Snoqualmie Real Estate: Move-Up Home Buying Opportunities in ...

This guest piece is by local real estate agent, Tony Gilbert, who originally wrote the article for his real estate website blog, The RealFX Group.? The interesting information highlights statistics currently seen in the Snoqualmie real estate market as it recovers from the housing market recession.? Although, Tony uses Snoqualmie Ridge real estate statistics for his article, the information might be useful for other Valley areas.

Currently own a smaller home at Snoqualmie Ridge and feeling a bit ?squeezed?? Thinking of buying a bigger house? Move-up home buyers have a great opportunity going into 2013 at Snoqualmie Ridge due to the VERY strong demand for homes priced at, or near $400,000, compared to the somewhat weaker demand for homes priced above $500,000.

To demonstrate the move-up opportunity compared to years past, let?s compare the number of sold homes on Snoqualmie Ridge in 2006 and 2012.

snoqualmie-ridge-sales-2006snoqualmie-ridge-sales-2012

Notice the statistics have completely flip-flopped. Affordability and loan qualification standards are among several reasons for this ? but many home buyers are now uncomfortable buying a larger home as in years past, unless they truly need the space. In 2012, it?s clear that the majority of home buyers in Snoqualmie Ridge were looking for homes priced at, or below $500,000, and this will likely continue into 2013. We do expect to see continued improvement in higher price brackets, but the rate of increase will obviously be slower.

By Comparison, Lower Priced Homes Often Sell at a Premium

I had a conversation today with a friend of mine who is a resident of Snoqualmie Ridge. She indicated their family would like to move into a larger home sometime in 2013. They own a smaller home in excellent condition which presently fits into a $375K ? $400K price range. With demand being exceptionally strong in that price range, they are in a prime position to both sell their current home at a potential premium (compared to other price ranges), and ?move-up? by buying a pre-owned home of $500K or greater at a potential ?discount? by comparison, since the pace of the market is clearly slower in the higher price brackets.

More Affordable Home Inventory Needed

Home buyers are looking on Snoqualmie Ridge in impressive numbers ? and they?re especially attracted to more affordable new construction. But, this is partly due to thelack of affordable resale homes for sale on The Ridge in a comparable price range ? roughly between $400,000 ? $475,000. For several months, new home builders have been filling the demand in this price range ? and building activity is picking-up steam as I write this. However, when a pre-owned home comes up for sale under $450,000, if it?s priced according to recent market activity, there should be strong buyer interest.

Margins for Negotiation Will Decrease in 2013-2014

All buyers looking for homes over $500K will find more homes to choose from, and likely a wider margin for negotiation. However, as more move-up buyers return to the market in 2013 and beyond, homes in the upper price ranges will also likely begin to enjoy increasing values. Accordingly, the window of opportunity for buyers to get the elusive ?good deal? is definitely shrinking.

Screen Shot 2012-12-29 at 10.08.18 AMAnthony Gilbert REALTOR? is a Real Estate Agent with Windermere Real Estate, serving the communities of Issaquah, Sammamish, southern Bellevue, Snoqualmie, North Bend & Fall City.?? Have other questions for Tony regarding the local real estate market?? You can contact him HERE.

Source: http://livingsnoqualmie.com/2012/12/29/snoqualmie-real-estate-move-up-home-buying-opportunities-in-2013/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=snoqualmie-real-estate-move-up-home-buying-opportunities-in-2013

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Cain Velasquez reclaims UFC heavyweight title

LAS VEGAS (AP) ? Cain Velasquez waited 13 miserable months for the chance to put the UFC heavyweight belt back around his waist.

When he finally got Junior Dos Santos back in the cage, Cain didn't waste another minute.

Velasquez reclaimed the UFC heavyweight title Saturday night, thoroughly battering Dos Santos on the way to a lopsided unanimous decision in UFC 155.

Velasquez (11-1) took early control of the rematch of his only career loss, flooring the Brazilian champion with a big right hand midway through the first round. Velasquez spent most of the match stalking and pounding on Dos Santos (15-2), who never fully recovered from the first-round shot that left him swollen and woozy.

"I was so tired, but I had to endure," Velasquez said. "My coaches and everybody helped me so much. He's tough, too. ... It feels so good to get this. This is my wife's Christmas present. I promised her I would do this."

Velasquez won every round on every judge's scorecard in the UFC's traditional year-end event in its hometown. The three judges scored the bout for Velasquez 50-45, 50-44 and 50-43. The Associated Press also favored Velasquez 50-44, giving a 10-8 advantage to Velasquez in the first round.

Dos Santos took the UFC belt away from Velasquez in November 2011 in just 64 seconds, earning a first-round stoppage victory with one vicious overhand right in Anaheim, Calif. Velasquez refused to blame a knee injury for his only defeat ? but in the rematch, he demonstrated exactly what he can do at full strength.

"I knew that Junior was a tough striker and he was able to end our last fight that way, so I was prepared for him this time," Velasquez said. "I was able to effectively use my striking and my grappling to control him throughout the fight and get the title back."

Jim Miller won a narrow unanimous decision over Joe Lauzon in a sensationally bloody fight on the undercard, and rising middleweight Costa Philippou stopped Tim Boetsch in the third rounds. Yushin Okami grappled his way past Alan Belcher and Derek Brunson easily beat veteran Chris Leben.

But 12,423 fans bought a record $3.2 million in tickets at the MGM Grand Garden to see the second meeting in what seems certain to be a memorable heavyweight trilogy ? although UFC President Dana White said Velasquez is likely to fight again, probably against Alistair Overeem, while Dos Santos heals.

"I don't know if you saw (Dos Santos) after the fight, but he looked terrible," White said. "It's going to be a while until he starts training again."

Dos Santos' loss was his first in the UFC in 10 fights with mixed martial arts' dominant promotion, and his first defeat anywhere since November 2007. Dos Santos expected the rematch to last longer, but also predicted a second knockout.

Instead, Dos Santos barely avoided getting stopped in the first round, and he headed straight to a hospital after the bout with what White thought was a broken jaw.

"His game was very effective, and tonight he was better than me," Dos Santos said. "It's not usual for me to take a punch, but he walks forward all the time. His takedowns, his grappler game is very effective, so congratulations for him."

Velasquez immediately showed the rematch would bear little resemblance to the first fight, pursuing Dos Santos from the opening bell and quickly backing up the champion. Velasquez then floored Dos Santos with that huge right to the head midway through the round, and Dos Santos had to cover up in the corner while barely surviving an onslaught of strikes and ground-and-pound.

After brusquely swatting aside his stool and choosing to stand in his corner between rounds, Velasquez went to work on the ground in the second, and the former Arizona State wrestler repeatedly got the boxing specialist into bad positions.

Dos Santos struggled to regain his rhythm, and Velasquez managed another takedown early in the third round before repeatedly tagging the champion with shots that left his face discolored and puffy.

At the final bell, Velasquez collapsed on his back at the center of the cage, pointing skyward with both hands. Although Overeem is tops among several heavyweights who would like a title shot, a third bout between Velasquez and Dos Santos can't be too far away.

"Cain Velasquez, like you said (last year), I'm going to come back and I'm going to take my belt again," Dos Santos said.

Dos Santos' win over Velasquez last year in the UFC's first fight on American network television catapulted the hard-punching Brazilian heavyweight into an international spotlight. Both fighters injured their knees in the month leading up to their first fight, but stayed in the bout because of its importance.

Dos Santos defended his title against Frank Mir earlier this year and got a lucrative sponsorship deal with Nike while emerging as one of the promotion's most likable stars.

Miller and Lauzon also turned in one of the UFC's best fights of 2012 in its final show, starting when Miller opened a gaping gash over Lauzon's right eye early in the first round. Blood gushed out of Lauzon's face and onto the canvas, yet he blinked it away and survived the round to a standing ovation.

Lauzon bled substantially for the final two rounds, yet traded big shots with Miller and even took down his fellow veteran, although submission holds were nearly impossible due to the blood slickening both fighters' bodies. Miller narrowly avoided two submission attempts by Lauzon in the final seconds before celebrating his second win in four fights.

"Joe Lauzon is a tough kid," Miller said. "I knew I was going to have to bring my best effort to put him away and I was never able to. That's how good he is on the ground. And even in the last minute, look what he was trying to do to win the fight."

After two dull main-card bouts resulted in wins for Okami and Brunson, Philippou (12-2) and Boetsch entertained the crowd ? but Boetsch (16-5) left his first loss in two years with big cuts on his forehead and nose along with an apparently injured hand. Philippou was impressive in his fifth straight victory, winning as a fairly late replacement for Chris Weidman, his training partner.

In the early fights, veteran Jamie Varner (21-7-1) continued his comeback with a split-decision victory over Melvin Guillard (47-13-3), and heavyweight Todd Duffee (9-2) returned to the UFC after an acrimonious 2?-year absence with a nasty first-round knockout victory over Phil De Fries.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/cain-velasquez-reclaims-ufc-heavyweight-title-061214081--spt.html

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University to Offer Course Studying 'Fifty Shades of Grey' Trilogy

29 Dec 2012, 12:39 PM PDT post a comment

Adjunct professor Stef Woods claims, ?No other contemporary text on sexuality has transformed American culture the way that this series has.? The trilogy started out as erotic fan fiction based on characters from the Twilight books before being developed into a stand-alone series.

The course curriculum aims to tackle such topics as, ?Does referring to the book as ?mommy porn? further belittle women's sexuality?? and, ?Would E.L. James's writing have been judged to the same extent, if she wasn't a female writing an erotic trilogy?? Professor Woods stresses that ?this is not a sex-shop book club.?

?We?re not doing dramatic readings, we?re not discussing personal preferences?mine or theirs,? Woods insists. She claims the books have ?impacted the fields of public relations, social media marketing, health, publishing and sexuality? and are worthy of serious study in a ?critical and intellectual way.?

Woods claims the course is no different than other classes that study the relevancy of pop culture phenomena like the television show ?The Wire? or the Twilight series that inspired the Grey trilogy. She says the university has no objections to her planned course, but some students are questioning the relevancy of the core subject matter: ?It?s not an accurate representation of American sexual culture,? School of Communication freshman Sarah Voelker said. ?It does not present these things in a way that is safe and positive. It?s basically S&M porn.? ?

Tuition for the spring semester at American University costs $19,491 for full-time, undergraduate students.


Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/BigHollywood/~3/9ZciZsuKqdQ/American-Univeristy-to-Offer-Course-on-Fifty-Shades-of-Grey

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Snowstorm disrupts hundreds of Northeast flights

As a storm system moves into New England, it's expected that parts of Boston and New York state will see pockets of snow, with rain expected from Cape Cod to Washington, D.C. TODAY's Dylan Dreyer reports.

By Miguel Llanos, NBC News

Several hundred flights were canceled and several thousand delayed by midday Saturday as a storm moved into the Northeast that's expected to dump several inches of snow on big cities and up to a foot in other areas.

Most of the flight disruptions were at the Boston and New York area airports, according to the tracker service FlightStats.com. By 4:25 p.m. ET, it had counted 446 flights canceled so far Saturday across the country, and nearly 5,600 delayed.

New York City could see 3 to 5 inches, as well as hazardous driving conditions from the short-lived storm, NBCNewYork.com reported.


The brunt of the storm was likely to hit southern New England, according to NBC meteorologist Dylan Dreyer. "It's from Boston back into Rhode Island where we'll see the heaviest of the snow," she said on TODAY.

Weather Channel meteorologist Mike Seidel, speaking on MSNBC, called the storm a "quick hitter" that nonetheless was having an impact on air travel before it clears out Saturday night.

The Weather Channel's Mike Seidel has more on what residents in the Northeast can expect to see as a winter weather system moves through the region.

More content from NBCNews.com:

Follow US news from NBCNews.com on Twitter and Facebook

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Source: http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/12/29/16236065-snowstorm-disrupts-hundreds-of-flights-across-northeast?lite

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The Perils Of Aging Alone

SPECIAL FROM Next Avenue

By Jane Gross

The number of Americans living single is soaring, and our bag-lady fears may not be so far-fetched

Old and alone.

The words haunt me.

You know the platitude: Few people fear death but rather the process of dying. Well, I'm not so much afraid of dying as I am of dying with nobody by my side.

This is the plight of those of us who are single and childless, and we now make up 27 percent of households in America ? the second-largest type, according to the Census Bureau. The largest remains married couples, with children or without, although for the first time since such data collection began, they now represent fewer than half of all households, at 48 percent.

(MORE: The Concessions We Make Before We Age)

"Whatever happened to the typical American family of four: Mom, Pop and two kids?" the MetLife Mature Market Institute asks in its recent study, "The New American Family," compiled in partnership with the Society of Actuaries Committee on Post Retirement Needs and Risks. That is precisely the kind of family I grew up in, but such groupings are becoming historical artifacts, like rotary phones and rabbit ears on TV sets. From 1960 to 2010, the number of U.S. households more than doubled, from 53 million to 117 million. But in that same period, the number of married couples with children actually declined, from 23.9 million to 23.6 million. Such families now make up just 20 percent of American households, down from 45 percent in 1960.

The High Cost of Living Alone

The most stunning change in American household data, though, is the rapid increase in the number of people living alone. There were 7 million of us in 1960, representing just 13 percent of all households. Now there are 31.2 million, a jump of 350 percent. Among those of us who are age 65 or older, 45 percent live alone -- and this development will have significant repercussions for both retirement planning and long-term care.

The new report doesn't sugarcoat the situation. "There is no easy solution to helping the many millions of single individuals plan for their retirement and manage their short- or long-term health care expenses,'' its authors write. "Families are a significant social support system -- between spouses and partners, but also between parents and children."

As the family changes and the number of single-person households rises, there will be "financial and social consequences,'' the report says, with implications for both individuals and the nation. Among them:

  • Limited assistance for single people from retirement programs, like Social Security, whose spousal benefits will not be available.
  • No access to a second income, found in two-thirds of married households, which helps couples cover living expenses and finance personal retirement programs.
  • Greater difficulty convalescing at home, with no family assistance, in a time when many medical procedures are done on an outpatient basis and hospital stays are short and shrinking.
  • The premature need, at potentially great cost to the federal budget, for elderly singles to move into group settings, like assisted-living facilities and nursing homes. Most such people would prefer to age in place even as their health declines, but will not be able to because of a lack of family caregivers, who remain the bulwark of the current long-term care system.

The study also examined the fears that people expressed as they grew older, like not being able to maintain a reasonable standard of living in retirement, pay for health care and manage changes in Social Security and Medicare. And researchers looked at which types of households actually faced the greatest risk from these challenges. On average, researchers found, couples -- especially those in first marriages with two incomes -- were better off financially than singles. They were also more likely to have lowered or shed debt, invested for their retirement, met with a financial adviser and, overall, to "feel they have planned well enough that they can face problems when they arise.''

(MORE: Don't Want to Move? How to Age in Place)

None of this is counterintuitive. Non-couples are well aware of their vulnerability. Of all the permutations of households studied, those who were single and childless had the lowest rate of home ownership and the second-lowest average household income and assets -- in both cases, behind only those who were divorced. Their concerns about financial security were greater than those of couples, especially among women, who told researchers it was harder to save for retirement.

Calculating the Odds

The research puts flesh on the jagged bones of my own worries, not that I really needed it. And my worries rage, despite how relatively privileged I am compared to the average single, childless woman: I have always made a good living, and do so even in semi-retirement. I own a home and, but for my mortgage, carry no debt. I have savings and long-term care insurance. I have a financial adviser, who is more worried about my neurotic frugality than he is that I might go over the financial cliff. Before leaving my job at The New York Times, at age 60, with a generous buyout and a book contract, I insisted that he plot my future. Assuming I never earned another dime in my life, with the expected addition of Social Security at age 67 and of my last mortgage payment being made at age 70, we calculated how much I could spend per year through age 85, without running out of money.

So I've planned my future as best I can -- disaster preparedness against a lonely old age -- but it hasn't stilled my bag-lady worries. And I know I'm not the only woman who has them. At every speech I've ever given -- most are about the aged and their adult children -- I'm pelted with questions from dutiful daughters, like myself, who know that there is nobody to do for them what they are doing for their mothers or fathers. What preparations would I suggest, they ask?

(MORE: The Village Movement: Redefining Aging in Place)

Struggling not to tear up, which you're not supposed to do when you're the "expert" standing at a lectern and wearing a microphone, my answer is always the same: Save every dime you can to buy the care and kindness of strangers, which you know may be wildly expensive because you are doing it for your parents for free. And make sure you have lots of younger people in your life, like the 31-year-old twin daughters of my best friend from sleep-away camp, who have already promised to "feed me creamed spinach'' when the time comes.

That same friend is one of many people who has told me over the years that nobody got married or had children simply as a hedge against the indignities of old age -- not that I ever suggested they had -- merely that they wound up advantaged to live in the embrace of families. "A husband and children are no guarantee,'' they would tell me, almost without exception.

This to me has always seemed a failure of empathy. I like my life just fine and probably wouldn't trade it, but it does have its downsides. Why pretend otherwise? So I carefully crafted an answer for my "well-daughtered" friends, as I've come to think of them, and it has been useful at those moments when their "no guarantee'' comment has felt flippant enough to send me into a rage.

"I'll take your odds over mine," I'd say, "because mine are zero.''

Read more on Next Avenue

After a Superstorm, a 'Spinster' Finds Community
Co-Housing Designed for All Life Stages
Building a Network to Look Out for Your Parents

Earlier on Huff/Post50:

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Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/12/29/aging-in-place_n_2375979.html

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Central African Republic Conflict: Obama Says U.S. Troops Will Help Evacuate American Citizens

WASHINGTON ? President Barack Obama says 50 U.S. troops have deployed to the African country of Chad to help evacuate U.S. citizens and embassy personnel from the neighboring Central African Republic's capital of Bangui in the face of rebel advances toward the city.

Obama informed congressional leaders of Thursday's deployment in a letter Saturday citing a "deteriorating security situation" in the Central African Republic.

The evacuation of the U.S. diplomats comes in the wake of criticism of the Obama administration's handling of diplomatic security at its consulate in Benghazi, Libya. The ambassador and three other Americans were killed in a Sept. 11 attack.

In the Central African Republic, rebels have seized at least 10 northern towns. On Saturday they continued their advance, seizing the city of Sibut, 114 miles from Bangui.

Related on HuffPost:

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Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/12/29/central-african-republic-troops_n_2382538.html

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Walmart: Solo Products Clearance Board Games Discounted!

From Reader Ashley in IN great clearance finds at Walmart! Remember that all the ?holiday? stuff which means the red and green paper products are being clearanced right now!

Make sure to check out the paper products aisle at your Walmart.? I was able to score red and green Solo plates and cups on clearance for $1.25.? Use the $1.25 off 2 Solo products coupon from the 12/2 SmartSource to score 2 for $1.25 or $.63 a piece!? Put these back to use for your kids? Valentine?s Day and St. Patrick?s Day parties!

Walmart has a TON of clearance toys right now near the garden center.? Check for discounted board games to put in your unexpected gift pile.? You can get a hold of Battle of the Sexes with a bonus Quelf card game for $9.00 (regularly $19.84) or? Buzzword for $9.00 (regularly $18.88)!? Cranium is also on Clearance for $12.00 (regularly $24.97)!? Over 50% savings and NO COUPONS needed!

Thanks Ashley!

This post may contain affiliate links. When you use them, you support this site. Thank you!

Source: http://mylitter.com/walmart/walmart-solo-products-clearance-board-games-discounted/

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India rape victim's body cremated in New Delhi

An Indian participates in a candle-lit vigil to mourn the death of a gang rape victim in New Delhi, India, Saturday, Dec. 29, 2012. Indian police charged six men with murder on Saturday, adding to accusations that they beat and gang-raped the woman on a New Delhi bus nearly two weeks ago in a case that shocked the country. The murder charges were laid after the woman died earlier Saturday in a Singapore hospital where she has been flown for treatment. (AP Photo/ Dar Yasin)

An Indian participates in a candle-lit vigil to mourn the death of a gang rape victim in New Delhi, India, Saturday, Dec. 29, 2012. Indian police charged six men with murder on Saturday, adding to accusations that they beat and gang-raped the woman on a New Delhi bus nearly two weeks ago in a case that shocked the country. The murder charges were laid after the woman died earlier Saturday in a Singapore hospital where she has been flown for treatment. (AP Photo/ Dar Yasin)

A young Indian girl leads a protest march while holding torches as they mourn the death of a gang rape victim in New Delhi, India, Saturday, Dec. 29, 2012. Indian police charged six men with murder on Saturday, adding to accusations that they beat and gang-raped the woman on a New Delhi bus nearly two weeks ago in a case that shocked the country. The murder charges were laid after the woman died earlier Saturday in a Singapore hospital where she has been flown for treatment.(AP Photo/ Dar Yasin)

Indian men and women lie down on the ground mimicking dead bodies as they mourn the death of a gang rape victim in New Delhi, India, Saturday, Dec. 29, 2012. Shocked Indians on Saturday were mourning the death of the woman who was gang-raped and beaten on a bus in New Delhi nearly two weeks ago in an ordeal that galvanized people to demand greater protection for women from sexual violence. (AP Photo/ Saurabh Das)

Indians participate in a candle lit vigil to mourn the death of a gang rape victim in New Delhi, India , Saturday, Dec. 29, 2012. Indian police charged six men with murder on Saturday, adding to accusations that they beat and gang-raped the woman on a New Delhi bus nearly two weeks ago in a case that shocked the country. The murder charges were laid after the woman died earlier Saturday in a Singapore hospital where she has been flown for treatment. (AP Photo/Altaf Qadri)

Indians participate in a candle lit vigil as they mourn the death of a gang rape victim in New Delhi, India, Saturday, Dec. 29, 2012. Indian police charged six men with murder on Saturday, adding to accusations that they beat and gang-raped the woman on a New Delhi bus nearly two weeks ago in a case that shocked the country. The murder charges were laid after the woman died earlier Saturday in a Singapore hospital where she has been flown for treatment. (AP Photo/Altaf Qadri)

(AP) ? The body of a young woman who was gang-raped and brutally beaten on a moving bus in India's capital has been cremated.

Indian police have charged six men with murder in the Dec. 16 attack, which shocked the country and triggered protests for greater protection for women from sexual violence.

The murder charges were laid Saturday, hours after the woman died in a Singapore hospital, where she had been flown for treatment.

Her body was cremated in a private ceremony Sunday in New Delhi soon after its arrival from Singapore on a special Air-India flight.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Sonia Gandhi, head of the ruling Congress party, were at the airport to receive the body and meet family members of the victim who had also arrived on the flight.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/3d281c11a96b4ad082fe88aa0db04305/Article_2012-12-30-Singapore-India-Gang%20Rape/id-be4401b1f818445c90c00902d9e1da0f

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Art Insurance Losses from Hurricane Sandy May Reach $500 Million ...

Two months after Hurricane Sandy caused severe flooding in many Chelsea galleries, the bill for the art world?s recovery is shaping up to be hefty. By mid-November, AXA Art Insurance, one of the largest art insurers, estimated that it would be paying out $40 million, and a Reuters report last week quoted industry estimates suggesting that insurance losses for flooded galleries and ruined art may come to as much as $500 million ? or the rough equivalent of what the art insurance business takes in each year. That would amount to the largest loss the art world and its insurers have ever sustained.

Included in this half-billion-dollar total, Reuters reported, is a claim for losses sustained on work by the pop artist Peter Max, whose works on paper are said to have been stored in a warehouse that was flooded. Reuters, quoting unnamed sources, put the claim on Mr. Max?s work at $300 million (although Mr. Max?s Web site, unlike those of many other artists affected by Sandy, made no mention of storm-related losses as of Friday). A message left for the representative listed on Mr. Max?s Web site was not returned on Friday.

In a telephone interview on Friday, Filippo Guerrini-Maraldi, the executive director of fine art at R.K. Harrison, a London-based insurance broker whose clients include several Chelsea galleries, said that the industry-wide figure ? which he estimated at between $400 million and $500 million ? covered the physical damage to the galleries themselves as well as art losses.

?Chelsea got hit hard,? Mr. Guerrini-Maraldi said, ?and there were other consequential losses. Because many of the galleries lacked power for a while, and because it then got cold in New York, things that needed to be in a controlled environment were affected. Works on wood, for example ? we?re seeing those kinds of claims.?

The scope of the claims could have other ramifications for art dealers and insurers, including higher insurance rates. Mr. Guerrini-Maraldi guessed that the rate increases could be as much as 5 to 10 percent, reversing recent rate reductions caused by competition and rate wars in the art insurance business.

?A lot of underwriters have felt that art insurance was a good business to be writing,? Mr. Guerrini-Maraldi said, ?because it?s profitable, and because losses are rare ? although when they do happen, they can be big. Already, we?re seeing that cost reductions are out. People are holding their prices firm, and I?m convinced that we will see a rise in the coming months.?

Meanwhile, a recent visit to Chelsea suggested that gallery owners? initial estimates that the area would be fully back in business by mid-December were overly optimistic. While some street-level galleries were up and running, others were shuttered, and at several, signs posted on their doors said that only authorized workers could enter. Construction crews and gallery staff could be seen through the windows, working on walls and shelving, with no art in sight.

Source: http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/12/28/art-insurance-losses-from-hurricane-sandy-may-reach-500000-million/

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Language Log ? Innovation, rules, and regulation

« Literary moist aversion | Human behavior is behind so much of what we do in our lives » -->

? previous post | next post ?

John McIntyre, "I said pound sand, sticklers", 12/27/2012:

Yesterday I sent out this tweet: "Just waved through a singular 'they.' Pound sand, sticklers."

The singular they was in a sentence on The Sun's editorial page: "Although experts say only a tiny proportion of seriously mentally ill people ever resort to acts of violence, the odds of someone doing so are greatly increased if they aren't in treatment or refuse to stay in it."


John goes on to observe that the argument over singular they is "a typical liberal/conservative divide, of the kind common in disputes over usage":

The lefty is all enthusiastic about some novelty, and the righty resists until the novelty either drops off or becomes established. It's an evolutionary view of the operation of language.

But in this case the polarities are reversed. [I am] arguing for a long-established usage in English, and the sticklers are holding fast to a rule that is a relative novelty.

I made a similar argument in "Regardless whether Prudes will sneer", 12/10/2012:

[M]any people seem to believe that opinions about linguistic usage reflect attitudes towards innovation. ?The story goes like this: A new word, a new form, or a new construction is invented; at first, most people reject the innovation and deprecate the innovators; but the innovation spreads all the same; eventually it becomes normal and accepted, and no one even remembers that there was a problem. While this process is underway, one side supports tradition, insists on standards, and mutters about Kids Today; the other side supports innovation, points out that many of the Best People Are Doing It, and mutters about peevish old snoots.

Historical processes of that kind certainly do happen [?]. But overall, as an explanation of attitudes towards linguistic variation, this story is a failure. Usage peeving, though usually claiming to protect traditional usage, in fact aims to eliminate older forms at least as often as it tries to hold the line against newer ones.

And the insistence on regulation by prescriptive "rules", in whatever relationship to the direction of linguistic history, is another interesting inversion of the standard political metaphors as applied to matters of usage. Consider this passage from Friedrich Hayek,? Law, Legislation and Liberty, Volume 1: Rules and Order, p. 10-11:

[Constructivist rationalism] produced a renewed propensity to ascribe the origin of all institutions of culture to invention or design. Morals, religion and law, language and writing, money and the market, were thought of as having been deliberately constructed by somebody, or at least as owing whatever perfection they possessed to such design. .?.?.

Yet .?.?. [m]any of the institutions of society which are indispensible conditions for the successful pursuit of our conscious aims are in fact the result of customs, habits or practices which have been neither invented nor are observed with any such purpose in view. .?.?.

Man .?.?. is successful not because he knows why he ought to observe the rules which he does observe, or is even capable of stating all these rules in words, but because his thinking and acting are governed by rules which have by a process of selection been evolved in the society in which he lives, and which are thus the product of the experience of generations.

It would be hard to find a better statement of the descriptivist attitude towards linguistic norms.

But Hayek is using a general discussion of "all institutions of culture" to argue for a libertarian approach to economic and social policy, avoiding central planning and minimizing coercive regulatory intervention. Hayek was "one of Ronald Reagan's favorite thinkers" and an important influence on Margaret Thatcher ??I think it's fair to associate these attitudes with the right-hand side of the political spectrum over the past half-century or so.

Projecting political, social, and cultural philosophies onto a single dimension necessarily yields odd juxtapositions. ?But if we insist on doing it, we should try to be clear about the process and the results. Today, most people who know what the words mean would align "descriptivism" and "prescriptivism" as left and right respectively, I suppose because they associate the elitist and authoritarian aspects of prescriptivism with the political right. But the right has no monopoly on class-consciousness or on coercion. And in this case, I feel that the natural projection falls in the opposite direction.

For more on this, see:

"Authoritarian rationalism is not conservatism", 12/11/2007
"The non-existence of Kilpatrick's Rule", 12/14/2007
"James Kilpatrick, Linguistic Socialist", 3/28/2008
"Querkopf von Klubstick returns", 6/10/2008
"Peever politics", 11/20?/2011
"Rules and 'rules'", 5/11/2012
"Bottum's plea", 7/16/2012

Update ? Given some of the comments, I should amplify my remark about sociopolitical dimensionality reduction. In addition to the "Nolan Chart" dimensions of personal freedom and economic freedom, there are dimensions of tradition/innovation, elite/demotic, rational/mystical, and so on. (And of course, every coordinate system for this space carries debatable descriptive and evaluative assumptions.) ?If you insist on somehow projecting everything onto a single "left/right" dimension, there is certain to be lots of confusion and little enlightenment.

My main goal here is to get (some) people to think in a fresh way about what sort of "rules" linguistic norms really are.

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Source: http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=4390

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