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If you will accept the U.S. Census Bureau's own count of population on 1 April 2000, please see #50 in the table ranking state population, showing Wyoming with 493,782 people at the time of the last census.

Compare that to Miami listed in the table ranking city population, at #48 with 362,470 people.

If you will accept the U.S. Census Bureau's own count of population on 1 April 2000, please see #50 in the table ranking state population, showing Wyoming with 493,782 people at the time of the last census.

Compare that to Miami listed in the table ranking city population, at #48 with 362,470 people.

Median household income in the US remained roughly unchanged between 1976 and 1996 at ~$34,000 (1996 dollars). So, even though the price of an average car might have risen from $10,000 to $22,000 in raw dollars, the real cost dropped from roughly 1 year's income to roughly 8 months income.

Now I'm gonna rag on you (and, frankly, the majority of slashdotters) a bit. If you're gonna make statements that are supposedly factual, for god's sake reference them or provide a link. We're all on the Internet, dammit! It's all about finding information. It took me three minutes to find the link I provided above. It sure as hell wouldn't have taken you more than ten if you bothered to try!

This is why we end up with 300 comments on an article and only 30 of them worth reading.

Go ahead and flame me, I don't care.

So, how did this all happen? I meet a woman (now my wife) that taught me not to spend all my paycheck and to save some money. I still have all the toys I need (ham radio and computers) but now I have my own place (and garage!) to play with them in.

Moral: Get a good woman that will ride you ass about saving money and investing in the future and you just might have a future in which you can enjoy life and help out others.

If you look at the actual figures, you get a different picture. In 1997, the US murder rate was 18,209. In the same year, in England and Wales, there were 739 murders. Population of England and Wales, about 52 million. Population of US, about 270 million.. Therefore E&W murder rate of 1.4 per 100,000 is much smaller than the rate of 6.8 per 100,000 for the USA.

People who talk about self-sufficiency on Mars and being able to do without supplies from Earth are either (1) living in a dream world where closed economies like Albania or North Korea are wildly successful or (2) talking about colonies of millions of people. Take a look at the data in the US Economic Census and you'll see the scope of manufacturing, agricultural production, industry, and services required to have a fully functioning modern economy. Or perhaps you think you could live on Mars with the technology of a 15th century feudal village?

First, many people are ignorant. Stupidity is not the same as ignorance. You are may ignorant, but not stupid. How does ignorance relate to poverty? An example occurred in my city last year. A black high school student at a school in a poor area of town applied for a scholarship. It is generally accepted that she had a very good chance to receive the scholarship. However, she did not have access to a typewriter, so the application had to be hand printed. Because the application was hand printed, the school counselor did not submit the application. The parents should have known to find a typewriter, but they were ignorant of the consequences.

In my own life, information keeps me out of poverty even without a job. I know where to buy cheap food, I know were to buy cheap clothes, I know how to make things that I cannot afford to buy. My family knows how to play the money game to create wealth.

Second, the U.S. is a very rich country. However the wealth is very top heavy. First, though out public housing is good, it is not adequate. For instance, according to this Harvard University article, the waiting time is three to seven years in Boston. Boston housing may be a bit scarce, but it is really not much different in other major cities. In my neck of the woods, public housing has been systematically destroyed over the past 5 years.

As far as drug use is concerned, I know people who use drugs. Some of them have money, some of them don't. Some then can support $1000 a week habits legally, some can't. We see the poor crack users on TV because the rich cocaine users won't let the cameras into the country club.

Money is not distributed equally. I am not going to get into a argument about what money is where, and how much should be where. Suffice it to say that this 1999 census report indicates that a black household earns about 62 cent for every dollar a white household earns. Some of this may be education, because a high school education earns you about 64 cent for every dollar a graduate of a 4-year college earns, but that only applies if you believe black people are stupid. It is hard to get into college if you scholarship application is discarded by your counselor.

Finally, I am well aware of third world countries. People are not necessarily poor. The people I know are very rich. We have cars, mansions, country houses, chauffeurs, maids, everything. What is missing is a vibrant middle class. Your most ignorant statement is we could just vote the poor out of the country. The middle class is a drain on the rich. The poor are their servants. The middle class are the stockholders that are complaining to Washington about the stick scandals that destroyed their pensions. The rich are the one complaining to Washington that their sweetheart deals and multi-million retirement pensions are being outlawed. The middle class are the union workers demanding higher wages that can cut company profits. The rich are the one create fictitious trades to keep the stock up so that their enormous compensations are justified. The poor do nothing but work, consumer, sleep and die. The poor are no threat rich, so why would the rich bother to align themselves with the middle class, the exact people who threaten the prosperity of the rich, to expel a perfectly harmless and useful group?

If you are going to make blanket statement, at least cite some real references.

That's the point I was trying to make -- it's not just because Texas is "bigger" that it has more cell towers for sale, or at least that's not all of it.

Take a look. Texas has more towers for sale than Minnesota, Utah, West Virginia, Washington, New York, New Mexico, Nevada, and Illinois combined. But this doesn't tell us too much on the face of it.

Let's just look at Washington. According to the 1990 census, Washington has an average of 73.1 people per square mile, while Texas has an average of 64.9. So they're pretty close in terms of population density.

Texas (261,914 sq.mi) is 3.9 times as big as Washington (66,581), so it seems reasonable to expect 3.9 times as many towers for sale in Texas.

But that's not what we get. Washington has 6 towers for sale. Multiplied by 3.9 gives us 23.4 towers expected for Texas. But Texas has 72 towers for sale, 3 times as many as predicted.

It seems that you'll get the same result for any state of similar population density. Texas has 3.3 times more towers per person than West Virginia, for example, even though West Virginia has roughly the same population density as Washington.

So why does Texas have 3 times as many towers per person as Washington or West Virginia? I don't know. Maybe someone else does. Is the market for microwave towers worse in Texas than in Washington for some reason, or was there a need for more towers to begin with? (It's not all academic. If the market for microwave towers in Texas is worse for some reason, you might be justified in offering a significantly lower bid on one.) It's worth looking in to.

What you are are looking for is freely provided by the census in the form of TIGER/line files. TIGER Data contains all the census data from 2000. You can find an overview here: Tiger Overview

FWIW, this table may provide some incentive to complete your degree. Note the median $13k per year premium for a bachelor's degree v. high school and additional $8k per year premium for a master's degree. Doing a little arithmetic, the average median income for people in the IT industry according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics is around $55,505; quite how the premiums for higher education are affected by this is hard to tell, I can't seem to find statistics for middle 50% salaray by industry and education. But hopefully this will give you some incentive...

According to the 1990 Census it's about 75/25 urban/rural.

Aargh ... Why are you being so difficult? Most western countries have agreed to adapt GPRS as a temporary standard before a UMTS-net is up and running. You are moving towards isolation regarding mobile technology, that isn't good. Not for you and not for the other 95.5% of the world population. (world PopClock and cia factbook)

I'm to do all of this with just a piece of chalk,a computer, a few books, a bulletin board, a 45 minute more-or-less plan time and a big smile, all on a starting salary that qualifies my family for food stamps in many states.

Although I agree with many parts of this rant, I was really surprised by this comment on teacher salaries. Yes, they've historically been a major complaint about teaching, but I was under the impression that things were getting better. So I did a little web research.

First of all, starting salaries are starting salaries. You don't make much when you start in most careers. According to this page at the American Federation of Teachers website, the average starting salary for teachers in the U.S. was $27,989 in 2001. The average salary in general was $41,820.

Now, that isn't spectacular pay, but it's not exactly horrifyingly low either. The average pay is almost exactly the national median ($42,148), in fact. Yes, there are some states which are lagging on teacher salaries, but of course there are some which are ahead as well.

Why do I bring this up? Maybe so that people won't be completely scared off from teaching? :)

2.2 billion x triple-damages = 6.6 billion from fax.com.

Estimated world population by US Census Bureau: 6,245,356,272

6,600,000,000 / 6,245,356,272 = 1.06

So, basically, that's enough to give every person in the world a dollar...or enough to get Worldcom back on their feet for another year or two!

make it illegal for any business to contribute a politician

The Number of Representatives shall not exceed one for every thirty Thousand ~.

If by "ludicrous salary" you mean "Allows me to pay all my bills" then, yes, I am looking for a ludicrous salary.

[snip] Somehow, I have to cover a $43k set of bills with $24k-34k.

This could be an indication you're living above your means, don't you think?

My house is for sale right now for exactly this reason...All the positions I'm looking at are posting up for significantly less than I'm used to getting.

Tech workers who made $40-45k last year and got laid off are competing for jobs with guys who will do it for $22,500 just so they can get into the country.

I'm definitely in favor of a drastic reduction in the number of NEW H1-B visas issued.

I agree with you, it's not a good idea to bring in more. But you (as a whole) wanted them to come working in the US, you have to deal with the consequences...
Back in the early 19's, belgium (my country) was in need of miners, we asked for them, a lot of italians came and worked, they've settled, founded families, paid taxes, created businesses. They're now part of the country so we have to deal with them. Your H1-Bs are worse than that though, because they're for disposable work force. After 6 years, bye bye. Never mind that they invested time and energy into making YOUR country better, they're now unwanted parasites...

Now positions are filled before they're announced, if they're even announced. The ones that are getting advertised are for people with 10 years Windows 95 experience, and 20 years of Java. Nowadays, we don't need more tech workers, we honestly (right now) need less.

Don't think of it as "protectionism" or "racism", because its neither of those things. Its like a bus. There's a fixed number of seats. Once those seats are full, the driver can't let any more passengers on.

For all the money the federal government spends, it is widely dispersed and little of it is discretionary.

For a somewhat detailed accounting of the federal budget, go here or here.

For a bird's eye view, go here

Of that 2 thousand thousand thousand thousand dollars, about 30 thousand thousand thousand dollars can go under the general heading of "administration of justice".

So there are not unlimited funds available.

Just look at the case against Lindh. Here was a guy, caught red-handed fighting for the Taliban. THe Attorney General publically villifies him, and the Justice department has to settle for a plea bargain on technicalities.

The government has great power and there is potential for abuse of that power, but it is nowhere near omnipotent.

Name me three women you'd elect as President.

Umm, that's my point, there aren't a lot of women qualified to be president, partly because they don't have as many opportunities in politics. There's only a couple of women governors. In our society, most women expect to just be homemakers, wheras in other countries, more women seek and receive positions in politics.

Firstly, generalizations like that just expose your subserviance to the patriarchy... ;)

Secondly, you're logic is reversed. You can't state the effect (no women you'd vote for), then pick a cause which suits your argument (women have no political opportunity!). It would be more legitimate to say that currently there aren't many female Presidential contenders because the current crop of political women aren't very popular with the voters. Does this expose some deep-rooted distrust of powerful women? Nope, it exposes the poor abilities of many female politicians. When the candidate is popular (Ms. Clinton in NY, Christie Whitman in NJ, Ann Richards in TX (thought she lost to Bush running for a second term)) they can beat a man, even in a tough race.

Like I said before, Condi Rice springs to mind immediately, a black woman currently acting as the head of the NSA (appointed by Bush no less). Hillary Clinton also comes to mind. I don't think I'd vote for Ms. Whitman, but I bet there are some nutjobs who'd pick Diane Feinstein. Ain't democracy great?

According to this 2002 NOW press release...
And there's an unbiased source for you... I took the time to get the actual Census report... you can find it here (.pdf). Some other numbers from that report:
Since 1993... Family households maintained by women with no husband present experienced a 28.9% increase (from $21,813 to $28,116), the largest among household types.

Of the 79.2 million men age 15 and over who worked in 2000, 78% of them worked full-time, year-round. 6.9% of these men are the sole earners for a two-parent family.

Only 70.8 million women worked in 2000 (even though there are slightly more women than men), and only 58.7% of those women worked full-time, year-round. How are the other half of the women surviving? Either they can get by on part-time work, they take government assistance, or they work part-time in a household where a man takes the brunt of the financial burden.
Certainly, in the job climate that existed from 1993-2000, you can't claim that there were no jobs to be had...

For single men with families, earnings DROPPED 2.6% from 1999-2000, and only increased 20% for 1993-2000, whereas earnings for the same periods for single women with families INCREASED by 4% and 28.9%, respectively. That represents the largest increase of any group. The smallest increase was single men with no families, where income only increased 7.5%.

Looking at the historical data, women consistantly work less and in fewer numbers, so it's pretty pointless to look at the straight average of male/female earnings. Women tend to take more part-time jobs, which are necessarily lower earning positions with less chance of advancement or opportunity to gain valuable work experience that translates into higher earnings as they get older.

It's not a good idea... This isn't to say there aren't women who are qualified physically for these jobs who don't get them due to prejudice.
My point was that 'feminists' and in particular NOW, specifically push for numbers of women as the almighty indicator of gender equity, and that forces people in jobs like firefighting to lower the standards for women, just to get the numbers up. Maybe there are qualified (on the male scale) wonem who get turned down, but there are definitely, provably, women (in particular in San Francisco) who have been hired as firefighters because the standards have been formally lowered for women.

'Feminism' once was about seeking equality (see the writing of Betty Friedan) but now is about payback and pursuing power specifically to the detriment of men (see Gloria Steinem's writing or any number of courses at Smith College).

If by "the detriment of men" you mean giving up some power, you're probably right. But I'm a man and I'm willing to give up some power if it'll help people like my girlfriend make a fare wage.

No, I meant specifically the detriment of men. Actually go out and read some of what Ms. Steniem thinks about men. Jokes about 'the patriarchy' are only slight exaggerations of stuff these women really believe about a conspiracy effort to maintain a male-dominated society and the militant, anti-male tactics needed to defeat it. I'm saying specifically that NOW has gone from being gender-equal to being anti-men. Lok up some of the work of Christina Hoff Sommers if you want good citations.
As far as what would help your GF to make the same amount of money as a man, tell her to start working full-time when she's 15, get into a field where the pay is good and likely to increase (i.e. not nursing, teaching, or PR/HR), and work full-time, year-round until she's 50. Don't have any kids, and don't have a family. If she does have a family, don't take more than 4 days off work for the birth (that's what most men get) and make sure there's a man in the house who can take full- or part-time care of the child (including doctor's appointments, etc) so that she doesn't have to miss any work.

But the "number of women in a given job" is a good indicator of whether women have opportunities in that field...

Number of women in a given job is a piss-poor way to determine if they have opportunity. It's the worst possible way to determine equality, because it disregards every other factor in favor of bodies in the building. Who cares if they're competant, if they deserve to be there, if they worked for the position, if they even like the field! Get me more women, or we'll be percieved as gender-biased.

What if women don't WANT to be garbage collectors in a statistically significant proportion? Does that mean that garbage collecting companies are biased against women?

Dude, break out of the NOW nonsense and think about equality as it really means, i.e. equality of opportunity, not of result.

Lastly, our culture (as if it were an entity with a mind of its own and a specific adjenda) shouldn't be encouraging anyone to do any specific job, because equity of result is not important or desirable. The culture should foster an atmosphere where it's just as OK to want to stay home and have 5 kids as it is to want to be a futures trader or a Senator. Currently, what NOW and the feminist movement is aiming for is far from that.

Name me three women you'd elect as President.

Umm, that's my point, there aren't a lot of women qualified to be president, partly because they don't have as many opportunities in politics. There's only a couple of women governors. In our society, most women expect to just be homemakers, wheras in other countries, more women seek and receive positions in politics.

Firstly, generalizations like that just expose your subserviance to the patriarchy... ;)

Secondly, you're logic is reversed. You can't state the effect (no women you'd vote for), then pick a cause which suits your argument (women have no political opportunity!). It would be more legitimate to say that currently there aren't many female Presidential contenders because the current crop of political women aren't very popular with the voters. Does this expose some deep-rooted distrust of powerful women? Nope, it exposes the poor abilities of many female politicians. When the candidate is popular (Ms. Clinton in NY, Christie Whitman in NJ, Ann Richards in TX (thought she lost to Bush running for a second term)) they can beat a man, even in a tough race.

Like I said before, Condi Rice springs to mind immediately, a black woman currently acting as the head of the NSA (appointed by Bush no less). Hillary Clinton also comes to mind. I don't think I'd vote for Ms. Whitman, but I bet there are some nutjobs who'd pick Diane Feinstein. Ain't democracy great?

According to this 2002 NOW press release...
And there's an unbiased source for you... I took the time to get the actual Census report... you can find it here (.pdf). Some other numbers from that report:
Since 1993... Family households maintained by women with no husband present experienced a 28.9% increase (from $21,813 to $28,116), the largest among household types.

Of the 79.2 million men age 15 and over who worked in 2000, 78% of them worked full-time, year-round. 6.9% of these men are the sole earners for a two-parent family.

Only 70.8 million women worked in 2000 (even though there are slightly more women than men), and only 58.7% of those women worked full-time, year-round. How are the other half of the women surviving? Either they can get by on part-time work, they take government assistance, or they work part-time in a household where a man takes the brunt of the financial burden.
Certainly, in the job climate that existed from 1993-2000, you can't claim that there were no jobs to be had...

For single men with families, earnings DROPPED 2.6% from 1999-2000, and only increased 20% for 1993-2000, whereas earnings for the same periods for single women with families INCREASED by 4% and 28.9%, respectively. That represents the largest increase of any group. The smallest increase was single men with no families, where income only increased 7.5%.

Looking at the historical data, women consistantly work less and in fewer numbers, so it's pretty pointless to look at the straight average of male/female earnings. Women tend to take more part-time jobs, which are necessarily lower earning positions with less chance of advancement or opportunity to gain valuable work experience that translates into higher earnings as they get older.

It's not a good idea... This isn't to say there aren't women who are qualified physically for these jobs who don't get them due to prejudice.
My point was that 'feminists' and in particular NOW, specifically push for numbers of women as the almighty indicator of gender equity, and that forces people in jobs like firefighting to lower the standards for women, just to get the numbers up. Maybe there are qualified (on the male scale) wonem who get turned down, but there are definitely, provably, women (in particular in San Francisco) who have been hired as firefighters because the standards have been formally lowered for women.

'Feminism' once was about seeking equality (see the writing of Betty Friedan) but now is about payback and pursuing power specifically to the detriment of men (see Gloria Steinem's writing or any number of courses at Smith College).

If by "the detriment of men" you mean giving up some power, you're probably right. But I'm a man and I'm willing to give up some power if it'll help people like my girlfriend make a fare wage.

No, I meant specifically the detriment of men. Actually go out and read some of what Ms. Steniem thinks about men. Jokes about 'the patriarchy' are only slight exaggerations of stuff these women really believe about a conspiracy effort to maintain a male-dominated society and the militant, anti-male tactics needed to defeat it. I'm saying specifically that NOW has gone from being gender-equal to being anti-men. Lok up some of the work of Christina Hoff Sommers if you want good citations.
As far as what would help your GF to make the same amount of money as a man, tell her to start working full-time when she's 15, get into a field where the pay is good and likely to increase (i.e. not nursing, teaching, or PR/HR), and work full-time, year-round until she's 50. Don't have any kids, and don't have a family. If she does have a family, don't take more than 4 days off work for the birth (that's what most men get) and make sure there's a man in the house who can take full- or part-time care of the child (including doctor's appointments, etc) so that she doesn't have to miss any work.

But the "number of women in a given job" is a good indicator of whether women have opportunities in that field...

Number of women in a given job is a piss-poor way to determine if they have opportunity. It's the worst possible way to determine equality, because it disregards every other factor in favor of bodies in the building. Who cares if they're competant, if they deserve to be there, if they worked for the position, if they even like the field! Get me more women, or we'll be percieved as gender-biased.

What if women don't WANT to be garbage collectors in a statistically significant proportion? Does that mean that garbage collecting companies are biased against women?

Dude, break out of the NOW nonsense and think about equality as it really means, i.e. equality of opportunity, not of result.

Lastly, our culture (as if it were an entity with a mind of its own and a specific adjenda) shouldn't be encouraging anyone to do any specific job, because equity of result is not important or desirable. The culture should foster an atmosphere where it's just as OK to want to stay home and have 5 kids as it is to want to be a futures trader or a Senator. Currently, what NOW and the feminist movement is aiming for is far from that.

If it posessed a more qualitative nature, it would no longer posess a mirrored structure to Slashdot's blurb about the article. Since my goal was to mock the article, rather than perform a comparison of parallel vectored processor supercomputing or massively parallel supercomputing (Cray) versus clustered supercomputing (Beowulf), I believe that I chose the right words.

... If you're making the national income average of about $40k-$45k per FAMILY ...

The median family income for the U.S. in 2000 was $62,228, and I am not currently making anywhere near that much.

... I doubt you'd be blowing money on a iMuck for websurfing and email ...

Of course they will, people blow their money on all sorts of stupid things.

... Mac owners have a disportionate number of photoshop types ... but then, my criteria for better "home computers" involves what runs neverwinternights and WC3 better ...

Which of the two sounds more productive and useful, PhotoShop or Neverwinter Nights?

... or Mucks would ...

That wasn't all that funny the first time.

... confirms writer of the article has an elitist leaning and is trolling for attention ...

Well of course. It's on the Internet, isn't it?

Well, having followed more links, it looks like you're pretty much right, so I'll take my lumps. The 1997 numbers are here and I see JCPR's 13.3% overall, but their 24% is nowhere to be seen. It's possible they made an honest mistake and computed the rate for "women" by mistakenly going to the column for all black people and meticulously removing children under 18 to get the adult rate -- in the text I just pointed to I can imagine getting it messed up because the layout is wacky. The original pdf here is better laid out.

I managed to miss the, uh, ancestral poster's claim of the overall rate being 14% and the female rate being 25%, which, yeah, doesn't add up.

If it helps, just remember - 74% of statistics are completely made up.

Fortunately we still have the other 67% to go on.

Well, having followed more links, it looks like you're pretty much right, so I'll take my lumps. The 1997 numbers are here and I see JCPR's 13.3% overall, but their 24% is nowhere to be seen. It's possible they made an honest mistake and computed the rate for "women" by mistakenly going to the column for all black people and meticulously removing children under 18 to get the adult rate -- in the text I just pointed to I can imagine getting it messed up because the layout is wacky. The original pdf here is better laid out.

I managed to miss the, uh, ancestral poster's claim of the overall rate being 14% and the female rate being 25%, which, yeah, doesn't add up.

If it helps, just remember - 74% of statistics are completely made up.

Fortunately we still have the other 67% to go on.

If you really insist, I'll slam-dunk you with a nice bit of research.

First, when I want to quote Census Bureau records, I actually go to the Census Bureau, which his link does not.

From there, I would ask that you scroll down a bit, and look at the number in the column that represents female, total, all races, percent. What number do you find there? To save you the excercise, I'll put it here for you: 12.5%.

The number from the poorly named "great"-grandparent quote is 24%. This warped number is for African-American females. It is a sad number, and says untold volumes about remaining racial problems in this country, but there is little to gain by distorting facts completely by claiming that 24% of ALL American women live in poverty.

See, the reason myself and that other guy were making fun of this clown is because he claimed: Sounds like America in 10 years time - if you disagree, you're not a patriot... Did you know our poverty rate was currently at around 14%, with 25% of all women living below the poverty line? Anyone with the ability to think, and do simple math can see that this cannot possibly be true, since there are roughly the same number of men as women, and this would then mean that only 4% of men were below the poverty line. There were classes in school to get you to avoid obvious mistakes like this, called critical thinking. For the record, 10% of men are below the poverty line, more than double what Textbook Error would have you believe.

Also please note, that the quoter of these claims is a troll. A brief look into his posting history should make that clear. As for jcpr.org, and their erronious faq, I have no idea what got into them. Perhaps we should write them a nice little note. Also, the total poverty rate is under 12%, a notable difference from 14%, but jcpr is quoting from 1997 records. For the record, they are one of the groups that I must conclude has an "agenda".

I'm sorry if I was a little harsh on you, but I feel you were needlessly sarcastic. You're probably a very nice person, though, and thought I was being overly mean to the poor troll. If it helps, just remember - 74% of statistics are completely made up. ;)

well, it may be among the largest, but probably NOT among the most populated. I suspect one of NYC's 5 counties to be the most populated.

-J

We have so much land it's significantly more expensive to cover the USA than an island that is only 374,744 sq km compared to the USA which is 9,158,960 sq km

Hell Europe is barely bigger than the USA at and has significanlty more people at 731,716,000 compared to 287,412,865 in the USA.

BTW we're kicking the worlds ass when it comes to wealth. Which in my opinion is a hell of a lot better than sending a Instant Message(tm) over a cell phone.

"If they join all the state drivers licence databases together, they'll be able to track me! How do I change my identity?"

Currently there is no data to join on. They're using silly stuff like first name, last name, and birth date. Joining all the databases together will increase their ability to track you but it will also cause tons of headaches as license records for separate individuals will be joined because politicians aren't smart enough to realize that name and birth date aren't distinct across 250 million US citizens.

I'm too fucking dense to realise that this has been going on for over 15 years already, and I've just finished reading 1984. Go figure.

First of all, lack of awareness does not make one dense.

The "Problem Driver Pointer System" was created 20 years ago but some states did not become involved until the mid to late 90s. So the fact that the system doesn't work and hassles a lot of innocent people doesn't seem to have been worked out yet. If your name is rare enough you may never have a problem but my first name is in the top 10 of male first names and my last name in the top 30 (http://www.census.gov/genealogy/names/). My sister's first name is in the top 10 female names and she has also had problems with false matches.

The current system doesn't work. Trying to join all those databases together will cause tons of problems. If they do work out the kinks a single database will result in an increased ability to track individuals across state lines.

As far as changing your identity, I say just be happy with who you are.

True. THat's not what they've done. The dollar has devalued, relative to its old purchasing power. We have called it inflation, so you might not have realized what was happening, I suppose.

You could exchange your dollar for a dollar of silver. And you still can. You just have to go to some place where you can buy silver.

What was once a ``dollar of silver'' now costs about $5 and up , when you ``... go to some place where you can buy silver.''.

So far so bad. The really interesting part is that before the Federal Reserve got into the act in 1913, our nation had a history of mild deflation: the dollar gained purchasing power slowly but steadily (see here, at your library.) THat was great for widows and orphans, and since it was a steady trend, it didn't hurt borrowers. Since 1913, we have had HUGE inflation, which dwarfs the inflation we experienced during the civil war (see here [pdf]).

Back to the point: you were technically correct, and dead wrong.

True. THat's not what they've done. The dollar has devalued, relative to its old purchasing power. We have called it inflation, so you might not have realized what was happening, I suppose.

You could exchange your dollar for a dollar of silver. And you still can. You just have to go to some place where you can buy silver.

What was once a ``dollar of silver'' now costs about $5 and up , when you ``... go to some place where you can buy silver.''.

So far so bad. The really interesting part is that before the Federal Reserve got into the act in 1913, our nation had a history of mild deflation: the dollar gained purchasing power slowly but steadily (see here, at your library.) THat was great for widows and orphans, and since it was a steady trend, it didn't hurt borrowers. Since 1913, we have had HUGE inflation, which dwarfs the inflation we experienced during the civil war (see here [pdf]).

Back to the point: you were technically correct, and dead wrong.

A law set forth in a podunk Arizona county by people who probably shouldn't be remotely involved in lawmaking is not exactly precedent for any type of broad-scale action.

-J

A law set forth in a podunk Arizona county

Yeah, Maricopa is a podunk county. Not much there, considering it's the fourth largest county in the U.S. Oh, and it's the fastest gaining county in the U.S. as well.

A law set forth in a podunk Arizona county

Yeah, Maricopa is a podunk county. Not much there, considering it's the fourth largest county in the U.S. Oh, and it's the fastest gaining county in the U.S. as well.

This is impressive bit of database manipulation. Somehow I didn't think that all of the datatypes, etc would be so easily parsed.

Although I do recall telephone directories that used to give you results for a specified radius for certain types of businesses

First our government:

Believe it or not they usually have the best interests of the country in mind no matter what transgression we are talking about here. Are there going to be mistakes? YES, we are talking about human beings there are always going to be mistakes. And let he who has never made a mistake or acted with conflicting goals cast the first stone.

Anyone reading this that believes that they can make better decisions, I am glad run for office we need more geeks on The Hill.

Our Employers:

As hard as it is to admit some times we do live in a capitalist society. If you are unhappy with your job or pay it is your responsibility to look for something better. But if there are CCNAs out there that are making less then $60,000/year you need to be looking any way. If you are making that much, guess what you are already making more then %87 of Americans get over it.

Well I know it is always our desire to have our cake and eat it to but please while you are ranting and raving remember you are:

• Worth whatever you are dedicated enough to fight for.
• Going to have to give up something to the government to avoid chaos.
• Not the lease fortunate person on the planet.
• Responsible to your employers and your employer's customers.
• Not the only one that agrees with you but you don't have to shove it down our throats.
  

Amazing. I saw the 'around 300M people' number and thought to myself, "i thought it was closer to 230M"... So I looked it up and it turns out the official estimate was close to 285M people for last July. Wow learned something today.

And, btw: "Go Kazaa".

I'm pretty sure that the only Executive office exempt from this is the White House. All other offices/departments/agencies/commissions must release information whenever asked.

Nope. Each agency can withold information based on the following exemptions, which can be found in
5 USC 552(b).

To wit the Census Bureau says:

It is the policy of the agency to make records available to the public to the greatest extent possible, in keeping with the spirit of the FOIA, while at the same time protecting sensitive information that may be withheld pursuant to one of the FOIA's exemptions. In accordance with 5 U.S.C. 552(b), the following is a list of these exemptions which apply to Government information subject to the FOIA:

(b)(1) EXEMPTION - Protects Classified Matters of National Defense or Foreign Policy

This exemption protects from disclosure national security information concerning the national defense or foreign policy,provided that it has been properly classified in accordance with the substantive and procedural requirements of an executive order.

(b)(2) EXEMPTION - Internal Personnel Rules and Practices

This exemption exempts from mandatory disclosure records "related solely to the internal personnel rules and practices of an agency." Courts have interpreted the exemption to encompass two distinct categories of information:

(a) internal matters of a relatively trivial nature--sometimes referred to as "low2" information; and

(b) more substantial internal matters, the disclosure of which would risk circumvention of a legal requirement--sometimes referred to as "high 2" information.

(b)(3) EXEMPTION - Information Specifically Exempted by Other Statutes

This exemption incorporates the disclosure prohibitions that are contained in various other federal statutes. As originally enacted in 1966, Exemption 3 was broadly phrased so as to simply cover information "specifically exempted from disclosure by statute." The new Exemption 3 statute prohibits agencies from releasing under the FOIA any proposal "submitted by a contractor in response to the requirements of a solicitation for a competitive proposals," unless that proposal "is set forth or incorporated by reference in a
contract entered into between the agency and the contractor that submitted the proposal."

(b)(4) EXEMPTION - Trade Secrets, Commercial or Financial Information

This exemption protects "trade secrets and commercial or financial information obtained from a person [that is] privileged or confidential." This exemption is intended to protect the interests of both the government and submitters of information.

(b)(5) EXEMPTION - Privileged Interagency or Intra-agency Memoranda or Letters

This exemption protects "interagency or intra-agency memorandums or letters which would not be available by law to a party ...in
litigation with the agency." As such, it has been construed to "exempt those documents and only those documents that are normally privileged in the civil discovery context."

(b)(6) EXEMPTION - Personal Information Affecting an Individual's Privacy

This exemption permits the government to withhold all information about individuals in "personnel and medical files and similar files" when the disclosure of such information " would constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy." This exemption cannot be invoked to withhold from a requester information pertaining to the requester.

(b)(7) EXEMPTION - Investigatory Records Compiled for Law Enforcement Purposes

As amended, this exemption protects from disclosure "records or information compiled for law enforcement purposes...."

EXEMPTION 7(A) Records or information the disclosure of which could reasonably be expected to interfere with enforcement proceedings. This exemption authorizes the withholding of "records or information compiled for law enforcement purposes, but only to the extent that production of such law enforcement records or information ... could reasonably be expected to interfere
with enforcement proceedings."

EXEMPTION 7(B) Records, the disclosure of which would deprive a person of a right to a fair trial or an impartial adjudication.

This exemption is aimed at preventing prejudicial pretrial publicity that could impair a court proceeding, protects "records or information compiled for law enforcement purposes [the disclosure of which] would deprive a person of a right to a fair trial or an impartial adjudication."

EXEMPTION 7(C) Personal Information in Law Enforcement Records. This exemption provides protection for personal information in law enforcement records. This exemption is the law enforcement counterpart to Exemption 6, providing protection for law enforcement information the disclosure of which "could reasonably be expected to constitute an unwarranted invasion of
personal privacy."

EXEMPTION 7 (D) Identity of a Confidential Source. This exemption provides protection for "records or information compiled for law enforcement purposes [which] could reasonably be expected to disclose the identity of a confidential source --including a State, local, or foreign agency or authority or any private institution which furnished information on a confidential basis--and, in the
case of a record or information compiled by a criminal law enforcement authority in the course of a criminal investigation, or by an agency conducting a lawful national security intelligence investigation,information furnished by a confidential source."

EXEMPTION 7(E) Circumvention of the Law. This exemption affords protection to all law enforcement information which "would disclose techniques and procedures for law enforcement investigations or prosecutions, or would disclose guidelines for law enforcement investigations or prosecutions if such disclosure could reasonably be expected to risk circumvention of the law."

EXEMPTION 7(F) To Protect the Physical Safety of a Wide Range of Individuals. This exemption permits the withholding of information necessary to protect the physical safety of a wide range of individuals. Whereas Exemption 7(F) previously protected records that "would... endanger the life or physical safety of law enforcement personnel," the amended exemption provides protection to "any individual" when disclosure of information about him or her "could reasonably be expected to endanger [his/her] life or physical safety."

(b)(8) EXEMPTION - Regulation of Financial Institutions

This exemption protects matters that are "contained in or related to examination, operating, or condition reports prepared by,on
behalf of, or for the use of an agency responsible for the regulation or supervision of financial institutions."

(b)(9) EXEMPTION - Geological and Geophysical Information Concerning Wells

This exemption covers "geological and geophysical information and data, including maps, concerning wells."

Yeah, or another way to look at it is:

$40 billion = 40 thousand million dollars.

Population of the U.S. = 281,421,906 source.

40,000 / 281.422 = 142

Therefore, Microsoft has enough money in reserve to make everyone in the U.S. a millionaire 142 times over.

Jesus Christ.

~Will

If you are looking for data (the original askslashdot doesn't mention needing any, but jic) EROS Data Center and the GIS Data Depot are my favorite spots. Oh, yes, and the data are free.

I cannot say for sure why Arizona got one. I do know that Arizona has one of the Nations highest rates of growth. With all of the theaters going in around here they might just do one in digital. Second only to Nevada (66%) at 40% in growth. Fifth on the list in total numbers for growth from 1990-2000. 2002 Census Data

This is semi-OT, but interesting.

A full 25% of Americans are decended from German ancestry.

Followed by Irish, then British ancestry.

The average age of the members of Congress is 54.4. According to the 2000 Census, only 23.9% of all people fit into the category of being of eligible voting age but twenty or more years younger than the average member of Congress. Even if you include children, only 49.6% of the population fits into this group. 50.4% of the population -- the majority, especially when you consider the percentage who actually vote -- are older than the group claimed to be "the largest age group of the population."

Isn't it easier for lobbyists to persuade young members of Congress without much political experience? After all, they don't have as much experience to judge from and are less aware of lobbyists' favorite tactics and tricks to get support.

EVERYONE is worried about the unstated concern that the international organizations are really just fronts for foreign governments.

Written by a close friend of mine (in his free time) for the Bureau's centenntiall celebration...

There is also the US Census Data on Business, if you really want to get into the bloody details.

facts are good.

Not bad for Canada, a country with 31,081,900 people, compared to the USA, with about 286,686,848 people.

The US constitution specifies that US Citizens must be enumerated within every ten year period. Nowhere does the constitution authorize such detailed data collection, nor is it "necessary and proper."

This update program is called MAF/TIGER. An optional feature request in this update would involve merging these GPS coordinates with something like the Realsite program. This would give a textured 3D model that is geospatially accurate to within 1 meter, based off of aerial, satellite and hand held photography.

Thinking in paranoid mode I can't help but think of government surveillance via satellite and robot and cruise missiles targeting specific GPS coordinates.

I'm not seriously worried about anything in particular, but it's the abuse that I cannot foresee that truly worries me. As I cannot conceive of any benefit that this program would bring to the average citizen I have to ask, why are we doing it?

According to a NYTimes editorial a couple of weeks ago, Napster had 90 million unique users at its peak. I don't know exactly how many of those were American, though I hear that the bulk of internet users in the world are American. I don't know how many of them are, or will be by this November, over 18, but considering that Napster was so popular on college campuses, I think we can assume that the bulk of them are or soon will be over 18.

So maybe 45 million Americans of voting age used Napster. Maybe more. That's a larger number of people than the entire populations of African-Americans and Asian-Americans combined. (Check it out at www.census.gov).

My point here being that this is an enormous block of potential voters who are saying, by means of their behavior, that they resist to some degree the current protections offered to copyright holders. (And I mean by this not just IP protection but also access to store shelves or radio play--try to get your music played on commercial radio without major label backing.) No politician would ignore the voices of a group of this size if it were an ethnic group, so why are they so damn inclined to side with the media companies here?

I guess the answer is: we don't present a unified political front. But perhaps we should. Media companies already have too much power in this country.

Census has the population at 6,210,069,265.

According to this story at Wired, Xybernaut's Mobile Assistant® V product will be used at COMDEX Chicago by the event staff to reduce queues. I could envision two different ways that slashdotters could protest. If they are actually going to attend, they could wear something that states their position about the company and its practices. If they are not going to attend, but live in or near Chicago (big place, should be a few around somewhere), they could do the usual protest thing on public property at the border of the convention (I'm sure the COMDEX people would never allow them in the convention area).

Here it is.

Population 5,221,801. I think the fact that you left out Tarrant county might have skewed your numbers.

DFW is at #9 for metro areas sizes. (See, I can even admit when I'm wrong). But it has a growth of over 29% -- more than twice as high as any area in the top eight.

Now go and troll someone else.

If you consider the Metroplex (DFW) as one unit (for those of you who haven't been here, we're talking abot an area that is at least 1,200 square miles of connected cities), you're looking at more than 5 million people. DFW considered as a whole (and not individual cities) is probably #2 or #3 in population size.


I'm not sure where you're getting your figures but the 2000 census indicates that the "DWF" area has only about 3,480,663 people.

Collin: 491,675
Denton: 432,976
Dallas: 2,218,899
Ellis: 111,360
Kaufman: 71,313
Rockwall: 43,080

Compare that with the 9,519,338 people in Los Angeles County alone and it looks like a long race for 7th or 8th. Add in all the other counties that make up LA (Orange, Ventura, Riverside, etc., etc.) and you're looking more like 15th or 16th.

Travel more, it'll do you good.

Sources:

http://factfinder.census.gov/servlet/GCTTable?ds_n ame=DEC_2000_SF1_U&geo_id=04000US06&_box_head_nbr= GCT-PH1&format=ST-2

http://factfinder.census.gov/servlet/GCTTable?ds_n ame=DEC_2000_SF1_U&geo_id=04000US48&_box_head_nbr= GCT-PH1&format=ST-2