The bill is H.R. 3548.
The House passed the bill yesterday and the President is expected to sign it today.
You should consult your tax advisor immediately, as this bill provides for immediate tax refunds on taxes that your business has paid over the immediate 5 years, instead of the the usual 2 years for the tax period 2008 OR 2009 (not both!) There are other terms regarding the fifth year that we will not get into here.
The existing law per the stimulus bill only allowed for losses incurred in 2008, the language that PMPA worked to get passed added coverage for 2009.
Thanks to all who responded to our Action Alert October 23. Your action and support of this important provision has made a difference!
Month: November 2009
The US, EU and Mexico have just (2 hours ago) jointly made a formal request to the WTO for a dispute-settlement panel to address China’s export restraints on a number of raw materials of interest to our precision machining industry. Bloomberg coverage here.
Raw materials such as
- coke ( used in steel),
- zinc (used in brass),
- bauxite (aluminum ore),
- fluorspar (steelmaking slag conditioner),
- magnesium,
- manganese (steelmaking ingredient),
- silicon metal (steelmaking deoxidizer),
- silicon carbide (desulfurizer)
These are among the materials listed in the filing. These are important (essential!) ingredients into the steel and metallic raw materials our industry consumes. We remember reading about this as an emerging concern in June in the Globe and Mail.
The economic issue is that this “resource hoarding” results in artificially lowered cost for these raw materials in China and in effect becomes a subsidy for those manufacturing operations that China deems “strategic.” While at the same time making these materials more difficult (and Expensive) to obtain for non Chinese companies.
“Peace” according to Ambrose Bierce, in The Devil’s Dictionary, “in international affairs is a period of cheating between two periods of fighting.” I think that this is a particularly useful perspective in this situation.
“Diplomacy,” according to my 8th grade History teacher, Mrs. Abernathy, “is war by other means.”
Our industry, the EU, Mexico, and the United States- all of us are certainly looking forward to some diplomatic success.
The panel is expected to be convened Nov. 19th.
Steel loading Photo via Globe and Mail originally Shanghai Reuters.
Earth photo credit: NASA.
Put this subject on your watch list…
This act charges the EEOC with issuing finalized regulations by November 21, 2009.
These regulations have not yet been finalized, despite the claims of purveyors of employment law posters who insist that you need a new poster…
Title I of the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act of 2008 prohibits discrimination based on genetic information in health coverage and employment. Title II prohibits employment discrimination on the basis of genetic information. Title III contains numerous miscellaneous provisions including updates to child labor laws as well as establishing penalties.
The law requires full compliance by employers with 15 or more employees, employment agencies, labor unions, joint labor-management training programs, and all federal employers. GINA also updates language from ‘Handicap’ and ‘Handicaps’ to ‘Disability’ and ‘Disabilities’ in the existing EEOC code. This law extends HIPAA protections to genetic information. Ted Kennedy called it “”the first civil rights bill of the new century of the life sciences.”
The implementing regulations from EEOC are not out yet, but here are some ‘tools you can use’ to prepare for the upcoming rules in November:
Fact sheet.
Final version.
As a .pdf.
Final note: If your health or wellness plan pays or incentivizes employees to submit a family history, that is likely to change!
In North America, the AISI/SAE steel grade nomenclature system is widely used.
In this system, 4 numeric digits (XXXX) describe the base grade. The first two digits tell you whether the steel is a carbon or alloy grade.
If the first digit is any number other than a “1”, that steel is an alloy steel. We’ll discuss alloy steels in a later post.
If the first digit is a ” 1 “, the steel is a carbon grade. 10XX is the template for the plain carbon steels. We’ll explain those last two digits at the end of our post. (Exception: if the second digit is a “3”- then its one of the alloy manganese 13XX grades- grades we don’t encounter very often these days.)
If the second digit is a “1”, the steel is a resulfurized carbon steel. 11XX. Guess how many “extra” elements were added to the grade? If you guessed 1- thats right. Sulfur is the one element added to promote machinability in the 11XX grades of steel.
If the second digit is a “2”, the steel is called a rephosphorized and resulfurized steel. Both sulfur and phosphorus,-2 elements- are added to make these free machining steels. 1215 and 12 L14 are the grades we mostly see today. (As many of you know, that “L” as an infix tells us that there is a lead addition in the 12L14 steel.)
If the second digit is a “5” the grade is a high manganese carbon steel. Grades 1524, and 1541 come to mind as the principal 15XX grades seen by our industry.
A “B” infix tells us that the steel has been treated with boron. This makes it especially adept at being heat treated. 15B21 is used to make fasteners that are heat treated.
So, now that you know what the first 2 digits mean in a US grade designation for steel, what about the last two?
The last 2 digits in the grade are the mean or average carbon content of the steel. In weight percent.
So grade 1018, is a plain carbon steel, 0.18% average carbon content.
1144 is a resulfurized 0.44% average carbon content steel for higher strength and machining.
And 1215, well- 1215 is a resulfurized, rephosphorized 0.09 max weight % carbon steel for machining. 0.09% max!
Don’t you just love exceptions?
Published November 2009
By PMPA Staff
Enoch Manufacturing Company is one of the largest custom precision machining manufacturers on America’s west coast.
Published November 2009
By Miles Free III
There is nothing like business as usual to nurture a…well, let’s call it a “business as usual” managerial role.