Peter Bromberg's UnBlog

1) Only 1 Percent Of The U.S. Labor Force Earns The Minimum Wage 2) Teenagers Comprise The Single Largest Age Group Of Minimum Wage Workers 3) Most Minimum Wage Workers Are Under The Age Of 25 4) A Majority Of Those Who Earn The Minimum Wage Work In Food Preparation Or Sales 5) Less Than 5 Percent Of People Who Earn The Minimum Wage Work In Construction Or Manufacturing 6) A Majority Of Them Also Worked Less Than 30 Hours Per Week 7) Less Than One-Third Worked Full-Time 8) A Full-Time Minimum Wage Worker In 2014 Will Make 24 Percent More Than The Federal Poverty Limit 9) One-Third Of Minimum Wage Workers Either Dropped Out Of Or Never Attended High School 10) There Are Nearly Six Times More Minimum Wage Workers Today Than In 2007 11) A Change In The Minimum Wage Often Triggers Union Wage Hikes And Benefit Renegotiations In truth, there is only one way to regard a minimum wage law: it is compulsory unemployment. The law says: it is illegal, and therefore criminal, for anyone...

The best way to get over a failed relationship is to be completely honest with yourself.  The worst thing you can do is spend time imagining how things “could have been” or what “might have happened.”  The relationship failed, and that’s all there is to it. Maybe it failed because your partner wasn’t faithful, maybe your personalities just didn't "click", or maybe you both got bored with each other.  There are plenty of reasons why relationships fail. The first thing to do is give your old relationship the funeral it deserves.  This goes for a lot of things in life outside of relationships.  You have to move past the hurt feelings and the disappointment.  The better your relationship was, the worse this process may be. A lot of it also depends on how long the relationship lasted. The old adage of "well, we can just be friends"  is very difficult to make work; it's better to just make a clean break and forget everything - the sooner, the better...

When you're a divorced full-time programmer who has an autistic son living at home, you really don't have a lot of time for the dating scene. I never liked it anyway, so "no great loss", as far as I'm concerned.  In my case, I've been divorced more than 10 years and in the last year or so I've come to the realization that I'd really like to find love again and have a life - partner who wants to share the rest of her life with me. But what is left, if you are seriously "looking for love" again?  Well,there is social media (Facebook or Google+ - Twitter is out of the question) Of the two, I prefer Google+ because it gives you all the tools to meet someone in the virtual world, have private conversations, and even video hangouts. Facebook seems to have too many "fake profiles" and scams. The other alternative is dating sites such as OK Cupid or Plenty Of Fish (POF). I tried Match.com but it didn't seem to offer much more than the...

"My name is Peter, and I'm a social media addict" Have you ever run into a friend on Facebook or Google+ who posts that they "need to take a break from social media"? That their faith in humanity has hit a new low? Or that they are seeing too much intolerance, trolling, etc.? Social media has made many aspects of relationships more accessible: Viewing posts from friends scattered around the world can make you feel more connected to them, while the ubiquity of social media can often make it easier to get in touch with someone than more traditional, “offline” means. But social media also helps fuel feelings of isolation and self-doubt. A 2012 study published in the journal Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, for example, found that the longer people spent on Facebook each week, the more they agreed that everyone else was happier and had better lives. For some, that self-doubt can be countered in the same place it originates: through affirmin...

A friend posted somebody's link to a short movie about gratitude and happiness, and I instantly got the "connection" because it parallels many of the things that have been going on in my life right now. It turns out, giving thanks is good for your health. A growing body of research suggests that maintaining an attitude of gratitude can improve psychological, emotional and physical well-being. Adults who frequently feel grateful have more energy, more optimism, more social connections and more happiness than those who do not, according to studies conducted over the past decade. They're also less likely to be depressed, envious, greedy or alcoholics. They earn more money, sleep more soundly, exercise more regularly and have greater resistance to viral infections. For older children and adults, one simple way to cultivate gratitude is to literally count your blessings. Keep a journal and regularly record whatever you are grateful for that day. Be specifi...

The Danish health care system is the nightmare of any anti-government free market believer: it's a tax-funded state-run universal health care system. Denmark provides "free" health care to all residents, funded through taxes. According to OECD's Health Data, the Danish health care system delivers healthcare at roughly half the cost that Americans pay. Danish health care covers everybody - 100 percent of the population-while in the U.S. fewer than 80 percent of citizens are covered, and often only partially. But the real question is: what makes Danish health care so cheap? It's not because it's of poorer quality. According to international surveys, more than 90 percent of Danes are totally satisfied with their health care, and it uses the most advanced methods available anywhere. And per capita there are more hospital beds and doctors than in the U.S. It's mainly cheap because it's a lot simpler to manage. There are no medical insurance companies ...

In my travels through social media over the past several years, especially on Google+, I've come across a phenomenon that I've come to affectionately refer to as "MINO" - Marriage In Name Only. For whatever reason, women whom I've met on social media  have a tendency to be willing to confide in me - probably  at least in part because I actually happen to be a trustworthy person, and never, ever disclose private information that I am entrusted with to third parties. And so I end up finding out about their relationships. I wouldn't say there's a "typical" MINO; they're all a little different. One woman, a religious Baptist, confided that she hasn't been sexually attracted to her husband for over 20 years, even though she claimed that she "loves him". That's a MINO. Another woman who has a disabled child still lives with her husband but she really no longer loves him and the marriage is more or less "kaput". A...