Info in Bits & Pieces

NEWS IN BRIEF

$339 BILLION
Property taxes levied on single-family homes in the United States rose 3.6% to $339.8 Billion in 2022, according to property data provider ATTOM. Nationwide, property taxes rose twice as fast as in 2021. The highest effective tax rates appeared to be in New Jersey, Illinois, Connecticut, Vermont, and Nebraska.

$227 BILLION
Samsung Electronics plans to invest $227 billion over the next 20 years to build five new chip plants in South Korea as part of the government’s goal to establish “the world’s largest” chip center by 2042.

63 PERCENT
A Washington Post-ABC News poll has found that 63% of American adults don’t believe that President Joe Biden, 80, possesses the “mental sharpness to perform his duties as president, representing a 9% increase year over year.

60 PERCENT
of all Americans live paycheck to paycheck, according to a new report by Pymnts.

52 PERCENT
According to RentCafe.com, 52% of millennials, the largest generation in the U.S., owned their own home in 2022.

46 PERCENT
Vermont’s maple syrup production hit a record high of 2.55 million gallons in 2022, up 46% over the previous year, even after a warning that climate change could destroy the industry by 2021.

35 PERCENT
The official unemployment rate in South Africa is 35%, one of the world’s highest.

352,000 ACRES
Chinese holdings of U.S. agricultural lands reached more than 352,000 acres in 2020, more than 25 times the 14,000 acres owned in 2010, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates. Of the 109 countries that own U.S. agricultural land, China ranks No. 18, far behind No. 1 Canada (12.8 million acres) and even the Cayman Islands (672,000 acres).

NEW RULES IN CALIFORNIA’S MOVE TO ZERO-EMMISSIONS
California approves a rule banning diesel trucks by 2036. The California Air Resources Board approved this ruling on new regulations. It also requires all trucks to be zero-emissions by 2042, according to a government announcement. California is the first state to require new commercial trucks, including garbage trucks, delivery trucks, and other medium- and heavy-duty vehicles, to be electric. It is the first state to adopt new rules to reduce emissions created by locomotives.

Is China throwing away fields of electric cars and EV bicycles due to an absence of viable recycling methods? Active car sales have included these abandoned ones in each year of assembly.

Did You Know?
that the ideal time to water your lawns and outdoor plants is between 5:00 am and 10:00 am when the ground is cooler and the soil has time to dry during the day?

QUOTES

“The best teachers are those who show you where to look but don’t tell you what to see.”
~~~ Alexandra K. Trenfor

Groucho Marx

“I’ve worked myself up from nothing to a state of extreme poverty.”

“The best way to tell if a man is honest is to ask him. If he says he is, you know he’s a crook.”

“We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give.”
~~~ Winston Churchill

“Gratitude is the most exquisite form of courtesy.”
~~~ Jacques Maritain

“Whoever is careless with the truth in small matters cannot be trusted in important affairs.”
~~~ Albert Einstein