Nearly Half of U.S. Lives in Household Receiving Government Benefit

Families were more dependent on government programs than ever last year.

Nearly half, 48.5%, of the population lived in a household that received some type of government benefit in the first quarter of 2010, according to Census data. Those numbers have risen since the middle of the recession when 44.4% lived households receiving benefits in the third quarter of 2008.

The share of people relying on government benefits has reached a historic high, in large part from the deep recession and meager recovery, but also because of the expansion of government programs over the years.

Full WSJ Article

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Bag of Randomness

  • Apple.com’s home page after Steve Job’s death, and the page after you click on his image.
  • New Apple CEO Tim Cook’s email to his employee’s about Job’s death.
  • I wonder how awkward it was for that Apple employee to creative that page, and for the employee that had to update the website.
  • Twitter shortly after his death was announced.
  • Care to guess what fellow Apple founder Steve Wozniak’s first tweet was concerning Job’s death?  It was about Outback Steakhouse.  Here’s the tweet, and in case it was deleted, here’s the screen print.
  • America needs more visionaries like him.  Speaking of which, I found this quote from President Obama about Job’s death quite interesting, “The world has lost a visionary and there may be no greater tribute to Steve’s success than the fact that much of the world learned about his passing on a device he invented.”
  • His authorized biography is set to go on sale next month.  I have a feeling Amazon.com is about to get a whole lot more pre-orders.
  • One of the most unique tributes comes from Boing Boing which redesigned their website to look like it was on an old Macintosh from the 80’s.
  • Surprisingly I didn’t find any sort of tribute on the Pixar website.
  • Google didn’t do anything fancy on their webpage last night, but under the search box was “Steve Jobs, 1955-2011” which provided a direct link to Apple.com.
  • I expect some sort of Apple commercial that is nothing but a tribute to the man.  Maybe a updated Think Different commercial.
  • I’ve posted it before, but here’s my favorite Steve Jobs story.  Basically, Michael Dell was asked what should be done to Apple shortly after Jobs returned to the helm, and he stated the company should basically liquidate.  One the day that Apple was worth more than Dell, Jobs emailed his employees reminding them of the story.
  • It’s just a part of how the news does business, and it’s been done this way for years, but they had his obituary and tribute sections created long ago.  Heck, Bloomberg accidentally published it back in Aug 2008.  But you know, I bet Jobs enjoyed reading it, how often do we get to read our own obituaries and see what the world thinks of us?
  • Something I think many will overlook is how he changed the Super Bowl in terms of advertising.  Because of him, all eyes tune in on Super Bowl Sunday not only to watch the games, but to discuss the commercials and their impact.  That commercial is a legend in advertising commercials and is always discussed in any marketing class, and it was only played once.
  • He did it all in only 56 years.
  • Did you know that a domain squatter has the rights to SteveJobs.com?
  • This will make you think twice the next time you have to sit on a toilet.
  • A pastor’s gay son tried to attend his father’s church and was physically assaulted by his uncle and church deacons.
  • A friend of mine asked me to do a peer review, I actually used this performance review generator as a starting point.
  • There are rumors that Eddie Murphy will make an appearance on SNL this weekend, his first since 1984.
  • A list of 667 sins.
  • Drinking out of an ice straw would be interesting.
  • If you stare at the red dot long enough the outer blue circle will disappear.
  • The Cowboys all time sack leader never made a Pro Bowl.
  • Before Hitler, who did people use as the token evil person?  Here’s your answer.
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