tagged w/ Rebates
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In addition to my internship here with Sustainable Schmidt, I’ve been spending some time interning with San Mateo County government for their Energy Upgrade program. This statewide incentive program provides rebates for homeowners who want to increase the energy efficiency of their homes. This program is unique in that it helps you to “upgrade” the comfort and efficiency of the home as a whole – not just single products like PG&E’s rebates. Each county in the Bay Area has their respective branches to this program. Rebate amount goes from $1000-$4000, depending on how much you improve your efficiency by. My goal by the end of the summer is to convince my dad to retrofit our home with this program. With any luck, we’ll be able to combine them with other rebates and tax credits. If you’re looking for a comprehensive list of all the different rebates in your area, check out the Database of State Incentives for Renewables & Efficiency.
https://energyupgradeca.org/overview
Ever really thought about what that tree in front of your house does for you? The Colorado Tree Coalition has written a comprehensive list of the Benefits of Trees in Urban Areas. I understood the obvious benefits of urban forests like carbon sequestration and reduced run-off, but had never considered how trees in neighborhoods would strengthen its community, or helps slow traffic.
http://www.coloradotrees.org/benefits.htm#10
I’m halfway through Cradle to Cradle by William McDonough & Michael Braungart. These two authors introduce an interesting concept for product life-cycle that draws inspiration from nature itself. Rather than creating products that create unusable waste and degrade the natural environment, a product design that encourages integration of its life with the rest its environment. For example, whereas conventional roofing degrades, overheats, and eventually has to be thrown away, green roofs covered in plants “maintain the roof at a stable temperature, providing free evaporative cooling in hot weather and insulation in cold weather, and shields it from the sun destructive rays, making it last longer.” William McDonough gave a good lecture on TED Talks of this design concept.
http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/william_mcdonough_on_cradle_to_cradle_design.html
See the full blog post here: http://www.sustainableschmidt.com/In addition to my internship here with Sustainable Schmidt, I’ve been spending... more
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Later this fall, a new cash incentive program may be helping kitchen appliances get a sales boost with $50 to $200 rebates towards new and energy efficient household appliances, not just refrigerators as suggested by the name. The application is still in progress and if passed, could start the program at the end of November 2009.Later this fall, a new cash incentive program may be helping kitchen appliances get a... more
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Anxious to jolt the economy back to life, President-elect Barack Obama is considering a federal stimulus package that could reach a whopping $1 trillion, dwarfing last spring's tax rebates and rivaling drastic government actions to fight the Great Depression.
Obama is promoting a recovery plan that would feature spending on roads and other infrastructure projects, energy-efficient government buildings, new and renovated schools and environmentally friendly technologies.
What do you think? Is that too much? Why don't they just give most of it to the middle and lower class?Anxious to jolt the economy back to life, President-elect Barack Obama is considering... more
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The number of new people signing up for unemployment benefits last week shot up to the highest level in more than two years, fresh evidence of the damage to a national economy clobbered by housing, credit and financial crises.
The Labor Department reported Thursday that new applications filed for unemployment insurance jumped by a seasonally adjusted 38,000 to 407,000 for the week ending March 29. The increase left claims at their highest point since Sept. 17, 2005, following the blows of the devastating Gulf Coast hurricanes.
"This report supports the view that the jobs market is deteriorating toward recessionary conditions," said T.J. Marta, a fixed-income strategist at RBC Capital Markets.
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Conservative Economic Theory is built on the assumption that you could run an entire national economy of over 300 million people using only low wage service sector jobs (like Wal-mart and McDonald's) and supplement actual wages with high interest credit cards.
In 2008 it has become overwhelmingly obvious that, no, you can't replaces actual wages and benefits with credit cards and, no, you can't replace actual careers with temp assignments from Manpower.
The entire economy has been running on consumption made possible by credit cards, not wages. Now that the credit has been maxed out, consumer purchases are dramatically falling. Less demand equals less production. Less production (what little we had left here in the States) equals less employment. Less employment equals even less spending. And on and on.
Something similar to the WPA or the Civilian Conservation Corps is probably the only viable option to reverse the crash course our economy is set on.
A one time $300 check isn't enough to make the minimum payment on a credit card and is only half what most people pay PER MONTH just in daycare costs.
What's needed is a radical redesign of the economy -- like tax-payer supported healthcare and daycare (as they have in Europe). I would even go a step further and suggest 6 months PAID maternity leave (again, like they have in Europe). I would also rewrite the bankruptcy law to allow more consumer debt to be completely dischargable.
I seriously doubt keeping everything "as is" and just handing everyone a check for a fw hundred bucks is going to make a damn bit of difference.The number of new people signing up for unemployment benefits last week shot up to the... more
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Don't be alarmed. More than 130 million households will get letters from the Internal Revenue Service beginning next week and it's good news, not bad.
The letters are part of an extensive outreach effort to make sure people don't miss out if they are eligible to receive a tax rebate check under the recently passed $168 billion economic stimulus plan.
The IRS letters will remind people to file a 2007 tax return so they will receive the stimulus payment.
Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said Treasury and the IRS would work hard to get the word out. "For the majority of Americans, all they will need to do is file a tax return," Paulson said in a statement.Don't be alarmed. More than 130 million households will get letters from the... more
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jenn5
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added this
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4 years ago
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It looks like the government might follow through with Bushs' "stimulus plan". Individuals will receive $800, while couples will get $1,600, in an attempt to revive the U.S. economy. Being a single male with property taxes due, the timing couldn't have been better. Right after the christmas holiday, with my savings account nearly exhausted, I could really use the $800 rebate. If this plan goes through, the money will be greatly appreciated by myself and, probably, by many others.I guess I will just wait, and keep my fingers crossed for now. Maybe our government will be good for something after all. It looks like the government might follow through with Bushs' "stimulus... more
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This is such a great story! While thousands of customers are going to be happy, Jordan's Furniture is going to lose millions! (They did have an insurance policy, but it's still funny). This is such a great story! While thousands of customers are going to be happy,... more
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Ok, there are deals for more than Macs, but Apple products are the emphasis. Often there are crazy good deals on here. Check it early. Check it often.Ok, there are deals for more than Macs, but Apple products are the emphasis. Often... more
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cwhite
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added this
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4 years ago
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