some examples - Britain, New Zealand and Norway.  The payment may be in cash or other perks like stipends, houses, lifetime supplies of beer, free flights or even exemptions from mandatory military service. 

In the 1990s, the Singapore National Olympic Council devised an incentive scheme to reward medal-winning athletes in major international events. The payouts range from $1 million Singapore dollars for an individual Olympic gold medal to $10,000 for an individual gold at the South East Asian Games. According to the council, the program is supported by corporate sponsorship and donations from the country’s gaming revenue. 

Many Tokyo Olympians said they intended to use the bonus money on family.