Wednesday, January 30, 2019

Infineon Technolgies: The Future Is Now x4

A flash of streaming YouTube uploads from
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Somebody Is Watching You Right Now

Now You Know
Published: 28 Jan 2019
Views: 331,171+
Comments: 3,354
Who is watching what you are doing online right now?
Do you actually have any internet privacy?
It’s likely that most of you watching this show wouldn’t enjoy the prospect of every website you’ve visited and every search term you’ve entered into a comment box being made public knowledge. If not made public knowledge, then you probably feel at least a little bit uncomfortable knowing that what you do online is stored as data somewhere.

It came as quite a shock to some people in 2018 when Google became more transparent as to what data it stored regarding your searches, where you’ve been, what sites you like to visit. Your security is not sacred, and that’s one reason why from 2016 to 2018 the number of people using VPNs has grown substantially. Big Brother is watching, and where you virtually tread, you most likely leave some dirty footprints. Welcome to this episode of the Infographics Show, Who Is Watching What You Do Online Right Now?

AZ Central Reporter EJ Montini: Eye On AZ State Senator David Farnsworth

There's absolutely nothing surprising or silly - SERIOUSLY - in reporting 5 hours ago about actions by our elected Arizona Law-Makers in the AZ State House. EJ Montini gets it right: "You elect these people, you pay them, you pay for their offices, their staffs, and you expect them to do work that is vital to the state. And instead they fiddle around with issues they do “not have jurisdiction to act upon” and that will have “no official standing or effect.”
This is just one example of the disconnect between voters and long-time office-holders. It's time way overdue for more accountability. What are our state senators and AZ state house members  doing to waste time when there are deadlines to be met dealing with important issues: some of those issues include education, prison reform, water rights, gun violence, voter protection . . . ratifying the Equal Rights Amendment anyone? [ guaranteeing the equal rights of women by the force-of-law ]
The latest legislative session has barely gotten started and already the time has come to waste time. And your money.
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Surprise! (Or not)
Lawmakers waste your money on worthless ‘wall’ bill
EJ Montini  
Republican lawmakers this week pushed through the senate government committee Senate Concurrent Memorial 1101.
. . . This particular “memorial” urges the U.S. Congress to enact what is called the Fund and Complete the Border Wall Act, or something similar. It’s a waste.
Only the authority to waste money
The meaningless request took up time in an actual senate committee and it could continuing wasting time in another committee and then the Senate as a whole and then to the House. And in the end it will have absolutely no effect and mean absolutely nothing.
The people you elected to office know all this.
And they do it anyway. 
Did you get that?
SCM1001 was introduced by (Mesa) Republican David Farnsworth and was passed in committee 4-3, along party lines. The three Democrats voted against it. If passed by both the House and Senate (still controlled by Republicans) copies of the meaningless memorial will be sent to the president of the Senate, the Speaker of the House and members of Arizona’s congressional delegation, all of whom will promptly and permanently … ignore it.
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Another long-time officeholder:
Mesa Republican Rusty Bowers

Tuesday, January 29, 2019

2 Minutes + 33 Seconds to Get-To-Know Jennifer Duff?

This short streaming video upload to YouTube today from the Mesa City Council hardly tells anyone anything more than what we have already heard before - nothing.
Your MesaZona posts this in good faith that is critical for sure and might be just an opinion that readers can choose to ignore. However, the new member on the Mesa City Council has a job and responsibilities to District 4 residents.  

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Our new representative really needs to do more than start off sitting on-her-duff [pardon the pun] as 'a talking-head' at a desk inside City Hall. . . .
Does she even say that now that you've met me [in about two minutes on YouTube],
"I want to get to meet-and-know you - let's talk and work together and identify our shared interests and concerns and get you more involved in our city government?"
That's something that's been a missing connection here in Mesa for far too long.
Where to start: contact [it works more than one way]
 

Taking A Big-Bite From Data: The Tech Economy’s Untold Story

Here's who and what tells that "untold story". [Tech
If you look at data, not hyped-up press releases, a more nuanced picture about the nation's high-tech economic emerges - much of the fastest growth—including in tech—is shifting dramatically not to dense urban centers but to more sprawling regions and the suburban periphery.
That is definitely the case here is distressed Downtown Mesa [nothing nuanced] affectionately named "The Old Donut-Hole by your MesaZona blogger at the same time certain other influencers would have you believe it's vibrant and exciting.
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Please Note: The views and opinions and some insights expressed on this blog definitely reflect the fact that your MesaZona blogger enjoyed living and working in New York City for more than 22 years - there's no other place like it for sure!
Nonetheless and moreover, yours truly lives here now, more outspoken than ever before.
This statement might help to explain to readers my orientation and different perspectives:
The author of one report cited here clearly states that "The uniqueness of New York’s urban core has never been replicated in any of the other major metropolitan areas, despite frequent envious proposals on the part of many officials and others."
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Mesa (and Maricopa County) are "fast-growing" for sure once again, expanding in bouts-and-fits and leap-frogging out from what used to be the Central Business District 50 years ago. That's not an unusual nor short-lived phenomenon.
Centrifugal Sprawl - fleeing away from central urban cores - 
is a Money-Maker. 
Since 1900 here in The Valley of The Sun that explosive growth has been documented using data to produce an easily understood stunning visual that shows the earth-changing shifts in population - the largest Suburban Sprawl in the entire United States. Was Downtown Mesa ever urban?
Definitely not. The original one-square mile was "colonized" by Mormons sent on a mission from Salt Lake City, layed-out for homesteading on a grid plan with large 2.5-acre plots to encourage farming by families of the city founders. They started a small cooperative and other small-scale family-owned businesses on Main Street, built mostly one-story buildings for commercial and residential development.
Before and after World War II, Main Street morphed into a supply center for federal projects, as well as a 1950's-style "boom-town" for about 20 years that expanded well beyond outside the fringes of the original One-Square Mile. Then the recurring cycles of Booms-and-Busts took over
Fast-forward to update the moving visual we get this stunning infographic derived from the American Community Survey that shows where the growth moved from 2013-2017 >
The ACS data indicates that 89.8% of major metropolitan growth since the 2010 Census has occurred in the suburbs and exurbs that include metrics for City Sector Model categories - and the Earlier Suburbs and Later Suburbs and Exurbs.
[Here in Mesa, the usual reference is to "The Outer Loops" and "The Inner Loops" and west-east "Tech Corridors"] 
Suburban and Exurban expansion essentially follows the earlier car-driven commuter-culture and pre-existing patterns, which was were detailed in the four previous annual analyses.
The study provides a mid-decade snapshot (2015) of US demography.
Link: SuburbanAlliance.com 17 Dec 2018
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Generally, urban core growth was the exception, as only 16 of the 53 major metropolitan areas had population gains in their urban cores.
The predominant trend continues. At least since World War II, most population growth has been concentrated in the suburbs and exurbs.
Despite all the blather and pronouncement about a “back to the city” wave, things have not changed very much overall several decades.
Only 10.2 percent of the major metropolitan growth throughout the United States was in the urban core, which includes the City Sector Model CBD (central business district) and its adjacent Inner Ring.
SEE THIS NOTE AND NOTE 2 BELOW*:
INSERT: Southeast Mesa
Patterns of residential and commercial development, as well as areas for job creation according to the Master Plan developed by the City Mesa.
You can see where this going  . . . 
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The only sector to gain in its share of the population was the Later Suburbs (Figure 2), which with 46 percent of the metropolitan area growth was well ahead of its 28 percent share in the 2010 census.
The Exurbs had 16 percent of the growth from 2010 to 2013/2017, equaling their 2010 population share.
The Earlier Suburbs, however fell far short of their population share, adding 27 percent of the new residents, compared to their 2010 share of 41 percent (Figure 6).
If you want to see more of an analysis, go here >
Suburbs & Exurbs Continue to Dominate Metropolitan Growth at Mid-Decade
by Wendell Cox
http://www.newgeography.com/content
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* Note 2: The City Sector Model classifies small areas (ZIP codes, more formally, ZIP Code Tabulation Areas, or ZCTAs) in metropolitan areas in the nation based upon their function as urban cores, suburbs, or exurbs.
The criteria used are generally employment and population densities and the extent of transit use versus car use (Figure 9).
The purpose of the urban core sectors is to replicate, to the best extent possible, the urban form as it existed before World War II, when urban densities were much higher and a far larger percentage of urban travel was on mass transit.
The suburban sectors replicate the automobile-oriented suburbanization that began in the 1920s and escalated strongly following World War II. The suburban areas are largely within the continuous built-up urban areas, while the exurban areas are generally in the metropolitan areas, but outside the built-up urban areas.
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ARE YOU READY TO TACKLE TECH?
Eye on the news from City Journal
The Tech Economy’s Untold Story
Job growth is shifting from media-favored “superstar” cities to more sprawling metro regions and the suburban periphery.
Joel Kotkin  January 20, 2019
The decisions by Amazon and Google to expand into the New York area have led some pundits to claim that the nation’s high-tech economic future will be shaped in dense urban areas.
“Big cities won Amazon and everything else,” proclaimed Neil Irwin of the New York Times. “We’re living in a world where a small number of superstar companies choose to locate in a handful of superstar cities where they have the best chance of recruiting superstar employees.”
Yet the trends in job creation, particularly in technology, are not nearly as favorable to the “superstars” as some urbanists imagine.
If one looks at data, not press releases, a more nuanced picture emerges, with much of the fastest growth—including in tech—shifting dramatically not to the elite, dense urban centers but to more sprawling regions and the suburban periphery. . .
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That comes with some cautious take-aways however:
SUMMARY:
Increasingly, then, the job market embodies two basic models:
one based on middle-class, middle-income jobs, and another that lives off youthful energy and produces both high-end and lower-end employment.
The media celebrate superstar-city economies but ignore how the vast majority of new employment occurs in lower-cost cities and suburbs, which now generate roughly 80 percent all jobs and most population growth. Suburbs also are seeing a strong influx of the educated, those earning over $75,000, and those between the ages of 30 and 44
About the "Innovation Economy""
Cities may not want to assume the super-high prices, congestion, “woke” politics, and massive inequality that attend the arrival of thousands of temporary, temperamental, young creative types working on the more glamourous—but also more fleeting—side of the innovation economy..
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1 Not all tech jobs are created equal.
"Second wave” tech firms like Amazon tend to be short-term employers, where young workers earn their spurs before heading elsewhere. . . Such practices contrast with those of more traditional tech firms—those involved with semiconductors, computers, network equipment, and aerospace—which rely on long-term employees.
These firms, Modarres suggests, thus have different priorities when it comes to siting and corporate planning.
2 Second-wave workers, particularly coders and those involved in media-centric work, for example at Google, may prefer an urban location.
“The new economy, epitomized by Amazon, neither requires nor offers loyalty to its employees,” Modarres notes.
“They need the largely youthful ‘creative class’ to give a few stressful years of their lives to innovate, pad their CVs and leave for the next job, hopefully in less expensive places.
They work hard, live fast, and burn out in a few years, ending up often in more suburban and other less-costly areas.” These urban habitués are usually short-timers. . . The second-wave model is ideal for the young and restless but not for those entering middle age.
3 Different imperatives are at work if you’re looking for engineers as opposed to coders. Engineers tend to be long-term employees who seek to buy houses and raise families; they want to move to affordable locales.
According to data from the EMSI consultancy, this movement away from superstar cities toward more affordable locales like Houston, Dallas, Jacksonville, Orlando, and Nashville is happening in other industries, too, such as finance and business services.
Cost of living is a huge factor.
Simply put, the geography of jobs, even high-paying ones, may be shifting, but not entirely in the ways that the mainstream narrative suggests.
4 “The new information peddling economy,” notes Modarres, “creates nomadic labor pools, who have to embrace placeless-ness to survive. They move where their skills take them.”

Sunday, January 27, 2019

Want To Try to Influence Public Opinion? OK. Go-Get EVT Staff Writer Jim Walsh Write The Story

Like they say "He's just doing his job" Manipulating news.
It's not online yet, but it was the pulp fiction-Front Page Story in the hard copy The Sunday East Valley Tribune:
Mesa Drive overhaul a mixed blessing for many
"City officials are about to begin the second phase of the transformation of Mesa Drive - a $28-million project. . .
O Lordy it is a [mixed]  blessing for some . . .But
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There are 2 "Buts" and mebbe a Butt-Head in the story
But #1:"But the city's eminent domain actions to acquire mostly strips of land - along with the impending 18-month construction period* - have been irritating business owners before the first piece of pavement gets replaced"
and Walsh added, "It is irritating property owners who are going through eminent domain for road widening and will create no end of irritation for 18 months . . .  
Yes, using eminent domain tactics is a very touchy subject here in downtown Mesa for sure.
But #2: "But the project will come at a cost beyond the funds approved by voters in a bond issue years ago.
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For your hyper-local MesaZona blogger THIS IS A BLESSING-IN-DISGUISE - Making it way-to-easy to show readers exactly how Mainstream Media Manipulates news to influence public opinion . . . with an added twist speculated by writer Jim Walsh: "Eventually, the project will complete a major unpgrade that started in 2012 . . . " at a cost beyond the funds approved by voters in a bond issue years ago
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Later on Walsh quotes Mayor John Giles:
"It's pretty evident that we need to finish the job . . . We took a breath for a while and now we need to finish the plan."
Here's the killer from Walsh twisting words again: "Despite speculation from a blogger and other critics to the contrary, 'It's not tied to a downtown agenda'. The voters said they want better roads . . ."
WHOA! "not tied"????????????????? Denial not believable.
* Just a coincidence that the 18-month construction period for the Mesa Drive overhaul project just happens to coincide with the the re-opening of the LDS Temple Transformation + Major Mormon Make-Over of Downtown @ Mesa Drive/Main Street?
[Pardon me for that "speculation". Me bad]
And this: You can get your time-pieces and watches fixed: Walsh mentions that one business, Norm's Watch Repair, is happy. The owner and his mother Jewel Collins expect to attract more clients, particularly because the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is building a major residential project next door. . . A lot of people fix things because of their sentimental value."
Farther on in the piece, he happens to add "The opposition from business owners  is not unanimous"
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Enter some quotes from Julie Christoph, the Mesa Drive Overhaul project director and a supervisory engineer in the City of Mesa Engineering Department. . .
Readers of this blog will have wait to see "the fix" online from Jim Walsh online.


 

A Home-Grown Libertarian Economist From The Ikeda Family Here In Mesa

Your MesaZona blogger's favorite economist is definitely Niall Ferguson, while Sanford Ikeda is certainly getting more of my attention lately. His friends call him "Sandy"; I'm not one of his friends [except on FB], but I do really admire what he does and what he thinks.
Who is Sanford Ikeda?
Sanford Ikeda is a professor of economics at the State University of New York, Purchase College. He is an expert on the economy of cities, taking an Austrian School approach to the subject.
He is the author of Dynamics of the Mixed Economy: Toward a Theory of Interventionism (London: Routledge, 1997) as well as articles in the Southern Economic Journal, Journal of Economics and Humane Studies, American Journal of Economics & Sociology, Cosmos + Taxis, the Review of Austrian Economics, and the Independent Review, Forbes, and others. He received a B.A. from Grove City College and a Ph.D. from New York University.
Image result for sanford ikeda dynamics of the mixed economyHere's just one reason: what he got published on 24 Jan 2019 online in LIBERTARIANISM.org  . Down-to-earth and it starts with a hamburger
What’s the Economic Meaning of Cost?
Often, the meaning of cost varies when you ask different people who are part of the same single transaction. 
Meaning of Cost
"Ask a friend how much that hamburger cost him and his response might be something like, “It cost me $5.”  If he were economically savvy, he might include in his response the value to him of what he would have spent that $5 on if he hadn’t bought the burger plus the time it takes him to consume it (which he could have spent doing something else).
By contrast, ask the manager of the restaurant where your friend bought the hamburger how much that burger cost and her response might be “It cost me $0.50s worth of labor, $0.50 in ingredients, and $2.50 in rent, insurance, overhead, gas, electricity, maintenance, and equipment.”  And if the manager had taken a good economics course she might include the value to her of other things she could have spent that money on and also the value of what she would have done had she not decided to sell hamburgers."
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Blogger Note: Follow along . . . Follow along . . .it's value-added
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These costs involving our alternative choices are called “opportunity costs.”  In economics, all costs that are relevant to decision-making, unless otherwise specified, are opportunity costs.  But which perspective should you take if you’re trying to answer the question, “How much does that hamburger cost”?  Whose point of view, even if we rightly include opportunity costs, is the “correct” one?  How might this help us to analyze issues of public policy? Follow along . . .it's value-added
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THE MEAT-OF-THE-MATTER =
These costs involving our alternative choices are called “opportunity costs.”  In economics, all costs that are relevant to decision-making, unless otherwise specified, are opportunity costs.  But which perspective should you take if you’re trying to answer the question, “How much does that hamburger cost”? 
Whose point of view, even if we rightly include opportunity costs, is the “correct” one? 
How might this help us to analyze issues of public policy?
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Blogger Note: We need all the help we can get to help us to analyze issues of public policy
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A Cost Is Always a Cost to Someone for Something

The problem here is that asking “How much does that cost?” is itself ambiguous.  A cost is never disembodied but is always connected to a specific person who is making a particular decision.   
To avoid the ambiguity, you would need to ask “What does that consumer have to give up to buy that hamburger?” or “What does that seller have to give up to sell that hamburger?”  Possible answers might be, in the case of your friend, to buy a bowl of sprouts or to save for the future, or in the case of the manager, to sell a taco instead or to update her equipment.
Cost is one of those concepts that we each use in daily life but that can create misunderstanding, even harm, if everyone isn’t on the same page.  Fortunately, to avoid most of the confusion all you need to do is understand the following:  A cost is always a cost to someone for something. . .

Why Does It Matter?

Okay, so a cost is always a cost to someone for something.  But what confusion or harm might arise from not understanding that?

Expenditure Accounting vs. Economic Costs

But what about the expenses you record in your household budget or your business’s spreadsheet?  Are they costs?  The data you record in on such ledgers may indeed help you to make buying and spending decisions in the future, but they are not your true, economic costs. 

READ MORE > https://www.libertarianism.org