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Krugman points to the need for action on revaluation of the yuan, and sees the vote in the House of Representatives sponsored by Sander Levin as a necessary step to get China to act. He sees China as dragging its feet on this issue for many years, and the need to keep the heat on US policy makers, who have acted very passively on this issue. He describes the US policymakers as being infuriatingly, incredibly passive in the light of the Chinese inaction and stalling on currency appreciation. China he says denies manipulating the exchange rate, even as $2.4 trillion foreign currency was purchased by China. Krugman says China is not letting what is a natural process to unfold that would help the world economy as a whole to recover. Its manipulation of the exchange rate, is in effect subsidizing its exports at the expense of other countries like the US. See the link to Roubini, who shows how this is bad for China. Roubini says China will see a growth collapse in 2-3 years, if it does not change direction and let the yuan appreciate. He says it is in effect a large transfer of income from Chinese households to Chinese state owned companies which is dangerous because of increasing misallocation of resources and real estate speculation. See David Barboza for information on the real estate speculation of these Chinese state owned companies. When all this information is added up, it shows China's serious need to act. This would make possible a transition to a new model of development that relies on domestic consumption, and bettter allocation of resources and investment. ...

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Israel vaccination drive has now reached 2 million people for the first dose and 400,000 for the second dose. What do early results show? As the effectiveness is only 52% after the first dose, according to Pfizer for its vaccine, vaccination drive is only one part of the solution. The number of cases in Israel are high at 10,000 a day. There is concern about the ultra-Orthodox community following the protocols and rules for prevention. Ben Gurion International Airport may be restricted to only essential flights. A mutation variant of the coronavirus, a UK detected variant, is seen as making up about 30% of the cases and could make up the bulk of cases in the future. Lessons being learned are that Pfizer vaccine is effective at about 52% for the first dose. Only after the second dose are enough antibodies triggered to resist the virus effectively. This can be as much as 6 to 12 times the increase in antibodies for second dose, compared to what happens after the first dose says the Sheba Medical Centre at Tel Hashomer, Israel.   ...

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Apple appears to have peaked and it marks the end of an era. Americans have more to be concerned about than the latest incremental iPhone design with decline in reading skills among children, dropping mens college enrollments, cost of living crisis, and retiree poverty.  For the most part US prices are kept at last year's level as Apple is facing new competition and restrictions in China, with a new Huawei phone which matches the new iPhone. Apple has increased iPhone revenues by 44%, even though shipments have increased by 15%, with aggressive pricing, making iPhones generate $40 billion, 50% of total revenue. This aggressive pricing phase may now be ending as Huawei plans to increase global shipments by 20% even as the total smartphone market declined by 6% to 1.15 billion shipments. Apple has 55% of the US smartphone market and worldwide at 27%. This may be the peak and the end of an era in which Apple and other Tech companies not paying a fair share of taxes led to the defunding of infrastructure and public services. ...

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With majorities in both houses of parliament Lopez Obrador now has the mandate to come up with an independent position for Mexico on issues of NAFTA negotiation, and social programs to lift Mexico's poor and working class, come up with a new way to reduce violence and corruption in society.  Stakes are large in the relationship with the U.S. Mexico exported $340 billion of products to the U.S. and imported $276 billion in goods. The team of Mr. Obrador sees the need to plan conversations with the U.S. carefully recognizing that Mr. Trump is not a lunatic, but a man with a political plan, says Marcelo Ebard, a top adviser to Obrador. On migrants even as Mexico has detained 76,000 central American migrants Lopez Obrador sees Mexico as a nation of refuge, and says migrants rights must be respected. On NAFTA Obrador supports the current negotiations and will have his advisers present at the negotiations. Obrador says Mexico is a country with a lot of natural resources and wealth, so that "the demise of the existing NAFTA will not be fatal for Mexicans." ...

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As Nigeria's president Buhari returns from 100 days of receiving treatment for an unknown illness in London, the situation in Nigeria has deteriorated further. For most of 2017 Buhari was absent from Nigeria. In his place Vice president Obisanjo was running the administration. The situation in Nigeria has deteriorated under Buhari- in the northeast that attacks by the Boko Haram group, and discontent in the south from the lack of investment in that region with oil revenues leading to corruption. One of the dominant themes in Nigeria has been that oil revenues have led to corruption with little change under the administration of Buhari's predecessor, Goodluck Jonathan, who came in as "Mr. Clean." Again and again the hope for a clean administration and good governance are not being met in countries with much of Africa's population. Nigeria with 186 million people suffers sorely in this respect.  See Ruchir Sharma's WSJ article on how oil revenues have become a curse with widespread Nigeria corruption. ...

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S. Korea and the U.S. propose limiting trade imbalances to 4% of each country's GDP by 2015. S. Korea is the host of the current G-20 meeting. Germany and Japan oppose this move, arguing that their governments cannot engineer such outcomes, as it was determined by economic activity in the private sector. Japan's representative, Finance Minister Yoshihiko Noda, said that while he was dubious about the idea of setting strict numerical goals, it would be acceptable to use them as reference numbers. Germany has traditionally opposed the idea. Germany wants to be counted as part of the European Union, rather than as a single nation, in any such reference goal. China has not commented on the target. S. Korea has presented the idea as a way to use more than currency exchange rates to achieve a global rebalancing. And People's Bank of China Deputy Gov. Yi Gang said Oct 10, that China is planning policies that could result in its surplus falling below 4% of GDP in 3 to 5 years, from about 5.8% in 2009....

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Local customs, tradition and history of development play a part in each region. This is the message from Islamist politicians who want to bridge the differences with the USA in the northwest frontier province of Pakistan. They want to keep some of their Islamic ways of life and still work with the US. These Islamic organizations are working to reduce the violence in the region and promote democratic discourse and electoral representation. This is happening amid widespread mistrust of the U.S. of all Islamist politicians. There are negative perceptions about things Western which are not automatically accepted in these highly tradition bound areas of Pakistan, especially the Afghanistan border regions. Some kind of rapprocement could bring peace to the region and cool growth of militants. Is there a basic misunderstanding of the area and are their other more gradual ways of bringing these areas into the mainstream. Of modernizing these societies over time so they gradually accept women's rights, education and development as opposed to the sudden onset of change. One sign - these areas need hospitals, they need roads and there is no disagreement about this. Once they see the benefits of development and militancy drops then it s easier for them to understand the benefits of schools for girls, women's rights, and education and all other development. Its like the American South trying to baccept negro rights after years of blatant racism, took some time but now some of the southern states can't even be recognized from what they used to be in their perception of black people....

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Problems President Buhari of Nigeria faces problems with the Avenger group in the Niger Delta and disruptions by the group in the flow of oil. As a result Nigeria now lags behind Angola in oil exports. The decline is about 25% in oil production compared to a year earlier.  Years of neglect and frustration in the south are fueling the movement- the Niger Delta people feel oil resources do not benefit their region and benefits going to politicians and people in the government. Buhari has not visited the Niger Delta and a recent trip was postponed leading to a a sense of alienation. The south is Christian and feels discriminated against by Buhari, a Muslim from the north.  Separatist sentiment is growing in Biafra. And the Boko Haram movement has led to 2 million refugees in the north of the country. The result is that Nigeria faces a crisis.

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Limits of new tech devices without good intelligence or help and support from the local people.

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Statistics show small investors are shifting away from stocks. The charts also show less buying on dips in the market. US mutual funds that invest in stocks saw net inflows in January, but net withdrawals in May, resuming a trend that is in place for several years. There is a growing loss of confidence in the market among small investors and a cautious approach is taking hold.

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Pearlstein says the major news stories of today all are about the same theme- of how the US was encouraged to live beyond its means by trading partners who prospered as this went on, with the tacit agreement of financial and political leadership in the US who raised no alarm about this. These stories are: the G-20 meeting in South Korea with the goal of rebalancing the world economy, the President's Deficit Commission Report recommending bold steps in changing the tax and spending policies of the US, the criticism of the Fed's decision on $600 billion of quantitative easing, and the renewed concerns about Ireland where severe cuts in public spending have failed to reverse a downward slide.These trading partners prospered by lending Americans the money to consume more than they produce. It was he says a wonderful arrangement while it lasted, because it helped bring millions out of poverty in Asia, while letting Americans enjoy a transitory period of a higher standard of living. This unsustainable arrangement converted the US from world's biggest creditor nation after World War II to the world's bigggest debtor nation. He credits Geithner for coming up with a more convincing and less confrontational way to correct the imbalances by setting limits on the deficits and surpluses of trading nations. He points out that the Chinese have barely budged on the issue of an undervalued currency, the world be damned. And the German and Chinese criticism rings hollow he says, as both countries are the main beneficiaries of the current system. The normal mechanism of correcting imbalances with a floating rate exchange system is hardly relevant, as it is incompatible with state run economy and strategy of export growth of China. Erskine Bowles and Alan Simpson have presented he says a bold deficit reduction plan that is credible, fair, economically sound. Even though it was received with the usual complacency and lack of awareness both in the media and in Congress. The simple reality after all the awfully complicated details and the painful implications is this: Americans have to consume less and produce more, and trading partners have to consume more and produce less. And this shift cannot be pushed into the future as our trading partners would like....

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Australian anthropologist Genevieve Bell heads a group of 75 people at Intel Labs working to figure out all the ways technology affects people and society. Here she talks to NYT's Quentin Hardy. She says there are three areas in which technology is changing the way we live, and act, and our relationship to society. Like electrification the digital revolution is changing the concept of time, introducing new ideas about availability and response time. Here she points out the need to leave some parts of the day for disconnectedness, to preserve quiet time in our lives for recharging and getting a sense of who and where we are. Then there is the idea of space, of imaginary space when connecting to people in distant places, and physical space such as at airports and public places with wifi and internet to connect. After space and time come social relationships, about relating to one's fellow human beings. With this comes ideas of privacy, security and risk. With changes in how we view time, space and social relationships, comes anxiety. Social movements are likely to develop around ideas of government and governance, on issues such as what it means to be unequal and denied economic opportunity, when the digital revolution itself is opening up new visions of what is possible, just as electrification did at the turn of the twentieth century....

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Pope Francis meets Bosnia's three presidents in a Council, with each president rotating in office every 8 months. He also addresses a crowd of 65,000 in Sarajevo. Pope Francis told the crowd: " In a world unfortunately rent by conflicts, this land can become a message, attesting that it is possible to live together side by side." A council of Interracial Dialogue to bring together different clerics is working well, says the Vatican's ambassador Luigi Pezzuto. At the level of politics divisions remain as political leaders still promote ethnic nationalism. But overall the Dayton Accords negotiated by Richard Holbrooke of the U.S. are working well. The economy struggles with 50% unemployment and 60% of the workers dependent on the government.