Automotive Fuel Efficiency? Look to China:
The Chinese are leading the way in automobile sales and fuel efficiency, according to a report filed by New York Times' writer Keith Bradsher. The world economy may be in an awful slump, and Detroit may have collapsed into a sink hole, but the prognosticators who proclaimed the twenty-first century as the century of China may have their strongest evidence to date.
Highlighting the story is the Chinese government's reduction of its tax on the sales of automobiles with engines no larger than 1.6 liters down to 1 percent. This apparently along with China's energy concerns has sparked a wider interest in cars with small engines. The future, apparently, does not belong to those who drive gas guzzling cub holders.
Meanwhile in the Tech Industry:
Today's big news is that Oracle, a software company, is buying out Sun Microsystems for some $7.4 billion. Evidently, there is still plenty of cash in the system. Sun is best known as a hardware/server company, but it is also responsible for Java and the Microsoft Office alternative, OpenOffice. Expectations are that Sun will lose some 10,000 jobs as a result of the buyout, or a third of its workforce.
For sometime now, the tech industry has been saying that it is still solvent even if the banking industry and the housing industry and the auto industry have been flushed down the tubes. It will be interesting to see of the release of Windows 7 by Microsoft in the near future will help spark an economic recovery.
The Chinese are leading the way in automobile sales and fuel efficiency, according to a report filed by New York Times' writer Keith Bradsher. The world economy may be in an awful slump, and Detroit may have collapsed into a sink hole, but the prognosticators who proclaimed the twenty-first century as the century of China may have their strongest evidence to date.
Highlighting the story is the Chinese government's reduction of its tax on the sales of automobiles with engines no larger than 1.6 liters down to 1 percent. This apparently along with China's energy concerns has sparked a wider interest in cars with small engines. The future, apparently, does not belong to those who drive gas guzzling cub holders.
Meanwhile in the Tech Industry:
Today's big news is that Oracle, a software company, is buying out Sun Microsystems for some $7.4 billion. Evidently, there is still plenty of cash in the system. Sun is best known as a hardware/server company, but it is also responsible for Java and the Microsoft Office alternative, OpenOffice. Expectations are that Sun will lose some 10,000 jobs as a result of the buyout, or a third of its workforce.
For sometime now, the tech industry has been saying that it is still solvent even if the banking industry and the housing industry and the auto industry have been flushed down the tubes. It will be interesting to see of the release of Windows 7 by Microsoft in the near future will help spark an economic recovery.
Labels: The Economy
posted by Jim | 6:13 PM
2 Comments:
Jim, thanks for visiting my site recently. Do you follow James Howard Kunstler's Web postings? He's been writing about Peak Oil for a while now in addition to tackling suburban sprawl. One of his oil-related pieces can be found at http://www.kunstler.com/spch_petrocollapse.html
He has also offers a very good "eyesore of the month" feature.
Here's one of Kunstler's choicest eyesores of the month postings:
http://kunstler.com/eyesore_200712.html
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