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How a tightly interconnected community such as tech startups can quickly fall apart in a crisis is the subject of this WSJ report by Christopher Mims. He says on the way up this meant positive leveraging that exceeded 150% and this is also true in the other direction on the way down just as fast. Most startups depended on Silicon Valley Bank and First Republic for financing. Venture capital moved from inside to unravel the SVB bank. The US government simply wants to stabilize the economy and is not intending to make the uninsured depositors whole except in the way that it is self contained and does not spread to other parts of the banking system. Tech startups will now find it difficult to get new financing, if not impossible, says this report. About 8% of total jobs in the US economy are dependent on tech. When it comes to work that is dependent on tech the number is higher closer to 20%. Some of the tech layoffs will be offset by new kinds of tech and with government private collaboration in the new frameworks coming up, such as for EV vehicles with manufacturing in the US, and the $53 billion for the  CHIPS and Science Act of president Biden. Solar and wind have new frameworks of a similar type as the focus shifts to fighting climate change. These networks are interconnected with the EU which is creating its own parallel networks of this type. ...

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This is one of the strongest worded statements on Syria made on the editorial pages of the Washington Post, as editorial page editor Fred Hiatt talks about the situation in Syria created by the policies of president Obama and his closest advisors. He calls the failure of these policies Obama's achievement, failing to find any other word to describe the years of deliberate inaction and appearing to act in crisis when simply stalling, during 2011-2015, that reversed all the gains and opportunity presented by the Arab Spring. Instead it has put that part of the world back into a dark period similiar to 17th century Europe with the religious and sectarian conflicts that lasted for the better part of that century, compounding the serious errors under Republican administrations since Reagan, with new errors by taking the opposite extreme in policies- without giving a place for thoughtful courageous policies and making difficult choices.

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The IMF and Egypt reach preliminary agreement on a $4.8 billion loan in Nov. 2012. Andreas Bauer, IMF division chief for the Middle East says fiscal reforms by reducing waste in expenditures, changing energy subsidies to better channel them to the most needy are part of the plan for Egypt. This includes tax reforms increasing progressive nature of income tax and broadening the sales tax. The goal is to bring the deficit down from 11% of GDP in 2011-2012 financial year to 8.5% in 2013-2014. As part of this plan more money can go to infrastructure investment. Monetary polcies will be geared to keeping inflation down and increasing Egypt's competitiveness to attract foreign investment and increase international reserves. Egypt's international reserves are at $15 billion in Nov. 2012. In all the program of assistance to Egypt including IMF assistance and other donor loans gives Egypt access to $14.5 billion in loans.

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On the surface Turkey's implementation of an IMF program to reduce its deficit in 2001 has lessons for Greece, but looked at closely the situation has some serious differences. Turkish tax collection was weak and this was corrected by the incoming Erdogan administration, salaries were capped and spending was reduced, taxes raised and state assets sold to improve the deficit. But as Tim Ash an economist at RBS bank points out, achieving GDP growth will be very difficult for Greece. For one thing Turkey's lira fell 54% against the dollar in 2001, spurring exports and increasing growth. Greece is part of the euro currency system and this won't be part of the solution. Also Turkey's debt approached 80% of GDP in 2001 (down to 46% of GDP now), compared to 115% for Greece in 2010, so Greece is in a much worse position than Turkey in 2001. Ash sees a restructuring of debt as the best way to restore growth in Greece.

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Most Americans pay less in taxes, including state, local and federal taxes, today than in 1980 in inflation adjusted dollars. The taxes have gone down by 2-3% for incomes in the range of $50,000 to $150,000, and gone down by 3-4% for incomes between $150,000 and $350,000. Taxes have gone down over 7% for incomes above $350,000. The main reason is the decline in federal income taxes.Tax rates increased in the period to 1990 and declined from 1990 to 2010. The Democratic party and president Obama are pushing for increase in taxes for incomes above $250,000. Republicans are resisting the changes citing disincentives to investment and growth for small business which generates a large proportion of new jobs created in the U.S. economy. The New York Times study shows the percent of the U.S. population that makes between $200,000 and $350,000 almost doubling in the period 1980-2010 and at the same time its share of the U.S. income remaining the same - many small business owners who hire employees would fall into this income category. Republican's response is for tax reforms that reduce loopholes, deductions and other tax expeditures that disproportionately help the wealthy. Democrats say this cannot create enough revenues to address the deficit, when mortgage deductions, charitable deductions are excluded. The back and forth is leading to stalemate but also opening up discussion for the first time on whether the mortgage and charitable deductions make sense in today's environment. A significant portion of revenues lost in the mortgage deduction goes to affluent households, subsidizing larger borrowings to build larger homes than otherwise, according to the Brookings Institution. Politicians have resisted changes that would go against powerful lobyying groups in the past, yet the impasse has opened up new thinking outside the box because of the pressing need to come up with a solution....

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Bank lending is recovering in parts of the midwest from Cedar Rapids, Iowa to Madison, Wisconsin not hit hard by the housing crisis, but lags far behind in California and Florida. Between 2006 and 2011, a WSJ survey using data from Moody's Analytics and Equifax shows bank lending declining in New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles by 38%, 44%, and 55%. Overall U.S. consumer loan originations declined by 40% from 2006 to 2011.

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The opposition of parties from the far-right in the Netherlands and France, and other parts of Europe, to austerity measures imposed by the EU under the leadership of Germany's Angela Merkel. Geert Wilders, leads this far right opposition in the Netherlands and Marie Le Pen in France. The far right parties are gaining influence with high unemployment and economic recession in Europe, making spending cuts painful for pensioners, and the middle class.

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On my bookshelf is NY financier Felix Rohatyn's 2009 book, Bold Endeavors, citing the bold investments America has made in the past from Louisiana Purchase, Erie Canal, Transcontinental Railroad, Land Grant Colleges, Homestead Act, Panama Canal, Rural Electrification, Interstate Highway System, and how this needs to happen once again. NYT lacks this vision. In this Op-Ed it  leaves the field open after comparing Mamdani to De Blasio's failure to run NYC. NYT Editorial Board says Mayor Bloomberg was an effective manager and ran the city better than other mayors, it describes the accomplishments of Andrew Cuomo but does not give Cuomo second chances to use his experience to serve New York City, after Michael Bloomberg comes out in favor of Cuomo. This is  NYT and NYC dysfunction. It says there is so much to do in NYC to improve life in the city but refuses to make the tough decisions needed to make things happen, turning into someone who decides who gets second chances to serve the city and the country.  The Washington Post was clear in warning about the danger of a "free everything" Mayor as this has never worked and fiscal chaos happened in NYC in the 1970's, a NYC near bankruptcy in 1975 which Rohatyn tackled as head of NY's Municipal Assistance Corporation and $10 billon in bonds backed by New York state. NYT and NYC residents have short memories. Most have forgotten Rohatyn and his vision in Bold Endeavors, or were not part of the American fabric of the 20th century, which again points to the importance of history, civics and education. ...

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Abdulkader al-Saleh, a rebel commander in the Aleppo region of Syria, leads the military wing of Al Tawhid, which operates in this part of Syria. An effort is made by the Assad regime to assasinate him. Saleh survives and says he is focusing on the fight to end the regime.

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After the catastrophic Hurricane Helene damage in the western part of North Carolina in areas around Asheville, Governor Roy Cooper, a Democrat, said of relief efforts-

“It makes no difference who you are, if you need help we are going to provide it. If there is ever a time where we all need to come together and put politics aside, it is now.”

Parts of Georgia were also hit by the storm system. Governor Kemp, Republican of Georgia, said that Biden told him-

"Biden just said, hey, what do you need, and I told him, you know, we got what we need, we’ll work through the federal process. He offered that if there’s other things we need just to call him directly,” he said.

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U.S. Supreme Court nominee BrettKavanaugh, a Court of Appeals judge in the District of Columbia, could affect the Mueller investigation and issues of pardon, because of his expansive views of the presidency. He was part of the Kenneth Starr investigation of president Clinton. During that investigation he pursued it vigorously but later his opinion was that the president should be not distracted from his important duties, and should have some freedom from being prosecuted. For this reason it is not clear how he would act in the Mueller investigation. President Trump could have considered this when he selected Kavanaugh, says this report.

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Airports and airlines are trying to promote flying by offering coid testing to avoid quarantines imposed by state and federal governments. Airports are opening test centres offering the PCR test which takes 48 hours for results and rapid tests that take 15 minutes but are not as accurate. Some airlines are looking at designating certain flights as covid tested flights with all passengers either tested and negative or having been removed from the flight. Lufthansa has testing at airports in Frankfurt and Munich with the German government agreeing to it that people tested and negative did not have to quarantine for 14 days. Following this summer traffic jumped. The head of the resting task force at Lufthansa, Mr. Leffers, says testing is now becoming an integral part of the flying experience. Bermuda has some of the toughest testing rules with tests required on Day 1, Day 4, Day 7 and Day 14, resulting in low traffic over the summer. Yet with covid rates rising elsewhere Bermuda has become a safer destination resulting in a large increase in traffic this month. ...

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This video shows Dr. Birx explaining the three Phases for reopening the U.S. economy. Each state's governor would decide when a state thinks it is safe to move to the first phase. States which have not been affected much and fewer cases in the western part of the U.S. such as Idaho, North Dakota, Iowa could open earlier. Texas could start in May. California would have to do more testing before it starts Phase 1. New York, New Jersey, Michigan and Massachusetts, would come later because of the severity of the crisis. Each phase criteria are carefully set out and parameters set down for social distancing rules to be followed, number of people, locations, how offices open, how stores open, how hospitals open. Germany and the U.S. have set out detailed guidelines and phases. A state in the U.S. could even move back in phases if data shows it is doing badly. Hotspots would continue to be tracked and resources shifted from the federal government quickly to these new hotspots now that medical supplies, medical personnel and other shortages such as testing are being aggressively addressed. ...

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Japan's Premier Hatoyama admitted that he failed to win popular support for moving the American base off Okinawa. He said that it was hard to do it during my time, as the presence of China and N. Korea has made public opinion leery of making changes to the alliance with the U.S. However there remain questions about Obama's treatment of Hatoyama during the negotiations, by keeping Hatoyama at arms-length and refusing to compromise on the Okinawa issue.

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Happiness in Finland may be more about expectations for contentment being more reasonable, says this report on Finland. Colston and Michaels talk to Finns in different parts of the country to get a sense of how Finns look at life and why the country is rated so highly on a happiness index put out by the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network. For one thing Finland has a small homogenous population of 5 million people spread out over a vast densely forested region with a strong sense of identity and mutual help. It is also a technologically advanced country. This has enable Finland to maintain a state that provides an extraordinary amount of public services in education, health care, culture, that promote a sense of well being. Its participation in winter and other sports and sports facilities open to all also factor into this. This is true also of Denmark with 5 million people another country in the same region. Consider that the greater Mumbai region alone has over 20 million people, Shanghai 29 million and Tokyo 37 million. Just the pressure on space in homes is different. The long dark winters have an impact for Finns yet the people have adapted with a persevering quality that helps them deal with it. And having a peculiar Nordic version of mindfulness, a Buddhist quality, that brings contentment by understanding the nature of happiness which is mixed with tinge of sadness. Qualities that are shared throughout the Nordic region including Sweden.   ...

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For the first time in three decades US economic growth will be much faster than China's. Second quarter 2021 growth in the US was 12.2% compared to 7.9% in China, and will continue to be much higher for five consecutive quarters. This report in the WSJ says it is the result of the US response to the Covid pandemic. The US vaccination drive, massive fiscal stimulus and near zero interest rates have helped, including the confidence generated by the $1 trillion infrastructure investments planned for this decade. Over the longer term Capital Economic estimates China's GDP around 2030 will drop to 2% growth with demographic decline, just as the demographic factors favor Indian growth to levels that China has seen in the last two decades. This was the plan and vision set out by the Indian prime minister for 2047, on the 100th anniversary of independence. For the future government help has helped US households accumulate $2.6 trillion in excess household savings, which Moody's estimates is 7 times that in China.  In the longer term gaps will have narrowed between Asia and Europe, the US, which is a good thing. More will need to be done in Africa and Latin America. Much of the talk about who leads ignores the local needs in cities and towns across all parts of the world for a better quality of life, better education, better nutrition, better healthcare, meeting aspirations of young people, and supporting hope for a better future. ...

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This article in DW.com says Russia's open intervention in Syria with bombing attacks on Aleppo comes with risks. It says the prevailing opinion is that Russia is trying to show its superpower  status in the Middle East and other areas. Other views are that it is showing that it will counter all civil society movements following the one that toppled Yakunovych in Ukraine, and sending a message to civil society movements in Russia. President Obama after meeting with Putin in Hangzhou in September 2016 for 90 minutes, said it appears that Russia is willing "to live with constant low grade conflict" for a long time. DW.com says this is risky for Russia, and it offers so little in return, with the loss of credibility with world public opinion. Compared to Georgia where ethnic Russian ties were involved, and Ukraine where Russia has historically had ties with the eastern part of Ukraine, Russia has no interests of this kind in the region of Syria-Iraq. In its ties with Iran Russia was historically one of the colonial powers like Britain and the U.S., with U.S. relations having worsened only after the 1950's, so no historic ties exist with Iran either.   ...

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Osipova and Castle provide details about the personal life of Theresa May, the new British prime minister. May was only 25 when her father died in a car crash and her mother died soon after from multiple sclerosis. This has made her come closer to her husband Philip whom she met at Oxford, where they bonded over a love of cricket and debates at the university. She was interested in Tory politics from a young age, but has her own style of hard work and dislikes the chumocracy in British Conservative Party politics that prevailed under David Cameron. Unlike Cameron who was brash and confident to the point of making bold moves such as the decision to call a referendum as election year politics and did not consider carefully the impact of the austerity programs on Britain's working class; May is thoughtful and has been critical of the long period of deficit cutting austerity under Cameron and Osborne. She loves cooking and has a library of over 100 cookbooks, loves clothes and is carefully dressed for each event. Her matter of fact way to get on with it also has to do with her response to diabetes, with 4 injections a day her thought is "to just deal with it." She and her husband worked in investment banking, before her election as MP from Maidenhead, a constituency near London, on the third attempt. In an interview with the Daily Telegraph she has described the woman she is often compared to, Angela Merkel of Germany, as someone who doesn't get enough appreciaton. For May Merkel has actually achieved something significant by "steering Germany through a difficult time," and with her negotiation abilities during the eurozone crisis proved her resourcefulness, "hats off to her," says May. ...

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The growing number of women in their 40's who are childless, one person homes, "child-free" adults, higher rates of divorce, are not limited just to Western Europe, the U.S. and Japan. This is spreading rapidly in lower income countries in the Arab world and Asia also. In Europe the progress is relentless. With divorce rates higher and fewer women marrying, the probability of a women of reproductive age getting married in Belgium is about 40%, and divorce at about 50%, according to Eurostat. So that the probability of women getting married and staying married is about 20%. This is true of other European countries also. There is a huge increase in "child-free' adults, men and women choosing voluntarily to not have children. The proportion of childless women in their 40's is highest in Berlin and Hamburg, nearly 33%, about 25% in Italy, and 20% in Sweden. One person homes are increasing in Western Europe, with about 32% in Europe and 45% in Denmark, not from aging alone as in Denmark as many as twice the number of one person homes are under age 65 than over 65. The UN population Division's "World Marraige Data 2012," shows that places like Morocco, Libya, and other parts of the Arab world are also experiencing these trends, with income and schooling levels much lower than in Europe and the U.S. These trends are now worldwide and affecting traditionally conservative societies like China....

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Mark Robinson Republican candidacy for Governor in North Carolina remains one of the strangest, some might call it bizarre, aspects of this year's election with a black candidate reportedly supporting pro-slavery positions. North Carolina has a large Black vote, a large vote in rural areas west of Raleigh/Durham which like in Michigan's west tend to vote Republican, and the suburbs around Raleigh/ Durham more midwestern in outlook, and a popular two term Democrat as Governor Roy Cooper who is a part of the Harris-Walz team.

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Oxford Biomedica is the company that is part of the consortium making the coronavirus vaccine being developed by Oxford University's Jenner Institute.  Her Mr. Dawson describes the challenges he faced and cash crunches 4 times in 12 years, the last 4 years ago. The turning point he says was in 2012 when the cell and gene therapy was validated with a new drug developed for a form of cancer using this method. Oxford Biomedica is setting up a facility for manufacturing the vaccine in England at a 84,000 square foot former Royal Mail sorting facility in the city's business park called Oxpark. Dawson says cell and gene therapy is going to be big in health care. He did not see it coming till 2012. In 2014 he says during a cash crunch they had realized that what they had to do at Biomedica was to get to the time when it was going to be big. Today Astra Zeneca of the UK is organizing the effort and includes the use of British and Indian facilities for manufacturing, and Oxford University for research effort. ...

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This view in DW.com looks at the rising inequality in Chile and the devastating inflation of over 50% in Argentina, the failure in providing basic public services such as sanitation in Brazil, as failures in the economic models and also in the lack of social solidarity within Latin American nations.. The pursuit of "what is the most of what I can get" in place of "what is the best I can do so that the country and people benefit as a whole including myself as part of that society." Argentines have billions of dollars overseas, and billions are stored in homes outside of banks because no one trusts the government or banks to keep inflation in check. In Chile the economic model accepts high inequality as a norm. In Brazil much of the public spending goes to generous pensions crowding out basic services such as transport and sanitation. In each case one section of society looks after its own interests at the expense of the society as a whole leading to a breakdown and misery for all. ...

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This report in the NYT says Hillary Clinton has studied policy briefings, academic papers and taken advice from 200 policy experts, including experts from Bill Clinton's administration such as Alan Blinder, all in an effort to define her own policy positions on issues facing the U.S. This happens at a time different from the period of slow growth when Bill Clinton ran against George H.W. Bush. Since then middle class families face the added problems of not being able to keep up with the rising cost of college education, health care, child care, low interest rates on savings and volatile markets dampening savings growth. For working class Americans in the middle class during Bill Clinton's time in office the problems take the shape of a sharp decline in the manufacturing wages that once supported a middle class life in industrial states of the midwestern U.S., with global competition doing the damage, and few solutions available except improving technology and technical skill of the workforce to compete in higher end products. Consider the points made by Janet Yellen, the Fed chairwoman at a Boston Fed conference in Oct. 2014- Fed information for 2013 showing the average net worth of the lower half of American families representing 62 million households is $11,000. Only this conceals the situation facing one fourth of these families who have zero wealth or negative net worth, and a significant fraction owing more on their homes than they are worth. Hillary Clinton told a audience at the New School in Greenwich Village in New York, this is the defining economic challenge of our time. " We must raise incomes for hard-working Americans so they can afford a middle class life. This will be my mission from the first day I'm president to the last."...

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When shortages of wheat following the war in Ukraine are causing a crisis in some countries such as Egypt and Africa, there are other unusual changes  as emerging market currencies such as the Brazilian Real and the Chilean Peso, South African Rand are increasing in value. Even with the strengthening of the US dollar the supply chain disruptions are benefiting exporters of soyabeans such as Brazil and Argentina, and copper such as Chile with strengthening of their currencies. The Brazilian Real has strengthened by 13%. The WSJ calls it the sharpest commodities rally in modern trading history. One analyst says this is unusual how emerging market currencies could rally in the first quarter of 2022 with war in Ukraine, supply chain disruption, strengthening dollar reaching almost parity with the euro.  Today this is a positive sign for the Free World in Latin America. Currencies weakening are ones in countries exposed to a sharply slowing Chinese economy and rising energy costs such as Thai Baht and South Korean Won.  Brazil's central bank is also increasing its lending rate to the highest level in 5 years. Other American allies in Eastern Europe such as Poland which has taken in 3 million Ukraine refugees are also seeing a strengthening currency in this new situation. The National Bank of Poland increased its key lending rate by three quarters of a point to 5.25% which has attracted investors to the Polish currency the Zloty. ...