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Italian born Canadian Sergio Marchionne, a former tax consultant turned auto executive who joined Fiat in 2004, planned the acquisition of Fiat in 2009. GM's payout to Chrysler following a decision not to acquire Fiat, and the U.S. government's need to merge Chrysler with another auto company after a bailout, gave Marchionne the opportunity to acquire Chrysler on favorable terms. Hard bargaining with the government led to acquiring Chrysler for free, using the $2 billion from GM to show the government that it would make the needed investments to bring Chrysler back from bankruptcy. This decision, the bringing in of outside talent, and the revival of the auto industry following the bailout, has led to the success of Fiat Chrysler.  Sergio Marchionne had the right instincts to persuade the government that Fiat with its small cars including the Fiat 500 was the right company to run Chrysler, and supporting president Obama's fuel efficiency goals gave him the right credentials with the Obama administration. A chain smoker of cigarettes who also gulped down espressos, her was a workaholic sometimes carrying 5 smartphones. He passed away at the age of 66 from health complications. Ironically the Dodge Dart was presented as the car that would get 40 miles per gallon. Other efforts at fuel efficient automobiles have not happened in the way it was envisioned by the Obama administration. The Dart did not become popular. Only the redesigned Fiat made it as a hit in Europe. The plan to import small Fiats to the U.S. remained only on paper. As the auto industry revived Marchionne canceled plans to make nearly all of the Chrysler cars and shifted production to more popular Jeeps and Dodge Ram, a move followed by Ford and GM. Fuel efficiency issues from the bankruptcy period are still alive today with the decision to leave small car manufacturing to Japanese and German carmakers, and the efforts of the Trump administration to turn back the Obama administration fuel efficiency targets.  ...

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Sofia Diego from the Southern European region of Spain and Portugal, says the idea of a multi-speed European Union as put forward by some in Brussels, including Jean-Claude Juncker, is not the answer- because at some point it makes the whole exercize of a united Europe futile with some countries choosing to ignore the very ideal of European unity. In fact she says we have come too far in that direction and it is necessary to pause and reflect what this means. France's leading presidential candidate Emmanuel Macron has called for a closer union as a better solution to eurozone financial stability with a tighter union. German public opinion and other opinion in the EU does not favor more concessions following Brexit. This opinion from a Southern European country shows how young people especially have developed a new attitude and feeling of togetherness as the European generation. Young people from all parts of Europe have a changed attitude compared to previous generation, and this is a valuable experience that needs to be nurtured with closer interaction to take the EU experiment to the next stage. ...

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Martin Feldstein points out why the recent agreement for a "fiscal compact" is no more than an empty statement about fixing the eurozone's finances. In this respect it is no different than the Stability and Growth Pact it replaces, with serious weaknesses. Feldstein cites the weaknesses in the language of the agreement. Each eurozone country is required to limit its"cyclically adjusted" budget deficit to 0.5% of GDP and bring its debt down to 60% of GDP. Compliance will be performed by the European Court of Justice and fines imposed. In practice the questions loom large- for a country like Spain with a 23% unemployment rate, isn't all of the 6% budget deficit cyclical? Again the agreement says deficits are calculated "net of one-off and temporary measures." Under this provision a lot of the stimulus programs would be considered in the category of "one-off." Other language lets eurozone countries frame budgets based on "exceptional circumstances" and "periods of severe economic downturn." Italy has declining economic growth, does it make sense to have a large budget surplus in that situation to lower debt to GDP, and how does that goal relate to "exceptional circumstances."...

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Rep. Dave Camp, House Ways and Means Committee chairman, representing northern Michigan, says every deduction in the tax code is there because of a reason, and powerful lobbies will oppose any changes. The best he can do is work himself out of this job as he will have to tackle the Democrats on entitlements, the business lobbies on tax loopholes, and other lobbies protecting their preferences in the tax code. He plans to achieve a simpler tax code with lowered rates of 25% for business and earners above six figures, and 10% for everyone else. The approach he is taking is to be revenue neutral when tackling tax reform, in the belief that the economic growth generated from a simpler tax code and lower rates would generate revenues of 18 to 19% of GDP, up from about 16% today. He says the economc cost of not getting this done to get the economy rolling again is so high that he is upbeat that both sides can come together after the election no matter who wins. He is also looking at a repatriation tax of 5% on profits kept by American companies overseas, which would boost revenues for business which could be reinvested in stead of sitting idle. Today the much steeper tax rate on repatriation makes businesses reluctant to bring it back....

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Hilsenrath gives an account of how U.S. Federal Reserve chairman Bernanke convinced his fellow governors to support QE III and achieved a rare consensus.

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David Leonhardt on the policy errors of the Obama administration in managing the economy. Why he asks did the Obama administration not take the risks it took for "undeserving" recipients in the auto industry to provide significant help to GM and Chrysler and at the same not provide large scale and situation changing help to millions of mortgage holders who were under water? The housing crisis with millons of foreclosures depressing home prices has played a significant part in the lagging economic recovery. He points out that Obama economic advisors had read Rogoff and Reinhart's book "This Time Its Different," about the longer times it takes for a economic recovery after a housing bubble, and still made the mistake of believing economists who suggested that the stimulus by itself would be sufficient and that recovery was underway in 2010. Others in the Democratic party had pointed to the lack of focus on unemployment by the Obama administration. Why were such voices not heard?

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Toutiao and the growing mobile segment for news aggregated from thousands of sources for tech, politics, and other local news. Toutiao and Tencent QQ are taking advantage of the growing need for news in China. Toutiao's algorithm targets new internet users in rural areas and small towns who are looking for news and do not need the use of global news sites as is done by Google and Apple. The deep learning of computers is used to study user habits such as learning about the main soccer teams, watching funny videos,as habits of users. Beijing Bytedance Technology has come up with the new site. The highest growth rate is now for news on mobile, growth is 73% year over year far surpassing travel and mobile video, according to QuestMobile.

China restricts use of Google and Facebook News and other sites and favors local content and news sites to give international news, and news about China.

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Steven Mufson reports in the Washington Post that oil exports from Iran will only gradually increase by 400,000 barrels a day in the next 6 months, because Iran does not want to depress prices further than $30 a barrel. Foreign investment in Iran is also likely to improve gradually because of the remaining sanctions and the slowly improving economy.

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The last minute efforts by Boehner and Reid to come up with their own backup plans for U.S. deficit reduction one week before the August 2, 2011, U.S. debt ceiling deadline.

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China's economic planning agency, the National Development and Reform Commission, has approved $156 billion in new infrastructure projects, new subways, highways and other projects in recent weeks. The response is more carefully planned than the stimulus projects in 2009-2010, which are now seen as excessive response creating the prospect of bad loans in the banking system and causing inflation. The stimulus spread over 2 years, 2009 and 2010, was by government's initial estimates about 4 trillion yuan and this does not include additional local government spending as the government encouraged spending. This time the stimulus is about 1 trillion yuan or $158 billion, 2% of GDP, spread over 4 years, with projects going through careful review, according to Nomura economist Zhang Zhiwei. The Chinese government wants to avoid losing gains made in controlling a property bubble and holding down inflation.