By Ann Saphir, Reuters

The gap between the richest Americans and the rest of the nation widened after the Great Recession, a survey by the Federal Reserve showed on Thursday, suggesting deepening U.S. income inequality.

Though incomes of the highest-earners rose, none of the groups analyzed by the Fed had regained their 2007 income levels by 2013, underscoring deep scars from the financial crisis and its aftermath.

The Fed survey released suggests that wealth and income is concentrated not just within the top 1 percent, as some analyzes have suggested, but actually among a slightly broader slice of the ultra-rich: the top 3 percent.

From 2010 to 2013, average income for U.S. families rose about 4 percent after accounting for inflation, the survey showed. All of the income growth was concentrated among the top earners, the survey showed, with the top 3 percent accounting for 30.5 percent of all income.

Read the whole story

Douglas County commissioners are having a public hearing Oct. 16 regarding water rates at the lake.

The increase in fees for Zephyr Water Utility District are in regards to monthly water rates, connection charges, private fire service charges and other fees.

The current water rates were established in 2010. New fees would be effective Nov. 1.

For more info, call 775.782.9989.

The 1pm meeting is at the transit center in Stateline.

By Hannah Weinberger, Outside

If the reward-based philosophy of the fitness tracking industry hasn’t kept you from skipping workouts, it might be time to try a different approach.

Enter Pavlok, the habit-forming, accelerometer-equipped wearable that won’t let you avoid your goals. The neon-yellow wristband helps track fitness benchmarks and uploads progress to an app. But instead of only rewarding positive behaviors, Pavlok (think Pavlov) is a taskmaster that uses negative reinforcement.

Pavlok users who do what they set out to can earn money and prizes, but as the fitness band’s creators explain on their website, “The carrot isn’t enough—sometimes you need the stick.”

Hit the snooze button twice or skipped the gym? Bluetooth 4.0-capable Pavlok shames you on Facebook by letting friends know you’re sleeping in or slacking off. You can also sync with a buddy and monitor each others progress—if you’ve fallen off the wagon, your friend can remotely shock you or require you to pay a fine.

Read the whole story

By Abigail Wise, Huffington Post

Ascending a cliff, boulder or even an indoor rock wall requires a large amount of physical strength and endurance. Some conquer climbs through nutritious meals and campus board pull-ups. Meanwhile, for some diehard climbers, that endurance was historically powered by canned beans and a wide variety of snacks from the Tioga Gas Mart outside of Yosemite.

But with or without the gas station nibbles, there’s no doubt that climbers know a thing or two about a healthy lifestyle. Here’s how rock climbing helps you lead a happier, healthier life.

Contrary to what many beginners may believe, climbing requires much more than upper-body strength. The success of sending — or completing — a route relies heavily on a long list of physical factors, including intricate footwork, lower body strength and lean muscle mass. Although not often thought of as a common form of cardio, ascending walls is a sure way to get your heart pumping, similar to the way climbing stairs or jogging does. A one-hour climb session can burn well over 700 calories. Plus, tricky maneuvers and lengthy reaches often require developing flexibility that wasn’t there before. To increase bendability, more and more rock gyms are incorporating yoga studios into their facilities.

Read the whole story

By Josh Mitchell, Wall Street Journal

College graduates may be taking on historically high debt burdens to finance their educations. But it will take them far less time to get a return on that “investment” than it took their parents’ generation.

That’s the conclusion of new research from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Researchers there estimate someone earning a bachelor’s degree in 2013 will need 10 years to recoup the entire cost of that degree. Those who earned a bachelor’s in 1983 needed 23 years to do so.

That’s the good news. The bad news is that the shift has a lot to do with the plight of those who never went to school, rather than simply the higher wages of college graduates.

The Fed first had to calculate the cost of a bachelor’s, a sum that includes direct costs and “opportunity” costs. Direct costs are tuition and fees. “Opportunity” costs are foregone wages that students would have earned had they worked those four years (or three, or five) instead of going to school.

Read the whole story

• Lake Tahoe Resort Hotel in South Lake Tahoe has begun work on a $3 million project to add alpine mountain ambiance touches to its premium and balcony suites, lobby, banquet rooms and pool area in time for the holiday season. This follows an investment of $5 million in top to bottom renovations last April.

• The California Water Board has released this video about swale and rain gardens.

• The 2nd annual Tahoe-Regional Job Fair is Nov. 7 from 3:30-6:30pm at the North Tahoe Event Center, Kings Beach.

• Switchback PR + Marketing in Truckee is celebrating 15 years in business.

• Lake Tahoe Community College board of trustee’s is having a public hearing Sept. 9 at 6:15pm regarding the 2014-15 budget.

The moon from the West Shore on Sept. 7. Photo/Kathryn Reed

Sprinkles have been falling throughout the basin Monday morning.

The National Weather Service in Reno is calling for a 30 percent chance of scattered showers throughout the region for Sept. 8.

Still, the high today is expected to be 75 degrees. Temps are expected to keep rising through the week, with low 80s in the forecast for the end of the week.

With a 10 percent chance of rain showers this evening, it may obscure the full moon. Sept. 8 is the Harvest Moon — so called because it is the closest full moon to the Sept. 22 autumnal equinox.

— Lake Tahoe News staff report

By David Pierson, Los Angeles Times

There’s a war over your salad dressing, and the front line has been drawn in California.

The Golden State is considering first-of-its-kind grading standards for olive oil that could have far-reaching consequences for the $5.4-billion global industry.

The California Department of Food and Agriculture may soon agree to require testing and certification for purity and quality. New labeling could also be introduced that would bar common terms such as “light” and “pure” olive oil.

The proposed standards would apply only to the largest California olive growers and millers, but they drew a rebuke from the European Union and the olive oil importer community, which view the rules as a blueprint for wider trade restrictions.

Read the whole story

Max

Max is a 1-year-old Malamute mix. He is a big boy who loves to play and cuddle with people.

He does well with other medium to large dogs, but will not be able to go home with cats or small pets.

Max would love to go to training classes as he really does want to please his people. Max is house trained. He is at the El Dorado County Animal Services shelter in Meyers, along with many other dogs and cats who are waiting for their new homes.

Go to the Tahoe animal shelter’s Facebook page to see photos and descriptions of all pets at the shelter.

Call 530.573.7925 for directions, hours, and other information on adopting a pet.

For spay-neuter assistance for South Tahoe residents, go online.

— Susan B.

Jamie Anderson, Maddie Bowman and Hannah Teeter, all from Meyers and athletes for Sierra-at-Tahoe, competed in the Sochi Games. Photo/LTN file

By Kathryn Reed

Champions. Lake Tahoe has quite a few. And soon they will be memorialized in South Lake Tahoe.

Champions Plaza was an idea that came about after the Winter Olympics earlier this year because so many athletes from the basin competed in Russia.

Work on this plot of land by Lakeview Commons is being done now as part of the Harrison Avenue project. The corner of Highway 50 and Lakeview Avenue will become a small, circular area with a wall of champions and walk of champions.

Incorporated into the site will be artwork. But what that art will be remains to be seen.

That is because at the City Council meeting last week it was agreed the city would put out another request for proposal to artists. This is because with the first RFP they were bidding on a project without defined dimensions.

The council agreed to spend up to an additional $60,000 on the Harrison project to make the plaza. The money will come from undesignated excess reserves.

Money for the artwork will have to come from someplace else.

Five artists turned in ideas that ranged in price from $650 to $3.9 million.

A panel selected a sculpture by Mischell Riley and artwork for flags from Mark Allione. However, because the project site has been changed the sculpture would be too large for the allotted space.

Allione, who attended the meeting, said he favored the RFP process starting from scratch.

The sculpture was a three-piece granite stone monument allowing for engraving of names of champions with a sculpture atop the center stone. The flags were custom designed reflecting outdoor recreation and Olympic sports.

Mayor Hal Cole suggested the RFP be put out after the plaza is done so the artists may walk the area to have a better feel for what it will look like instead of relying on a rendering of it.

A member of the Tahoe Art League suggested a fundraiser for the project include the sale of miniature versions of the art that will be incorporated into the plaza.

Still to be determined is exact criteria for who gets included in the Champions Plaza.