Go check with your local federal bankruptcy court to localize this story.
Consumer bankruptcy filings of all kinds are at record levels, but Chapter 13 filings — the category that attracts most homeowners — are outpacing other consumer categories.
They were up 8 percent in the second quarter from a year earlier, compared with a less than 3 percent increase in personal bankruptcies overall and a slight decline in the more-popular Chapter 7, according to the
American Bankruptcy Institute, a nonprofit group in Alexandria, Va.
The Wall Street Journal says, " A portion of today's huge mortgage debt is attributable to people who took out large first mortgages amid the recent low-interest-rate environment in order to buy ever-larger and more expensive homes. But a good chunk represents people who are juggling debts and who took advantage of today's easy refinancing and home-equity-loan opportunities to extract more cash from their house. According to Fannie Mae, one of two government-sponsored mortgage companies, nearly one in five homeowners refinanced their mortgages in the past year, with 30 percent of those using the money to pay down other debts."
State of TV News Survey Released Today
The study, available online at
www.journalism.org, found that:
-Even as the war on terror came home with airport baggage checks and the threat of bioterrorism, only 1 percent of stories dealt with the topic of homeland security.
-Despite the financial scandals that rocked Wall Street and Main Street, coverage of economic and business issues amounted to only 7 percent of stories, the lowest level ever in the five-year study.
-Coverage of foreign affairs rose during the intense fighting in Afghanistan, but then dropped off dramatically.
The study shows evidence again showed that good journalism attracts viewers. Yet stations around the country are still trying to do more with less, pushing reporting staffs harder and producing less than quality work.
"TV news departments are struggling to meet all the obligations set out for them with the resources they have," said Tom Rosenstiel, PEJ director. "What's more, in the past year as citizens have sought good information and a way to better understand a more complicated world, local TV news has missed a real opportunity to bring viewers back."
The Truth Dies With Them
The Seattle P-I provides a blockbusting and sobering analysis of state death records, suggesting that official statistics significantly underestimate how many children die due to abuse and neglect, partly because authorities are failing to identify and track such cases.
SIDS becomes, for example, a catch-all category for when investigators don't know the cause of death for a child.
And part of the problem may be that in half of Washington State's counties anyone, for a filing fee of about $300, anyone from a plumber to a police officer can run for coroner.
Noise News
Noise is making news these days in several states and countries. It would be pretty interesting to walk around your community and see how noisy it is, as some activists did. Even at mundane places like restaurants or hair salons, they found very high noise levels.
Here is a page of links to read more about noise pollution.
See this noise pollution fact sheet.
The United Nations said, "Noise is an increasingly omnipresent, yet underestimated, form of pollution. Long periods of exposure to relatively low levels of noise can have adverse effects on human health, such as raised blood pressure, hypertension, disrupted sleep and cognitive development in children (Kiernan, 1997b), diminished working memory span, and psychiatric disorders (Bond, 1996)."
Is it just me, or are movie theatres getting LOUDER? The threatre sound sometimes blows my ears away. And health clubs are louder. According to the National League for the Hard of Hearing "A study by Raymond H. Hull, Ph.D. (1991) found that 80 percent of the health clubs and spas consistently played music which exceeded 105 dBA over one hour periods and the intensity of the instructor's voice using an FM head-mounted transmitter averaged 5 dBA above this level. 60 percent of the health clubs and spas studied used music and FM-transmitted voice which exceeded 110 dBA. Sound levels in a few health clubs exceeded 120 dBA for 30-minute classes. These levels pose a serious risk to hearing. The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health Criteria Document (1998) recommends that the maximum exposure time in the workplace at 110 dBA is one minute and 29 seconds and at 120 dBA, the maximum exposure time would be only 9 seconds."
The League also warns that workplaces and many occupations put people at risk from noise pollution, "Firefighters, police officers, factory workers, farmers, construction workers, military personnel, heavy industry workers, musicians and entertainment industry professionals all work in environments that pose noise risks. Even office staff employed in crowded office buildings with phones ringing and the constant hum of computers, air conditioners and fans are faced with the annoyance and increased stress noise creates.
"How much is too much? Standards set by OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration) indicate that continued exposure to noise over 85 dBA will eventually harm your hearing. The exposure time allowed is cut in half for every 5 decibel increase. For example, if a sound is 95 dBA, then 4 hours of exposure, over time, could cause hearing loss, and exposure to sounds at 115 dBA for just 15 minutes a day will cause hearing loss. The risk is widespread. The thousands of people who listen to personal stereo systems at hazardous levels for hours a day, for example, face an almost inevitable hearing loss as the result of their long-term exposure."
According to the National Association of Counties website, "There's a newfound silence in the air of Dekalb County, outside Atlanta. The County Board of Commissioners recently approved an overhaul of the noise ordinance by a 6-0 vote. The primary target for the new regulations in the ordinance is "boom cars" — those pesky vehicles that cruise around with the stereo bass pumping so loudly that nearby windows shake." (See an article in defense of boom cars from the LA Times.)
"'It was aiming at loud parties at night and boom cars. Apparently the [county] CEO's office had gotten lots of complaints,' said Janet Ward, assistant public information officer of DeKalb County, east of Atlanta."
The ordinance basically strengthens the public's ability to fight intrusive sounds, and can only be invoked through citizen complaints. "'If the police see a car on the street, they can't stop it. There has to be a complaint. That's the difference from other noise ordinances. It mandates that the police have to stop the car, but only if there’s been a complaint,' Ward said. The noise ordinance is in effect every night from 10 p.m. to 7 a.m. A judge can slap first-time violators with a minimum $100 fine and second-time violators with a minimum $500 fine. There is no possibility of jail time mandated in the ordinance, which has yet to receive much public feedback."
At the same time, the California Supreme Court agreed with an appellate court that a 1999 county ordinance to ban Jet Skis, also known as personal watercrafts, was constitutional. The state Supreme Court rejected pleas in mid-October by Jet Ski riders and dealers to lift the ban. The ordinance was the first of its kind in California, and bans the loud watercrafts from all of Marin County's waterways, including the coastline of the Pacific Ocean and the Petaluma River.
One Million Graduating High School Seniors Did Not Go to College Last YearSo who are they and what kind of work did they find?
The Washington Post profiles one such guy named Ben and in so doing, discovered a bigger story, 2.5 million American seniors enrolled in either a two-year or a four-year college. Almost a million did not. They were overwhelmingly poor, male and white.
Much to the surprise of social scientists, who traditionally have looked for educational problems among minorities, low-income black and Hispanic men are more likely to go to college right out of high school than white guys like Ben. So are young women of any background. If Ben had a twin sister, she'd likely be enrolled.
And it is becomming more and more difficult for guys like Ben to find decent work and insurance.
