THE GEORGIST NEWS

Welcome to the April issue of The Georgist News.

Welcome aboard to new subscriber Arthur Rodriguez. Any dear readers
know of any others who should be reading this? In this issue, the
Forbes list is out and so is a sound analysis of how to get on it.
Plus, Minnesota has another bill to shift taxes. The business press is
citing HG more often. And the land-price cycle is turning, just as
predicted, unlike the predictability of recent weather around here in
the Pacific Northwest. Could geonomist become more reliable than
weathermen?

CONTENTS:

1.  Movement forward: Academic conference, Minnesota bill, Sharon
    hears us, Mayor Reed wows audience, Canadian Greens urge land tax,
    New professor at AJES, Nicaraguan Georgists gain ground
2.  Good Press in Bloomberg
3.  News: Road subsidies, Iraqi oil for Iraqis? Fix behind billionaires,
    TV host admits rigging stocks, Ohio bonds for homebuyers, New world
    tallest building
4.  Numbers: Building permits, Prices, Bankruptcies, Inflation
5.  Letters to editor: Art Scholbe departed
6.  Likable link: Economics as Science now online
7.  What You Can Do: Write billionaire, Attend conferences, Shoot video
8.  At the Margin: Quips and Quotes
9.  Publication affairs: Contributors, About the Georgist News

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1a.  Movement forward: After 16 years, CGO goes academic again.
     By Sue Walton, sns at swwalton.com

Save the dates: July 22-27, 2007 for the CGO's 27th annual conference,
Land, Labor and Social Justice from Two Perspectives. This is the
Council's first academic conference since 1991. We are pleased that
the University of Scranton is both hosting and co-sponsoring the event
with the Council. The Robert Schalkenbach Foundation is cosponsoring
as well. Conference brochures will be mailed no later than April 14,
2007. For more information, please contact Sue or Scott Walton at sns
at swwalton.com or 888/262-9015.

The Scranton Hilton Hotel & Conference Center has been selected as the
headquarters hotel for the 2007 Council of Georgist Organizations
Annual Conference. Staying at the Hilton helps keep future conference
costs down. Hotel amenities include indoor pool and health club, free
parking, refrigerators, voice mail, coffee makers, irons & ironing
boards, and complimentary Internet. Our popular hospitality suite will
also be at this hotel. Restaurants and shopping malls are within
walking distance. Room Cost: $89 per night without tax (1-4
occupancy). To get this rate you must reserve your room by June 29th,
2007 by calling (800) HILTONS (800-445-8667) or 570-343-3000. Please
be sure to mention that you are attending the CGO/Georgist Conference.

There will also be a limited number of dormitory beds available at the
University of Scranton. There will not be Internet or phone service
available in the dorm. There are shared bathrooms, kitchens and
laundry facilities. Most rooms are small and have one single,
twin-sized bed. Our conference dorm also has 8 suites, which have 4-6
beds per suite on three floors. Only the first floor is handicapped
accessible. Each suite has two baths. Those wishing to share a suite
should register together.

A complete list of suggested creature comforts which participants
might want to bring will be included in the confirmation letter.
Neither the council nor its administrators shall be held responsible
for those who do not designate their suite mates. 100% prepayment is
required for all those reserving dorm space. Please note that there is
a limited number of beds that has been reserved and will be assigned
on a first come, first serve basis based on full advance payment. Bed
Cost: $29.90 per night. To reserve, please mail your check in US
Dollars to: CGO, PO Box 57, Evanston, IL 60204 as soon as possible.

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1b.  Movement forward: Minnesota has a land-tax bill
     By Bill Clements, Finance and Commerce Feature Writer,
     March 8, 2007, via Rich Nyman

The property tax study from University United encourages officials to
explore assessing the property tax based on the value of land and not
the value of improvements to the land. The idea is that taxing the
land encourages development because undeveloped land would be taxed
the same as developed land. Vacant lots would disappear. Henry George,
an American political economist of the late 19th century, developed
this theory, called the "land tax." In Minnesota, as in every state
with a property tax, by statute the tax is assessed with a heavier
emphasis on the value of the buildings developed on a parcel of land.
As it happens, tax data from the Ramsey County Assessor's Office shows
that over the last few years the weight of the land component in the
property tax equation has increased rather sharply, especially in St.
Paul. So, is a land tax afoot in Ramsey County? Ramsey County Assessor
Stephen Baker says, "I know a lot of people love Henry George, and
maybe he was onto something. But the time to impose a land tax would
have been before the first building was put up in the United States."

Mark Hageman, director of development for the Minnesota Taxpayers
Association, disagrees. "Certainly, this system does work and works
well - as shown in several areas, for example, Pittsburgh and
Harrisburg in Pennsylvania. But in those situations, the system is
implemented on a local basis. To implement a land-tax system on a
statewide basis is a different matter. It would require some statewide
meetings among assessors and so on, but yeah, it could happen. Where
there's a will, there's a way."

State Rep. Ann Lenczewski (DFL-Bloomington), tax committee chair in
the House, has introduced a bill, HB 962, calling for Minnesota to
shift toward a land-based tax on commercial-industrial property
starting in 2010.

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1c.  Movement forward: Sharon council mulls over LVT after
     presentation by J. Vincent
     By Courtney Anderson, Herald Staff Writer, Sharon, PA
     March 15, 2007

Joshua Vincent, executive director of the Center for the Study of
Economics in Philadelphia, said the taxing system, which reduces taxes
on buildings and raises rates on land, would be revenue neutral for
the city but would save money for about 63 percent of homeowners.
About 10 percent of the land in Sharon is vacant, Vincent said, and
valued at about $1.2 million. This is a high percentage and not
healthy for the city, he said. Switching to a land value tax would
reward people who keep their buildings maintained and encourage
construction, said Vincent. And it would discourage people who don't
live in the city but own vacant lots to either do something with them
or sell them.

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1d.  Movement forward: Mayor Reed gives another inspiring speech
     By Richard Biddle, Director, Henry George School & Museum
     March 3

The conference, "Real Problems, Real Solutions, Real Estate Tax In
Philadelphia," sponsored by the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy - a
spin-off of the Lincoln Foundation - drew more than 200 attendees. It
was free. There were few politicians. No incumbent office holders or
staff showed up, other than the new city controller, Alan Butkovits,
who was about the only negative voice. Harrisburg mayor, Steve Reed,
was a most exciting voice, making clear the fact that land value tax
is not a theory but a tool Harrisburg uses and has used for his 26
years in office - in a city described by a 70s HUD report as the most
distressed city in the USA; now it's rated as one of America's best
small cities. There are some papers available.

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1e.  Movement forward: Canadian Greens again urge shift to
     taxing land value
     GPO press release, March 23, 2007, via Caspar Davis

The Green Party of Ontario proposes a tax shift from property taxes to
a land value tax. Annual reassessments can come at the cost of
predictability and stability, unfairly punishing homeowners who make
improvements to their principal residence and become vulnerable to
volatile market conditions. Taxes based on the value of the land,
rather than the building on the land, is in itself more predictable
and stable. An empty lot or one-storey building in a downtown core
would be taxed at the same rate as a high-rise apartment building.
This would encourage higher density accommodations and increase
development in urban areas, while preserving green space and farms,
taxed at a lower rate because of the reduced infrastructure costs to
support them.

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1f.  Movement forward: Award-winning professor edited AJES
     DePauw University News, March 17, 2007, via Ed Dodson

Daniel E. Shannon, professor and chair of philosophy at DePauw
University, co-edited the current issue of the American Journal of
Economics and Sociology. The edition (Volume 66, Number 1) is
entitled, "Challenges of Globalization: Rethinking Nature, Culture,
and Freedom." Founded in 1941, the journal is a quarterly publication
which provides a forum for discussion of issues raised by the American
political economist, social philosopher, and activist, Henry George
(1839-1897). Earlier in March, Dr. Shannon was named the recipient of
a DP University Professor Award for 2007-2011.

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1g.  Movement forward: From Nicaragua, school update
     By Paul Martin, Director, Instituto Henry George
     nssmga at ibw.com.ni

The IHG Nicaragua's first two Comprehending Economics courses so far
this year had so many students register for the first course in
February (86) that we had to turn away about twenty because of space
limitations: the room we rent only holds 60. The current course is not
so large (61) but we have the added element of the registration of two
European students after putting up a flyer in an hostel.

We have had recent meetings with the National Consumer Network and the
National Communal Movement in Nicaragua, both of which are influential
in all of Nicaragua at a grassroots level, and interested in workshops
for their leaders. At the Graduates' Meeting, thirteen participants -
old-timers and newcomers - asked for an advanced teacher training
course. With respect to the building permit for the construction of
the smaller building for the IHG, the authorities have taken some
money from us: and now we have the privilege of finally paying the
actual fee. Please note the change in the website address of the IHG:
www5.ibw.com.ni/~ihg: (they changed www to www5 for some reason).

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2.  Good Press: Speculators in Land Grab Go Bust
    By Bob Ivry, Bloomberg.com, Feb 7, 2007, via Edward Dodson

When prices reached a point where speculators quit buying,
homebuilders were forced to abandon so much property that they helped
create a glut that drove land prices down more than 9% last year. In
Florida, where they helped inflate land values as much as ten-fold
from 2000 to 2005, prices have dropped by as much as 50%. Lots of
people will lose money and a lot of paper wealth will be disappearing.
At one point in the 1920s, a third of Miami residents were real estate
agents.

Japan's land prices skyrocketed in the late 1980s, fueled by low
interest rates and easy credit. The peak came in 1991, when some
Japanese boasted that the land under the Imperial Palace in Tokyo,
home of the Japanese emperor, was worth more than the gross domestic
product of Canada. Henry George wrote in his 1879 book, Progress and
Poverty, that land's boom-and-bust cycle is natural because land isn't
produced by human labor and prices can be manipulated by owners who
are able to delay selling to get higher prices.

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3a.  News: Road Subsidies Promote Global Warming
     The Ecologist, February 26, 2007, via Stewart Goldwater

Paying for Pollution: Road Subsidies Promote Global Warming. Road
transport subsidies of up to 140 billion euros (184 billion US
dollars) a year are countering attempts to reduce Europe's greenhouse
gas emissions:
http://www.theecologist.org/archive_detail.asp?content_id=767.

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3b.  News: Whose Oil Is It, Anyway?
     By Antonia Juhasz, NY Times, March 13, 2007, via H. Remoff

Today, more than three quarters of the world's oil is owned and
controlled by governments. It wasn't always this way. Until about 35
years ago, the world's oil was largely in the hands of seven
corporations based in the United States and Europe. Those seven have
since merged into four: Exxon Mobil, Chevron, Shell and BP. They are
among the world's largest and most powerful financial empires. But
ever since they lost their exclusive control of oil to governments,
the companies have been trying to get it back. Iraq's oil reserves -
thought to be the second largest in the world - have always been high
on the corporate wish list. A new oil law set to go before the Iraqi
Parliament this month would, if passed, go a long way toward helping
the oil companies achieve their goal. The Bush administration has
highlighted the law's revenue sharing plan, under which the central
government would distribute oil revenues throughout the nation on a
per capita basis. But the benefits of this excellent proposal are
radically undercut by the law's many other provisions which allow
much, if not most, of Iraq's oil revenues to flow out of the country
and into the pockets of international oil companies.

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3c.  News: The fix behind billionaires
     Los Angeles Times Editorial, March 17, 2007

The global distribution of billionaires is also quite interesting.
Turkey is home to 25 billionaires; Hong Kong accounts for 21; but
France has only 15. The oil-rich, former Soviet Union, including those
in Russia, Ukraine and Kazakhstan, would rank second to the United
States as home to 65 billionaires. Quite a few of these billionaires
in emerging markets, such as Mexico and Russia, were helped along the
way by cronyism and weak antitrust laws.

Ass't editor's note: I always regarded gross wealth inequality as a
hallmark of third world countries. The neo-con revolution of 1970-2006
made it a feature of other places, especially the US and USSR as well.
Hopefully the pendulum is - finally - starting to swing the other way
again.

James Petras at stwr.net, "Share the World's Resources", excerpted at
The Progress Report.

The total wealth of this global ruling class grew 35% year to year,
topping $3.5 trillion USD, while income levels for the lower 55% of
the world's 6-billion-strong population declined or stagnated. Put
another way, one hundred millionth of the world's population
(1/100,000,000) owns more than over 3 billion people. Over half of the
current billionaires (523) come from just 3 countries: the US (415),
Germany (55) and Russia (53). The 35% increase in wealth mostly came
from speculation on equity markets, real estate and commodity trading,
rather than from technical innovations, investments in job-creating
industries or social services.

Among the newest, youngest and fastest growing group of billionaires
are the Russian oligarchs. The transfers of property were achieved
through assassinations, massive theft, and seizure of state resources,
illicit stock manipulation, and buyouts. The future billionaires
stripped the Russian state of over a trillion dollars worth of
factories, transport, oil, gas, iron, coal and other formerly
state-owned resources. Of the top eight Russian billionaire oligarchs,
all got their start from strong-arming their rivals, setting up "paper
banks," and taking over aluminum, oil, gas, nickel, and steel
production and the export of bauxite, iron, and other minerals. The
key "policy" measures, which facilitated the initial pillage and
takeovers by the future billionaires, were the massive and immediate
privatizations of almost all public enterprises. Over a hundred
billion dollars a year was laundered by the mafia oligarchs in the
principal banks of New York, London, Switzerland, Israel and elsewhere
- funds which would later be recycled in the purchase of expensive
real estate in the US, England, Spain, and France as well as
investments in British football teams, Israeli banks and joint
ventures in minerals. From young, swaggering thugs and local
swindlers, they became the "respectable" partners of American and
European multinational corporations. The new Russian oligarchs had
"arrived" on the world financial scene.

Of the total $157.2 billion USD owned by the 38 Latin American
billionaires, 30 are Brazilians or Mexicans with $120.3 billion USD.
The wealth of 38 families and individuals exceeds that of 250 million
Latin Americans; 0.000001% of the population exceeds that of the
lowest 50%. In Mexico, the income of 0.000001% of the population
exceeds the combined income of 40 million Mexicans. Half of Mexican
billionaires inherited their original multi-million dollar fortunes on
their way up to the top. The other half benefited from political ties
and the subsequent big payola from buying public enterprises cheap and
then selling them off to US multi-nationals at great profit. The great
bulk of the 12 million Mexican immigrants who crossed the border into
the US have fled from the onerous conditions which allowed Mexico's
traditional and nouveaux riche millionaires to join the global
billionaires' club.

Ass't editor's note: Many have also been driven off the land because
unable to compete with subsidized crops imported from the US.

In most cases there were three stages: first, the current billionaires
successfully "lobbied" and bribed officials for government contracts,
tax exemptions, subsidies and protection from foreign competitors.
State handouts were the beachhead. Second was state privatization by
which current billionaires seized lucrative public assets far below
their market value and earning capacity. The privatization, although
described as "market transactions," were in reality political sales in
four senses: in price, in selection of buyers, in kickbacks to the
sellers and in furthering an ideological agenda. Third, current
billionaires accumulated wealth from the sell-off of banks, minerals,
energy resources, telecommunications, power plants and transport, and
the assumption by the state of private debt. This was consummated in
Latin America via corruption and in Russia via assassination and gang
warfare. The billionaires have consolidated and expanded their empires
through mergers, acquisitions, further privatizations, and overseas
expansion. Private monopolies of mobile phones, telecoms and other
"public" utilities, plus high commodity prices have added billions to
the initial concentrations. Some millionaires became billionaires by
selling their recently acquired, lucrative, privatized enterprises to
foreign capital.

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3d.  News: Insider admits to insider-like trading in internet interview
     By Matt Krantz, USA Today, March 23, 2007

CNBC TV host, Jim Cramer, of the popular show Mad Money: "A lot of
times when I was short (stocks) at my hedge fund ... meaning I needed
it (the stock) down ... I would create a level of activity beforehand
that would drive the futures. It's a fun game, and it's a lucrative
game." Cramer described how he would make bets that gave the
impression knowledgeable investors were predicting a stock's future.
Cramer said everything he did was legal but added that illegal
activity is common in the hedge fund industry, where regulation is
lax. Cramer said some hedge fund managers spread false rumors about a
company to large trading desks and the media to drive a stock price
lower. He said this practice is illegal, but easy to do "because the
SEC doesn't understand it." He says, "The way that the market really
works is to have that nexus of hit the brokerage houses with a series
of orders that push it down, then leak it to the press and then get it
on CNBC."

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3e.  News: Ohio Plans Bonds to Bail Out Homeowners Strapped by Mortgages
     By Martin Z. Braun, Bloomberg, March 23, via Phil Anderson

Ohio, which had the highest foreclosure rate among the 50 U.S. states
at the end of 2006, plans to issue $100 million in taxable municipal
bonds next month to help homeowners refinance mortgages they can't
afford. Proceeds of the bond issue by the Ohio Housing Finance Agency
will provide financing for about 1,000 loans. That is not going to
solve Ohio's foreclosure problem but politicians hope to at least make
a dent.

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3f.  News: This cycle's "world's tallest building" near completion
     Emaar Properties PJSC press release, via Phil Anderson
     March 3, 2007

Burj Dubai, the iconic super-tower, is now the tallest structure in
the Middle East and Europe and it is not finished. Already at 110
levels and 380 meters high, Burj Dubai shares the honor of having the
largest number of floors in any building in the world, alongside Sears
Tower in Chicago. At the current height, the tower is also the world's
ninth tallest building. Burj Dubai is only one meter shorter than the
Empire State Building, the second tallest in the US. It is the
centerpiece of the AED 73 billion (US$20 billion) Downtown Burj Dubai,
a mixed-use project in the heart of Dubai featuring residences,
commercial space, hospitality projects, and several retail outlets
including The Dubai Mall, the world's largest shopping and
entertainment destination. Burj Dubai is on its course to become the
world's tallest building.

Editor's note: Every time the newest world's tallest building opens,
it has been just after the 18-year land-price cycle peaked.

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4a.  Numbers for February: Building Permits down
     USA Today, March 23, 2007

As expected, given that housing starts had fallen so much in January,
construction of new homes rebounded in February, up 9%, after
falling14.3% the previous month. But building permits, a more reliable
gauge of future activity, slowed again, by 2.5%, the 12th decline in
the past 13 months. After five boom years of record sales of new and
existing homes, demand has fallen sharply and home prices, which had
been surging, have stagnated.

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4b.  Numbers for February: Existing home prices fall
     Rex Nutting, Washington bureau chief, MarketWatch,
     March 23, 2007

In February, US existing home sales rose 3.9%, their fastest rate
since March 2004. More telling, inventories of unsold homes rose 5.9%
to 3.75 million, representing a 6.7-month supply, and bottom line,
their median price dropped 1.3% to $212,800 compared with the same
time last year. It marked the seventh consecutive monthly decline.
Prices have been down year-on-year for eight straight months.

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4c.  Numbers for Winter: Some sub prime lenders bankrupt
     New York Times, Gretchen Morgenson, via H. Remoff
     March 11, 2007

More than two dozen mortgage lenders have failed or closed their
doors, and shares of big companies in the mortgage industry have
declined significantly. Delinquencies on loans made to less
creditworthy borrowers, known as sub prime mortgages, recently reached
12.6 percent. Some banks have reported rising problems among borrowers
that were deemed more creditworthy as well.

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4d.  Numbers for Winter: Mortgage Crisis Spirals, and Casualties Mount
     By Julie Creswell and Vikas Bajaj, NY Times, via H. Remoff
     March 5, 2007

Many of the problems that have surfaced thus far are not tied to the
resetting of rates. Rather, they stem from a sharp and early spike in
the default rates among loans issued last year. And this is happening
at a time when the overall economy is healthy. The explosive growth in
sub prime lending had turned mortgage bankers and brokers into
multimillionaires seemingly overnight. They collected millions of
dollars more in dividends, salaries, bonuses and perks, then sold
their shares in their lending institutions. Of course, most of the
500,000 people who work in the mortgage industry did not cash in so
grandly. The wealth was concentrated among executives, loan officers
and brokers, because the greatest rewards were meted out in the form
of commissions, bonuses and stock awards.

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4e.  Numbers for Winter: Inflation jumps up
     Mark Trumbull, The Christian Science Monitor March 19, 2007

Some prices, namely for housing, food, and medical care, jumped at a 6
percent annual rate during the three month period from December
through February. Retail gasoline prices rose 7 percent in just two
weeks. The core rate of inflation (prices of all goods and services
minus volatile food and energy) for the past three months rose at a
2.6 percent annual rate - at 2.7%, that would double prices in 27
years. In the past two months, average weekly earnings, adjusted for
inflation, have fallen in real terms.

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5a.  Letters to editor: Corrections
By Robert Elgin, St. Louis

Sorry to be six weeks late in noticing this, but one of the AP
articles (4e) you quoted in February had a really gross
miscalculation. It compared the 2.1% real increase in wages in 2006 to
the 2.5% increase in Consumer prices. However, the real increase in
Consumer prices is, by definition, always 0%. So, a 2.1% real increase
in wages cannot possibly lag behind the rise in prices. As a result,
the title of the entire article is a big fat lie!

From Alanna Hartzok
My organization is Earth Rights Institute, not Equal Rights Institute.
Hope it is correct when the CGO brochure comes out! Also my name is
spelled "Alanna Hartzok."

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5b.  Letters to editor: Obit of Art Scholbe
     Feb 23, 2007; via Wyn Achenbaum

Arthur William Scholbe, 88, formerly of Farmington IN, passed away
February 19, 2007, in Indianapolis. Arthur, who was born In St. Louis
on February 23, 1918,. was retired from the Terminal Railroad Company.
He was a US Army WW II veteran, a member of The American Legion and
Veterans of Foreign Wars, a member of Greenpeace, the Sierra Cub,
Amnesty International, and The Voice of The Martyrs. He was a lifelong
follower of the teachings of the economic philosopher, Henry George.
Arthur was a member of St. Joseph's Catholic Church and St. Joseph's
3rd Degree, Council #12332 of Farmington, the Knights of Columbus, 4th
degree, Council #4596, and Holy Family Parish of Cahokia, and a member
of The International Brotherhood of Railway and Steamship Clerks.

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6.  Likable link:  Economics as Science now online
    By Dr. Fred Foldvary, Santa Clara University

Fred Foldvary's manuscript, The Science of Economics, has been set in
pdf format and is at:
  http://www.foldvary.net/sciecs/Science-of-Economics.pdf
This economics textbook is currently being used by Professor Julius
Krause at the Dardania University in Kosovo. Fred Foldvary originally
wrote it for Fred Harrison, and uploaded the text by chapters to his
web site in 1999. Dr. Krause formatted it in pdf form.

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7a.  What You Can Do? Write billionaire combating homelessness
     By Audrey Mcavoy, Associated Press, March 25, 2007

One of Japan's richest men, billionaire Genshiro Kawamoto, is handing
over eight of his multimillion-dollar homes to low-income native
Hawaiian families, who are disproportionately represented among the
state's homeless and working poor. Asked whether he was concerned
about losing money on the effort, the Japanese real estate mogul
laughed and said, "This is pocket money for me." Kawamoto is known for
evicting tenants of his rental homes on short notice so he can sell
the properties, and also for leaving houses vacant without proper
property maintenance and upgrades.

ICMP JOURNAL, Vol. 1, Issue 2, November 30, 2006
Some wonder if his intention is to depress property values so he can
buy more upscale homes at a discount. Kawamoto owns dozens of office
buildings in Tokyo under the name Marugen, and he has been buying and
selling real estate in Hawaii and California since the 1980s. If he's
serious about eradicating homelessness at a structural level, he needs
to know about shifting the property tax off buildings and onto land.
Address comments to Genshiro Kawamoto at P.O. Box 15547, Honolulu, HI
96830.

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7b.  What You Can Do? Get movement consultation for free
     By Grace Potts, Partner, Insight Unlimited LLC: Non-profit,
     Community, and Grassroots Consulting, grace at insightunlimited.org,
     www.insightunlimited.org, 734-975-1293

Contact us for a free 2 hour consultation.

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7c.  What You Can Do? Attend London conference,:
     "Smart Taxes Replacing Bad Taxes: If Not Now, Then When?"

The School of Economic Science, The Henry George Foundation, and the
Labour Land Campaign are running a seminar, organized by Waterfront, to
discuss how smart taxes can replace bad taxes. This seminar aims to
demonstrate that moving the structure of taxation away from highly
distortionary taxes on productive activity towards taxes on the use of
scarce natural resources, including land, would have major economic,
environmental and social advantages. There is a tendency to avoid
fundamental reform because of a perception that such reform is really
intended to increase the burden of taxation. This seminar will take
the tax-take as a given (fiscal neutrality), and discuss ways of
replacing bad taxes with smart (green, economically non-distortionary,
socially equitable) taxes. At the School of Economic Science,
11 Mandeville Place, London. W1U 3AJ, 15th May 2007.
Email: conference at thewaterfront.co.uk

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7d.  What You Can Do? Attend Schumacher seminar

The E.F. Schumacher Society cordially invites you to a seminar,
"Building Sustainable Local Economies," with Erbin Crowell, Eric
Harris-Braun, Elizabeth Keen, Chris Lindstrom, Alex Thorp, Chuck
Turner, Greg Watson, Susan Witt, and other guest speakers, from May
23rd to 27th of 2007, at the E.F. Schumacher Library and Simon's Rock
College of Bard, Great Barrington, Massachusetts. Space is limited to
25 participants! Seminar cost of $500 includes tuition, materials, and
seven meals. Housing is available at Simon's Rock College for $300
(single room with shared bath; includes breakfast). To register please
return the registration form, available online at
www.smallisbeautiful.org. Or call 413-528-1737
or email efssociety at smallisbeautiful.org

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7e.  What You Can Do? X PRIZE Contest

The X PRIZE Foundation is always looking for new ideas about what
people consider to be the largest, most challenging issues facing
humankind today, and this is our "soap box" for you to be heard. Tell
us what grand challenges you think the world ought to be thinking
about. And while we're interested in the opinions of individuals,
we're also interested in the opinions of the group. An X PRIZE
committee will review the videos that receive the most votes to
determine a winner. Keep your clips provocative, interesting and under
two minutes.

About the X PRIZE Foundation: The X PRIZE Foundation is an educational
nonprofit prize institute whose mission is to create radical
breakthroughs for the benefit of humanity. The Foundation is preparing
to offer new prizes for breakthroughs in medicine, healthcare, energy
production and consumption, education and the automotive industry. For
more information please visit www.xprize.org. Submission Period: Feb
23, 2007 through May 13, 2007. Winner Announced: May 30, 2007. Grand
Prize: Round trip air travel for two to the Wirefly X PRIZE Cup,
October 2007, and three nights' accommodation for two in Las Cruces,
New Mexico. Enter in three easy steps:
 1. Make a short video (2 minutes or less) where you tell the world
   what you think is the most important issue facing humankind.
 2. Log in to Zannel
 3. Submit your video to the contest.

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8.  At the Margin: Quips and Quotes

On a Fence: "Salesmen welcome! Dog food is expensive."

At a Car Dealership: "The best way to get back on your feet - miss a
car payment."

At the Electric Company: "We would be delighted if you send in your
payment. However, if you don't, you will be."

There you struggle, armed only with innocence and a just cause; I, for
one, am with thee. - Henry David Thoreau, addressing fish butting
their against a dam.

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9a.  Publication affairs: Contributing to this issue:

Wyn Achenbaum, Phil Anderson, Richard Biddle, Caspar Davis, Ed Dodson,
Robert Elgin, Fred Foldvary, Stewart Goldwater, Alanna Hartzok,
Paul Martin, Mark Monson, Rich Nymoen, Grace Potts, Heather Remoff,
Josh Vincent, Sue Walton, Dave Wetzel.

Editor: Jeffery J. Smith
Assistant Editor: Caspar Davis
Copy Editor: Enzo Piccone
Archivist: Stewart Goldwater
Owner: The Robert Schalkenbach Foundation
Founder: Adam Monroe

Send your news and other interesting material to the Georgist News at
jjs at geonomics.org or gn at progress.org. The deadline for the next
issue is April 25.

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