Monday, 9 January 2012, 2:26 pm Article: BusinessDesk
Mining, energy sector underpins 5% growth in NZ pay packets in 2011, SEEK says
By Hannah Lynch
Jan. 9 (BusinessDesk) ? A jump in salaries offered in the mining, resource and energy sectors underpinned a 5 percent national increase in the average pay packet offered by employers using online job website Seek last year.
Roles in mining, resource and energy sector showed the biggest increase, up almost 18 percent in the eleven months to November, for a national salary average of $118,629, Seek said in a statement. That helped the average salary offered across all regions and sectors rise 5 percent to $73,530.
?The mining, resource and energy sector currently boosts New Zealand?s highest average annual salary and we saw a marked increase in available roles in the industry in 2011,? said Janet Faulding, general manager at Seek. ?There is a concentration of roles in this sector both on the West Coast and Taranaki and this is having a positive impact on salaries in these regions.?
That boost came in the months after the Pike River Coal mine explosions that killed 29 miners and scuppered the project for the forseeable future, and also includes the approval for Bathurst Resources to pursue its open-cast mining plans above Westport.
New Zealand?s highest pay packets are not confined to the main centers with both the West Coast and Taranaki recording annual salaries above the national average, two resource-rich areas.
Jobs in advertising, arts and media were the second-biggest gainer in the 11-month period, up 16 percent to an average salary of $70,429.
In Auckland, the average salary rose six percent from January to November to $75,533, while in Wellington it increased $2,825 to $78,952.
The national increase in salaries advertised on Seek outpaced the 3.2 percent annual increase in average ordinary hourly wage to $26.53 by the end of September, according to government data. On a 40-hour working week, that equates to $55,182, or one-third below the average advertised salary on Seek.
Drinking glasses made from used wine bottles have grown in popularity in the last few years with the general surge of interest in DIY and because, hey, people love wine. Instead of paying nearly $40 on Etsy for a set you can make a jig out of a glass cutter, a couple of boards, wood glue, and two wire rope clips.
Instructables user grammers created a jig for cutting wine and beer bottles into glasses by cutting a V into two boards, making sides for the V boards, and mounting the glass cutter so that the wine bottle is cut by placing it in the V and turning it over the cutter. Full instructions and step-by-step photos can be found at the source link below.
It'll take around an hour to put this together (and a couple of hours for the glue to dry) and you'll spend around $12 on materials assuming you already have wood glue and a saw. Glass cutters are around $4 and 5/16" wire rope clips are two for a dollar at most home improvement stores or online.
For less than $15 you'll not only have your own set of trendy wine bottle glasses, but you'll know exactly what to make for the birthday of every person who admires the glasses.
Want to cut wine bottles? Build this jig! | Instructables
Dwight Howard failed to produce his usual magic, but Orlando did enough to defeat Sacramento 104-97 on Sunday and hand new Kings coach Keith Smart his first loss.
Howard managed just five points while battling foul trouble in 20 minutes of play, but Orlando still pulled out the win with a strong run in the fourth quarter.
With the game tied at 87-87 with little more than five minutes remaining, Jason Richardson and Hedo Turkoglu knocked down back-to-back three-pointers as the visitors closed with a 14-7 run.
Richardson had a season-high 22 points and Glen Davis had 20 and eight rebounds off the bench as the Magic improved to 6-3 despite trade rumors swirling around Howard, who will become a free agent at the end of the season.
?You can either make excuses about that and get distracted, or you can overcome it,? Orlando coach Stan Van Gundy told reporters.
Sacramento coach Smart lost in his second game in charge after he took over from the fired Paul Westphal last week. The Kings won their first game under Smart with a spirited comeback over Milwaukee.
Sacramento?s Tyreke Evans had 28 points and eight assists, while DeMarcus Cousins added 16 and 10 rebounds.
It was the second straight start for Cousins, who had clashed with Westphal, leading to him being dropped from a game last week before returning to the team and coming off the bench.
Following the game, Howard had a lengthy conversation with the 21-year-old Cousins, who has been criticized for showing a lack of maturity early in his career.
?I just told him not to get into it with the referees. I said: ?Learn from me, learn from someone who has gotten on the wrong side of the refs,?? said Howard, who picked up a technical foul in the third quarter. ?It?s cost me a lot of money in technical fouls and stuff like that. I told him you don?t want to have that reputation with the refs.?
The game was a razor-close contest throughout, with the Magic holding a two-point lead at halftime and after the third quarter.
Orlando made 10 three-pointers to gain an advantage and capitalized on 17 Sacramento turnovers.
TRAIL BLAZERS 98, CAVALIERS 78
In Portland, Oregon, LaMarcus Aldridge had 28 points and eight rebounds as Portland overcame a slow start to pull away from Cleveland.
Wesley Matthews added 24 points for the Trail Blazers.
Kyrie Irving, the top pick in last June?s NBA draft, had 21 points ? 11 in the third quarter ? to lead Cleveland, which allowed the Trail Blazers to have 22 fast-break points.
LAKERS 90, GRIZZLIES 82
In Los Angeles, Kobe Bryant scored 26 points as Los Angeles struggled past Memphis to notch their sixth consecutive home win.
Andrew Bynum had 15 points and 15 rebounds for the Lakers, who committed a season-worst 27 turnovers and never pulled away from the injury-depleted Grizzlies.
Rudy Gay scored 19 points to lead five players in double figures for Memphis, which wrapped up a three-game road trip with an unimpressive fourth quarter.
SUNS 109, BUCKS 93
In Phoenix, Arizona, Steve Nash had 17 assists and 10 points in 27 minutes as Phoenix routed weary Milwaukee.
The Suns beat the Bucks in Phoenix for the 24th straight time, dating back to 1986 to 1987. It is the NBA?s second-longest active streak behind San Antonio?s 27 wins in a row at home over Golden State.
Phoenix shot 58 percent, led by Marcin Gortat, who scored 18 points on 9-of-10 shooting.
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#1 ? CowgirlsFan?
Group:Members
Posts:1,697
Joined:22-November 08
Posted 06 January 2012 - 10:10 PM
May we all enjoy his colorful work again tonight!!
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#2 ? NewEra?
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Joined:22-April 02
Posted 06 January 2012 - 10:45 PM
Not sure how people enjoy his work anymore. Once one of the best, if not the best in the biz, he's taken a big turn for the worse in my book. He just too loud and exuberant calling 4 yard runs as if they're 50 yards tds. I'm over him. Completely. He ruins the college bball tourney for me now too. Acting as if every shot in the game is the game winner. Get over yourself Gus.
0
#3 ? Indy Dave?
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Posted 06 January 2012 - 11:44 PM
NewEra, on 06 January 2012 - 10:45 PM, said:
Not sure how people enjoy his work anymore. Once one of the best, if not the best in the biz, he's taken a big turn for the worse in my book. He just too loud and exuberant calling 4 yard runs as if they're 50 yards tds. I'm over him. Completely. He ruins the college bball tourney for me now too. Acting as if every shot in the game is the game winner. Get over yourself Gus.
He isn't doing the NCAA tournament anymore. He works for Fox exclusively now, after CBS didn't renew his contract.
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#4 ? dpbillsfan?
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Posted Yesterday, 01:16 AM
Almost turned the sound off. That was horrible... :wallbash:
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#5 ? Wagon Circler?
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Posted Yesterday, 03:26 PM
Gus Johnson made the game exciting. He is a great announcer IMHO.
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#6 ? KD in CT?
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Posted Yesterday, 10:29 PM
Wagon Circler, on 07 January 2012 - 03:26 PM, said:
Gus Johnson made the game exciting. He is a great announcer IMHO.
You need an annoucer to make the game exciting for you? :blink:
Those with a PS3 in the United Kingdom might have gotten a sneak peek at a placeholder, but according to The Guardian, apparently its proper "early 2012" launch isn't far off. Purportedly the video streaming service is close to signing rights to content from Sony, Disney and Paramount, which'll join existing agreements with Lionsgate, Miramax and MGM. But it isn't just studios, as Channel 4 and ITV are supposedly close to joining the UK bash as-well. If everything goes to plan, most of the British Isles will be treated to an ad campaign that'll reveal all next week. Game on, Lovefilm.
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@sidrosenberg right, the other 2 do. but nat'l hosts are inherently flawed. I'm saying the avg mope knows who Jim Rome is but prob not youIl y a environ 2 heuresvia web en r?ponse ? sidrosenberg
At the end of last year, I have written two stories on the United Kingdom and in particular its Prime-Minister David Cameron:?PM David Cameron of the United Kingdom is ?stuck between a rock and a hard place? and?Sucker-ball league: The great match UK ? EU ends in a tie.
Both stories had as main theme how PM David Cameron tried to save the London City as ?a free port for ?haute finance? banking and trading?; a place where the prospective stricter rules for financial institutes within the Euro-zone would not apply. Frankfurt, Amsterdam, Brussels and Paris ? all important financial hubs? were not amused by this possible threat to the financial level playing field within Europe.
Of course, it ended in the UK sailing its own course where it concerned the new EU legislation (see the second link). This forced the EU-leaders to design a new legal construct, enabling them to adopt stricter legislation after all, without the required full EU-27 approval.
By ignoring the desire of the wide majority of EU countries for stricter financial legislation, the UK placed itself effectively in the penalty box of the European Union: they are still a member, but a member with a strongly diminished influence. Every attempt of PM David Cameron to push pro-UK legislation in the coming months will be confronted with scornful laughter of the ?Merkozy leadership?. How long this situation will last, depends on the future behavior of Cameron and the clemency of Nicolas Sarkozy and Angela Merkel or their successors. Keeping a cautious low-profile seems a good advice to Cameron.
Cameron himself turned into the fall-guy: scorned by the EU-leaders and deputy-PM Nick Clegg (Liberal Party) for his anti-EU, pro-City banker behavior and disliked by his own Tories for his (still too) pro-European stance. Summarizing: Cameron crashed and burned in those dreadful days in December.
Since then, there have been rumors that the UK might be invited to become a member of NAFTA (North-American Free Trade Agreement), as the NAFTA offers presumably a much better fit for the UK then the EU does.
How this might end is anybody?s guess, but people should not forget that the countries of the EU are still the UK?s most important trading partners; a void that cannot easily be filled by the North-American countries.
But let?s zoom in on the London City as the economic stronghold of the UK. How important is it anyway?!
Therefore I took the GDP per capita of all British regions in the period of 1995-2009 and compared it to the weighted GDP per capita for the Euro-zone.
Warning:
The British data in 2009 is originally in pounds and is converted to Euro?s at the current exchange rate of the pound (?1.20). Later I found out that the historical rate of the pound at the time was ?1.12, but I couldn?t change the source data anymore, as it had not been saved properly this morning. This causes the British GDP data for 2009 being slightly too high.
The Euro-zone weighted data is based on the GDP per Capita (source: Eurostat) for the original Euro-zone countries (per 2002), multiplied by my own rough weighting factor. The data for 2009 is based on my estimate, as it was not available through Eurostat. This data must therefore be considered as indicative and not as official European data.
Now that is taken out of the way, we can look at the chart that I made based on this data:
Gross Domestic Product per capita per region in the UK. All data courtesy of: Eurostat and UK National Statistics Publication Hub Click to enlarge
What immediately stands out is the huge difference in GDP between the London area and the rest of the United Kingdom in 2007:
More than ?20,000 per capita between London and South East UK (the second richest region);
A staggering ?31,000 between London and the poorest region Wales;
Except London, all British regions operate within a bandwidth of ?11,000;
Only four regions in the UK achieve a better performance than the weighted average of the Euro-zone, including the PIIGS countries (!);
And in 2008 and 2009 none of the British regions, except for London, outperformed the Euro-zone, inclusive the weak countries.
When the London City would be left out of the data, the GDP per capita in the UK would drop by about ?4000 in 2009, leaving the country in the lower regions of the European Union.
This information helps to put the behavior of PM David Cameron during December?s European summit, in a historic context. And although Cameron didn?t play his hand very well, I can?t blame him for trying.
With the premise that this article is absolutely not meant to do UK-bashing, the key question is then: why is the UK in general such a weak country in terms of GDP?
To answer this question, it helps to look at the French-speaking Belgian part, called Wallonia.
Both Wallonia and the UK were front runners in the industrial revolution and had an enormous potential in the production of raw materials (steel and iron), heavy manufacturing industry and coal-mining in the 19th and early 20th century.
Where Wallonia has held the head above water with the financial help of the Flanders and Brussels areas in Belgium, the UK went mainly downhill; from being one of the leading industrial nations in the world to being a problem child that can only disguise bad economic results with the excellent results of the city of London.
The British class-society with its huge differences between the wealthy, leading class people and the (underpaid)?lower classes?led to a counterproductive situation where envy, incomprehension, incapacity and?anger were ruling.
This might have led to a creative outburst in the music industry that already lasts for fifty years, but for the British manufacturing industry it has been killing. Visible results of this situation were:
The?sometimes terrible production quality of British products;
The militant labor unions that saw the companies and employers as enemies, instead of as partners;
The countless strikes over the last 50 years;
The situation made that the leading British industries almost seized to exist:
The ailing coal-mining industry, that yielded too little profits in the end, has been butchered during the Margaret Thatcher era. This left whole cities in tatters and countless numbers of people unemployed and without a future. To get an impression of this havoc, please look at the beautiful British film??Brassed off?.
Also the British car industry (British Leyland and dozens of other brands) has been butchered in the Thatcher era, eventually leaving only a few brands untouched, albeit mostly under a German (Volkswagen AG (VLKAY),?Bayerische Motoren Werke AG (BMW)) or US (Ford Motor Co (F), General Motors (GM)) umbrella. See?this fragment of the British show Topgear
The textile industry, the ship-manufacturing industry?and other manufacturing industries moved largely to the low-wages countries.
Of course, there have been many startups in the United Kingdom since the eighties and some companies and brands have become or remained very successful. However, all in all the British industries have been ailing and the whole country is much too dependent on the London city.
If the country would be a member of the Euro-zone (which it isn?t of course), it would probably be one of the PIIGS. Now it can cover up the difficult economic situation with the achievements of the London City and by devaluating the British pound, when necessary.
Still it would be a shame if the UK would leave the Euro-zone and would become a full member of NAFTA in order to protect its London City.
In case of the UK, the following proverb is applicable: a near neighbor is better than a distant cousin.?I hope that the UK and the EU both realize the truth behind this and that the EU can help the British in creating a more vivid economy that is not so dependent on the splendor of the London City.
Drinking glasses made from used wine bottles have grown in popularity in the last few years with the general surge of interest in DIY and because, hey, people love wine. Instead of paying nearly $40 on Etsy for a set you can make a jig out of a glass cutter, a couple of boards, wood glue, and two wire rope clips. 
? 
? 
NewEra, on 06 January 2012 - 10:45 PM, said:
AlexSalta 