Transportation surpassed electricity production in the United States in 2016 to become the country’s largest source of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions at 28.5 percent of the total. Approximately 60 percent of U.S. transportation-related GHG emissions are caused by light-duty vehicles (LDVs), which chiefly consist of gasoline-powered passenger cars and light-duty trucks, including sport utility vehicles,…
Although the U.S. unemployment rate is currently 4.1%, which probably approximates full employment, there are still a substantial number of discouraged workers. In addition, especially in the manufacturing sector, there continues to be job insecurity and layoffs. This is due to the impact of new technology, the shift of the U.S. to a services economy,…
The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Paris Agreement was signed in December 2015 to widespread acclaim. Although largely symbolic and non-enforceable, it begat optimism that governments would act to substantially decrease carbon pollution. The agreement focuses on voluntary pledges to reduce carbon pollution in order to limit global warming to a 2.0°…
Tobacco harms and kills. Direct or passive consumption of tobacco causes annually the premature deaths of six million people worldwide. Even worse is the frustration, pain, and cost of living with tobacco disease and addiction. Although smoking kills more people than illegal drugs – and nicotine is as addictive as heroin – tobacco remains legal,…
The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) was signed by Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney, Mexican President Carlos Salinas de Gortari, and American President George H. W. Bush on December 17, 1992, and entered into force on January 1, 1994. In addition to substantially increasing trade between the three countries, NAFTA has reduced trade friction…
2017 may be the year that cognizance of the global warming threat reached a tipping point. Powerful hurricanes inundated Houston, Florida, Puerto Rico, and other lands, causing painful losses in lives and treasure. In what some might have thought was an Orson Welles “The War of the Worlds” sci-fi redux, Hurricane Ophelia, the easternmost Atlantic…
