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A new jobs training oversight report by Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) found that a federally-funded Oklahoma Job Corps program spent around $76,000 per person to help youth secure minimum wage jobs. The report, released Tuesday, comes 18 months after a Government Accountability Office (GAO) report that found that billions of taxpayer dollars are being poured into job training programs that benefit those who run them, not the unemployed workers they are supposed to assist. "Taxpayers should be appalled Congress has done nothing to reform these programs for more than 18 months," said Sen. Coburn. Sen. Coburn said he wanted to...

Employees of a Pennsylvania city, who have all seen their salaries cut to minimum wage as the mayor grapples with budget problems, are hoping a judge restores their paychecks in full.

"The minimum wage is the  'Black Teenage Unemployment Act'...  The guaranteed way of holding the poor, the minorities  and the disenfranchised out of the mainstream is  if you price their original services too high..."  -Art Laffer As Rep Duncan Hunter (R-Ca) attempts to floor a bill that would force the US Labor Department to publish real unemployment numbers -ones that actually reflect the all-time-record number of Americans who have given up/left the labor force- some Democrats are now planning to unveil ill-advised legislation that would hike the federal minimum wage to as much as ten bucks an hour... a monstrous and unprecedented 35% leap from...

Newt says that with the way the Fed is printing money, Romney’s proposal for an automatic minimum wage increase based on inflation could be potentially catastrophic. Newt remembers the Carter years and how inflation was rampant by 1980, setting the nation toward collapse. He says with the Fed printing so much money, inflation could potentially soar if the economy begins to recover which could send minimum wage soaring with it:

Wage Floor Is Increasing in 8 States in New YearBy CATHERINE RAMPELL Published: December 23, 2011 Eight states will ring in the New Year with a higher minimum wage, under state laws that require wage floors to keep apace with inflation. San Francisco, one of the few cities that sets its own minimum wage above the federal level, is also raising wages for the lowest-paid workers in the new year. It will become the first big city in the country to require companies to pay their workers more than $10 an hour. The minimum wage increases in Arizona, Colorado, Florida,...

They come out from under their rocks every time we have a few tornados and never miss an opening when it comes to exploiting popular ignorance. An AP column last Friday titled Science panel: Get ready for extreme weather opened by asserting – “Think of the Texas drought, floods in Thailand and Russia's devastating heat waves as coming attractions in a warming world. That is the warning from top international climate scientists and disaster experts after meeting in Africa.” And of course their thesis is that this weather is the fault of mankind. They fail to mention that for the...

The climate may be less sensitive to carbon dioxide than we thought – and temperature rises this century could be smaller than expected. That's the surprise result of a new analysis of the last ice age. However, the finding comes from considering just one climate model, and unless it can be replicated using other models, researchers are dubious that it is genuine. As more greenhouse gases enter the atmosphere, more heat is trapped and temperatures go up – but by how much? The best estimates say that if the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere doubles, temperatures will rise...

Nations most at risk from global warming Save this story to read later AAP October 26, 2011 10:17AM A THIRD of humanity, mostly in Africa and South Asia, face the biggest risks from climate change and rich nations in northern Europe will be least exposed, according to a new report. Bangladesh, India and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) are among 30 countries with "extreme'' exposure to climate shift, according to a ranking of 193 nations by Maplecroft, a British firm specialising in risk analysis. Five Southeast Asian nations - Indonesia, Burma, Vietnam, the Philippines and Cambodia - are also...

Global warming is 'real' and temperatures have climbed steadily over the past decades, a long-awaited, independent study has found, refuting skeptics’ claims that there isn’t enough evidence to assert that the world climate is changing. According to a study published yesterday (20 October) by the Berkley Earth Project, which included U.S. physicists, climatologists and statisticians, the average world land temperatures climbed approximately 1 degree Celsius since the mid-1950s. The Berkley project, funded among others by the Koch Foundation, linked to the company which Greenpeace called a ‘kingpin of climate science denial,’ has analysed data from 15 different sources, in some...

SUMATRA, Indonesia –Several earthquakes have struck near south Sumatra of the 5.0 and 5.1 magnitude range today- making a tense situation on the volcanically-dotted archipelago potentially even more volatile. The Anak Krakatau volcano is showing signs of increased seismic activity. Authorities fear the volcano is building towards an eruption that could dwarf the one which occurred in 2007. Indonesia’s Volcanology and Geological Disasters Mitigation Center reported the numbers of seismic tremors now registering from the volcano have exceeded 5,000 a day. There are also reports of a gaseous mist which has seeped from the volcano and have enshrouded it in...

Minimum Wage To Rise In 8 StatesBumps Range From 28 Cents To 37 Cents Per Hour Tami Luhby UPDATED: 2:54 pm MDT October 3, 2011 NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- Minimum-wage workers in eight states could see their paychecks grow by hundreds of dollars next year, thanks to automatic annual increases in the rates. Colorado, Montana, Ohio, Washington and Oregon recently announced their 2012 minimum wages, which contain bumps ranging from 28 cents to 37 cents per hour. This translates into annual raises of between $582 and $770 for full-time workers at that end of the pay scale depending on where...

Some unusual solar readings, including fading sunspots and weakening magnetic activity near the poles, could be indications that our sun is preparing to be less active in the coming years. The results of three separate studies seem to show that even as the current sunspot cycle swells toward the solar maximum, the sun could be heading into a more-dormant period, with activity during the next 11-year sunspot cycle greatly reduced or even eliminated. ...Currently, the sun is in the midst of the period designated as Cycle 24 and is ramping up toward the cycle's period of maximum activity. However, the...

Minimum wage would go to $10 under Senate billBy DAVE MCKINNEY Springfield Bureau Feb 11, 2011 02:11AM SPRINGFIELD — Senate Democrats proposed raising the state’s minimum wage Thursday in a bid that eventually would boost pay for the working poor to more than $10 an hour. Sen. Kimberly Lightford (D-Maywood) introduced legislation that would raise Illinois’ $8.25-an-hour minimum wage by 50 cents plus the rate of inflation annually until it reaches its “historic level.” **SNIP** If the proposal gains traction in the Legislature this spring, it would help offset the impact on low wage earners of the 67-percent increase in...

Link only - Minimum wage rises in seven states

Debt is a big issue in the United States. The level of debt undertaken in the last two years alone by the United States government is unprecedented. Debt should always be a high priority, but at its current state, it has become something that is going to be destructive unless action is taken quickly to remove it. The government is not the only entity that has strapped itself to debt. A great number of Americans have done so. A great number of people worldwide have done so. Do not be mislead into thinking debt is a modern problem. Debt is...

Republic National Committee chairman Michael Steele doesn't know what the minimum wage is, and he doesn't think it's "relevant." During an appearance on "The Last Word" Tuesday night, during a segment about tension the Tea Party has caused within the GOP, Steele was asked point-blank by host Lawrence O'Donnell to name the minimum wage. He responded by laughing. "It's ok to say you don't know," O'Donnell said, as Steele launched into a rambling response. "I know what the minimum - look, look, I know...stop the trap playing here...the reality is, that is not the most paramount issue that voters out...

After getting frustrated out of the lemons his problems gave him, David Miller made his own corporate lemonade. Due to the frustration of always having to call technical support to solve his own frequent hardware problems, he started taking the initiative to educate himself.

Hello American Samoa! We’re from the government and we’re here to help you. We’re going to ensure you earn a living wage by forcing employers to pay you a minimum wage equal to workers in the United States. Sounds great right?

Earlier this month, Six Flags Inc. announced that it would be closing the Kentucky Kingdom theme park in Louisville, Kentucky. The park had originally opened in 1987. During its tenure, Kentucky Kingdom had become the state’s leading tourist attraction as well as the state’s largest employer of teens, with over 1,000 seasonal employees hired each year.

NREGA scheme affected as govt lowers minimum wageNT NETWORK Serving Goa since 1962 Posted on 2007-01-08 PANAJI - The government has been forced to renege its decision to raise the minimum wage rate to Rs 150 and revert back to the rate of Rs 110 that is as per the Minimum Wages Act, inform government sources. A notification to this effect has already been issued. An assurance on increasing this minimum rate had been given by the government in the House recently. However, the implementation became a problem due to opposition from the industrial sector already reeling under the effects...