Inflation Thread

[HawkGold]

Damn, it's still that way in Iowa City? It was always a dime higher than everywhere else. I don't know if they have an extra tax or something or if it's not a gas tax itself they could have a different city or county property tax rate for gas stations that forces them to have higher prices to fund the property tax. It could be pipeline terminal proximity, too. It might run up to CR and create more transport costs. That huge southeast/east coast pipeline runs just south of where I live and there is definitely some relief on prices the closer to the pipeline terminal you get because the transport costs are lower.

What the average leftist doesn't understand is the extent to which oligarchs directly influence policy in the Dem's national platform. Yes, a pipeline poses risk. Absolutely. Pipelines should be subject to stringent monitoring to mitigate that risk. But once it's done, the carbon emissions for moving product are damned near zero. But to the oligarch point, the giant rail company BNSF is owned by Warren Buffet's company, Berkshire Hathaway. They own a ton of track over and adjacent to the Bakken shale reserves. Canada also has a bunch of oil, maybe 10% of proven global reserves. Guess who is the largest shareholder in CN, the biggest Canadian railway company that benefits from the lack of a feasible pipeline out of Canada? If you guessed Bill Gates you are correct. A decade of propaganda has created a near Pavlovian negative response in the typical NPC leftist if you even mention the word pipeline nowadays.

Just curious (and I agree) if you are implying the oligarch thing isn't about Republicans?

 

[okeefe4prez]

The bigger issue is the influence on politicians to avoid renewable energy due the oil industry. As oil dies out, expect more wars and conflicts over oil demand and needs. The Ukraine War is entirely over oil.

Here's the problem, bruh. People are more than willing to mindlessly repeat things like "oil is dying" or whatever but it simply isn't true. Oil demand goes up every year save for absolute calamities. It went down in 2009 with the massive recession and it went down in 2020 with the lockdowns from The Germ. The lockdowns in 2020 were massive, I would see 10 cars en route to work, flight traffic plummeted, oceanic travel was halted for passengers and cargo shipping was disrupted by quarantines in China. The diminution in economic activity was absolutely massive. But despite all that, oil demand only fell to 2012 levels. Contemplate that for a minute. By 2021, it was back at 2016 levels. Hydrocarbons are the bedrock of modern civilization and as places like China and South Asia industrialize oil demand is only going to go up. There is no viable scalable replacement for oil. None. It is relatively cheap, high in energy and massively transportable.

Passenger cars are only 25-30% of oil use in the US. When you crack a barrel of oil (heat it in the refinement process) there are different grades of product that come from each barrel. Some of it is jet fuel, some of it is diesel, some of it is car grade gasoline, some of it is propane, some of it is heavy oil that is only useful in heavy industrial applications like running cruise ships and ocean freighters. An entire symbiotic ecosystem has developed with applications for each and every type of product that comes out of the refining tower. It is an amazing scientific development. But there are applications that will take decades, maybe a century, to run on anything but oil. And if you flipped all US passenger cars to electric, all you would do is create a bunch of surplus car grade gasoline because the refineries would still have to crack the same amount of crude to meet diesel, jet fuel and cargo ship demand.

 

[racerhawk]

In all seriousness, I had thought about retiring in Ukraine. My skill set is very agriculturally based and have ties to universities there. That thought kind of blew up.

So sorry. It's such a shame what is happening.

 

[HawkGold]

Here's the problem, bruh. People are more than willing to mindlessly repeat things like "oil is dying" or whatever but it simply isn't true. Oil demand goes up every year save for absolute calamities. It went down in 2009 with the massive recession and it went down in 2020 with the lockdowns from The Germ. The lockdowns in 2020 were massive, I would see 10 cars en route to work, flight traffic plummeted, oceanic travel was halted for passengers and cargo shipping was disrupted by quarantines in China. The diminution in economic activity was absolutely massive. But despite all that, oil demand only fell to 2012 levels. Contemplate that for a minute. By 2021, it was back at 2016 levels. Hydrocarbons are the bedrock of modern civilization and as places like China and South Asia industrialize oil demand is only going to go up. There is no viable scalable replacement for oil. None. It is relatively cheap, high in energy and massively transportable.

Passenger cars are only 25-30% of oil use in the US. When you crack a barrel of oil (heat it in the refinement process) there are different grades of product that come from each barrel. Some of it is jet fuel, some of it is diesel, some of it is car grade gasoline, some of it is propane, some of it is heavy oil that is only useful in heavy industrial applications like running cruise ships and ocean freighters. An entire symbiotic ecosystem has developed with applications for each and every type of product that comes out of the refining tower. It is an amazing scientific development. But there are applications that will take decades, maybe a century, to run on anything but oil. And if you flipped all US passenger cars to electric, all you would do is create a bunch of surplus car grade gasoline because the refineries would still have to crack the same amount of crude to meet diesel, jet fuel and cargo ship demand.

Nothing much there I don't agree with. But, you also can't ignore there are environmental concerns

Oil for auto consumption is dying. It will be a slow death.

 

[MelroseHawkins]

Nothing much there I don't agree with. But, you also can't ignore there are environmental concerns

Oil for auto consumption is dying. It will be a slow death.

There are environmental concerns with lithium batteries as well. They heat up, can be a fire hazard. But, more importantly, the real question is what will we do with all of them when they go bad. Bury them or throw them in the ocean? It's a legit issue.

I would think incinerating them would cause bad carbon gas which the greenies won't like. But, maybe they're fine with burning lithium batteries, just not coal or oil.

Everything has collateral damage.

 

[HawkGold]

There are environmental concerns with lithium batteries as well. They heat up, can be a fire hazard. But, more importantly, the real question is what will we do with all of them when they go bad. Bury them or throw them in the ocean? It's a legit issue.

I would think incinerating them would cause bad carbon gas which the greenies won't like. But, maybe they're fine with burning lithium batteries, just not coal or oil.

Everything has collateral damage.

 

[HawkGold]

Yes, but it is time we move on from oil. It is oligarch influence that keeps us in it. It's oil oligarch s triggering the Ukraine War.

 

[racerhawk]

Here's the problem, bruh. People are more than willing to mindlessly repeat things like "oil is dying" or whatever but it simply isn't true. Oil demand goes up every year save for absolute calamities. It went down in 2009 with the massive recession and it went down in 2020 with the lockdowns from The Germ. The lockdowns in 2020 were massive, I would see 10 cars en route to work, flight traffic plummeted, oceanic travel was halted for passengers and cargo shipping was disrupted by quarantines in China. The diminution in economic activity was absolutely massive. But despite all that, oil demand only fell to 2012 levels. Contemplate that for a minute. By 2021, it was back at 2016 levels. Hydrocarbons are the bedrock of modern civilization and as places like China and South Asia industrialize oil demand is only going to go up. There is no viable scalable replacement for oil. None. It is relatively cheap, high in energy and massively transportable.

Passenger cars are only 25-30% of oil use in the US. When you crack a barrel of oil (heat it in the refinement process) there are different grades of product that come from each barrel. Some of it is jet fuel, some of it is diesel, some of it is car grade gasoline, some of it is propane, some of it is heavy oil that is only useful in heavy industrial applications like running cruise ships and ocean freighters. An entire symbiotic ecosystem has developed with applications for each and every type of product that comes out of the refining tower. It is an amazing scientific development. But there are applications that will take decades, maybe a century, to run on anything but oil. And if you flipped all US passenger cars to electric, all you would do is create a bunch of surplus car grade gasoline because the refineries would still have to crack the same amount of crude to meet diesel, jet fuel and cargo ship demand.

I agree that we are almost completely dependent upon oil, for lots of reasons. Although significant, oil is also not the only source of carbon emissions. Livestock, our current construction methods, etc account for a ton of carbon emissions.

Having said that, as we wring our hands about the current economic outlook, the costs (financial and human suffering) of climate change will be massive and devastating in the future. There simply isn't the will, innovation, or alignment to move our lovely globe to a safer future for humans. The earth will be fine. It has billions of years to rebalance. Humans, on the other hand, are f*cked. I'll likely be dead before the truly significant impacts come (although we are seeing some already). There will be famine, mass migration, massive droughts, flooding.

In our country, we surely have politicized a real issue, and trivialized it, IMHO. It's how we roll these days. Rollin coal to make a point, ya know.

In short, there's nothing incorrect about what you wrote. It's just depressing. Hydrocarbons are in fact at the center of our world economy (and conflicts). Honestly, are we not f*cked?

 

[MelroseHawkins]

MelroseHawkins said:


There are environmental concerns with lithium batteries as well. They heat up, can be a fire hazard. But, more importantly, the real question is what will we do with all of them when they go bad. Bury them or throw them in the ocean? It's a legit issue.

I would think incinerating them would cause bad carbon gas which the greenies won't like. But, maybe they're fine with burning lithium batteries, just not coal or oil.

Everything has collateral damage.

The Problem is Not the Problem. The Problem is Your Attitude About the Problem.

I'm a realist and I'm not going to apologize for that.

Now, instead of getting woke on me because I don't agree with or align with your thinking, break down what I stated and tell me where I am wrong or what your thoughts are. We can be mature about this and debate.

Seriously, when we have millions of vehicles or equipment/machines being operated by lithium batteries or maybe another technology, what do we do with all the batteries that eventually go bad? To my understanding, one can't just throw in the garbage that's taken to the landfill.

Now, I am open to reliable energy sources and investigating battery technology that might be better and better for the environment, but we do not have those answers for our current technology.

People think wind and solar is so great. But people have to understand that windmills have to be manufactured which takes other sources of energy to manufacture them. Also, windmills are a maintenance nightmare and quite costly to maintain. For wind farms and solar farms. it takes a lot of land to accommodate the farms. They need a lot of space. Maybe they can build solar farms up like skyscrapers. I think there is an efficiency issue with both these technologies as well. And with solar, another negative is that the panels degrade over time and now have a life span of about 22-25 years. The balance is if you are going to get the benefit over the cost it is to maintain the technology. It doesn't make sense to be upside down financially with technology if the overhead/maintenance is high, just because it sounded like a good idea or was good for the environment. Solar started in the 1970's. Why do you think not every other home has it at this point. Because, the upfront cost to install ends up only being a negligible savings in the end at this point. Yes, at the beginning one is going to see an efficient system and many energy savings, but, at the same time they have a big sticker price they may have to pay for, 15-20 years. During this time the energy created degrades over the years until about year 22 when they recommend you purchase new panels and start the entire process again.

 

[MelroseHawkins]

Yes, but it is time we move on from oil. It is oligarch influence that keeps us in it. It's oil oligarch s triggering the Ukraine War.

I do not disagree with you here. Like I said above, everything seems to have collateral damage and this is a huge one with oil. When you have such a necessity such as oil for a power source all over the world, it is going to be used as a chess piece, unfortunately.

I think the key is to become energy independent along with Canada and Mexico and all support North America and get out of those situations with the middle east. We could leave them along and they could leave us alone and we wouldn't have them using oil or any other energy source as leverage.

But, I will add, if it is not oil it will just be another energy source that will cause the same issues. Now it's on to lithium. This is where China is becoming and going to be the most dangerous to deal with. They want control of lithium. Why? They than can call the shots and move the goal posts. China would love to infilt into Mexico more and have a footprint there. I understand that Mexico has been found to have significant lithium reserves. China is already in Mexico manufacturing many of the illegal drugs that are coming over our border. They would love to get their claws into the lithium reserve and Mexican government. If they ever do, that could be very dangerous.

 

[okeefe4prez]

Nothing much there I don't agree with. But, you also can't ignore there are environmental concerns

Oil for auto consumption is dying. It will be a slow death.

I didn't disagree there are environmental concerns, but those concerns exist with everything. Oil for auto consumption is and will be robust for years to come. Slowing growth rates have come from increased efficiency of engines. Electric has made a negligible dent in demand. Electric will gain traction, but is still a long ways off from widespread viability. The ancillary considerations with the grid are of utmost importance. And then that raises issues of sourcing as well.

But it would be absolutely foolish to "kill" all demand for gasoline. You have to crack oil to create diesel fuel, jet fuel and other fuels and petroleum biproducts, like the stuff that makes asphalt. Some portion of this cracking process is gasoline. It would be horribly inefficient and probably environmentally harmful to discard gasoline generated in this process.

 

[okeefe4prez]

Yes, but it is time we move on from oil. It is oligarch influence that keeps us in it. It's oil oligarch s triggering the Ukraine War.

You really don't understand. You can't just say "it's time to move on from oil" and poof, it happens. It is a decades' long process. The first really big push started over 10 years ago as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. But even that massive porkulus moved us about an inch up Mount Everest.

You can't fly an airplane on anything but jet fuel. You can't move a freighter across the ocean on anything but the bottom of the barrel hydrocarbons from the cracking process unless you want to unleash a nuclear fleet like our subs and aircraft carriers, but that sounds even worse than oil. You can't run the truck fleet or trains or tractors or construction equipment on anything but oil until there are substantial advances in technology and infrastructure buildouts so that Walcott, Iowa can support running 200 massive chargers all at once. I don't even think electric is the breakthrough. It needs to be something bigger and more massive, like hydrogen.

 

[MelroseHawkins]

I didn't disagree there are environmental concerns, but those concerns exist with everything. Oil for auto consumption is and will be robust for years to come. Slowing growth rates have come from increased efficiency of engines. Electric has made a negligible dent in demand. Electric will gain traction, but is still a long ways off from widespread viability. The ancillary considerations with the grid are of utmost importance. And then that raises issues of sourcing as well.

But it would be absolutely foolish to "kill" all demand for gasoline. You have to crack oil to create diesel fuel, jet fuel and other fuels and petroleum biproducts, like the stuff that makes asphalt. Some portion of this cracking process is gasoline. It would be horribly inefficient and probably environmentally harmful to discard gasoline generated in this process.

Damn right about how viable electric cars are at this point. Electric cars are great at this point for getting around town and when they are new. I laugh at every greeney person I see driving around in them with there "I'm saving the world" sticker on the back. Often times, they are the proverbial middle aged woman who really hasn't done any research about the vehicles and have no idea of the horror stories they are going to encounter in the years to come. All is great when they are new with low miles on them, or if you live in a warm climate. People in the cold climates don't learn to love them or trust them so much.

Just as with solar panels, the batteries only have so many charge cycles in them and they degrade over time. Ya ever price paying for the new batteries for that $73,000 car new? Yikes. In addition, those in colder climate states DO NOT get the reported miles out of a charge as stated. It may say one will get 225 miles out of a charge, but that is stated for absolute ideal situations. On a cold day, that may go down to 75 miles and will go down faster than you think. Read and watch reviews from people who have had experience owning Tesla cars in cold climates. In addition, watch horror videos of the astronomical prices people have to pay for normal maintenance. A couple guys said they had to pay somewhere around $5,000 for a brake job. One had to have his computer swapped out because of some communication issues in the car and it was like $7,000. There didn't seem to be any repair that cost under a couple thousand dollars. There's going to be a surplus of used Tesla's in about 5 years. Batteries are going to go bad and people are going to try to unload them. Smart people out there will never buy a used Tesla. It's a money pit.

Some people I'm sure have done their homework and/or have the extra $$ to pull the trigger on them. I feel bad for those that are not too mechanically inclined who didn't really do their homework or care to do any, but wanted that new Tesla. They are going to be screwed and pizzed in 6 years when they find out that it costs too much to repair and they can't unload it on anybody. That shit show is coming.

 

[okeefe4prez]

Damn right about how viable electric cars are at this point. Electric cars are great at this point for getting around town and when they are new. I laugh at every greeney person I see driving around in them with there "I'm saving the world" sticker on the back. Often times, they are the proverbial middle aged woman who really hasn't done any research about the vehicles and have no idea of the horror stories they are going to encounter in the years to come. All is great when they are new with low miles on them, or if you live in a warm climate. People in the cold climates don't learn to love them or trust them so much.

Just as with solar panels, the batteries only have so many charge cycles in them and they degrade over time. Ya ever price paying for the new batteries for that $73,000 car new? Yikes. In addition, those in colder climate states DO NOT get the reported miles out of a charge as stated. It may say one will get 225 miles out of a charge, but that is stated for absolute ideal situations. On a cold day, that may go down to 75 miles and will go down faster than you think. Read and watch reviews from people who have had experience owning Tesla cars in cold climates. In addition, watch horror videos of the astronomical prices people have to pay for normal maintenance. A couple guys said they had to pay somewhere around $5,000 for a brake job. One had to have his computer swapped out because of some communication issues in the car and it was like $7,000. There didn't seem to be any repair that cost under a couple thousand dollars. There's going to be a surplus of used Tesla's in about 5 years. Batteries are going to go bad and people are going to try to unload them. Smart people out there will never buy a used Tesla. It's a money pit.

Some people I'm sure have done their homework and/or have the extra $$ to pull the trigger on them. I feel bad for those that are not too mechanically inclined who didn't really do their homework or care to do any, but wanted that new Tesla. They are going to be screwed and pizzed in 6 years when they find out that it costs too much to repair and they can't unload it on anybody. That shit show is coming.

Electric cars are awesome for performance. I was big into RC cars in the '90's and learned a lot about electronics. I got a new RC car not too long ago and the quantum leap in battery and motor technology over 20-30 years is nothing short of breathtaking.

You simply can't beat the low end torque of an electric motor. And the mechanical simplicity has some sort of understated elegance. There's just a motor and battery. No transmission. No massive complexity in the engine, no valve train, no cat converter, no camshaft. It's great.

But in terms of scaling the US passenger fleet there are really major issues. My neighbor has a plug in hybrid and the power company has to bribe him to only charge at night because the grid is too taxed during the day. Those green residential transformers also can't carry the load if there are a bunch of those clustered in one small group of houses. The lines getting into the neighborhood also can't carry the load if you tried to charge 100 of them at once. Plus we need to get massive power out to the truck stops and crap and make sure they can scale up room for cars to charge. Not to mention that even if you scale electricity production, you also have to build massive baseline capacity for situations where solar or wind underperforms due to weather or other conditions. Don't get me wrong, there is a lot of promise, and using electric cars as a way to siphon out what would otherwise be wasted electricity out of the grid at night is a brilliant idea, but there are legitimate issues created by the immutable laws of physics that run deep into the tens of trillions of dollars to solve for widespread adaptation and even if you hit that point, you still have to figure out what to do with the hydrocarbon chains from the cracking process that would otherwise become gasoline.

 

[racerhawk]

I'm a realist and I'm not going to apologize for that.

Now, instead of getting woke on me because I don't agree with or align with your thinking, break down what I stated and tell me where I am wrong or what your thoughts are. We can be mature about this and debate.

Seriously, when we have millions of vehicles or equipment/machines being operated by lithium batteries or maybe another technology, what do we do with all the batteries that eventually go bad? To my understanding, one can't just throw in the garbage that's taken to the landfill.

Now, I am open to reliable energy sources and investigating battery technology that might be better and better for the environment, but we do not have those answers for our current technology.

People think wind and solar is so great. But people have to understand that windmills have to be manufactured which takes other sources of energy to manufacture them. Also, windmills are a maintenance nightmare and quite costly to maintain. For wind farms and solar farms. it takes a lot of land to accommodate the farms. They need a lot of space. Maybe they can build solar farms up like skyscrapers. I think there is an efficiency issue with both these technologies as well. And with solar, another negative is that the panels degrade over time and now have a life span of about 22-25 years. The balance is if you are going to get the benefit over the cost it is to maintain the technology. It doesn't make sense to be upside down financially with technology if the overhead/maintenance is high, just because it sounded like a good idea or was good for the environment. Solar started in the 1970's. Why do you think not every other home has it at this point. Because, the upfront cost to install ends up only being a negligible savings in the end at this point. Yes, at the beginning one is going to see an efficient system and many energy savings, but, at the same time they have a big sticker price they may have to pay for, 15-20 years. During this time the energy created degrades over the years until about year 22 when they recommend you purchase new panels and start the entire process again.

To me, the actual problem with all of our discussion about climate change is a very human one.

Have you heard of the experiment called "the prisoner's dilemma"? It's part of game theory, and oftentimes, in the experiment, individuals risk having better gains for themselves as individuals, even if it could tank everyone, instead of choosing to cooperate, with everyone getting a bit less overall.

How does this translate? As Americans, we only look at our individual needs. What's cheaper now? What do I want? Etc... The problem is... we're all fu@king doomed because of this. You can't have your own climate.

Several years ago, I was on this board quite a bit. Back then, some folks were extolling the virtue of "clean coal." Of course that might sound silly right now, but it was a real thing then. Now, we carp about solar, wind, teslas. While none of these individual solutions is perfect by any stretch, they at least move us to a potential for a better tomorrow. Where did the term "clean coal" come from? Paid political pundits and purveyors of cable infotainment.

This brings me back to the game theory part. We're screwed. People don't want to cooperate for a better future. We want what we want right now. So, we're screwed. I'll be dead by the time the sh*t really hits the fan, but it will happen. It has already started.

I'm quite pessimistic. We'll complain and long for the good ol days, but they ain't coming back in terms of climate change. It's an existential threat to humanity. Meanwhile, we say wind won't work (did you know Iowa gets 55% of it's energy from wind?). Solar panels suck (California has tons of desert space and well over 300 days of blazing sun per year).

The "right now, me me me" folks poo poo all solutions. Like I said, we're screwed.

Here's an example: California is in an extreme water shortage, fueled by climate change related mega droughts. There was an announcement about this, and a plea to curtail unnecessary water use. Ya know what happened? Water use INCREASED. We're screwed.

 

[uihawk82]

#1 Should they segregate their old gas from their new gas?

#2 Hydrocarbons are the bedrock of Western economies and will be for decades to come. These people do not give a solitary F if they push hydrocarbon prices through the roof because they're so rich it doesn't affect them. It will diminish your standard of living, but that is a price they are willing to pay.

Well in #1 this is the essence of price gouging where a gas tanker pulls in to fill the underground tanks, and that gas is at a certain price and was maybe paid for well before the price went up, but guess what they sell the gas at a higher price. Iirc, back in the 1970s and into the '80s when there were the oil embargoes and prices changed a lot, various entities were charges with looking at the seals on gas pumps, and price records and what was determined to be too high a price.

And #2, well yes, no shit the world runs on the energy of hydrocarbons/carbons and not just the western economies. I heard a report from a few different outlets over the past months that China is building a new coal burning power plant every day. WOW, so much for lowering CO2 into the air, and we really need to cut way down on dumping CO2 into the air.

People say we have to have gasoline and carbon fuels and we do to a point but I am all for newer, safer nuclear fission plants. Terrapower from the western US is building a modular (smaller molten salt reactor) at a smaller city in Wyoming to power that city and the surroundings. Many small cities could do this.

The US gets about 18-20% of electricity from nuclear and it could be very higher. When you can create a lot of electricity you can shuttle natural gas to powering vehicles instead of heating homes, water, and stoves.

The Big Oil people who thinks oil and carbon are the main thing to do are dinosaurs.

 

[racerhawk]

A lot to keep up with on this thread, but yeah, as someone over 40 I've already felt like I've had to be nimble and move around a bit within the organization to stay ahead of the posse. The good news is we are in the client services biz, so I can develop individual relationships with clients that insulates me somewhat from the Bobs. I try to both sell and help execute the work, so as long as my name is attached to that revenue I'm ok. But increasingly clear there is a layer of oligarchs at the top, and a push for that cheap/smart/young labor coming up from below. I can also pivot within the sectors I serve, so building some pretty loyal clients within healthcare/health insurance isn't the worst place to be. And certainly seems like I can do that from Iowa City or the Pac-NW.

Here is a fun new wrinkle for you. In recent weeks, my company has contracted with a firm peddling an app called lovework. I mean, actually it is #lovework. I shit you not. The division I work for must be piloting this program for our whole organization. But we're honestly being mandated to download this app and check in on it daily. I checked the box and got off the naughty list by downloading it, but otherwise haven't done shit with it. And now we have smaller team meetings being put on our calendars on a regular basis to discuss the results. This is apparently like a 12 month engagement. The firm touts some kind of bullshit about metrics related to decreased turnover/improved morale with this app, but honest to f*cking god. Some rep from the firm was on a call with us yesterday and was mentioning authenticity and leadership. Jesus - there is nothing authentic or nor will any leadership be developed by being mandated to download an app.

Supposedly you take some surveys and identify your energizers and your drainers and the whole spectrum of your "energy wheel." And there are daily activities related to it. You give "kudos" to others on your team, etc.

I just can't. If this was a one-off deal at an off-site team building event, no big deal. Internal trainings involve that kind of thing - everyone plays along, you get some nice meals for a few days, everyone gets away from their kids for a couple nights, you hit the bar together. This is an on-going engagement, with regularly scheduled calls to talk about it. Thus far I've been able to drag my feet since the whole thing got delayed with emails going to quarantine (nice roll out guys), but not sure how long I can hide out.

Anyone heard of this love work app?

OMG some leaders are so clueless. #lovework. sounds really stupid. How about meet with your team and see what bothers them, and be responsive to their needs?

I worked at a hospital in a mountain state during the pandemic and (somewhat related) mental health crisis for kids. There were a lot of closures for residential facilities during this time. In short, we got the most acute, violent patients that nobody wanted, and didn't have homes to go to. So, our staff got the living crap beaten out of them (some with serious injuries). Many people quit. The response? Resilience resources... and to pour salt in the (literal) wounds, they handed out little sachet bags with a meaningful quote and a rock you could rub for your own resilience. I'm surprised people didn't throw those rocks at the "resilience director" (actual title). #don'tgethurt

 

[SwirlinLingerie]

Just a hunch, but I think housing prices peaked last month in our neighborhood out here in the PacNW. Think we're looking at a big pretty big drop?

 

[MelroseHawkins]

Gas around where I'm at is at $4.19 gal. Question is will it be $6.00 and over around June or July? Krist we are so screwed. But, apparently to the dems, gas prices are really not too high and we've just been really lucky up to this point.

 

[HawkGold]

Gas around where I'm at is at $4.19 gal. Question is will it be $6.00 and over around June or July? Krist we are so screwed. But, apparently to the dems, gas prices are really not too high and we've just been really lucky up to this point.

Not sure what you mean by "Dems" and I'm not a Dem. The US is replenishing the National Reserve and when that is done, prices should reduce some.

Do we have a trucker shortage? Yes. Did the Russians destroy oil refineries in Ukraine? yes.
Are Russian sanctions impacting this? Yes.

Housing prices are coming down about everywhere.

The current oil situation mostly is on Biden and Putin with Putin being mad about Biden's personal gain.

Fact is we need to learn from Ukraine. In that war we have two corrupt mafia controlled Govt's fighting which also drew in Biden and John Kerry.

Until we Americans are going to be willing to put partisanship behind and work to stop corruption.....