Economist Mark J. Perry makes this point about Black Friday retail sales:
On Black Friday, avg retailer will make $3.30 in profits per $100 of sales, but the average state/local government’s take will be almost $7
Category / Government
Black Friday New Hot Item: Guns
Black Friday saw long lines at Best Buy, Walmart and other retailers. One other business sector stayed swamped that many did not think of: gun dealers. The FBI reported their division that does background checks for gun purchases had to endure 17 work days to keep up with gun purchases on Friday. Here is a report from CNN:
The busiest shopping day of the year also saw a major boom for gun sales, with the federal background check system setting a record of more than 175,000 background checks Friday, according to the FBI.
The staggering number of checks — an average of almost three per second, nearly three times the daily average — falls on the shoulders of 600 FBI and contract call center employees who will endure 17-hour workdays in an attempt to complete the background reviews in three business days, as required by law, FBI spokesman Stephen Fischer said. “Traditionally, Black Friday is one of our busiest days for transaction volume,” Fischer said.
An average of three background checks happened every second. Here is some information on how background checks get denied and some stats on that.
Overall, about 186,000 background checks a year cannot be completed, according to the FBI. It’s difficult to know exactly how many gun sales are authorized from that number because whether to make the sale is ultimately in the hands of the shop owner. Last year, the agency completed 21 million background checks, and about 1.1% of those purchases were denied, the agency said. Firearm background checks have doubled from the more than 9 million conducted when the system was implemented in 1999.
Ten factors can disqualify a purchase: felony conviction, arrest warrant, documented drug problem, mental illness, undocumented immigration status, dishonorable military discharge, renunciation of U.S. citizenship, restraining order, history of domestic violence or indictment for any crime punishable by longer than one year of prison.
Dutch Central Bank to US: Pound Sand
The United States Federal Reserve is not trusted and it doesn’t appear to be getting any better. In plain speak, the Dutch just told them they didn’t either. Also take this news as a great investment tip to start buying gold and silver as a precautionary investment.
The Dutch central bank, De Nederlandsche Bank, has repatriated in utmost secrecy 122.5 tonnes of gold from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York to its vaults in Amsterdam, The Netherlands, according to a press release from DNB published today.
“It is no longer wise to keep half of our gold in one part of the world,” a DNB spokesman said. WOW.
Why Doctors Are Leaving Medicaid
The new healthcare law that passed in 2010 was more of an expansion of getting people on medicaid then getting insurance. Medicaid is the “universal health care” that most don’t realize exists and it is taking on millions of new people each year. FORBES magazine has pretty lengthy write up about this program along with medicare.
Doctors seeing Medicare patients face a 24 percent cut in reimbursements beginning January 1. But almost no one has grasped that those cuts will hit Medicaid too—thanks to Obamacare. Together both programs cover more than 100 million Americans, and the government expects about 9 million more people to join Medicaid next year.
The number of just regular doctors is drying up as new doctors coming out of med school go into specialty areas. Doctors cannot afford new Medicaid patients and here is one reason why:
Medicaid pays doctors about 59 percent of what medicare pays them—which is why doctors increasingly refuse to take new Medicaid patients.
In 2012 doctors ran to the exits in fleeing medicaid.
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) recently released a document showing that 9,500 doctors who had previously accepted Medicaid patients refused to do so in 2012.
In 2013 Congress voted to increase medicaid payments at the same rate of medicare. Now that is about to get cut again. The up and down of government intrusion in healthcare as this complicated law unfolds is taking a toll on our healthcare system. The people who suffer ultimately will be the patients.
Countries That Sold Military Weapons To Saddam Hussein
The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute investigated what countries sold Iraq weapons while Saddam Hussein was dictator. Their research debunks the long held belief that the United States was the sole seller of military arms.
Share per nation of sale of weapons to Iraq from 1973 through 2002.
USSR/Russia 57%
France 13%
China 12%
Czech 7%
Poland 4%
Brazil 2%America is tied with Egypt, Romania, Denmark and Libya at 1%.
Graph of the Day: Inflation Since 2008
Indiana State University Selling Debt
Marketwatch.com is reporting Indiana State University is wanting to sell $20 Million in bonds so it can refund outstanding student fee bonds, and to pay costs of issuance. Fitch provided a detailed analysis and gave the university a grade of (AA-). This should make investors feel comfortable when buying the debt. Debt sale is planned for December 8th.
Here is some highlights of the article:
-As of fall 2014, the university had 11 residence halls with total occupancy for 3,660 students and a 99.5% occupancy rate, including the recently completed Reeve Hall.
-Indiana State has over $110 Million in existing bonds due to residence hall and food services upgrades
– the university’s fall enrollment headcount grew to a record high of 13,183 in fall 2014, increasing by 2,649 students (or 25.1%) over fall 2009.
– ISU’s available funds, defined by Fitch as cash and investments not permanently restricted, grew to about $157 million at the close of fiscal 2014, up 5.8% from the prior year and 39.9% from the period since fiscal 2010.
Illegal Immigrants Trashing Border
An unspoken sin not addressed by pro immigrant advocates is the yearly waste and destruction illegals leave behind in the form of trash and human waste. The taxpayers in Southern states and on federal level get the bill for the cleanup according to Judicial Watch:
Each year illegal immigrants leave behind an estimated 2,000 tons of trash—including soiled diapers, plastic bottles and abandoned vehicles—in public Arizona lands along the border.
Getting cleanup crews and equipment to these increasingly remote portions of the desert is, not only tough, but also hazardous. Camp sites set up by illegal immigrants and drug smugglers are the most difficult to clean up.
How much does it cost to clean up?
This so-called “landfill fee” ranges from $37 to $49 per ton in southern Arizona and that doesn’t even include costs for materials, equipment, labor and transportation.
2007 financial report for the state of Arizona titled “The Southern Arizona Project To Mitigate Damages Resulting from Illegal Immigration”. In the report, clean up costs over a span of 5 years totaled $4.4 Million. Damage caused by illegals each year is just not trash but also infrastructure and national monuments in parks located on these corridors they travel on.
Current Indiana Gun Permit Numbers
Indiana State Police statistics show 570,712 active firearm licenses in the state, with 22 percent belonging to women.
H/T RTV6
Medicaid Eating Up State Budgets
Medicaid spending in state budgets is becoming the largest line item costs in many state governments. State Budget Solutions had this national average stat:
Though the federal government provides some Medicaid funds via matching rates, this welfare program has been taking up a larger and larger share of state budgets in recent years. In fact, Medicaid is the largest category of state spending, accounting for 23.6 percent of state budget expenditures according to the National Association of State Budget Officers. That percentage is likely to increase over time.
Indiana currently spends over 27% of their budget on Medicaid.
Hoosier Econ 