h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Capital gains tax in Canada is 50%.

That now includes any real-estate property value increases on any second
home, cottage or vacation property beyond the one you declare as your
'principal residence'.

There was always an exemption for family cottages but it was removed
about 20 years ago and a lot of families found themselves facing huge
tax bills based on the increase in value of their old properties, especially
waterfrontage and lakeside cabins, which might have been in a family for
generations. These had often increased in value from a few hundred of
initial investment to current potential values of hundreds of thousands.

A generation of baby-boomers suddenly found themselves prematurely
inheriting properties during the one year delay in implementing the new
tax rules.

They could then register the value at the time of deed transfer and this
became the baseline for future 'gains'. The tax bite would then be on the
difference between the assessed value at time of acquisition and the time
of sale. But it's still a stiff tax bite when it comes time to sell which often is
at the time of the original owners' death and a pre-agreed dispersement
of the estate.

Happily we have very few other 'inheritance taxes' - but an increasing levy
of assorted fees and probate charges are really eating into the expectations
of younger heirs.


~jwf~

Estate taxes are another big bugaboo.

What's the real issue is how the ultra rich bitch about raising income taxes on the upper brackets even though most of their earnings comes in the form of capital gains. That's how you have folks like Mitt Romney paying a lower effective tax rate than his secretary.

Blind woman with guide dog shouted out of Tesco store: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-29652764


I think this highlights very well a problem I'm starting to see growing, that could well become a major one. Companies and corporations are putting all these wonderful sounding policies in place so that they can appear as loving and caring organisations, yet they never actually implement them.

In this case, not only do Tesco allow guide dogs, but they have staff on hand to assist visually impaired shoppers in the store. A lovely, cuddly policy that makes them sound like a helpful, caring organisation. Yet the reality is that the staff shouted at the woman to get out.

Companies really need to either start putting their money where their mouths are, or stop lying.

Young Dutch guy's admirable work to rid the oceans of our plastic garbage:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-29631332

Got a sneaking feeling the reason for the guide dog not being welcome was cultural more than anything else. It's been known to happen in other shops, taxis etc.

The problem then still lies with the company not training its staff.

Guide dogs being admitted to shops is something that I would have thought is pretty well entrenched in society now and I'm willing to bet that this Tesco had prominent signs up saying guide dogs were allowed - as every other Tesco in the country does. Training in big organisations like this is done by rote, covering points that have been brought up over decades. Whilst it is possible the law about guide dogs and store policy was omitted from the training of a number of employees at this store, I find it unlikely.

This isn't so much a training issue as a disciplinary one imo.

Disciplinary action should definitely be brought in, I agree.

Also, I find the £20 voucher incredibly cheap. "We shouted you out of the shop, humiliated you in public, but hey, here's a voucher that'll barely cover the dog food for a week."

£20 is also probably less than their profit on her weekly shop.

Put the title back

and on a darker note

http://www.ianvisits.co.uk/blog/2014/10/17/200-years-ago-the-london-beer-flood/

Reminds me of the great molasses flood of Boston in 1919
which killed about 20 people. A fifty foot wave of molasses,
over 3 million gallons...

(*NB: An American gallon is smaller than 4 Imperial pints.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7T33CvXUUKY


~jwf~

More electioneering by Labour: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-29662554

Making a pledge that'll cost an estimated* (*figure pulled out of their *cough*) £750 million, which they reckon will be covered by a levy* (*tax they won't be able to enforce) on tobacco companies.

Because, you know, *all* cancer is caused by tobacco.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-29678989

Sticks and stones may break my bones .... but say something nasty and it's up to 2 years in the clink.

Really?

It has to be more than just a bit nasty; it has to be something like a death threat.

'A paralysed man has been able to walk again after a pioneering therapy that involved transplanting cells from his nasal cavity into his spinal cord.

Darek Fidyka, who was paralysed from the chest down in a knife attack in 2010, can now walk using a frame.

The treatment, a world first, was carried out by surgeons in Poland in collaboration with scientists in London.'


He has also regain some bladder and bowel sensation and some sexual function.



http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-29645760

"It has to be more than just a bit nasty; it has to be something like a death threat."

But if I said you're going to die quotes. That could be construed as a death threat when in fact we are all going to die sometime.

"But if I said you're going to die quotes. That could be construed as a death threat when in fact we are all going to die sometime. "

Context would no doubt be important in such cases.

Somewhat

Regardless, a statute like that is ripe for abuse. Just look how much damage the British libel laws have done.

Wind power outstripped nuclear power, for a short period of time:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-29715796


The article is one of those that starts with a lovely attention grabbing sound bite of a headline, and then goes into more details that point out it was an expected, unusual and temporary occurrence.

But it does show that it is possible to get quite a lot of our electrical needs from wind turbines, and we don't have that many of them (relatively speaking).

What was also interesting from that article, is the figures it doesn't show. Wind made 14.2% and nuclear made 13.2% of the electricity, 27.4% in total. So 72.6% of the UK's energy is still coming from elsewhere, almost certainly fossil fuel.

Something that can't last, and will only get more and more expensive. With so much reliance still on fuel that's running out, it's no wonder the government's fast tracking through fracking.