Viber for Windows Phone 8 update adds free VoIP calling with HD audio

After several months as a watered down messaging app, Viber for Windows Phone 8 is finally catching up to its Android and iOS counterparts. Starting today, the redesigned VoIP application now supports free calls with HD audio, lock screen notifications and the ability to pin conversations to your Start screen. This Metro modern UI version of Viber also includes photo sharing and group conversations with up to 40 participants. So, if your call plan is running low on minutes and the latest version of Skype just isn't cutting the mustard, head on over to the source link to give this free VoIP software a whirl.

Filed under: Software, Mobile, Microsoft

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Via: Windows Phone Blog

Source: Windows Phone Store

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2013/04/02/viber-windows-phone-8-update/

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Op-Ed: Rookie Teachers Need Way More Support

Steve Jobs once said, "Technology is nothing. What's important is that you have a faith in people, that they're basically good and smart, and if you give them tools, they'll do wonderful things with them." One of the most effective ways to use modern technology in education is in observing teaching to greatly influence the effectiveness of educators.

Reflection is vital for teachers to improve their craft as professionals. However, it can be difficult to objectively examine one's teaching skills. For new teachers, it can be particularly challenging.

I can remember many times myself, as a beginning teacher, feeling overwhelmed with the amount of information and areas of improvement I identified. Sometimes it was difficult to identify where, when, how, and why things went awry. I remember feeling both anxious and excited for others to come into my classroom and observe; I looked forward to hearing ways to improve. Many times, however, I was somewhat disappointed when little meaningful feedback was offered. That was then. This is 2013.

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Now out of the classroom, I'm the director of a beginning teacher induction program serving five school districts in the California East Bay Area. I am responsible for helping new teachers become more effective.?

Most teachers are hungry for authentic, meaningful feedback to boost their development. Our limited resources, however, make this a hunger challenging to feed.

According to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation's Met Project study on measures of effective teaching, if observations are meant to positively influence professional growth, having more than one set of eyes to conduct the observation needs to occur.

The good news is many of us now carry a recording device in our pockets and can record and upload videos from anywhere in the world to anyone in the world in a matter of seconds. These devices can be extremely valuable in giving new teachers more than one perspective on their teaching, and helping them become more effective. Let me explain.

The districts I serve partner with New Teacher Center (NTC) to give new teachers the support they need to be effective and to remain committed to teaching. Thanks to a grant from Chevron, this includes a pilot initiative using video recordings of teachers to influence teacher growth. Teachers use a secure platform to post and share their recorded lessons with those they choose through NTC's E-Mentoring for Student Success (eMSS).?

Many educators I work with are critical of themselves, and this gives them the ability to reflect while playing back and pausing raw footage of their teaching. The benefits are endless. Not surprisingly, teachers find a wide variety of ways they can improve by viewing themselves. And when they watch the recording with a mentor, there are even higher yields in terms of communication and reflection.

Part of my work consists of coaching and providing support to beginning teachers. I have used video as a way to show teachers areas they can improve. Viewing recordings with teachers allows me to use a facilitative voice, allowing the teacher viewing themselves to offer suggestions for improvement. Afterwards, it's easy for them to generate next steps and understand how these modifications will be implemented into their classroom right away.?

How this looks in your district, at your school site, or in your classroom may be as unique as the students served. A few powerful concepts to keep in mind revolving around effective professional development are:

Educators willing to take risks are viewed as a professionally growing teacher.? Professional development that is sustained, intensive, and focused on subject matter has a large impact on teacher development.? There is a higher rate of growth for teachers who participate in ?hands on? learning relevant to daily tasks within the classroom. Designing high quality professional development needs to possess a focus on collective participation of educators, core features, and duration of time.

Utilizing technology in the classroom for teacher observations is a high yield strategy to increase teacher effectiveness, especially when paired with the expertise of a trained mentor. When teachers take ownership while collaborating and placing ownership and accountability on themselves, instead of sources far beyond their control, positive outcomes are a result.? Like Steve Jobs said, "Technology is nothing." As professionals, it is essential we use technologies wisely and "do wonderful things with them."

Related Stories on TakePart:

? Op-Ed: For First-Year Teachers, It?s Sink or Swim

? Diary of a First-Year Teacher: I Never Thought I?d Feel So Isolated

? Diary of a First-Year Teacher: Here?s the Most Stressful Part of My Job

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Todd Airola is an accomplished educator who now leads an initiative to help beginning teachers accelerate their professional growth as a BTSA Induction Coordinator with the Far East Contra Costa County Consortium in California.? The consortium credentials teachers employed in Brentwood, Byron, Knightsen, Liberty, and Oakley school districts. TakePart.com

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/op-ed-rookie-teachers-way-more-support-185900665.html

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Sifting of Sept. 11 debris for remains begins anew

FILE - Construction workers and equipment excavate the southeastern corner of the World Trade Center site on in this Jan. 8, 2008 file photo taken in New York. About 60 truckloads of debris that could contain tiny human bone fragments have been unearthed by construction crews working on the new World Trade Center tower in recent years. That material is now being transported to a park built on top of the former Fresh Kills landfill on Staten Island. City officials say investigators will spend 10 weeks attempting to identify the remains. Investigators began sifting through newly uncovered debris from the World Trade Center on Monday April 1, 2013 for the first time in three years. (AP Photo/Mark Lennihan, File)

FILE - Construction workers and equipment excavate the southeastern corner of the World Trade Center site on in this Jan. 8, 2008 file photo taken in New York. About 60 truckloads of debris that could contain tiny human bone fragments have been unearthed by construction crews working on the new World Trade Center tower in recent years. That material is now being transported to a park built on top of the former Fresh Kills landfill on Staten Island. City officials say investigators will spend 10 weeks attempting to identify the remains. Investigators began sifting through newly uncovered debris from the World Trade Center on Monday April 1, 2013 for the first time in three years. (AP Photo/Mark Lennihan, File)

NEW YORK (AP) ? Jim Riches pulled his son's mangled body out of the rubble at the World Trade Center, but the phone calls still filtered in years afterward. The city kept finding more pieces of his son.

"They'll call you and they'll tell you, 'We found a shin bone,'" Riches said. "Or: 'We found an arm bone.' We held them all together and then we put them in the cemetery."

Those are the phone calls both dreaded and hoped for among the families of Sept. 11 victims. And as investigators began sifting through newly uncovered debris from the World Trade Center on Monday for the first time in three years, those anxieties were renewed more than a decade after the attacks. But there was also hope that more victims might yet be identified after tens of millions have been spent on the painstaking identification process.

"We would like to see the other 40 percent of the families who have never recovered anything to at least someday have a piece of their loved one," Riches said. "That they can go to a cemetery and pray."

About 60 truckloads of debris that could contain tiny fragments of bone or tissue were unearthed by construction crews that have been working on the new World Trade Center in recent years. That material is now being transported to a park built on top of the former Fresh Kills landfill on Staten Island, where investigators will attempt to identify any possible remains during the next 10 weeks, the city said.

The city's last sifting effort ended in 2010. This time, crews were able to dig up parts of the trade center site that were previously inaccessible to workers, the city said.

Some 2,750 people died at the World Trade Center in the 2001 terrorist attacks, but only 1,634 people have been identified.

"We have been monitoring the World Trade Center site over time and monitoring the construction," said Ellen Borakove, a spokeswoman for the medical examiner's office. "And if they see any material that could possibly contain human remains, we collect that material."

About 9,000 human remains recovered from the ruins of the World Trade Center remain unidentified because they are too degraded to match victims by DNA identification. The remains are stored at an undisclosed location monitored by the medical examiner's office and will eventually be transferred to a subterranean chamber at the National September 11 Memorial & Museum.

Some victims' families expressed impatience that the city has only just uncovered more debris.

"Quite frankly, they should've excavated this and searched it 12 years ago," said Diane Horning, whose son, Matthew, died in the attacks. "Instead, they built service roads and construction roads and were more worried about the building and the tourism than they were about the human remains."

The city's efforts to identify Sept. 11 victims have long been fraught with controversy.

In April 2005, the city's chief medical examiner, Charles Hirsch, told families his office would be suspending identification efforts because it had exhausted the limits of DNA technology.

But just a year later, the discovery of human remains on a bank tower roof and then in a manhole near ground zero outraged families who said the search for their loved ones had been rushed initially. The findings prompted a renewed search that cost the city tens of millions of dollars and uncovered 1,500 pieces of remains.

Meanwhile, some victims' relatives sued the city over its decision to move 1.6 million tons of materials from the trade center site to the Fresh Kills landfill, saying the material might contain victims' ashes and should have been given a proper burial.

The lawsuit was dismissed, and unsuccessfully appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.

As it embarks on combing through debris yet again, the medical examiner's office says it will keep monitoring the site as long as new areas are being dug or exposed.

Charles G. Wolf was pleased to hear about the renewed search, though he believes that his wife, Katherine, was vaporized during the attack. Investigators have never found her remains.

Years ago, it bothered him that he had no grave to visit. Wolf said the opening of the Sept. 11 memorial has filled a hole in his heart, but he'll never have closure.

"You heal. You carry on," he said. "It's not closure."

___

Associated Press Writer Jennifer Peltz contributed to this report.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/3d281c11a96b4ad082fe88aa0db04305/Article_2013-04-02-World%20Trade%20Center-Sifting/id-63ec9577c174494ea7e8f8b26219a83b

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Pope makes Easter pleas for Mideast peace

VATICAN CITY (AP) ? Pope Francis delivered a plea for peace in his first Easter Sunday message to the world, decrying the seemingly endless conflicts in the Middle East and on the Korean peninsula after celebrating Mass at an outdoor altar before more than 250,000 people in flower-bedecked St. Peter's Square.

Francis shared in his flock's exuberance as they celebrated Christianity's core belief that Jesus Christ rose from the dead following crucifixion. After Mass, he stepped aboard an open-topped white popemobile for a cheerful spin through the joyous crowd, kissing babies and patting children on the head.

One admirer of both the pope and of the pope's favorite soccer team, Argentina's Saints of San Lorenzo, insisted that Francis take a team jersey he was waving at the pontiff. A delighted Francis obliged, briefly holding up the shirt, and the crowd roared in approval.

Francis has repeatedly put concern for the poor and suffering at the center of his messages, and he pursued his promotion of the causes of peace and social justice in the Easter speech he delivered from the central balcony of St. Peter's Basilica, the same vantage point above the square where he was introduced to the world as the first Latin American pope on March 13.

The Roman Catholic leader aimed his Easter greetings at "every house and every family, especially where the suffering is greatest, in hospitals, in prisons." Francis prayed that Jesus would inspire people to "change hatred into love, vengeance into forgiveness, war into peace."

As popes before him have, he urged Israelis and Palestinians to resume peace talks and end a conflict that "has lasted all too long." And, in reflecting on the two-year-old Syrian crisis, Francis asked, "How much suffering must there still be before a political solution" can be found?

The pope also expressed desire for a "spirit of reconciliation" on the Korean peninsula, where North Korea says it has entered "a state of war" with South Korea. He also decried warfare and terrorism in Africa, as well as what he called the 21st century's most extensive form of slavery: human trafficking.

The first pontiff to come from the Jesuits, an order with special concern for the poor, and the first pope to name himself after St. Francis, a medieval figure who renounced wealth to preach to the down-and-out, Francis lamented that the world is "still divided by greed looking for easy gain."

Earlier, wearing cream-colored vestments, Francis celebrated Mass on the esplanade in front of the basilica at an altar set up under a white canopy. He frequently bowed his head as if in silent reflection.

The sun competed with clouds in the sky Sunday, but the square was a riot of floral color in Rome, where chilly winter has postponed the blossoming of many flowers. Yellow forsythia and white lilies shone, along with bursts of lavender and pink, from potted azalea, rhododendron, wisteria and other plants.

Francis thanked florists from the Netherlands for donating the flowers. He also advised people to let love transform their lives, or as he put it, "let those desert places in our hearts bloom."

The Vatican had prepared a list of brief Easter greetings in 65 languages, but Francis didn't read them. The Vatican didn't say why not, but has said that the new pope, at least for now, feels at ease using Italian, the everyday language of the Holy See. Francis also has stressed his role as a pastor to his flock, and, as Bishop of Rome, Italian would be his language.

The pontiff improvised his parting words to the crowd. He repeated his Easter greeting to those "who have come from all over the world to this square at the heart of Christianity" as well as to those "linked by modern technology," a reference to TV and radio coverage as well as social media.

Francis added that he was especially remembering "the weakest and the neediest" and praying that all of humanity be guided along "the paths of justice, love and peace."

In another departure from Easter tradition, Francis won't be heading for some post-holiday relaxation at the Vatican's summer palace in Castel Gandolfo, in the hills southeast of Rome. That retreat is already occupied by his predecessor, Benedict XVI, who went there in the last hours of his papacy on Feb. 28. Benedict became the first pope in 600 years to resign from the position, and eventually is to move back to the Vatican, after a convent there is readied for him.

Francis so far has declined to move into Benedict's former apartment in the Apostolic Palace, into the rooms whose studio overlooks St. Peter's Square. He is still in the Vatican hotel where earlier this month he was staying along with other cardinals participating in the secret conclave to choose Benedict's successor.

While Francis has just begun to make his mark on the church, it is plain he has little desire to embrace much of the pomp customarily associated with the office.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/pope-makes-easter-pleas-mideast-peace-101523086.html

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EBay Beats Out Amazon To Lead $50M Round In India's E ...

Online e-commerce giant eBay last week said that it expects to have 12% of its sales coming from BRIC countries by 2015 in a global e-commerce market that will be worth $300 billion, and here is one more step in that strategy: it is leading a $50 million, Series C investment in Snapdeal, an online marketplace in India with 20 million users. Existing backers Nexus Venture Partners, Bessemer Venture Partners and IndoUS Venture Partners also participated.

The news was first reported by Indian tech blog NextBigWhat, and we have now confirmed the details with our own sources. Snapdeal?s CEO and co-founder Kunal Bahl has declined to comment. It will make eBay a minority shareholder in the company, and this Series C investment means that Snapdeal has now raised about $102 million in funding since 2010, with the previous two investments being $12 million in January 2011, and $40 million in September 2011.

We understand that Snapdeal was not actually looking for such a big round but when it went fundraising for its Series C, but the response was more enthusiastic than it had expected, perhaps owing to the company?s currently crazy growth, with sales growing year-on-year?by about 400% in terms of gross merchandise value.?Among others that were interested was Amazon ? another sign that it, too, wants to doing more in emerging markets going forward. We understand that part of the reason Snapdeal went with eBay was it was a pioneer in the marketplace business model and has been pushing hard on its international strategy.

The news will mean one further step into India for eBay: the company already has a full subsidiary in the country, eBay India, but that only has 5 million users. Ebay India recently noted in its 2012 Census that it enables transactions at the rate of about 1 per minute. That?s for smaller items like mobile accessories and beauty products.

Snapdeal, meanwhile, was first established in 2010 as a daily deals site but more recently, in 2012, moved into a marketplace model ? similar to the one built out by eBay and Amazon, offering a platform for merchants to sell goods. This model has proven particularly successful in emerging markets where there are a lot of small businesses but a relatively young e-commerce landscape: a vacuum for those who come in to offer a platform to take those small businesses online ? one that others like Rocket Internet are also tapping.

Some of the verticals that Snapdeal has focused on include fashion, home goods, and consumer electronics and it now has 20 million users, or about 1 in every five Indian people who are online. It?s expected that Snapdeal will generate about $400 million in sales in 2013. The company does not have any immediate plans to expand to countries outside of India, TechCrunch understands.

Overall, eBay already has a strong business outside of the U.S. In its analyst day last week, Wendy Jones, VP of geographical expansion and cross border trade, noted that 61% of its Marketplace revenue comes from non-U.S. markets.

Within that, the BRIC block of Brazil, Russia, India and China are playing a key role. Last week, eBay chose to hone in on Russia?s role there: Jones called Russia eBay?s number-one priority for expansion, partly because it now has the largest Internet population in all of Europe, and partly because that population is still growing fast. For eBay in particular, Russian users bought $400 million in goods on the site in 2012, growing by 54% over 2011.

But that is also growing beyond Russia: eBay believes that 25% of total active users, and 12% of global sales will be coming from the BRIC block by 2015. Within that eBay says it wants to build out active users in BRIC and emerging markets 6.5-fold.

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Snapdeal, India?s largest online marketplace features best priced deals on branded products like mobile phones, electronics, computer peripherals, apparels, cosmetics, perfumes, watches, bags, sunglasses, footwear, kitchenware and more. Launched in February 2010, Snapdeal.com is the market leader in the retail services deals space, and is the largest e-retailer of watches, sunglasses, jewellery, among other categories. It has been rated as the number 1 e-commerce site in India by Dataquest/Sapient E-commerce Survey 2011. A dynamic and vibrant company, Snapdeal provides a...

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September 1, 1995

February 10, 1998, NASDAQ:EBAY

Founded in 1995 in San Jose, CA, eBay connects millions of buyers and sellers globally in the world?s largest online marketplace, utilizing PayPal to ensure secure transactions. The company also operates specialized marketplaces such as StubHub, the world?s largest ticket marketplace, and eBay Classifieds sites, which together have a presence in more than 1,000 cities around the world. eBay items can be sold either via a silent auction, in which users input the maximum price they are willing to...

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NEA-IndoUS Ventures is a leading venture capital firm which provides early and mid-stage funding to new or growing businesses in India. The team comprises experienced entrepreneurs and executives who understand the model of incubating ideas and transforming them into successful enterprises. They fund these entrepreneurial ideas and offer collaborative partnerships. They invest in tomorrow?s business leaders, explosive new markets and enterprises that will transform their future.

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Source: http://techcrunch.com/2013/04/01/ebay-builds-up-its-bric-strategy-leads-50m-investment-in-india-e-commerce-giant-snapdeal/

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Exxon has yet to excavate area of ruptured Arkansas oil pipeline

LAHORE, March 31 (Reuters) - Pakistan have dropped senior batsman Younus Khan from the list of 30 probable players announced for this year's ICC Champions Trophy on Sunday. Younus, 35, was the only surprise omission and the decision probably signals the end of his one-day international career which has spanned 253 matches. The former captain struggled in the recent one-day series in South Africa and has been out of form in this format of the game since last year. ...

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/exxon-yet-excavate-area-ruptured-arkansas-oil-pipeline-185433705--finance.html

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The Ten Best Employers To Work For | The Big Picture

Charle Hugh Smith is an author. He blogs at Of Two Minds.

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The insecurity of self-employment can generate a far more resilient life and mindset. There are all sorts of ?10 best companies to work for? lists, but I?ve assembled a slightly broader list: The Ten Best Employers To Work For. Without further ado, let?s go to number 1:

1. Yourself

Surprised? Expecting Google or Zappos? The National Security Agency? Nope, not even close. It?s you?yes, you, Bucko. You?re the best employer to work for. OK, on to the rest of the list:

2. ?Yourself
3. ?Yourself
4. ?Yourself
5. ?Yourself
6. ?Yourself
7. ?Yourself
8. ?Yourself
9. ?Yourself
10. Yourself

Aren?t you glad I didn?t make this a ?100 best employers? list?

Before you start nitpicking the list: yes, there is only one of you, so the list is somewhat repetitive.

And yes, there are some downsides to working for yourself. For example:

1. There?s no point in leaving a snippy note on the fridge to the sneaky co-worker who stole your bagel: oops, you ate it during coffee break #3 without noticing. Dang, accepting responsibility sucks.

2. When you launch a full-blown rant against your psycho, control-freak, demanding boss, you?re doing so in front of a mirror. Sigh?it?s just no longer fun blaming the boss.

3. Excuses don?t fly too far with clients and customers.

4. Nobody cares when you show up or how productive you are except you.

5. Shouting ?Take this job and shove it? isn?t quite as satisfying.

All those stupid regulations you chafed under: gone. All those impossible demands that stressed you out: gone. All those shiftless, incompetent co-workers: gone. Time cards: gone. Staff meetings: gone. People to blame for your troubles: gone. Paycheck: gone.

Do you really miss anything but the last item? But really, wasn?t that paycheck the chain that bound you to serfdom?

Here?s the dirty little secret of the U.S. economy: you?re already working for yourself now unless you?re in the Armed Forces or a civilian equivalent. The clock is ticking on all those promises of pensions and benefits for life you think separate you from the self-employed entrepreneur. Maybe the promises pay out for a few more years, maybe even a decade, but they are impermanent for the simple reason that the promises made (and the nation?s debts) far exceed the economy?s ability to pay those promises and debts in dollars retaining today?s purchasing power.

Either the promises will be broken/defaulted, or a $2,000/month pension will buy a loaf of bread and a gallon of gasoline. There is no other end-state other than default or inflate-away-the-debt/promises.

You already know how ?valued? you are by your corporate/agency employer. All that rah-rah ?team-building? stuff is nice for the younger employees who are still naive enough to believe the propaganda at face value, but once the layoffs start again (if they ever stopped), then all that rah-rah cheerleading loses its sparkle.

Many employees are waking up to find themselves in 1099 nation: no benefits, no tax withholding, no matching 401K, no status as an employee, just a contract and a 1099 statement at year end.

In a sense being self-employed simply means stripping away the artifice that somebody else is going to take care of you or give you ?free money.? Once we understand the promised security is bogus, self-employment doesn?t feel so risky?it feels like embracing the risk that is hidden behind the flimsy facade of team-building, ?guaranteed? pensions and all the rest of the unpayable promises.

The self-employed person generally trades ?security? for job satisfaction. The compensation may be higher or lower, but it will likely be lower. The earnings will likely be more sporadic and uncertain.

People Are Beginning To Realize Self-Employment Isn?t All It?s Cracked Up To Be

But ironically, perhaps, the insecurity of self-employment can generate a far more resilient life and mindset. Instead of counting on Big Brother in one form or another to provide retirement, the self-employed person builds their own human, social and financial capital. Those who rely on Big Brother are terribly vulnerable should Big Brother fail to make good on on his extravagant promises to 310 million people.

Gaining power and control over your life doesn?t come cheap. Does anything really worthwhile come cheap? Knowledge, tradecraft, experience, networks of trusted suppliers, expertise: none of them come easy or cheap. All must be gained the hard way.

No wonder self-employment is down. It?s tough to scratch out a living as an entrepreneur. It can be wearisome, but never as wearisome as a job you loathe.
Fewer people choose to be self-employed (USA Today, 9/11)

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In August, 14.5 million people were self-employed, down 2.1 million from the most recent peak in December 2006, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data.The number of ?incorporated? self-employed workers ? those who incorporate to gain legal protection and other benefits ? began its decline in 2008. Last month, 5.1 million people were in this category, down 726,000 from August 2008.

Unincorporated self-employed ? at 9.4 million last month ? has changed little since last spring. It?s hovering at its lowest level in 25 years, says BLS economist Steven Hipple.

Working for others is a good idea while you?re building skills and networks. By all means, work for someone else while you?re learning the ropes, and give them 150% value on the paycheck they hand you. Heck, if you find a decent employer, work part-time for them while you build your own income streams/career. You might even work part-time for several like-minded people and yourself on the side.

Interestingly, this survey found that the self-employed often see their work as helping society. How many employees feel that? I mention this as an example of the intangible benefits of working for yourself.

Take this Job and Love It (Pew Research)

The Rise of The 1099 Economy: More Americans Are Becoming Their Own Bosses (Forbes, 7/12)

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According to research by Economic Modeling Specialists International, the number of people who primarily work on their own has swelled by 1.3 million since 2001 to 10.6 million, a 14% increase.This rise is partially reflective of hard times, and many of the self-employed earn only modest livings in fields such as childcare and construction. However the shift to self-employment is likely to accelerate in the future, and into higher-paying professions, for reasons including the ubiquity of the Internet, which makes it easier for some types of business to use independent contractors, as well as the reluctance of large firms to hire full-time employees with benefits.

How can self-employment be falling and rising? It depends on how you count the self-employed. The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) divides the self-employed into two categories, incorporated (about 5 million) and unincorporated (about 10 million). Incorporated self-employed people are often professionals such as doctors, accountants and attorneys who value the legal benefits of a corporation or LLC (limited liability company).

To further confuse things, the BLS counts the incorporated self-employed as ?wage earners? because they draw paychecks from themselves. So right off the bat we find a confusion between 14.5 million (total BLS self-employed) and the 10 million (the unincorporated self-employed) reported by the BLS as self-employed.

Self-employment in the United States (BLS)

The private research firm mentioned above clearly counted those getting 1099s as self-employed, even if they are contract workers laboring alongside employees, as is often the case in Corporate America. It appears there are about 7 million people in 1099 nation, hence the other total of self-employed you see in print, 22 million.

So the conventional self-employed may be declining while the involuntary self-employed (those getting a 1099 instead of a paycheck) is rising. Of course it?s rising: the ObamaCare neutron bomb is about to go off, making employee benefits unaffordable to businesses large and small.

ObamaCare: The Neutron Bomb That Will Decimate Employment (February 22, 2013)

Right now the self-employed?an enormously diverse mix of everything from micro-sized eBay businesses netting a few thousand dollars a year to professional corporations?comprise about 10% of the workforce (14.5 million self-employed, a total employed workforce of about 142 million). Add in those now getting 1099s instead of paychecks (7 million) and perhaps 14% of the workforce is self-employed (or at least responsible for paying their own quarterly taxes and healthcare insurance?slick move, Corporate America!).

For reasons I will discuss tomorrow, this number is very likely to rise.

But why, you ask, is working for yourself so great? I?ll tell you why. Where else will you find a boss who knows your foibles, flaws and strengths so well? Where will you find a more forgiving boss, one who really understands what makes you tick? What other employer will give you the day off to go fishing because you really need a break? What other employer is going to let you keep everything you earned for the enterprise? And best of all?where else can you be boss and not have to deal with employees?

Category: Corporate Management, Employment

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Source: http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2013/03/the-ten-best-employers-to-work-for/

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