Reserves so they can make a cash investment in a Capital Infrastructure to build a city hall or to do Something Like that and also to keep the bond rating agencies happy, to demonstrate that they are good stewards of the fiscal resources. So if you noticed the trend over time, it was much less than what we are now at about 22 of expenditures. Some 25 or 30 years ago it was much less. What cities have done over the last 25 and 30 years is theyve realized several things. One, that you cant predict the future as we all witnessed this last winter when salt reserves for at least the northern cities and some southern as well ran out very early and they had to dig into their reserves to buy more salt and snowplowing services. So preparing for these unexpected emergencies is one of the reasons that the reserves tend to grow over time. The other is that between the time that we started monitoring ending balances in the general fund to the present is that the federal government has become a much
To move the thing along quicker, you know, for research or for staffing. And then, as we saw, by the way, you know, in the bill that kept the government going for another eight months or so, we saw writers attach to that, you know, fundamental budget bill what was designed to affect derivatives risk. So congress is in it, theyre in wit both feet, theyre in it at the front end, theyre in it in the middle, and theyre in it in the back. There is something, and let me get to this one on the next slide yeah. A guest speaker said derivatives were defined three different ways in dodd frank on purpose to give the agency more power to actually select the definition that they wanted because they could have more power not on the hill at that point but with the agency defining it. Yeah. Well, i mean but if youre saying that the agency has the power, youre really saying that the groups that influence the congress to write those three different definitions were expecting some advantage from one or m
You know . Who is going to be making their life miserable once this thing hits the street . And this is all about winners and losers like all Public Policy processes. Implementation information. How is the public how are universities going to react who in universities are going to take responsibility for changes in the rugs in their classrooms . How is this going to cur . How do you communicate with georgetown on the one hand or a. U. On the one hand and, you know, st. Olive college out in minnesota . How do you get to these people . How do you let them know this is a change in what theyve got to do . Splins information at what level at what point will the agency take action against st. Olive or a. U. . All right . And then of course the political information which, by the way, is driven entirely by impact information. If you know who this is going to help and if you know who this is going to hurt youve got the roadmap for whatever political information youre going to need out there. R
Clearly if these prices persist for a long time, then the reductions in capex that we are seeing are clearly going to start coming in down the road. Right now i think were looking carefully, were being prepared with analyses for alternative pathways forward. Right now consumers are having the benefit. Excellent. Ok, a question over there and the mike will be made available. Please identify yourself. Im a Public Policy scholar here at the wilson center. Can you talk about what the role is for biofuels to remain in the future energy mix . Well, i think the first of all, we certainly continue to invest in biofuels. In fact, just in i guess it was october i was pleased to be in kansas for what is now the largest commercial functioning biorefinery in the country. Our loan program helped put that into place. So if i go back to the what i mentioned about our entry in this book, first of all, actually i think its important that sorry. Let me go back a step. As we celebrate our incredible incre
Surprised the asked the question but yes, we are patriots. And one of the things were patriotic about is the nature of the democracy and the nature of the free press and the fact that one can in this country discuss and report these things. There is nothing the guardian published that is endangering people in the way that you it isnt only about what you have published. Its about what you have communicated. That is what amount or cannot do a criminal offense. You have caused the committee geisha of secret documents would classify things as secret and top secret in this country for a reason, not to hide them from the guardian by to hide them from those who are out to harm us. You have communicated those documents. Do you have a question . If you knew about the enigma code in world war ii would you provide that information to the nazis . That is a red herring. I think most journalists can make a distinction between the kind of thing to talk about, the enigma code or travel log, this is ve