Category Archives: Economics

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Youts Have A Big Vote Decision: A Good Economy Or Climate (scam) Action

For a change, ‘climate change’ isn’t coming in last or almost last on a poll

Economic issues, climate change, gun violence and abortion are top of mind for young voters

Forty-one million members of Gen Z can vote in this year’s election, and money is on their minds.

Economic issues — including inflation, cost of living and jobs that pay a living wage — are top of mind for young people when it comes to the 2024 Presidential Election, according to the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE) at Tufts University.

“Young people have the potential to have a huge impact,” said CIRCLE Spokesperson Alberto Medina.

Yeah, but, they so often go missing from the voting booth

The percentage of youth, ages 18-34 year olds, who selected each issue as one of their top three priorities, according to CIRCLE’s poll —

  • Cost of living/inflation — 53%
  • Jobs that pay a living wage — 28%
  • Gun violence prevention — 26%
  • Addressing climate change — 26%
  • Expanding access to abortion — 19%
  • Fighting racism — 13%
  • Securing the border — 13%
  • Public education — 13%
  • Student loan debt — 12%
  • Reducing the national debt — 11%

Ella Douglas, an 18-year-old freshman at Ohio State University, said the economy is her top issue. “I care about where our money is going,” she said.

Well, if that’s what she and 53% care about as their top issue, why would they vote for Kamala, who’s presided over much more expensive housing, food, energy, and so much more? Inflation that has outpaced wages? Do they really care enough about ‘climate change’ to destroy their own economic well-being?

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Happy BidenHarrisflation Labor Day Weekend!

Joe Biden’s intern is happy to post this

Wait, how is Brandon supposed to build 3 million homes by the end of January? They can’t even get 9 EV charging stations built. And no high speed internet hookups completed. As for inflation, he and Kamala helped cook it, and

No ‘Joy’ on Labor Day: Inflation Sends Cost of Cookouts Soaring

Americans are feeling less “joy” when firing up their grills and getting their marinades ready this Labor Day weekend, realizing that some of the classic barbecue staples are costing them a lot more.

It all begins with firing up the grill, which will cost more than it did three and a half years ago. According to data from the Bureau of Labor statistics, the price of propane, kerosene, and firewood has risen 16 percent from January 2021 to July 2024.

Staples of the basic all-American cookout are up too, meaning hamburgers and hotdogs are going to cost you. According to Consumer Price Index (CPI) data, the price of ground beef has risen 26 percent since January 2021, when former President Donald Trump left the White House.

Similarly, hotdogs are 25 percent higher than they were in January 2021. The price of chicken has also jumped since Biden and Harris came on the scene. Consumer Price Index (CPI) data, not seasonally adjusted, shows the price of fresh and frozen chicken parts 23 percent higher now than when Trump left office in January 2021. Matters are worse if Americans are looking to roast a whole chicken for their long weekend, as a fresh whole chicken is up 27 percent since January 2021.

And if friends and family are forgoing low carb trends and want to pair their barbecue delicacy with a roll, it is going to cost even more. Fresh biscuits, rolls, and muffins in the U.S. have risen 28 percent since Biden and Harris took office.

Side dishes, spices, lettuce, salad dressing, and beer are all up. So, people can vote for a guy they hate who does well on the economy, understands how it works, and wants you to have better costs without the government controlling everything, or, the lady who supercharged the issues as the economy was re-opening.

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Surgeon General Super Excited To Make Things Worse For Stressed Parents

What could parents be stressed about? Kids? School? Or, maybe the poor economy and kids’ declined learning from the COVID lock-downs

Parents can’t function they’re so stressed, surgeon general warns

American parents need a bailout.

Suffering from stress, money woes and loneliness more than their childless peers, nearly half of parents can barely function, according to a new report from Surgeon General Vivek Murthy.

I thought the economy was great. Didn’t Kamala say that Bidenomics during the Biden-Harris administration was working?

Murthy says government aid, in the form of child tax credits, universal preschool, early childhood education programs, paid family and medical leave, paid sick time and investments in social infrastructure, can help. That’s in line with Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris’ campaign pitch, but GOP contender Donald Trump is also considering how to get more cash in parents’ pockets — an issue his running mate JD Vance has championed.

“The stress and the loneliness that parents are dealing with at a disproportionate level has real implications,” Murthy told POLITICO. “We’ve got to provide more financial support.”

Chronic and excessive stress caused in part by the bills they have to pay exacerbates parents’ mental health conditions, including depression and anxiety, and can hurt children’s development.

Four in 10 parents say they’re so stressed they can’t function most days, according to Murthy’s report, with two-thirds citing financial hardship.

Where does the money come from? And what will all this addition federal spending do for inflation? Why is it the government’s job to fund all the parents? Perhaps the government should get out of the way and reverse course so that conditions will be ripe for people to be able to afford to have the kids. Perhaps government should reduce spending, and focus on their core duties and responsibilities.

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Harris Goes After Trump On Economy And Inflation Or Something

It’s not often that a politics article gives me a good laugh. I’m not sure how Politico writer Adam Cancryn could write this. He must be a Believer

Harris goes after Trump on economy and inflation in new ad

Vice President Kamala Harris is trying to make up ground with voters who still give former President Donald Trump an edge on the economy, airing a new ad this week that attempts to go on offense on inflation.

The ad, titled “Everyday” and first shared with POLITICO, features clips of Harris’ speech earlier this month in North Carolina, where she unveiled a series of proposals aimed at making housing more affordable, targeting corporations over price gouging and expanding a tax credit for families.

“Prices are still too high,” Harris said. “I will be laser-focused on creating opportunities for the middle class that advance their economic security, stability and dignity.”

The spot, which will start running on Tuesday, is part of a $150 million ad blitz targeted at battleground states surrounding last week’s Democratic convention, and the second in the last few days to focus on cutting costs and taxes. An earlier 30-second ad made only broad references to bolstering the middle class; this newest, one-minute one outlines Harris’ main focus areas, while also attacking Trump by name as siding with “billionaires and large corporations.”

Shame Adam failed to mention

Where was her laser focus the past 3 1/2 years? Also at Politico

Hill Dems try to tamp down backlash to Harris’ grocery price gouging pitch

Under pressure to defend Kamala Harris’ grocery price gouging plan, some Democratic lawmakers are delivering a quiet message to anxious allies: Don’t worry about the details. It’s never going to pass Congress.

The Harris campaign’s proposal, unveiled as part of her first big economic policy speech, has become a focal point for her presidential rival, Donald Trump, and fellow Republicans, who claim she’s pushing “communist price controls.” It has also alarmed food industry officials and even some left-of-center economists, who’ve warned such policies can hurt more than they help.

A lot of Democrats, particularly those who are not wacko leftists, and have to deal with tough re-election campaigns, know that this policy, which Harris is still pushing (I heard the commercial here in Raleigh yesterday or today), is really bad for them, and they do not want to hitch their wagon to something being called a communist policy.

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Once again, the left want to restrict our choices It's all for our own good, right?

I have said it many times before: today’s left are pro-choice on exactly one thing, prenatal infanticide. In everything else, they want the government to take control of your lives. William Teach noted that the Biden Administration are trying to shut down existing coal-fired electricity generation plants through emissions regulations which would force them out of business. The Democrats tried to force every American to take an experimental and long-term untested ‘vaccine’ against COVID-19, punishing those who refused with loss of their jobs. They have put in regulations designed to ban the sales of new gasoline-or-diesel-powered trucks and automobiles by 2035, even as the Administration threaten to shut down the coal-fired generation plants, even though 16.2% of our electricity is produced from burning coal. I’m not quite sure how the math works out in trying to push plug-in electric vehicles and concomitantly reducing our electric generating capacity.

Not only do they want to force people into plug-in electric vehicles, the government also wants to regulate the choices we have in those vehicles:

As cars and trucks get bigger and taller, lawmakers look to protect pedestrians

by Joel Rose | Friday, August 23, 2024 | 5:00 AM EDT

RUCKERSVILLE, Va. — In a cavernous white room full of bright lights, video cameras and microphones, a driverless cart hurtles at 37 miles per hour into the side of a large SUV.

Researchers at the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety have crash-tested thousands of cars and trucks like this one over the past three decades at their facility in central Virginia.

But a few years ago, they noticed that those vehicles were getting bigger and heavier. So they decided to make the cart that crashes into them larger, too.

“It was meant to represent a small pickup or a midsize SUV, and those vehicles have gotten heavier and heavier over time,” says Becky Mueller, a senior research engineer at IIHS. “So it’s 500 kilograms more weight because that’s what the vehicle fleet now reflects.”

Americans’ cars and trucks are getting bigger and taller, while roadway fatalities have also climbed sharply over the past decade.

Why have cars and trucks gotten bigger and taller? Because those are the vehicles that the car-buying public have chosen to buy. American automobile manufacturers have moved to produce the vehicles that their customers want to buy. Article continues below the fold, because it contains an embedded video. Continue reading →

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Karma comes to Taylor Lorenz!

Our regular readers, both of them, will remember Taylor Lorenz, a columnist at The Washington Post covering technology and online culture. Miss Lorenz most significant claim to fame was her investigation and doxing of Chaya Raichik, the owner of the Twitter site Libs of TikTok. The left hated LoTT, because Miss Raichik’s schtick was to find the idiocy that the left were posting to TikTok — and there was a lot of it — and expose it far more widely, to the ridicule of the libs. At the time, Miss Raichik was working as a real estate agent, and the exposure was designed to cost Miss Raichik her job.

In the end, it simply made Miss Raichik more popular and wealthy, but it also made Miss Lorenz more of a public figure as well, invited to some of the hoitiest and toitiest of Hollywood soirees.

Of course, despite her insistence that everybody wear face masks to prevent the spread of COVID-19 — though she subsequently deleted it, she informed readers that she was at least somewhat immunocompromised — as late as August of 2023, she didn’t wear one herself.

Well, in a true sauce for the goose moment, it seems that Miss Lorenz has been outed for something. From NPR, not exactly an evil reich-wing site:

‘Washington Post’ reviews star columnist Taylor Lorenz’s ‘war criminal’ jab at Biden

by David Folkenflik | Thursday, August 15, 2024 | 7:55 PM EDT

Senior editors at the Washington Post are reviewing a prominent tech columnist’s private story on social media, which appears to label President Biden a “war criminal” in a photo.

The Post’s Taylor Lorenz attended a White House event for digital influencers on Wednesday. In the photo she shared with a circle of friends on Instagram, Biden appears over her shoulder; the damning caption rests just below him, accompanied by a text frowny face.

After the New York Post’s Jon Levine — a frequent critic of hers — revealed the Instagram photo caption yesterday in a tweet, Lorenz wrote back at him: “You people will fall for any dumbass edit someone makes.”

I am thoroughly amused.

A fact-check appended to Levine’s tweet cited her apparent denial. (The contextual note to the tweet says, “Taylor Lorenz says this is a digital manipulation which has added a false caption.”) Lorenz told her editors that someone else had added the caption to the photo.

NPR has obtained a screengrab of Lorenz’s actual post, which contained that caption. It was not shared with her wider Instagram audience of 143,000 followers.

Four people with direct knowledge of the private Instagram story confirmed its authenticity to NPR. They spoke to NPR on condition they not be identified due to the professional sensitivity of the situation for Lorenz.

“Our executive editor and senior editors take alleged violations of our standards seriously,” a spokesperson for the newspaper told NPR. “We’re aware of the alleged post and are looking into it.” Lorenz declined to comment.

The Post has already been cutting staff, due to the newspaper losing a lot of money. If Miss Lorenz loses her job over this — something which is certainly not guaranteed — would it not be a delicious bit of karma for trying to cost Miss Raichik her real estate position?

Lorenz has since told associates that a close friend took her posted picture and superimposed the caption upon it, as a joke, and that she shared it with the group on the private Instagram posting.

If that is true, then yes, Miss Lorenz has admitted posting it on Instagram. Perhaps she thought it was a joke, but as a social media savvy reporter, she should have realized just what a stink this would cause, as well as understanding that once something goes out into the internet, it can be seen by the wrong people, and used against her. Using utter stupidity as an excuse isn’t a good look.

Perhaps Miss Lorenz is now learning about sauce for the goose!

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Ivy League research associate wants clerks at Wawa to pay for her commute

Talia Borofsky, from her Twitter profile.

Cry me a river! Talia Borofsky is “a postdoctoral research associate in Princeton’s High Meadows Environmental institute, where she researches the evolution and ecology of cooperative hunting.” Dr Borofsky lives in foul, fetid, fuming, foggy, filthy Philadelphia but commutes to work at Princeton University, and she greatly saddened by the fact that cashiers at WalMart and hamburger flippers at McDonald’s won’t be paying as much for her daily commute!

Amtrak’s sudden fare increases bite the hand that feeds it

Amtrak recently raised multi-ride fares along the Northeast Corridor without adequate prior warning to its ridership. The drastic increase is a slap in the face to taxpayers, writes Talia Borofsky.

by Talia Borofsky | Thursday, August 15, 2024 | 12:00 PM EDT

In July Amtrak raised multi-ride fares along the Northeast Corridor by anywhere from 32% to 70% without directly notifying its ridership in advance.

Amtrak, a federally funded and federally majority-owned company, is meant to serve the public. The drastic fare increase is a slap in the face to taxpayers after the infrastructure bill dedicated a total of $22 billion in direct grants to the company.

You might think from Dr Borofsky’s first two paragraphs that her complaint is that she wasn’t notified far enough and directly enough in advance, but that’s not it. What upsets her is that she’s having to pay more for a direct service she receives.

Investopedia notes:

Amtrak receives considerable subsidies from both state and federal governments but it’s managed as a for-profit company. This isn’t unusual. No country in the world operates a passenger rail system without public support.

But Amtrak’s “for-profit” status is sadly ironic. The train company has never been profitable since its founding nearly fifty years ago. It’s only thanks to its subsidies that the company has survived.

In other words, Dr Borofsky’s daily commute has never been entirely paid for by her fares. It has always been subsidized by taxpayer dollars, many of which are taken from people who earn less money than she does. But hey, if you’re a daycare worker in Philly, or a laborer for a roofing company in Lexington, shouldn’t you be glad to know that some of the money you pay in taxes goes to pay for “a postdoctoral research associate” at an Ivy League university, who earned her doctorate at Stanford, the hoitiest and the toitiest of the colleges west of the Mississippi, to research “the evolution and ecology of cooperative hunting”?

As a postdoc at Princeton University, I commute from Philly to Princeton using Amtrak. This commute used to make financial sense; rents in Philadelphia are almost half the price of those in Princeton, and Princeton provided a helpful although limited commute subsidy.

However, the commute became unaffordable for me and likely many others on July 1; the 10-trip (one-way) ticket package between Princeton and Philly shot up from $230 to $390, and the monthly pass increased from $576 to $975. These sudden increases have impacted many postdocs and graduate students at Princeton, whose budgets were already strained by the previous fares.

There’s such a whiff of elitism from Dr Borofsky’s OpEd. As a “postdoctoral research associate” at an Ivy League university, she is paid much more than most Philadelphians. According to Glass Door:

The estimated total pay range for a Postdoctoral Fellow at Princeton University is $57K–$67K per year, which includes base salary and additional pay. The average Postdoctoral Fellow base salary at Princeton University is $62K per year.

The minimum of $57,000 is slightly higher than the median household income of $56,517 for Philadelphians overall. But Dr Borofsky apparently believes that the baggers at Giant Food Mart or the clerk at Wawa brewing her large coffee for the train ride — yeah, I’m guessing about that last, but everyone in Philly should drink Wawa coffee! — should have to contribute a bit more to pay for her train ride.

Dr Borofsky continued to tell readers about Amtrak’s poor service, and that the suddenness of the fare increase was “exploitative.” I have no qualms with her point that the increase was sudden, nor that Amtrak’s service isn’t the greatest.

But it’s her concluding one-sentence paragraph that gets me:

Train travel should be viable for all, not just the wealthy.

No, train travel should be available to those who pay for the service. Why should I, a retiree, be required to pony up some of my tax dollars so that Dr Borofsky doesn’t have to pay for the service she receives? Why should the janitors at Princeton be required to help fund her commute?

The subtitle of her article states, “The drastic increase is a slap in the face to taxpayers,” but no; the drastic increase is a boon to the taxpayers, the ones who are already subsidizing her train ride. The good research associate should pay for the services she receives herself.

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When the government tells you that inflation is down, look more closely at what has come down.

The picture looked homey enough, mom and dad at the table in the dining room, dad looking into the kitchen at his daughter and son and the family dog . . . and The Wall Street Journal’s photographer, Kristen Zies. 🙂

Decent looking middle-class home, kitchen with the light grey cabinets which came into fashion not long ago, grey-and-white quartz (?) countertop, stainless steel appliances, but, shudder!, laminate flooring. And, for Jake and Marie Tromberg, inflation has hit hard.

Inflation Hurts Most for the Things We Can’t Skimp On

Costs for child care, rent and car insurance are up. Inflation might be easing, but it doesn’t feel that way.

by Harriet Torey and Terell Wright | Monday, August 8, 2024 | 5:30 AM EDT

Inflation is slowing. So why doesn’t it feel that way?

After all, price increases for lots of items, like cable and shampoo, are indeed cooling. Prices for vehicles, gasoline, TVs and plane tickets have even dropped over the past year. And the overall pace of year-over-year inflation as measured by the Labor Department’s consumer-price index was down to 3% in its most recent reading—much, much lower than the recent high of 9.1% that it clocked two years ago.

But prices for many of the things that are hard to do without are still posting eye-watering increases. Rent and electricity bills are up 10% or more over the past two years, and car-insurance costs are up nearly 40%, according to the Labor Department’s index. Shoppers might be able to trade down from prime steak to cheaper cuts of meat at the supermarket, but they can’t really do the same thing with the water bill.

Car insurance? In Virginia, where the Tromburgs live, there’s a $600 non-compliance fee if you let your insurance lapse, and you still have to reinsure the vehicle. The Commonwealth may suspend your vehicle’s registration (license plates) and possibly your driver’s license. Insurance companies operating in the Commonwealth must notify the Department of Motor Vehicles if a vehicle’s insurance lapses.

“We’re beginning to run out of rope in how much we can substitute out,” said David Bieri, an economist and professor at Virginia Tech.

Rising prices have been front and center in the U.S. over the past three years, affecting how Americans feel about the economy and how they are planning to vote. A softening jobs market will only amplify their concerns.

I am reminded of 2016, when the government did everything it could to to persuade people that the economy was doing just fine, thank you very much, in their attempt to get Hillary Clinton elected:

Problem: Most Americans don’t believe the unemployment rate is 5%

by Heather Long | September 6, 2016 | 3:18 PM EDT

Heather Long

Americans think the economy is in far worse shape than it is.The U.S. unemployment rate is only 4.9%, but 57% of Americans believe it’s a lot higher than that, according to a new survey by the John J. Heldrich Center for Workforce Development at Rutgers University.

The general public has “extremely little factual knowledge” about the job market and labor force, Rutgers found.

It’s another example of how experts on Wall Street and in Washington see the economy differently than the regular Joe. Many of the nation’s top economic experts say that America is “near full employment.” The unemployment rate has actually been at or below 5% for almost a year — millions of people have found jobs in what is the best period of hiring since the late 1990s.

But regular people appear to have their doubts about how healthy America’s employment picture is. Nearly a third of those surveyed by Rutgers believe unemployment is actually at 9%, or higher.

Republican candidate Donald Trump has tapped into this confusion. He has repeatedly called the official unemployment rate a “joke” and a even “hoax.”

At the time, while the official unemployment number, U-3, was 4.9%, the U-6 unemployment number[1]U-6: Total unemployed, plus all persons marginally attached to the labor force, plus total employed part time for economic reasons, as a percent of the civilian labor force plus all persons … Continue reading was 9.6%, pretty much in line with what the Rutgers survey guessed. As George Orwell put it in 1984, “The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.”

Back to the Journal:

Families with young children are also paying higher prices for child care. Costs have risen 6.4% over the past two years, in line with the overall CPI. Because daycare bills can be as big as the rent payment or the mortgage, even a relatively small increase can feel like a lot.

The median price to put an infant in center-based care in 2022 was more than $1,400 a month in major metro areas, according to the Labor Department. A 6.4% increase puts that bill closer to $1,500.

(Brendan and Alexis) Madigan’s daycare costs have risen much faster. The daycare bill for their older daughter shot up last month to $1,650 from $1,200 a month. Daycare for their younger daughter, who starts in two weeks, will be $1,800 a month. They searched for cheaper options but quickly realized that the price was the standard.

“I would have hoped that where my career path is at, and with my wife working as well, that we would have some financial flexibility,” said Madigan, 32.

Doing some back-of-the-envelope “cipherin'”, as Jethro Bodine would have put it, that comes out to $3,450 per month, or $41,400 a year. Assuming a total tax bite of 33%, that would require gross earnings of $55,062 just to pay for daycare! Does it really make sense for both of the Madigans to work, just so their kids can be reared by daycare workers? The Madigans live in Durham, North Carolina, a metropolitan area to be sure, but not the most expensive place in the US.

There’s more at the Journal’s original, mostly going over statistics and throwing in some human-interest stories, but the message is clear: inflation has come down significantly on the things people do not have to buy every week or every month. But on the expenses of daily life in America, people are having to pay more and more.

References

References
↑1 U-6: Total unemployed, plus all persons marginally attached to the labor force, plus total employed part time for economic reasons, as a percent of the civilian labor force plus all persons marginally attached to the labor force.
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Welfare for the well-to-do

If you watch the Weather Channel, whenever one of the bad winter storms hits, or hurricanes, tropical storms, etc, you’ll see that they always have a graphic showing how many “customers” are without power. Customers does not equal people, but residential and commercial units consuming power. As ’empty nesters,’ we count as one customer, but are two people. When the first tropical storm/category 1 hurricane hit the Lone Star State earlier in July, the Weather Channel was telling us about how long customers in Texas were dealing with near 100ºF temperatures with no sparktricity for air conditioners. Primarily distributed by overhead wires, electricity is our most vulnerable to the weather utility.

Heat pumps are having their moment. Are they right for you?

More homeowners are opting for heat pumps, once thought to be ill-suited to cold Northeast winters.

by Frank Kummer | Monday, July 29, 2024 | 5:00 AM EDT

For decades, Scott Nelson’s Oceanside Service has been installing traditional residential cooling systems and gas-powered furnaces in Jersey Shore communities such as Long Beach Island.

Within the past few years, however, the Allenhurst-based contractor has seen a big change: More homeowners are opting for heat pumps, once thought to be ill-suited to cold Northeast winters. The switch is fostered by warming winters, more efficient heat pump units, and federal and state incentives.

“We give everybody the option,” Nelson said, referring to a traditional system versus a heat pump. “And 8 out of 10″ have been buying heat pumps.

Heat pumps are having their moment, boosted in recent years by federal tax credits and other incentives that align their cost more closely with traditional fossil-fuel powered units, while also being highly efficient.

And there it is! You, the taxpayers, are on the hook to buy HVAC systems for Other People! And the homeowners in “Jersey Shore communities such as Long Beach Island” are much wealthier than the typical taxpayer in Flyover Country USA. In June of 2024, the median sale price in Long Beach Island, NJ, was $2,250,000, up 32.4% from the same time in 2023.[1]Data accessed on July 29, 2024, and may show differently in the future, as the referenced real estate site updates information as it is received.

The momentum could grow with the Environmental Protection Agency’s announcement last week of $4.3 billion in grants for projects in 30 states aimed at reducing climate change and air pollution, fostering environmental justice, and accelerating a transition to renewable energy. Pennsylvania received nearly $400 million, and New Jersey and a coalition of other states received nearly $250 million, all funded by the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) as part of the Biden administration’s agenda.

The grants will be used to fund various programs, including those that encourage a switch to heat pumps such as Pennsylvania’s Priority Climate Action Plan.

So, even more of your taxed-away dollars — or that money borrowed from investors and repaid with interest — being given to Other People.

Our HVAC system, a circa 1995 heat pump system, was destroyed in the 2021 flood, and the $6,100 it cost to replace it came from our pockets, not the taxpayers. Remember that $6,100 figure; it will be important later. How much moolah is Uncle Sam giving to people wealthier than you? Skipping down a few paragraphs we find:

Heat pump installations can quality for federal tax credits valued at up to 30% of the cost paid for the unit, or up to $2,000 per year, for air-source heat pumps. There’s a rebate up to $8,000 for an ENERGY STAR-certified electric heat pump for space heating and cooling.

Pennsylvania anticipates using money from the Infrastructure Act to offer rebates starting in 2025 for heat pumps installed in low- to moderate-income households.

Further down, readers are told that the up-front costs for a heat pump are about $15,000, versus roughly $8,000 for a gas furnace. I guess that my $6,100 wasn’t so bad, huh?

Philadelphia has plans to try and push heat pumps, but has 440,000 mostly brick rowhomes, with an average age of 80 years. Many have insufficient electrical service to power a heat pump system. My heat pump system has not one but two 220-volt, 50-amphere circuits, one for the exterior condenser unit, and another for the blower unit in the crawlspace, which includes heating elements for the ’emergency’ heat cycle. With our ‘backup’ heating system, a propane fireplace, we’ve never needed to use the ’emergency’ heat cycle. A modern, 200-amp circuit breaker panel is needed for installation of a heat pump system, so many of the Philly rowhomes would also need an electrician to upgrade that before any heat pump system could be installed.

There’s more than just that, though. As Frank Kummer, the article author noted, many Philadelphia houses, particularly the rowhomes, “still have boilers that use radiators and baseboard heat. Those likely would need ductless, mini-split heat pumps.” While it is possible to mount mini-split units on interior walls, doing so is more complicated, and more expensive than mounting them on exterior walls.

This is a program that is nothing more than welfare for the already well-to-do. The heat pump systems do have tax credits, but that doesn’t mean that homeowners can simply stroke a check for $15 grand, and be able to wait for their tax credits. While some rowhouse neighborhoods like Fishtown are gentrifying, and might have some better-off homeowners who would consider heat pumps as they remodel, it’s more difficult to see how the working-class people in Philly’s working-class neighborhoods could do so. If their gas furnaces have to be replaced, it’s still cheaper for them to replace with new gas furnaces than heat pumps, as Mr Kummer’s article tells us.

And so I go back to the beginning, and how electricity is our most vulnerable to the weather utility. If you live in a Philly rowhome, and the power goes out on a bitterly cold February day, whether you had a heat pump based system, or your old natural gas fired boiler for radiators, both would be out. But a low-end home generator from Lowe’s or Home Despot can provide enough 110-volt, 20-amp power to run your natural gas furnace, while you’d need a substantial generator, providing 220-volts to run your heat pump system.

I have no objection at all to people being able to choose what kind of heating system they want; I do find it objectionable that the government has its snotty nose in these decisions, and that the feds are providing what amounts to welfare for already prosperous people.

References

References
↑1 Data accessed on July 29, 2024, and may show differently in the future, as the referenced real estate site updates information as it is received.