tennyson wrote:

The thing that is a "shocker" to us in this area of the country is that a 150K to 250K is middle class. Yet, as of 2012 Palo Alto had the 3rd highest median family income at about $168,000. People there are "poor" in the sense that all their money gets plowed into housing which is sky high. IF you ever worked in a very large corporation that had transfers of people in from the Calif area, they wind up buying much larger homes here than the similar jobs would nornally have because they had such an expensive home in their Calif area and if they trade down they sustain a large capital gain which is taxable. 

Here is the 2012 article about the median family income in Palo Alto. 

http://blog.sfgate.com/ontheblock/2012/10/12/palo-alto-residents-earn-3rd-highest-median-family-income

Exactly - here's another good article, showing the income you'd need to purchase a median-priced home in many different cities in California, assuming no more than 30 percent of your income would go towards a mortgage (generally considered the 'safe' threshold): http://www.sacbee.com/site-services/databases/article13255952.html

In Palo Alto, to reasonably purchase a median-priced home, you'd need to make $442,000 a year
 

Love this place, not too far up the road from me over here in Lancaster County - http://www.paulbhardware.com/

Larger store than the typical Ace or True Value, but still retains the local small-town store feel. Their prices aren't far off of the big guys either. And they have plenty of unique and oddball tools and parts you'll never find at Lowe's or HD.

Conspiracy Theory wrote:

I've always been perplex by where some stores were being opened.

Many of the locations being closed are WalMart's experimental "Express" format, basically a WalMart version of a convenience store. From what I've read, they shot themselves in the foot with these because they located most of them too close to their existing stores.

They hoped people would stop by them to supplement their weekly WalMart runs, but instead just found that people were willing to drive the extra couple miles to the big store instead. Guess they didn't do their market research!

flowergirl wrote:

The state is bracing for "an Alaska-size shortfall" and needs to raise new taxes, including income and sales taxes, but will pay each resident that oil-funds produced annual dividend of at least $1,000.00 in the coming year.  HUH?
 

The Alaska Permanent Fund (which is where the oil-funded dividends for all Alaskan residents come from) was established by an amendment to their state constitution in the 70's, so they can't simply stop the dividend payout from the fund in order to help balance the budget - they would have to go through the process of repealing that amendment.

In the 90's, when oil prices were also very low, the state put a referendum on the ballot, asking residents if they would consider allowing the state to use the fund to balance the budget, in lieu of the annual dividend - 84% of voters said "no". https://ballotpedia.org/Alaska_Permanent_Fund_Advisory_Question_%281999%29
 

I am fortunate to work for an employer that understands the concept of work-life balance and discourages employees from working extra hours just to try to make themselves look more "committed" than the next guy, as well as offering nice perks like flexible time policies.

As a salaried employee, I recognize that occasionally, I will have to work more than 40 hours in a week to get things done. Sometimes there are deadlines to meet that require putting in extra hours to get the job done in time - you can't just miss the deadline and say "oh well, I tried". However, those are all tasks/projects that are directly related to the duties and responsibilities I'm paid to perform. As such, I don't feel like I need extra compensation for every minute over 40 hours that I might work on those things.

That said, I do not agree with UO's approach here, since they are angling for these employees to take on tasks that are well outside of their normal areas of responsibility, with no compensation. They are a retailer who knows the holiday shopping season is starting soon, and they should be hiring seasonal staff to help handle it. If they are having to fall back on salaried employees to fill in, then they either didn't plan their hiring appropriately, or they're just being cheap bastards.