Bay Area Jobs And The Economy

[Pavlov's Dog]

anybody have recent sales figures for other cities in the US and Canada?

[arturo]

Originally Posted by ERGO PROXY

Prius lovers please enjoy this reading:


Building a Toyota Prius causes more environmental damage than a Hummer that is on the road for three times longer than a Prius. As already noted, the Prius is partly driven by a battery which contains nickel. The nickel is mined and smelted at a plant in Sudbury, Ontario. This plant has caused so much environmental damage to the surrounding environment that NASA has used the ‘dead zone’ around the plant to test moon rovers. The area around the plant is devoid of any life for miles.
The plant is the source of all the nickel found in a Prius’ battery and Toyota purchases 1,000 tons annually. Dubbed the Superstack, the plague-factory has spread sulfur dioxide across northern Ontario, becoming every environmentalist’s nightmare.
“The acid rain around Sudbury was so bad it destroyed all the plants and the soil slid down off the hillside,” said Canadian Greenpeace energy-coordinator David Martin during an interview with Mail, a British-based newspaper.
The Recorder Online
By Chris Demorro

BLAME CANADA! BLAME CANADA!

[The anti-cheesehead]

[The anti-cheesehead]

Originally Posted by ERGO PROXY

Prius lovers please enjoy this reading:


Building a Toyota Prius causes more environmental damage than a Hummer that is on the road for three times longer than a Prius. As already noted, the Prius is partly driven by a battery which contains nickel. The nickel is mined and smelted at a plant in Sudbury, Ontario. This plant has caused so much environmental damage to the surrounding environment that NASA has used the ‘dead zone’ around the plant to test moon rovers. The area around the plant is devoid of any life for miles.
The plant is the source of all the nickel found in a Prius’ battery and Toyota purchases 1,000 tons annually. Dubbed the Superstack, the plague-factory has spread sulfur dioxide across northern Ontario, becoming every environmentalist’s nightmare.
“The acid rain around Sudbury was so bad it destroyed all the plants and the soil slid down off the hillside,” said Canadian Greenpeace energy-coordinator David Martin during an interview with Mail, a British-based newspaper.
The Recorder Online
By Chris Demorro

I thought people in the Bay Area were supposed to be smart?

[gladisimo]

People have been arguing back and forth about this issue. I heard about this Hummer thing a long time ago, and then shortly after saw it "disproved" somewhere else.

Until I see some concrete evidence, I'm not believing it either way.

[arturo]

Originally Posted by The anti-cheesehead

I thought people in the Bay Area were supposed to be smart?

we is, we is.

[The anti-cheesehead]

Originally Posted by gladisimo

People have been arguing back and forth about this issue. I heard about this Hummer thing a long time ago, and then shortly after saw it "disproved" somewhere else.

Until I see some concrete evidence, I'm not believing it either way.

I'm into cars and have read a little about hybrids, but I don't know if that's true or not either, I was just being an ass. These hybrids DO have huge batteries that will eventually need to be disposed of though.

I do know that many people don't get the advertised mileage from their hybrids, and that Lexus 600L is a joke.

Personally, I think people would be better off skipping the Prius and just getting a Corolla. It doesn't get quite as good mileage, but it still gets very good mileage, is much cheaper, much lighter, handles better, is faster, doesn't have a huge battery, and every mechanic knows how to work on it. Then, with the money saved by buying a Corolla instead of a Prius, people could donate to their favorite eco-charity.

BUT then they wouldn't be cool, cause they wouldn't be driving a hybrid.

[ERGO PROXY]

Originally Posted by gladisimo

People have been arguing back and forth about this issue. I heard about this Hummer thing a long time ago, and then shortly after saw it "disproved" somewhere else.

Until I see some concrete evidence, I'm not believing it either way.

When you pool together all the combined energy it takes to drive and build a Toyota Prius, the flagship car of energy fanatics, it takes almost 50 percent more energy than a Hummer - the Prius’s arch nemesis.
Through a study by CNW Marketing called “Dust to Dust,” the total combined energy is taken from all the electrical, fuel, transportation, materials (metal, plastic, etc) and hundreds of other factors over the expected lifetime of a vehicle. The Prius costs an average of $3.25 per mile driven over a lifetime of 100,000 miles - the expected lifespan of the Hybrid.
The Hummer, on the other hand, costs a more fiscal $1.95 per mile to put on the road over an expected lifetime of 300,000 miles. That means the Hummer will last three times longer than a Prius and use less combined energy doing it.
The Recorder Online
By Chris Demorro

[bay_area]

Originally Posted by krudmonk

Why not go local and fully electric with the Tesla Roadster?

My neighbor drives a Tesla everyday to his job in Sunnyvale. If I get one, he'll think Im copying...LOL

[bay_area]

Originally Posted by arturo

we is, we is.

speak for yourself, Im a dumbass.

[jchernin]

Originally Posted by The anti-cheesehead

Personally, I think people would be better off skipping the Prius and just getting a Corolla. It doesn't get quite as good mileage, but it still gets very good mileage, is much cheaper, much lighter, handles better, is faster, doesn't have a huge battery, and every mechanic knows how to work on it. Then, with the money saved by buying a Corolla instead of a Prius, people could donate to their favorite eco-charity.

BUT then they wouldn't be cool, cause they wouldn't be driving a hybrid.

i have a corolla - yea, its not really "cool" but it was a hell of a lot cheaper than a new prius

in my experience, toyotas are two things: practical and very very reliable - typical japanese engineering at its best

o yes, and were all hella smart around here
(if we havent smoked yet that day )

[gladisimo]

Originally Posted by The anti-cheesehead

I do know that many people don't get the advertised mileage from their hybrids, and that Lexus 600L is a joke.

Personally, I think people would be better off skipping the Prius and just getting a Corolla.

Or better yet, a Yaris

I've read about the mileage thing too, apparently its all manipulating the way the EPA or whoever does the tests, and you have to drive very lightly to get the mileage they advertise. Amazingly, I have a 10 year old camry that still gets 25 combined mpg as I drive it, but when I first started driving, the car only got about 19 mpg, and I can get it as high as 27 mpg.

That's a 40 percent difference based on driving style.

Originally Posted by ERGO PROXY

When you pool together all the combined energy it takes to drive and build a Toyota Prius, the flagship car of energy fanatics, it takes almost 50 percent more energy than a Hummer - the Prius’s arch nemesis.
Through a study by CNW Marketing called “Dust to Dust,” the total combined energy is taken from all the electrical, fuel, transportation, materials (metal, plastic, etc) and hundreds of other factors over the expected lifetime of a vehicle. The Prius costs an average of $3.25 per mile driven over a lifetime of 100,000 miles - the expected lifespan of the Hybrid.
The Hummer, on the other hand, costs a more fiscal $1.95 per mile to put on the road over an expected lifetime of 300,000 miles. That means the Hummer will last three times longer than a Prius and use less combined energy doing it.
The Recorder Online
By Chris Demorro

I've read this before. One thing about it is that even if it does cost more to make a Prius (I don't doubt that, considering the amount of technology and finer, purer materials needed to make parts of the vehicle (batteries, etc.) is probably more than that of your run of the mill SUV (Hummer, Yukon, Navigator, etc.).

The thing with that is if the energy is spent during the manufacturing process and emissions are controlled better thereafter, you concentrate the harmful materials instead of diffusing it. The same argument can be made for something like hydrogen cars, which is energy intensive to manufacture (nothing beats crude oil in terms of ease of obtaining it, you just mine it and stick it in a refinery), but hydrogen cars can concentrate the emissions to the plants manufacturing the hydrogen.

I still agree the best "eco" option is probably a light car with a small petrol/diesel engine. There are just too many factors that go into something like that, and at the end of the day, people can argue for their cause one way or another. What matters to ME, is that the cost for ME running the car will be kept to the lowest

[vanhattan]

Every cabbie I meet who drives one says that they absolutly love to drive them. It makes me want to buy one, but I drive so little (2,000 mi/year) that my mercedes will probably still be around for another 30 years.

[The misanthropist]

Originally Posted by vanhattan

Every cabbie I meet who drives one says that they absolutly love to drive them. It makes me want to buy one, but I drive so little (2,000 mi/year) that my mercedes will probably still be around for another 30 years.

If they love to drive that it must be because they come from India and they're used to driving Peroduas and the likes.

[aliendroid]

I'm waiting for the GM volt. Plug in hybrid electric car with 40 mile range all electric and the engine runs as a range extender up to something like 650 miles at around 50 mpg (not counting what the all electric does to the millage).

http://www.gm-volt.com/

[arturo]

Originally Posted by The misanthropist

If they love to drive that it must be because they come from India and they're used to driving Peroduas and the likes.

or the fact they get to pocket all of that saved gas money! (given they own their cab, of course!) besides, they have to be a million times better than the p.o.s. fords or chevys the rest of 'em drive.

[gladisimo]

a lot of them are old police interceptors

[JoshuaSantos]

Originally Posted by bay_area

My neighbor drives a Tesla everyday to his job in Sunnyvale. If I get one, he'll think Im copying...LOL

I didn't realize they sold roadsters in 2007.

[Animo]

By MARCUS WOHLSEN, Associated Press – Sun May 29, 3:41 pm ET



SAN FRANCISCO – Instead of paying attention in high school, Nick Cammarata preferred to read books on whatever interested him. He also has a gift for coding that got him into Carnegie Mellon University's esteemed computer science program despite his grades.

But the 18-year-old programmer won't be going to college this fall. Or maybe ever.

Cammarata is one of two dozen winners of a scholarship just awarded by San Francisco tech tycoon Peter Thiel that comes with a unique catch: The recipients are being paid not to go to college.

Instead, these teenagers and 20-year-olds are getting $100,000 each to chase their entrepreneurial dreams for the next two years.

"It seems like the perfect point in our lives to pursue this kind of project," says Cammarata of Newburyport, Mass., who along with 17-year-old David Merfield will be working on software to upend the standard approach to teaching in high school classrooms.

Merfield, the valedictorian of his Princeton, N.J., high school class, is turning down a chance to go to Princeton University to take the fellowship.

Thiel himself hand-picked the winners based on the potential of their proposed projects to change the world.

All the proposals have a high technology angle but otherwise span many disciplines.

One winner wants to create a mobile banking system for the developing world. Another is working to create cheaper biofuels. One wants to build robots that can help out around the house.

The prizes come at a time when debate in the U.S. over the value of higher education has become heated. New graduates mired in student loan debt are encountering one of the toughest job markets in decades. Rising tuitions and diminishing prospects have led many to ask whether college is actually worth the time and money.

"Turning people into debt slaves when they're college students is really not how we end up building a better society," Thiel says.

Thiel made his fortune as a co-founder of online payment service PayPal shortly after graduating from Stanford Law School. He then became the first major investor in Facebook. In conversation and as a philanthropist, Thiel pushes his strong belief that innovation has stagnated in the U.S. and that radical solutions are needed to push civilization forward.

The "20 Under 20" fellowship is one such effort. Thiel believes that the best young minds can contribute more to society by skipping college and bringing their ideas straight to the real world.

And he has the shining example of Facebook to back up his claim. Thiel's faith in the world-changing potential of Harvard dropout Mark Zuckerberg's idea led him to invest $500,000 in the company, a stake that is now worth billions.
Still, the Zuckerbergs of the tech industry are famous because they are the exceptions. Silicon Valley is littered with decades-worth of failed tech startups.

Vivek Wadhwa, director of research at Duke University's Center for Entrepreneurship and a writer for TechCrunch and Bloomberg Businessweek, has assailed Thiel's program for sending what he sees as the message that anyone can be Mark Zuckerberg.

"Silicon Valley lives in its own bubble. It sees the world through its own prism. It's got a distorted view," Wadhwa says.

"All the people who are making a fuss are highly educated. They're rich themselves. They've achieved success because of their education. There's no way in hell we would have heard about Peter Thiel if he hadn't graduated from Stanford," he says.

Thiel says the "20 Under 20" program shouldn't be judged on the basis of his own educational background or even the merits of his critique of higher education. He urges his critics to wait and see what the fellows achieve over the next two years.

According to data compiled by the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce, workers with college degrees were laid off during the Great Recession at a much lower rate than workers without degrees. College graduates were also more likely to be rehired.

But for fellowship recipients like John Burnham, 18, such concerns pale next to the idealism of youth. At his prep school in western Massachusetts, Burnham started an alternative newspaper to compete with the school's official publication.

The entrepreneurial experience of creating something out of nothing captured his imagination. Now his ambitions have grown.

Burnham believes that the world's growing population will put an unsustainable strain on the planet's natural resources. That's why he's looking to other worlds to meet humanity's needs.

Specifically, he believes that mining operations on asteroids could hold the key. For the next two years, he'll be studying rocket propulsion technology and puzzling through the economics of interplanetary resource extraction.
"This fellowship is so much of a better fit for my personality than I think college would be," Burnham says. "When you get an opportunity of the magnitude of this fellowship, I couldn't see myself being able to wait."

[FDW]

Originally Posted by Animo

snip

I just can't see this being a good idea.