Federal Income tax
I filed our Federal Income Tax yesterday. I have been using Turbo tax on line for many years now. They roll everything from the previous year into the current year and all I have to do is fill in the blanks. The whole process took about 15 minutes. My refund check will be auto deposited into my bank on March 25th. Such a deal. We can never evade paying taxes. Washington State, our last state of residence, does not have a state income tax, so we don’t have to file any state taxes. Gary
SSGT Barry Sadler Songs
From Ele Dietrich Slyter (69): Dunseith, ND
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A special thank you for including the you tube link to the SSGT Barry Sadler songs…they brought back so many, many memories. Besides the fact that they are great music to just enjoy, they also brought back memories of those who served during that time and those who serve today. Thank you.
ele
Ele,
I noticed those songs were included with the Red Skeleton U-Tube posting yesterday. I so very much agree with you.
Gary
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Dick Bercier – Highway Patrolman
Memories from Dick Johnson (68): Dunseith, ND
Gary and Friends,
Gary Metcalfe remembers the ND Highway Patrolman, Dick Bercier, who
was assigned the area around Dunseith. He was a regular in the Crystal Cafe
for a ritual card game with Bertha Vanorny, Bertha Myer , and Father
Wolfe. He was also a no nonsense patrolman when it came time to do his
job. I only had one encounter with Dick but came to remember it. I had
gone to an auction sale south of Rugby and was on my way home with my
father-in-law and Carmen Myer as passengers when just north of Rugby
there was a safety check for all vehicles. Dick Bercier and two other
younger patrolmen were pulling over EVERY vehicle and checking lights,
signals, horn, etc. As I was sitting in line, I looked in my mirror and
my friend, Rolette County Sheriff Bryant Mueller pulled in behind me in
his personal car. He noticed me and walked up to shoot the breeze while
we were waiting. Dick Bercier didn’t look as though he was enjoying his
duty very much as he walked toward me. He gruffly said, “Where is your
license.” There is a one liner I had just heard and couldn’t resist. I
said, “Gee, I don’t know. When I left home it was hanging on my front
bumper.” Bryant chuckled and Dick Bercier yelled, “I mean your g—-
—–m drivers license!” OK, so much for the humor. He checked us out
and we went on our way.
The other Dick Bercier story I have is about an incident with him
and my old buddy Bob Roberge. Bob was coming home from his cousin’s
place near Rolette late one night and Dick whipped around and stopped
him by Yellow Corners. Bob had an old two ton ’51 Ford truck with poor
tail lights and who knows what else. It was after midnight and Dick must
have figured something was wrong with this deal so he stopped him. Bob
knew Bercier well from around Dunseith so he too was joking a bit.
Bercier said, “What are you doing out here this time of night Roberge?”
Bob told him he was just coming from visiting his cousin. He said
Bercier didn’t buy that so he climbed up and looked in the empty grain
box. He then told Bob to show him his drivers license. Bob didn’t have
an interior light so he told Dick to shine his flashlight in the cab
while he looked in his billfold. The first thing he found was his
‘commodity card’, which is for food assistance, so he pulled that out
and handed it to Bercier. He said Dick looked and looked at it in the
dark with his flashlight and then jerked the truck door open and grabbed
Bob and took him over to the patrol car and put him in the back seat and
drove off for Rugby. Bob said he didn’t say a word as Dick was hot. Just
north of Rugby Dick Bercier slammed on the brakes and jumped out and
took Bob out of the back seat and got back in to leave. Bob finally
asked him what he was supposed to do now and how was he supposed to get
back to his truck? Bercier just said, “Walk—you smart son— —-ch!”
and drove off. I asked Bob if he walked the 20 miles back to Yellow
Corners? He said he only walked a short way and some ‘drunks from
Dunseith’ pick him up and took him back to his truck. Thanks Gary!
Dick
Posted by Lois Lilleby Fielding (51): Prescott, AZ
Why North Dakota Is Booming
They’re drilling for oil, attracting high tech, and keeping the tax burden moderate. Result: 3.8% unemployment.
Living on the harsh, wind-swept northern Great Plains, North Dakotans lean towards the practical in economic development. Finding themselves sitting on prodigious pools of oil—estimated by the state’s Department of Mineral Resources at least 4.3 billion barrels—they are out drilling like mad. And the state is booming.
Unemployment is 3.8%, and according to a Gallup survey last month, North Dakota has the best job market in the country. Its economy “sticks out like a diamond in a bowl of cherry pits,” says Ron Wirtz, editor of the Minneapolis Fed’s newspaper, fedgazette. The state’s population, slightly more than 672,000, is up nearly 5% since 2000.
The biggest impetus for the good times lies with energy development. Around 650 wells were drilled last year in North Dakota, and the state Department of Mineral Resources envisions another 5,500 new wells over the next two decades. Between 2005 and 2009, oil industry revenues have tripled to $12.7 billion from $4.2 billion, creating more than 13,000 jobs.
Already fourth in oil production behind Texas, Alaska and California, the state is positioned to advance on its competitors. Drilling in both Alaska and the Gulf, for example, is currently being restrained by Washington-imposed regulations. And progressives in California—which sits on its own prodigious oil supplies—abhor drilling, promising green jobs while suffering double-digit unemployment, higher utility rates and the prospect of mind-numbing new regulations that are designed to combat global warming and are all but certain to depress future growth. In North Dakota, by contrast, even the state’s Democrats—such as Sen. Kent Conrad and former Sen. Byron Dorgan—tend to be pro-oil. The industry services the old-fashioned liberal goal of making middle-class constituents wealthier.
Oil also is the principal reason North Dakota enjoys arguably the best fiscal situation in all the states. With a severance tax on locally produced oil, there’s a growing state surplus. Recent estimates put an extra $1 billion in the state’s coffers this year, and that’s based on a now-low price of $70 a barrel.
North Dakota, however, is no one-note Prairie sheikdom. The state enjoys prodigious coal supplies and has—yes—even moved heavily into wind-generated electricity, now ranking ninth in the country. Thanks to global demand, North Dakota’s crop sales are strong, but they are no longer the dominant economic driver—agriculture employs only 7.2% of the state’s work force.
Perhaps more surprising, North Dakota is also attracting high-tech. For years many of the state’s talented graduates left home, but that brain drain is beginning to reverse. This has been critical to the success of many companies, such as Great Plains Software, which was founded in the 1980s and sold to Microsoft in 2001 for $1.1 billion. The firm has well over 1,000 employees.
The corridor between Grand Forks and Fargo along the Red River (the border between North Dakota and Minnesota) has grown rapidly in the past decade. It now boasts the headquarters of Microsoft Business Systems and firms such as PacketDigital, which makes microelectronics for portable electronic devices and systems. There are also biotech firms such as Aldevron, which manufactures proteins for biomedical research. Between 2002 and 2009, state employment in science, technology, engineering and math-related professions grew over 30%, according to EMSI, an economic modeling firm. This is five times the national average.
While the overall numbers are still small compared to those of bigger states, North Dakota now outperforms the nation in everything from the percentage of college graduates under the age of 45 to per-capita numbers of engineering and science graduates. Median household income in 2009 was $49,450, up from $42,235 in 2000. That 17% increase over the last decade was three times the rate of Massachussetts and more than 10 times that of California.
Some cities, notably Fargo (population 95,000), have emerged as magnets. “Our parking lot has 20 license plates in it,” notes Niles Hushka, co-founder of Kadrmas, Lee and Jackson, an engineering firm active in Great Plains energy development. Broadway Drive in Fargo’s downtown boasts art galleries, good restaurants and young urban professionals hanging out in an array of bars. This urban revival is a source of great pride in Fargo.
What accounts for the state’s success? Dakotans didn’t bet the farm, so to speak, on solar cells, high-density housing or high-speed rail. Taxes are moderate—the state ranks near the middle in terms of tax per capita, according to the Tax Foundation—and North Dakota is a right-to-work state, which makes it attractive to new employers, especially in manufacturing. But the state’s real key to success is doing the first things first—such as producing energy, food and specialized manufactured goods for which there is a growing, world-wide market. This is what creates the employment and wealth that can support environmental protection and higher education.
Thankfully, this kind of sensible thinking is making a comeback in some other states, such as Ohio and Pennsylvania. These hard-pressed states realize that attending to basic needs—in their case, shale natural gas—could be just the elixir to resuscitate their economies.
Mr. Kotkin is a teaches at Chapman University and is an adjunct fellow at the London-based Legatum Institute.
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