November 30,2016-
How Oil Companies Make It Great Again……Un-drill baby, Un- drill
OPEC today is showing the way to make the oil business great again – restrict production. Un-drill those new wells. News that the cartel would decrease their oil output sent futures prices higher today which is expected to help US oil-related companies. OPEC said it had agreed on a proposal to reduce production by 1.2 million barrels per day, or about 4.5 percent, to 32.5 million barrels per day. But the question remains – will US oil firms take it as a signal to drill more US wells, insuring a future glut? Meanwhile your price at the pump may go up.
Big Fat Problem For US and The Trump Administration
A new report by the Milken Institute says the obesity epidemic in the US cost the nation $1.4 trillion in 2014. Politco writes that “ The staggering price tag — more than the country’s defense budget — includes everything from medical treatment and drug costs to lost productivity; it also tallies up the financial impact of diseases tied to obesity, like diabetes and Alzheimer’s. The report estimated that obesity’s direct cost in the U.S. in 2014 was $427.8 billion, or more than 14 percent of all health care spending that year. Indirect costs, like lost work-days and lost productivity, totaled $988.8 billion.”
“Obesity is weighing down America,” said Ross DeVol, Milken Institute’s chief research officer and a co-author of the study. Read the report here.
Yet the new Health and Human Services secretary Georgia congressman Tom Price has a record of oppossing current food polices aimed at reducing obesity including voting against Obamacare, the Food Safety and Modernization Act that aims to fight food born illnesses, the Healthy Hunger-Free Kids Act requiring school menus cut back on sugar and salt and a sponsor of the Common Sense Nutrition Disclosure Act that would exempt convenience stores and grocery retailers from FDA’s menu-labeling rules.
Small Businesses Lament There Are Too Few Mexicans in U.S., Not Too Many
The Wall Street Journal reports -As the labor market tightens and the population of undocumented immigrants shrinks, employers in low-skill industries such as hospitality, construction and agriculture scramble to fill jobs