Property taxes are lower right now than they were in December 2010 on a median-valued home in Wisconsin.
For a while there, Gov.Scott Walkerwas coyabout whether he would run for a third four-year term in 2018. But now hisintentions are all but official, and he is repeatedly sounding themes that could show up as part of his campaign platform. On May 18, 2017, Walkerwas interviewedby Jeff Wagner, a conservative talk show host on WTMJ-AM in Milwaukee. Wagner opened by asking about one of the governors favorite topics: property tax reform. Walker responded by declaring that property taxes on a median-value home are lower right now than they were in December 2010, the month before he took office. Hes correct, though theres a caveat. Prior fact checks Theres no question property taxes, though they might increase for some individual property owners and decrease for others, have generally been on the decline since Walker took office and his fellow Republicans took control of the Legislature in 2011. In 2015,we rated Mostly Truea Walker claim that because of his actions, property taxes were lower than they were four years earlier. Walkers actions to limit the ability of local governments and school districts to raise levies played a major role. But the lower property taxes to that point were also due in part to declines in housing values. In January 2017, when Walker said that property taxes -- as a percentage of personal income -- were the lowest that they've been since the end of World War II,our rating was True. An analysis by the nonpartisan Wisconsin Taxpayers Alliance showed that on the measure Walker cited, they were lowest since 1946. And on ourWalk-O-Meter, which tracks Walkers campaign promises, weverated In the Workshis pledge to cut property taxes so that the levy on a typical home in 2018 is lower than it was in 2010. Current claim Walkers new claim refers to a specific measure -- an estimate of the hypothetical property tax on a median-valued, or typical, Wisconsin home. The estimates are done by the nonpartisan state Legislative Fiscal Bureau. That tax was $2,963 for 2010-11, just before Walker took office; and its $2,832 for 2017-18. 2010-11 2011-12 2012-13 2013-14 2014-15 2015-16 2016-17 2017-18 2018-19 $2,963 $2,953 $2,943 $2,926 $2,831 $2,849 $2,852 $2,832 $2,831 A caveat Todd Berry, president of the Wisconsin Taxpayers Alliance, told us its important to note that levies -- the total property taxes collected -- have risen in each year but one during Walkers tenure, even though the the tax on a median-valued home is lower than before he took office. The reason is that compared to commercial and manufacturing properties, residential values have lagged. As a result, more of the property tax burden has shifted to commercial and manufacturing and away from residential, Berry said. Our rating Walker says property taxes are lower right now than they were in December 2010 on a median-valued home in Wisconsin. Estimates done regularly by the nonpartisan Legislative Fiscal Bureau show that the hypothetical property tax bill on a typical Wisconsin home is $2,832 for 2017-18 -- $131 lower than the year before Walker took office. But its worth noting that the total amount of property taxes collected have risen in each year but one during Walkers tenure. And that the drop in residential property taxes is due to commercial and manufacturing properties rising at a faster rate -- not due to collecting less taxes. For a statement that is accurate but needs additional information, our rating is Mostly True.
A Once in a Lifetime Photo of a forest fire in Bitterroot Forest/Montana This awsome picture was taken in the Bitterroot National Forest in Montana on August 6, 2000 by a fire behavior analyst from Fairbanks, Alaska by the name of John McColgan with a Digital camera. Since he was working while he took the picture, he cannot sell or profit from it so he should at least be recognized as the photographer of this once in a lifetime shot.  The year 2000 brought one of the worst fire seasons in half a century to the United States. By the month of August, more than 4 million acres (an area greater in size than the states of Connecticut and Rhode Island combined) had been burned by wildfires, and dozens of blazes raged out of control in eleven western states, with nearly half of the conflagrations occurring in Idaho and Montana. On 6 August 2000, as several fires converged in the Bitterroot National Forest near the town of Sula in western Montana, John McColgan, a fire behavior analyst in the employ of the USDA Forest Service, snapped the spectacular photograph shown above with a digital camera and described the experience to a writer for the western Montana newspaper The Missoulian: Bitterroot Forest Service "That's a once-in-a-lifetime look there. I just happened to be in the right place at the right time. I've been doing this for 20 years and it ranks in the top three days of fire behavior I've seen." The day was Aug. 6, the Sunday when several forest fires converged near Sula into a firestorm that overran 100,000 acres and destroyed 10 homes. Temperatures in the flame front were estimated at more than 800 degrees. Nevertheless, McColgan said, the wildlife appeared to be taking the crisis in stride, gathering near the East Fork of the Bitterroot River where it crosses under U.S. Highway 93. "They know where to go, where their safe zones are," McColgan said. "A lot of wildlife did get driven down there to the river. There were some bighorn sheep there. A small deer was standing right underneath me, under the bridge." McColgan snapped the photo with a Kodak DC280 digital camera. Since he was working as a Forest Service firefighter, the shot is public property and cannot be sold or used for commercial purposes. After McColgan downloaded his amazing image to an office computer, a friend found it, e-mailed a copy to another friend, and by mid-September 2000 the picture was blazing its way across the Internet. Because many forwarded copies of the image lacked any attribution or explanation, e-mail recipients began to circulate rumors about its origins and authenticity  some claimed that the photo was snapped by a tourist, that it was taken during the extensive Yellowstone National Park fire of 1988, or that it was yet another digital fake. fire As John McColgan said afterwards, "I couldn't have profited from [the photograph], so I guess I'm glad so many people are enjoying it." We're happy to help him at least receive proper credit for his work. This picture has also been circulated with text identifying it as a photograph of August 2003 forest fires in British Columbia, of October 2007 California wildfires, of the June 2012 Waldo Canyon Fire in Colorado Springs, Colorado, and the November 2016 forest fires in Gatlinburg, Tennessee. Chaney, Rob.  "Mystery Solved: Forest Service Firefighter Captured Tragedy with Digital Camera."
  The Missoulian.  15 September 2000. CNN.com.  "Montana Homes Threatened by Wildfires."
  7 August 2000. Claim:  Marco Polo said: "The militant Muslim is the person who beheads the infidel, while the moderate Muslim holds the feet of the victim."  Example:  [Collected via e-mail, January 2015] A quote attributed to Marco Polo.  Marco Polo, a Venetian merchant whose travels are recorded in the Book of the Marvels of the World, was the first to leave a detailed chronicle of his travel experience through Central Asia and China. "The militant Muslim is the person who beheads the infidel, while the moderate Muslim holds the feet of the victim." Is this accurate and attributed to Polo? Origins:  The Book of the Marvels of the World, more commonly known in English as The Travels of Marco Polo, is a travelogue compiled in the 13th century by Rustichello da Pisa.  The work was based on accounts told to da Pisa by Venetian merchant traveler Marco Polo when the two men were imprisoned together in Genoa and comprises tales of Polo's world travels and his experiences at the court of Kublai Khan.  The  Book of the Marvels of the World includes descriptions of a number of different cultures and comments about the religion of Islam, but neither Marco Polo nor the compiler of his travel tales wrote a "militant Muslim is the person who beheads the infidel, while the moderate Muslim holds the feet of the victim." The referenced quote has been circulating on the Internet for several years and seems to have originated in an article titled "The Alien Concept of Free Speech" published on a web site called Islamic Scriptures Unveiled.  That article offered up several quotes from "great thinkers" about Islam, including the phrase that has since been attributed to Marco Polo. But credit for that quotation was given to a professor of philosophy named Dr. M. Sabieski, not the famous Venetian traveler.  originated It's uncertain when Marco Polo's name became incorrectly attached to the "militant Muslim" quote, but it probably started after the Islam Watch web site reproduced the quotes used in the "Alien Concepts of Free Speech" article in August 2008. Islam Watch changed the order of many of the quotes and placed Marco Polo's name below the words originally attributed to Sabieski: reproduced  These quotes have subsequently been copied and pasted to various blogs over the years, and somewhere along the line Dr. M. Sabieski's name was elided.  An e-mail circulated in January 2015 under the title "Marco Polo Got It Right" included the quote superimposed over an image of Marco Polo: Marco Polo got it right. Marco Polo, a Venetian merchant whose travels are recorded in the Book of the Marvels of the World, was the first to leave a detailed chronicle of his travel experience through Central Asia and China.  There is no mention of "moderate" or "militant" Muslims in Book of the Marvels of the World. Marco Polo's name apparently became attached to the quotation now credited to him only because his name appeared in close proximity to the statement when it was reproduced online in 2008.  So that's the end of that, right? Well, the origins of the quote are still something a mystery, as no reliable information about Dr. M. Sabieski, the professor of philosophy who was originally credited for these words, is currently available. Last updated:  23 January 2015 Claim:  Terrorists are planning to strike the U.S. on 11 June 2004. Status:  False. Example:  [Collected on the Internet, 2004] PLEASE STOP WHAT YOU ARE DOING AND READ THIS. WHO KNOWS WHETHER OR NOT IT IS TRUE, BUT IT IS NOT WORTH TESTING OUT. PLEASE FORWARD THIS TO EVERYONE YOU KNOW. IT WILL TAKE FIVE MINUTES OF YOUR TIME AND HAS THE POTENTIAL TO IMPACT PEOPLE'S LIVES FOREVER! THANKS!! Please read the below that was forwarded...it is pretty scary. gloria sent this to me...this was sent to her from a coworker at CNN...i'm not sending this to freak everybody out...but just try to be careful... Hi all I hope everyone is doing well. The reason I am sending out this mass email to everyone is because of something that was brought to my attention the other day that I feel I need to tell as many people aspossible in case it turns out to be true.. One of my colleagues has a good family friend who works in city hall. This friend called my coworker on Friday to tell him about some intelligence the city has gotten regarding a possible terror attack in the city (most likely the subways) planned for this Friday and urged him to avoid the subways if possible. He also told him something about the city placing an order for 2 to 3 thousand extra body bags. Now you have to take these things with a grain of salt because I am sure they get tons of this intelligence that turns out to be nothing. However there are some things that coinside with this Friday that seem to give it a higher probability than usual. The terrorists attacked the WTC on 9/11. They attacked Spain's subways on 3/11. This Friday just happens to be 6/11 (thank GOD I'll be on a plane that day!). Whether that means anything or not who knows. The thing that really has me concerned however is that all of a sudden a lot of things are now closed on Friday due to Reagan's death. The stock market, banks, Mail and all federal buildings are closed. Obviously Reagan's death wasn't planned but the fact they chose Friday as the day to do this big honoring of him strikes me as a little to coincidental (less people going to work = less people on the subway). The question that I get most when I tell people about this is why wouldn't they go on TV and warn people. Well I think the answer to that is simple....they can't.  They would cause mass hysteria and the city would be out of control. Take this information and do with it what you want. I just felt the need to tell as many people as I could. God forbid something does happen this Friday and some people get hurt or die that I know and could have warned about it and didn't, well that would be a tough pill for me to swallow. I hope all this is bull and nothing happens this Friday or anyday for that matter. One thing is for certain though if I have to work on Friday I am taking a cab. Origins:  There's an old joke I've heard used by many a person called upon to deliver yet another generic opening speech at yet another public function, and it goes like this: "I feel like Zsa Zsa Gabor's seventh husband on his wedding night  I know what I'm supposed to do; I just don't know how to make it interesting."  This is an occasion when I can understand the sentiment  how can I write about the umpteenth variation of the same rumor and have anything interesting or informative to say, something that isn't a rehash of stuff I've written several times before?  I'm not sure, so in this case I'm not going to try.  I'll just reiterate the same points we've made elsewhere many times over the last three years:  The "extra body bags have been ordered" claim is a detail that shows up in rumor after rumor about upcoming disasters (usually ones about which the government is supposedly keeping quiet because they "don't want to cause a panic"), as it's a simple yet effective way of creating a striking visual image of death in the minds of readers.  (References to images such hospitals, ambulances, stretchers, and medics are similarly chilling, but they all allow for the possibility of survival, while a body bag signifies nothing other than the finality of death.) If a city government were really ramping up for a terrorist attack, there would be plenty of signs an insider might notice other than an order for "extra body bags": emergency personnel (police, firefighters, EMTs) being put on alert and scheduled for additional shifts, the implementation of extra security equipment and procedures, preparations to limit or close traffic to certain locations, stocking of emergency supplies (food, water, medical kits), maybe even requests to mobilize National Guard or federal troops.  Why is it that the one and only tangible piece of information these anonymous informants ever seem to have is that someone is stocking up on body bags?  Since the September 11 terrorist attacks, the government has warned us on several occasions about the heightened possibility of additional attacks, even when they had no specific information about when or where those attacks might occur.  That they would say nothing to the public when they did have specific information about the date and location of a possible attack makes no sense, but (as always) anonymous rumormongers conveniently explain away that incongruity by maintaining the government is keeping mum because to do otherwise might cause "mass hysteria." Is there a better recipe for "mass hysteria" than allowing a foreseeable attack to proceed against a completely unprepared and unwarned populace?  It serves no real purpose for terrorists to plan their attacks to fit into recognizable patterns. They might choose a date with symbolic importance (e.g., attacking the U.S. on the 4th of July would send a powerful symbolic message), but planning to strike on particular days simply because the dates make tidy numerical patterns is contrary to their purposes. They want to maximize their chances of success by attacking at times when their plans are least likely to be anticipated, and coordinating their strikes to fit easily recognized patterns is a pointless and poor way of accomplishing their goals.  As noted, President Reagan's death on 5 June 2004 was obviously not a scheduled event, and declaring the day of his funeral (11 June) to be a federal holiday wouldn't stop people from being killed in the event of a terrorist attack.  (The most common version of this message doesn't even identify a city by name  some readers assume it refers to New York, others to Washington, D.C.) Sure, fewer people might be out and about on a federal holiday, but there are plenty of people who aren't employed by the federal government (or financial institutions) and would still have to go to work that day, not to mention all the people in the city who use public transportation even on their days off.  Risking the deaths of, say, 20,000 people in order to avoid alarming 200,000 doesn't sound like much of a worthwhile trade-off. The New York Police Department has denied this rumor while (questionably) identifying it as a "part of a computer virus": denied THE NEW YORK CITY POLICE DEPARTMENT HAS RECEIVED NO CREDIBLE THREAT INFORMATION CONCERNING A WIDELY-CIRCULATED EMAIL MESSAGE THAT DISCUSSES A PURPORTED SUBWAY ATTACK ALLEGEDLY PLANNED FOR FRIDAY, JUNE 11TH. IN ADDITION, THE EMAIL IS PART OF A COMPUTER VIRUS WHICH ATTACKS THE ADDRESS BOOKS OF ITS RECIPIENTS AND SPREADS BY USING THOSE ADDRESSES. COMPUTER USERS ARE REMINDED NOT TO OPEN MESSAGES OF FROM SUSPECT OR UNFAMILIAR SENDERS. (It's possible this message has been re-sent by some recipients whose PCs were already infected by viruses, but we haven't seen any evidence that the message itself was deliberately circulated as a way of spreading malevolent code.) June 11 came and went without incident; no terrorist attacks took place, and there was no news of any having been thwarted. The essence of this message was the same as countless other similar rumors we've traced since September 11: the world is a scary place, especially when you're dealing with hidden foes who might strike anywhere, at any time.  Asserting that the enemy will follow a predictable pattern allows us to regain a sense of direction, to feel that we have control of our futures, to believe that we can take active steps to avoid becoming victims rather than passively awaiting our fates.  What we fear most is the unknown, and these types of rumors provide us with the comfort of knowing something, even if that something proves to be bogus.  Whether this sort of comfort is worth the price of the false fears that usually accompany it is up to the individual to decide. Last updated:  14 March 2008    Sources:  Reuters.  "New York Police Say E-Mail on Subway Attack Is Hoax."  9 June 2004. In July 2021, as the pandemic-delayed 2020 Olympic games approached, an interesting tidbit about basketball, Lithuania, and the 1960s psychedelic rock band the Grateful Dead started to circulate on social media. A viral Reddit post claimed that "after the breakup of the USSR, the Lithuanian basketball team couldn't afford to participate in the 1992 Olympics, so the Grateful Dead funded the team's expenses and sent a box of tie-dyed outfits in Lithuania's national colours. They went on to win bronze."  claimed This post is generally accurate. The Grateful Dead really did sponsor Lithuania's men's basketball team, and they did provide the team with tie-dyed shirts bearing the country's national colors (yellow, green, and red), and a "Skullman" logo designed by Greg Speirs, which can be seen above. Our one quibble with this claim is that the band was not the team's sole source of funding. While the Grateful Dead did provide the team some financial support (one report states that the band wrote a $5,000 check), the band's main contribution was that it allowed the team to sell special Grateful Dead merchandise, which proved massively popular with fans at the 1992 Olympic Games.  "Skullman" logo Greg Speirs Here's a newspaper clipping from 1992 about the popularity of these shirts. According to Grateful Dead spokesman Dennis McNally, some 20,000 shirts sold in the first week. A third of the money raised went to the Lithuanian Olympic Committee, and the band got "nothing more than a good time."  28 Aug 1992, Fri The Times Recorder (Zanesville, Ohio) Newspapers.com  28 Aug 1992, Fri The Times Recorder (Zanesville, Ohio) Newspapers.com The Grateful Dead's connection with the Lithuanian basketball team started in 1992 when Sarunas Marciulionis, the team's star guard, and scout Donnie Nelson showed up at a garage in San Francisco to hear the band play. The team, which would be competing in its first Olympic games since the country declared independence from the Soviet Union a few years earlier, was seeking sponsors to fund their trip to Barcelona.  Here's an excerpt from an article published on NBCOlympics.com in 2012 (archived here): NBCOlympics.com On a cold and windy Bay Area winter day 20 years ago, Sarunas Marciulionis and Donnie Nelson, a starting guard and a scout, respectively, for the Golden State Warriors, knocked uncertainly on the door of a nondescript garage in San Francisco. The Grateful Dead is in here? Nelson thought to himself. Somebody said to enter, and so they did, metaphorical hats in hand, taking in the sights and, more vividly, the smells. "Well, there was a little pot going on," Nelson recalls today. "The Dead were trying out Beatles covers, doing stuff like 'Here Comes the Sun' and 'Hey Jude,' but they were just kind of working through things and sounding kind of nasally. Sarunas pulls me aside and says, 'Donnie, no way these guys are famous. They're terrible.'" Nelson shakes his head and smiles. "I always think back and wonder what it would be like if someone caught that scene today -- Sarunas in the Dead pot garage." The Dead had heard about the Marciulionis-Nelson crusade to raise money to enable Lithuania, Marciulionis's native land, to try to qualify for the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona. "You're all about liberty and freedom and, man, we're all about that, too, so we dig what you guys are doing," said Jerry Garcia, the Dead's leader. That's a paraphrase but, if you've ever heard Jerry (who died in 1995), it's pretty close. NBC reported that the band ended up writing the team a check for $5,000. More importantly, the band gave the team a license to use and sell special Olympics-Grateful Dead merchandise. These items were a major hit and helped the team raise funds that were then used to fund their participation in the 1996 Olympics.  Strong anti-Soviet reaction from the West helped force a treaty, but by the time Marciulionis decided that he wanted to field a team, the nation was nearly bankrupt. He donated some of the money from his $1.28 million Golden State contract, and, with the help of Nelson, whom he had tapped to be Lithuania's assistant coach, set out to raise the rest. Getting the Dead was a major coup. The band wrote a check for $5,000 but more importantly granted Lithuania the rights to sell a Dead t-shirt, a stoned-out psychedelic masterpiece splashed with Lithuania's national colors of green, red, and yellow and anchored by the Dead's skeleton symbol. Purely from a fund-raising perspective, sales of the t-shirt had more to do with the 1996 Olympics; it financed most of Lithuania's participation in the Atlanta Games. But the t-shirt became the hit of the '92 Games, more treasured than any of the merchandise bearing the likeness of Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson and Larry Bird, the stalwarts of the United States Dream Team. The shirt kept Lithuania in the news, told the story of its heroic struggle for freedom, its battle to get to Barcelona (it earned a spot through the European Olympic qualifier) and its quest for a medal. For many American basketball fans, the 1992 Olympics are probably remembered for the dominant play of the "Dream Team," the American Olympic team that featured superstars such as Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson, and Larry Bird. But the Lithuanian team made its mark as well. In 2012, a documentary was released entitled "The Other Dream Team," which followed Arvydas Sabonis and arnas Mariulionis on their somewhat psychedelic journey to a bronze medal.   Updated [1 September 2021]: Updated to credit designer of Skullman logo. Legend:  Woman unsuccessfully tries to gas herself to death only to discover the gas company has turned off service. Example:  [Healey & Glanvill, 1996] A social worker mate in Glasgow had to visit a woman who's been put through the mill due to the incompetent Tories' recession. The worst slump since the 1930s had decimated her life. Nothing was going right. The company she worked for had sacked her and then gone bust, so she'd had no redundancy money after sixteen years' service. Her husband had lost his well-paid job in the building trade and they'd fallen way behind on their mortgage. The house was about to be repossessed, but it had plummeted in value so they owed the building society more than it was worth. The car and furniture on HP had been taken by the bailiffs, and every letter was a final demand. Finally, the strain of living on the breadline had wrecked their marriage and her husband had left to build a new life for himself down south. It was the last straw; the poor woman had had enough, and decided to end it all. So she opened the oven, stuck her head inside and switched the gas full on. But she woke the next day with a stinking headache, to find the gas supply had been cut off. Origins:  Whenever a story sounds too pat to be true, that generally turns out to be the case  real life is rarely that neat. In this instance, a tired plotline has been resurrected to service a new theme: The Tory government of Britain so screws up this woman's life it makes it impossible for her to kill herself.  The theme of the gas having been turned off is as old as the hills, although this plot twist is usually resorted to in murder thrillers rather than suicide tales. From the 1946 book 101 Plots Used and Abused comes this description: Henry Smithers, in a rage, strikes his wife and kills her. In a panic, he has an inspiration  why not make it appear that she had committed suicide by turning on the gas? Ah, what a great idea! Henry carries the body to the gas range, places it so that the head rests inside, turns on the gas, and, leaving the house, goes off on a "business trip." When he returns, he is arrested and charged with the crime. Unfortunately for Mr. Smithers, the gas company, carrying out an old threat, had turned off the gas shortly before the murder. This 1946 collection of overused storylines referred to this theme as "bewhiskered," and rightly so. Still, it's nice to see so old a device used for a new purpose. Barbara "gas masked" Mikkelson Sightings:  The 1977 Kinks song "Life Goes On" contains the following stanza: My bank went broke and my well ran dry.It was almost enough to contemplate suicide.I turned on the gas, but I soon realizedI hadn't settled my bill so they cut off my supply. Last updated:  18 January 2007     Sources:  Healey, Phil and Rick Glanvill.  Now! That's What I Call Urban Myths.  London: Virgin Books, 1996.  ISBN 0-86369-969-3  (p. 240). Now! That's What I Call Urban Myths   Young, James.  101 Plots Used and Abused.  Boston: The Writer, Inc., 1946  (p. 3) The introduction of new EMV (Europay, MasterCard, and Visa) technology has enhanced the security of debit and credit card transactions by replacing standard cards with ones embedded with small computer chips  thats extremely hard to counterfeit.  The addition of the chips makes the cards much harder to counterfeit and provides for additional authentication and security during point-of-sale transactions. The manner in which EMV cards are physically handled during a sales transaction is somewhat different than with older cards, however.  Rather than being swiped through a point-of-sale (POS) terminal, EMV cards are inserted (or "dipped") into the terminal and left in place for the entire transaction so that the reader and card can talk back and forth. EMV cards can be either swiped or dipped (since not all merchants are yet set up with EMV-compliant card readers), and that duality has led to some confusion among consumers about whether liability for fraudulent transactions shifts depending upon how an EMV card is processed.  Specifically, some consumers have heard rumors that swiping an EMV card rather than dipping it leaves them (rather than the merchant or card issuer) liable for any ensuing fraudulent use of the card. The issue of fraud liability has evolved with the introduction of EMV cards, but that liability has not been passed back onto cardholders.  According to CreditCards.com, that evolution solely concerns determining whether the merchant or the card issuer is the party bears liability for fraud in any given case  cardholders themselves remain protected from liability, regardless of whether their EMV cards are swiped or dipped: CreditCards.com Cardholders may be adjusting to "dipping" their chip cards instead of swiping them, but they won't have to adjust to fraud liability changes. If an authorized transaction occurs against a consumer's credit account, they will continue to be reimbursed by their card issuer for the charges per the major networks' (Visa, MasterCard, American Express and Discover) zero-liability policies. If the issuer finds that the fraud occurred at a non-EMV compliant merchant, it can request a refund for the chargeback transaction, but the consumer is not involved. Consumers will not be responsible for fraud charges that result from a merchant not being prepared to properly accept EMV cards or because their card issuer has not yet sent them a chip-embedded card. What the new rules govern is whether merchants or card issuers (i.e., banks and credit unions) are liable in cases of credit card fraud, with responsibility now falling upon whichever party was least EMV-compliant: Today, if an in-store transaction is conducted using a counterfeit, stolen or otherwise compromised card, consumer losses from that transaction fall back on the payment processor or issuing bank, depending on the card's terms and conditions. Following an Oct. 1, 2015 deadline created by major U.S. credit card issuers MasterCard, Visa, Discover and American Express, the liability for card-present fraud shifted to whichever party is the least EMV-compliant in a fraudulent transaction. Consider the example of a financial institution that issues a chip card used at a merchant that has not changed its system to accept chip technology. This allows a counterfeit card to be successfully used. "The cost of the fraud will fall back on the merchant," [chip card service company president Martin] Ferenczi says. The change is intended to help bring the entire payment industry on board with EMV by encouraging compliance to avoid liability costs. A separate article on that web site illustrated the liability shifts with a chart: illustrated  Many consumers have noticed that although some merchants have seemingly upgraded to EMV-compliant POS terminals, the card slots on those terminals are puzzlingly non-operational (and thus require that customers swipe their chipped cards).  As the New York Times noted  in March 2016, that situation is the result of merchants' having to wait for certification of their terminals: noted  Avi Kaner, a co-owner of the Morton Williams supermarket chain in New York, has spent about $700,000 to update the payment terminals at his stores. Trouble is, he cannot turn them on. The new terminals can accept credit and debit cards with embedded digital chips, a security feature intended to reduce the number of fraudulent purchases. But before the payment systems can work, they must be certified, a process that Mr. Kaner and many retailers around the country are waiting to happen. In the case of Morton Williams, the holdup has lasted several months. The cost of waiting, retailers say, is piling up. Until recently, banks covered much of the cost of fraudulent purchases. Since Oct. 1, though, merchants that cannot accept chip cards have had to shoulder the cost of fraud, and banks have not been shy about passing along the bill. For years, retailers have argued that the technology, commonly referred to as E.M.V., which stands for Europay, MasterCard and Visa, the technologys early advocates, mainly protected banks. Mr. Peterson estimated that only 40 to 50 percent of retailers are capable of accepting chip cards. Kaner told the newspaper he believed consumers were taking advantage of the interim period to file suspicious chargebacks due to the shift in liability: Mr. Kaner worries that some customers may be using the Oct. 1 liability shift to get out of paying for legitimate purchases. The number of chargebacks, he said, has risen sharply. It started out as a trickle, and now its turning into a flood, he said. In the first couple months, it might have been a few hundred dollars a month. Now, its thousands a month. Terry Crowley, CEO of processor TranSend, told KrebsonSecurity that consumer dishonesty was a larger issue than consumer liability during the transition period: told Crowley predicts that plenty of smaller merchants could soon get hit with a wave of chargebacks from unscrupulous people abusing the liability shift at merchants that still dont offer the chip dip. Theres an invisible hand at work that is about to kick everyone in the pants and accelerate U.S. dipping into EMV slots, Crowley said. If you use a chip card at a point of sale that says swipe   and you later say that wasnt me  theres very little a merchant can do to dispute that charge. Its going to happen because what people arent thinking about is the friendly fraud. When people are made aware that if I swipe and I have a chip card, that lunch can be free if Im a bad consumer. It's possible cardholders have confused information intended for merchants as being directed at them.Processor Square published a short instructional guide for the EMV card liability shift that might have caused such confusion among consumers who didn't realize the pronoun "you" referred to merchants and not cardholders: instructional guide  But, in short, consumers don't have to adjust to fraud liability changes with EMV cards.  That's an issue for merchants and card issuers to sort out between them. Abrams, Rachel.  "Chip-Card Payment System Delays Frustrate Retailers."
  The New York Times.  22 March 2016. Kossman, Sienna.  "7 Merchant Tips to Understanding EMV Fraud Liability Shift."
  CreditCards.com.  21 June 2016. Kossman, Sienna.  "8 FAQs About EMV Credit Cards."
  CreditCards.com.  17 June 2016. KrebsonSecurity.  "The Great EMV Fake-Out: No Chip for You!"
  16 February 2016. Claim:  Entering a phone number into the Google search engine can produce a home address and a map with directions to that address.   . Example:  [Collected on the Internet, 2002] Beware the New Google Feature! www.google.com Type your home telephone number into Google's search bar & click the search button . . . MapQuest returns with a physical location of your phone number. People could use this feature to locate your home address, and receive explicit directions on how to get there from anywhere in the country. You can remove your name off this database  To do this: Type in your full phone number  using dashes  like this:555-123-4567. If your number appears in the mapping database, an icon resembling a telephone will appear to left of the entry on the results page.                 Click on this icon and it will take you to a page containing a description of the service, and a link to request your number be removed! Recheck your phone # to be sure it has been removed.  Also, if you have children, please check their phone # too! This is another example of invasion of privacy, isn't it? Origins:  The gist of the message quoted above is true: Typing a phone number into the popular Google search engine can produce a display like the following: Google  Here we entered a phone number (805-495-9897) and were presented with a display showing the name and address of the person to whom that number is assigned, as well as two links (Yahoo! Maps and Mapquest) which will produce maps and driving directions for that address.  (The information we used for our display belongs to a friend who has since moved to another state, so we're not giving away anyone's valid personal information here.)  Clicking on the telephone icon will take the user to an informational page about the Google Phonebook feature, which includes a link to a form one can use to request that his personal information be removed from this feature. form As to the issue of whether this Google feature is a shocking "invasion of privacy," there are a few points to keep in mind:  This feature is not "new"  the PhoneBook service has been offered by Google for several years now.  This feature does not work for every phone number.  Some classes of phone numbers, such as unpublished phone numbers (i.e., numbers belonging to customers who have requested that their local phone service providers not publish their numbers in printed phone directories or make them available through directory assistance), will not display.  The information displayed is compiled from a number of publicly accessible sources and is not unique to Google.  There are many other web sources through which users can look up the same information.  Google has simply combined two different services readily available on a number of different web sites: reverse phone directory look-ups and mapping/driving directions services.  Even without Google, it's a simple feat for any moderately knowledgeable web user to plug a phone number into a reverse phone directory web site to find the name and address corresponding to that number, then use an on-line service such as Mapquest to obtain directions to that address. Mapquest In short, the Google PhoneBook feature may be troubling to those who value their privacy, but it's a symptom and not a cause.  The larger issue is that many entities we deal with in daily life who are privy to our personal information can make that information available to sources that compile databases which services such as Google PhoneBook use.  The public has been making privacy gains through the implementation of laws such as those requiring credit bureaus, phone companies, and motor vehicle bureaus to offer "opt-out" features which provide customers with means to restrict the distribution of their personal information, but until that larger issue is completely eliminated, trying to keep one's personal information off the web is akin to engaging in a perpetual game of "Wack-a-Mole": it provides momentary satisfaction but otherwise accomplishes little. credit bureaus phone companies motor vehicle Last updated:  21 February 2005 In closed-doorremarks to campaignsupporterson April 14, 2011, President Barack Obama looked back in frustration at lengthy negotiations with Republicans over funding to keep the federal government operating.Obama opined, as aCBS News onlinestoryreported, that he expects Republicans to continue using the budget process to enact their political agenda under the guise of cutting spending.The president singled out U.S. Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., the House Budget Committee chairman who has authored a long-term deficit-reduction plan.When Paul Ryan says his priority is to make sure, you know, he's just being America's accountant, trying to be responsible ...This is the same guy who voted for two wars that were unpaid for, voted for the Bush tax cuts that were unpaid for, voted for the prescription drug bill that cost as much as my health care bill -- but wasn't paid for, Obama told his supporters. So it's not on the level.In making the remark, Obama pointed to several big-ticket items approved during the Bush administration while Ryan was in Congress -- ones he says have helped drive the nations record deficits.Given the prominence of the protagonists and the timeliness of the comments, we decided to take a look at Obamas critique of Ryan.With the words, Obama is offering an opinion about how Ryan has framed his budget-cutting efforts. We cant fact-check the presidents opinion about Ryans message. But we can focus on the factual assertions, and try to put them into some context.We started with the White House, which declined to comment, saying the presidents remarks spoke for themselves.Lets look at the votes.There is no dispute Ryan voted forAfghanistanandIraqwarfunding; for themajor taxcutsenacted under President George W. Bush in 2001 and2003(andextended in 2010); and for the new Medicare prescription drug benefitcreated in 2003.All were big-ticket items.But Obama goes a step further to assert that all were unpaid for. Thats Washington parlance for bills not offset by corresponding spending cuts or tax increases elsewhere in the federal budget.Budget experts we consulted and the historical record confirm there were no direct offsets built into those bills.Obamas claim on the prescription drug bill was slightly different -- that it wasnt paid for and cost as much as my health care bill.Lets break this into two parts.Obama appears to refer to the gross outlays needed for the two landmark bills.For the Medicare prescription drug bill, passed in 2003 and effective in 2006, we found a range of cost estimates for 10 years: $395 billion to $720 billion. Theofficial Congressional Budget Officeestimatewas the low end.That was at the time. Now, government estimates show the original cost projections were too high, perhaps by as much as 40 percent, said Jon Gabel, senior fellow in health care research at the National Opinion Research Center.Obamas health reform bill -- thePatient Protection and Affordable Care Act-- was pricier, with estimates in the$800 billion to $1.4 trillion range. Ryan and Republicans opposed the bill.But the two measures were passed seven years apart, so inflation may be a factor.Paul Van de Water, a former Congressional Budget Office official who is now a senior fellow with the left-leaning Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, did an inflation-adjusted comparison and found the Medicare bill is probably two-thirds or three-quarters the cost of the Obama health care measure.That is, Obamas health care bill is still hundreds of millions of dollars more costly than the Medicare drug bill.So the president was off in equating the gross cost of the bills.On the offset question, the Medicare prescription drug bill, however, indisputably added to the federal deficit. It was not offset by new revenue or other spending cuts.In contrast, theofficial governmentestimateof the 2010 health care laws impact said it would actually reduce the deficit, in part because of the new taxes it enacts to help offset the cost of expanding health coverage.The source for that is the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.TheCBOs estimate is hardly undisputed-- Ryan, other Republican leaders and various budget analysts haveargued that the CBOs report was skewed by questionableassumptionsgiven to it by the Obama administration. They contend the law would actually add to the deficit.Nevertheless, we -- and Congress -- have used CBO estimates as the gold standard on such matters. So Obama has a pretty firm leg to stand on in saying his health bill was paid for while the Medicare bill was not.That covers the details behind the presidents remarks. In this case, its important to put them into their proper context. We consulted several experts and sought Ryans take.Ryan was asked in arecentinterviewabout Obamas citing the Medicare drug program, the two wars and the Bush tax cuts as major drivers of the deficit.He disagreed: We still had these enormous, building, unfunded liabilities, Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security -- I mean, the big drivers of our debt.His office sent us a defense of his votes on war funding, quotinghis budget plan: Like all categories of government spending, defense spending should be executed with greater efficiency and accountability. But responsible budgeting must never lose sight of the fact that the first responsibility of the federal government is to provide for the defense of the nation.On the Bush tax cuts, Ryan aides said the congressman believes that we have deficits because Washington spends too much, not because Americans are taxed too little. He says the tax cuts helped fuel economic growth and bring in more tax revenue.Indeed, in December, Obama himself backeda compromise with Republicans, including Ryan,that extended the Bush tax cuts.Bottom line: Ryan has voted for massive new spending and so has the president, said Tad DeHaven, a budget analyst at the libertarian Cato Institute.Iraq war costs have topped $1 trillion, said Scott Lilly, former staff director for the House Appropriations Committee and now a research fellow at the left-leaning Center for American Progress. Neither Bushs war effort in Afghanistan nor Obamas escalation there has been paid for, both analysts noted.In April, bothObamaandRyanunveiled long-term deficit reduction plans in the neighborhood of $4 trillion over a decade or more.So where does this leave us?The president cherry-picked a handful of votes in an effort to show that Ryan is not pristine on the subject of the deficit.Obama got it right on Ryans support for the big-ticket bills, including war funding, Medicare prescription drugs and the Bush tax cuts. He was also on target in saying that none was offset or paid for by spending cuts or tax increases. Thats the main part of his claim.He was off the mark in asserting that one of the bills -- Medicare prescription drugs -- was as costly as his 2010 health care reform bill.That puts him at Mostly True. In mid-March 2022, a widely circulated meme was sent to our editorial team for investigation, which we determined contains a mixture of true, false, and unproven claims. In a nutshell, the post argued that eco-friendly electric vehicles (EVs) were bad for the environment, and presented several vague, unsupported facts in an attempt to bolster the argument.  The Facebook post we received appeared to have started circulating online on March 12, 2022. The fact-checking website Lead Stories located a complete version of the post, which we have archived.  Lead Stories complete version archived   The entirety of the post is too long to share here, but we have broken out its primary claims below. For help evaluating them, we spoke with Elena Krieger, director of research at PSE Healthy Energy, a multidisciplinary research and policy institute focused on the adoption of evidence-based energy policy. entirety of the post Elena Krieger It is true that batteries store electricity produced elsewhere, but what that electricity is generated by depends on the electric grid that the battery is connected to. (For more background on this, read "Energy Storage: How It Works and Its Role in an Equitable Clean Energy Future," by the Union of Concerned Scientists.)  Energy Storage: California has specifically designed its Self-Generation Incentive Program (SGIP) to encourage charging at times when grid emissions are low, pointed out Krieger. As Jeff St. John wrote in an article for Green Tech Media, the goal of projects like SGIP are to incentivize power-producing technologies that contribute less to greenhouse gas emissions, such as solar or wind, than fossil fuels do. There are controversies with the technology, such as concerns that natural-gas-fueled generators used werent reducing the consumption of fossil fuels. SGIP encourage charging Green Tech Media Battery facilities also allow for power from renewable sources to be produced when the wind is blowing windmills or the sun is shining on solar panels before being stored for later use during times of high consumption. allow An electric vehicle has zero tailpipe emissions, noted Krieger. However, emissions from both greenhouse gases and health-damaging air pollutants throughout the course of the vehicles use depend on how and where the vehicle is produced, what electricity is used to charge the vehicle, and how the vehicle is disposed of. Union of Concerned Scientists analyzed data from 2018 and affirmed that EVs produce significantly fewer emissions than gasoline: affirmed Based on where EVs have been sold, driving the average EV produces global warming pollution equal to a gasoline vehicle that gets 88 miles per gallon (mpg) fuel economy. Thats significantly better than the most efficient gasoline car (58 mpg) and far cleaner than the average new gasoline car (31 mpg) or truck (21 mpg) sold in the US. And our estimate for EV emissions is almost 10 percent lower than our previous estimate two years ago. Now 94 percent of people in the US live where driving an EV produces less emissions than using a 50 mpg gasoline car. almost 10 percent lower than our previous estimate two years ago Data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EPA) show that 22% of electricity generated in the U.S. was from coal plants in 2021, up from 19% the year before, so the first part of this statement is incorrect, explained Krieger. Data The second part implies that the generation is proportional to vehicle charging. This assumption may be invalid for two reasons: 1) EV adoption is very high in places like California, which has minimal coal in its power mix, and 2) it depends on when the vehicles are charged, and which power plants dominate at the time the vehicles are charged. It is true that there are rechargeable and single-use batteries, both of which contain toxic materials of varying degrees. No technology is zero impact, but some battery chemistries use fewer toxic materials than others. For example, Tesla is phasing out cobalt from its batteries, albeit likely due to outside pressure, because cobalt is often mined by children in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). More on that below, explained Krieger.  phasing out It is estimated that more than 70% of the worlds cobalt is produced in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). Foreign-owned firms, primarily Chinese, account for about 60% of global cobalt demand to be used in the rechargeable battery industry to be used in cars and electronic devices. Cobalt mining does come with environmental complications that may outweigh its use in rechargeable electronics. The nonpartisan research group Wilson Center reports that quick cobalt extraction contributes to global warming, while mining operations generate incredibly high carbon dioxide and nitrogen dioxide emissions, both of which can contribute to the greenhouse effect. 60% of global cobalt reports contribute to the greenhouse effect Human rights groups have documented severe human rights issues in mining operations, according to the Council on Foreign Relations. It is estimated that of the 255,000 Congolese mining for cobalt, 40,000 are children. Council on Foreign Relations estimated Cobalt increases battery life and has been a popular choice for EV batteries, but the U.S. Geological Survey notes that the mineral is also used in a plethora of other goods, including airbags, petroleum and chemical industries, paints, varnishes, dyes, and magnets, among many other goods and processes.  popular choice notes Snopes spoke with Brandon Baxley, an LA-based engineer and physicists, who said that Einsteins formula is not the best concept to apply in this case.  Einsteins formula is more about how much total possible energy can be extracted from mass like, for example, in a nuclear explosion. It isnt relevant to something like this, said Baxley. If [the original poster] is referencing Einsteins formula, that means they arent entirely clear on the physics of the theory.  However, that doesnt mean the argument is entirely incorrect. Baxley noted that in this case, the theory of kinetic energy is a more appropriate concept. This follows that it would take the same amount of energy to move two vehicles of equal weight regardless of whether they are powered by gas or electricity  Over the last four decades, the average weight of a vehicle in the U.S. has increased from about 3,200 pounds to nearly 4,200 pounds for a variety of reasons, one of which is due to heavier battery packs in electric vehicles, according to a 2020 report by the EPA. Heavier vehicles require more energy to move than lower-weighted vehicles, but weight is just one component in addition to other factors like velocity and speed.  EPA I assume nickel-metal oxide is meant to refer to nickel-metal hydride, which is common in older Priuses. Nickel-cadmium batteries were common for small electronics but aren't used in cars or laptops or anything and are less common now. Lead-acid batteries, such as those used to start most cars, are also rechargeable. Nearly all lead-acid batteries are recycled, although it's worth noting these facilities aren't always safely managed, explained Kireger. Nearly all See, for example, the Excide plant in LA that was polluting a largely low-income Latino community for decades. Lithium-ion batteries are currently recycled at a low rate, largely because it is cheaper to make new batteries than recycle old ones, although there are a lot of start-ups working in this space (e.g. Redwood Materials, founded by former Tesla CTO). This is an area that needs additional funding, research, and regulations. polluting Redwood Materials Krieger explained that many batteries self-discharge at some rate (some higher than others), meaning that if a battery is left unused for a long period of time, it will likely have a lower state of charge over time. She furthered:  The "ruined flashlight" sounds like some kind of side-reaction occurred over time, likely producing materials that put stress on the battery and caused it to rupture, leaking out battery acid that damaged the surrounding casement. In terms of batteries being "run down," typically a battery is considered "dead" when it hits some threshold where the voltage of the battery drops below a certain level. The poster is correct that you could theoretically drain a battery even more if you hooked it up to a circuit. The battery isn't exactly "leaking" electricity to the outside. It is likely undergoing additional electrochemical reactions that, ideally, wouldn't occur. I think what typically comes out is the electrolyte, not the electrode materials, since the electrolyte is more likely to be a liquid. You certainly shouldn't touch the electrolyte. It's often acidic. In Oakland, at least, you're not supposed to throw batteries in trash; you're supposed to put them in a separate bag on your trash can so that the hazardous waste can be managed properly and not just thrown in a landfill. I do agree that you shouldn't just throw a lithium-ion battery in a landfill. Ideally, we learn low-energy and cost-effective ways to recycle them all. Lead-acid batteries, as noted, are usually recycled, and I think that is promising for our ability to manage the future lithium-ion battery waste stream.  Getty Images  This point is part of the continued debate over whether renewable energies like solar panels and wind turbines can be considered green as they require extractive resources to build, many of which can be harmful to human health.  debate  solar panels Silicon derived from quartz is the primary material used in the production of solar cells, a process that produces greenhouse gas emissions and requires manufacturers to handle toxic chemicals. Solar panels can also be sourced and made from a variety of materials, including silicon-based panels, gallium arsenide, cadmium-telluride (often referred to as "thin film", etc.  primary material These aren't usually all made at once (except in relatively rare multi-junction cells); instead, most manufacturers make silicon cells, and some others use other semiconductors such as cadmium telluride. Some parts of these are recycled, some aren't. The production process, like any materials processing, does need to be conducted in a way that protects environmental and human health, said Kreiger.  recycled The EPA notes that many of the materials are easily recyclable, including glass (about 75% of a solar panel), the aluminum frame, copper wire, and plastic junction box. Toxic chemicals, including cadmium, may also be present in solar panels that can make recycling more difficult. Even so, at least one U.S. manufacturer runs dedicated recycling facilities that recover semiconductor material like cadmium and tellurium.  notes The cited windmill is also slightly off and depends on the size and model the a turbine in question. For example, the Haliade-X turbine, which is among the largest in production, caps out to just over 900 tons. Wind turbines last an average of 25 years and about 85% of component materials  including steel, copper wire, electronics, and gearing  can be recycled, according to an article published by the Union of Concerned Scientists. As of this writing, it is true that used blades cannot be recycled. It is also true that windmills are energy intensive and that the blades are largely not recyclable. As we have previously reported, some windmills may not recoup their energy-construction costs, but it is untrue to say that no windmills will generate as much energy as was invested in building them. In some cases, a well-situated windmill could pay back the energy costs in under three years.  Haliade-X turbine 900 tons article cannot be recycled blades are largely not recyclable may not recoup their energy-construction costs generate well-situated windmill The question is: how long must a windmill generate energy before it creates more energy than it took to build it? At a good wind site, the energy payback day could be in three years or less; in a poor location, energy payback may be never, wrote earth scientist David Hughes in his 2009 book, Carbon Shift: How Peak Oil and the Climate Crisis Will Change Canada (and Our Lives).  Data in the meme appears to be quoted from the Tesla website (900 pounds, 6,831 cells; this is old and likely varies by model). As Krieger notes, its difficult to generalize the weight and amount of materials in any given EV as each manufacturer uses a different chemistry and the chemistries are constantly changing. website A 2021 article published in Nature suggested that many EV batteries contain eight kilograms of lithium, 35 kilograms of nickel, 20 kilograms of manganese, and 14 kilograms of cobalt  but many companies are moving away from cobalt or advancing various technologies and the usage of certain materials. Nature  An aerial view of Moss Landing in California with the power plant pictured in the center. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Digital Visual Library  U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Digital Visual Library It appears that the original poster is referencing the Moss Landing battery project that replaced an old gas plant. Currently, it measures 400 megawatts, and operators are considering doubling it. Exactly what that expansion looks like remains to be determined.  battery project that While some of the power charging this facility might come from solar and wind, there's no guarantee it will do so. It just charges and discharges from the grid. It might charge more with solar, since we're starting to see a surplus in the middle of the day, and it might help integrate wind power, and it might do other things like help limit the need for gas plants to ramp up quickly to meet the evening peak, explained Krieger. In short, the post claiming that EVs are no better for the environment than other energy sources is a form of copypasta in which social media users copy and paste content without verifying the claims made within it. A look through social media confirmed that the uncited facts had been reposted numerous times. While there are elements of truth to the post, it largely overgeneralizes the science behind batteries and EVs and does not list sources to verify the claims. As such, we have rated this claim as a Mixture.  copypasta A Bit About Batteries. 30 Nov. 2006, https://www.tesla.com/pt_PT/blog/bit-about-batteries. Are Electric Vehicles Really Better for the Climate? Yes. Heres Why. The Equation, 11 Feb. 2020, https://blog.ucsusa.org/dave-reichmuth/are-electric-vehicles-really-better-for-the-climate-yes-heres-why/. Are Solar Panels Toxic or Bad For the Environment? | EnergySage. Solar News, 1 Feb. 2018, https://news.energysage.com/solar-panels-toxic-environment/. Are Windmill Turbine Blades Buried in Wyoming Landfill? Snopes.Com, https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/wind-turbine-blades-landfills/. Accessed 28 Mar. 2022. Author: Elena Krieger, PhD. PSE | Physicians, Scientists, and Engineers for Healthy Energy, https://www.psehealthyenergy.org/about/staff/elena-krieger/. Accessed 28 Mar. 2022. Calma, Justine. Tesla to Make EV Battery Cathodes without Cobalt. 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Electricity Data Browser. https://www.eia.gov/electricity/data/browser/#/topic/0?agg=2,0,1&fuel=vtvv&geo=g&sec=g&linechart=ELEC.GEN.ALL-US-99.A~ELEC.GEN.COW-US-99.A~ELEC.GEN.NG-US-99.A~ELEC.GEN.NUC-US-99.A~ELEC.GEN.HYC-US-99.A~ELEC.GEN.WND-US-99.A~ELEC.GEN.TSN-US-99.A&columnchart=ELEC.GEN.ALL-US-99.A~ELEC.GEN.COW-US-99.A~ELEC.GEN.NG-US-99.A~ELEC.GEN.NUC-US-99.A~ELEC.GEN.HYC-US-99.A~ELEC.GEN.WND-US-99.A&map=ELEC.GEN.ALL-US-99.A&freq=A&ctype=linechart&ltype=pin&rtype=s&maptype=0&rse=0&pin=. Accessed 28 Mar. 2022. Expansion Plan to Take Worlds Biggest Battery Storage Project to 3GWh Capacity. Energy Storage News, 25 Jan. 2022, https://www.energy-storage.news/expansion-plan-to-take-worlds-biggest-battery-storage-project-to-3gwh-capacity/. Fact Check: Electric Vehicles DO Pollute -- But Engineers Are Reducing Impacts | Lead Stories. https://leadstories.com/hoax-alert/2022/03/fact-check-electric-vehicles-do-pollute-but-engineers-are-reducing-impacts.html. Accessed 28 Mar. 2022. 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At several points in his State of the Union Address, President Barack Obama noted the importance of manufacturing to the nations economy.Our first priority is making America a magnet for new jobs and manufacturing, Obama said. After shedding jobs for more than 10 years, our manufacturers have added about 500,000 jobs over the past three. Caterpillar is bringing jobs back from Japan. Ford is bringing jobs back from Mexico. After locating plants in other countries like China, Intel is opening its most advanced plant right here at home. And this year, Apple will start making Macs in America again.The claim about job numbers is an update of a line Obama included in his acceptance speech at the 2012 Democratic convention in Charlotte, N.C. We checked that one and rated itTrue.The main difference between Obamas two versions was that the timeline in the most recent claim has been extended by six months.Because of the wording of his claim, we are examining whether the numbers are right, not whether Obama's policies were instrumental. To check the numbers, we turned to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the federal governments official source for employment numbers. We used seasonally adjusted statistics for manufacturing jobs.Shedding jobs for more than 10 yearsIts not news that manufacturing jobs have been in decline in the United States in recent years, though sometimes with ups and downs. Generally, the decline has been due to broad economic shifts both inside and outside the United States, as well as changes in technology. Manufacturings share of U.S. employment was 29 percent in 1960, but it fell to just 9 percent by 2011. Even the raw numbers of manufacturing jobs fell over that period -- from 15.7 million to 11.7 million -- despite a large expansion of the overall U.S. workforce.Between March and April 1998 and December 2009 -- the decade-plus that Obama appears to be referring to -- manufacturing employment fell from 17.6 million to 11.5 million, a decline of just over one-third. So Obamas correct that manufacturing jobs had been shedding jobs for more than 10 years by the time he took office.Added about 500,000 jobs over the past three yearsDuring the period Obama chose -- from January 2010 to January 2013 -- manufacturing jobs began to rise again, by 490,000. We think that qualifies as about 500,000, as Obama put it.Its worth noting that while the reversal has been striking, this rise has still replaced only a fraction of the manufacturing jobs lost during the decade of decline. The manufacturing jobs gained during the turnaround replaced less than 10 percent of the jobs lost during the decade of decline.Our rulingThe rise in manufacturing jobs that Obama is referring to is modest compared to the prior decades decline, but he has described the numbers carefully. We rate his statement True.