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Naples, Italy is a city on the verge of bankruptcy. So what are they spending money on? They have begun to DNA-test dog feces so they can prosecute residents who do not pick up after their dogs. In a city with so many problems, especially financial, it is strange to spend money on dog droppings. Many…

Apple announced that they recovered more than 40 million dollars from their trash. The company recovered more 2,200 pounds of gold from recycled iPhones, iPads, and Macs. With gold valued at over $1,200 an ounce, the company gained over $40 million dollars from the recycling venture. Manufacturers use…

Engineers from the Colorado School of Mines have found a new way to get minerals. Rather than dig them out of the ground, the researchers are finding resources in the trash. So far, the project has been able to turn left-over banana peels, eggshells, and rice husks into crystal-clear glass. The process…

The latest survey by the American Time Use Survey shows that Americans spend an average of two hours and 46 minutes each day watching TV. It is our most frequent past time. Americans over the age of 14 also spend eight hours and 44 minutes a night sleeping 10 minutes more per night than we did a decade…

With enough money, a person can replace anything, even some of the responsibilities of parenting. Some New York City parents are now paying professionals up to $1,000 to pack their kids' summer camp gear. They fill their trunks with comforts such as French-milled soaps, 1,000 -thread-count sheets, and…

This statistic is a reminder of society’s misplaced priorities. “Households with incomes of under $13,000 a year spend an average of 9 percent of their income on lottery tickets.” That’s almost a tithe of their income thrown away. If the legitimately poor can afford to squander 9% of their income on…

According to a consultant’s report obtained by the Detroit Free Press, The Detroit Water and Sewage Department employs a horseshoer at a cost to the city of nearly $60,000 per year in salary and benefits. “According to the official job description—not updated since 1967—the DWSD horseshoer is required…

Election officials in Ohio say most of the votes in the 2012 Presidential elections were cast for the official candidates, but there were some write-in votes. In the Canton area, write-in votes were reportedly cast for actor Clint Eastwood, New York Jets backup quarterback Tim Tebow, and comedian Jon…

Even when people appear to be working hard, studies indicate that the average worker still wastes a lot of time on the job. Some of the waste comes through the use of the Internet and social media, and cell phones and text messages also take a toll. Joe Hruska is the founder and CEO of Rescuetime, a…

A new survey indicates a growing number of people are less attracted to social media sites such as Facebook. The poll conducted by Reuters and the Ipsos research firm found roughly a third of social media users are not excited about the experience, and the sentiment seems to be growing. The survey found…

Dakoda Garren used coins from a collection valued at over a hundred thousand dollars, spending them at face value, to purchase movie tickets and buy a pizza for himself and his girlfriend Elizabeth Massman. According to police, “One of the coins was a Liberty quarter worth between $1,100 and $18,500.”…

A new study conducted by the University of Queensland in Australia suggests watching a lot of television may actually shorten a person’s life. The study found for every hour a person watches television after the age of 25, the average human life span decreases 22 minutes. Researchers tracked 11,000 participants…

According to reports from the cell phone industry Americans lost nearly 30 billion dollars worth of mobile phone equipment in 2011 alone. The list of places phones were likely to disappear included coffee shops, workplaces, and restaurants. The security firm’s report concluded that the average American…

Recently the white house has dropped many regulations that “conflict, that are not worth the cost or that are just plain dumb.” “The EPA will no longer classify spilled milk at a dairy farm as an oil spill, saving $146 million.” “The Transportation Department will apply certain kinds of railroad safety…

ETERNITY David Murdock is an 87-year-old billionaire who has spent $500 million building a research campus in North Carolina to explore his conviction that they key to longer life is a low-fat diet rich in vegetables, fruit, and antioxidants. “I never have anything go wrong,” says Murdock. “Never had…

When a commercial product becomes a fad, it seems like every one wants one. It happened this way with the iPad. The tablet computer from Apple was so hot people would do almost anything to get one. A seventeen-year-old Chinese boy wanted one bad enough that he was willing to sell his right kidney in…

In the New Yorker, James Surowiecki commented on procrastination. “Each year, Americans waste hundreds of millions of dollars because they don’t file their taxes on time. American workers have forgone huge amounts of money in matching 401(k) contributions because they never got around to signing up for…

In Long Beach, California, police arrested a man for taking a photograph of “no aesthetic value.” “Sander Wolff, who takes photos for a local newspaper, was detained after snapping shots of an oil refinery.” What if authorities arrested everyone for engaging in activities of no value? Life could become…

Some things are more meaningless than others are. Australian Graham Barker has collected belly button lint for the past 26 years. He now has enough lint, pulled from his own navel, to fill three jars and tips the scales at just less than one ounce. --World, November 20, 2010, p. 69 Illustration by Jim…

Many of us struggle to make ends meet. Our thinking is, “If we could just get a better paying job or at least a raise in my current job, I would have it made.” What if you had a salary of $300,000 per year, could you make it then? The problem is not that we make so little money. The problem is that we…

At the ripe old age of 89, a year before English politician Sir Leonard Woolf died, he said, “The world today and the history of the human ant hill would be exactly the same if I had played ping pong instead of sitting on committees, writing books, and producing memoranda. I have therefore to make this…

An average football telecast lasts 174 minute, including 60 minutes of commercials. 75 minutes is the time between plays when players are huddling, and 17 minutes of the telecast are replays. There are only eleven minutes of executing plays, or about 6% of the telecast. --The Week January 29, 2010, p.…

RICHES In 1981, Lou Eisenberg had it made. The 53 year old worked in an office building changing light bulbs for $225 a week, when he hit the biggest lottery jackpot paid out at that time, $5million dollars. Instantly, Eisenberg became a celebrity making appearances on television talk shows. Many referred…

Before 2008 begin Robyn Okrant decided to see if there really was one simple path to satisfaction in life. She decided to set aside the many voices offering happiness and fulfillment and focus on the advice of one person for an entire year. Every day in 2008, Okrant focused on the advice of talk show…

Mysteries When we lived in a climate where I couldn't exercise outdoors year round, and I was a member of a health club, I used to catch myself circling the parking lot looking for a parking place close to the door. Why would I do that? I mean, if I'm about to go inside and get on a treadmill for 45…