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COSCO, CATL, Tencent and COMAC are companies that are added to a list of companies that are military in nature by the US Defense Department. This is signalling by the US government that regulatory actions can be anticipated, and inhibits investment from the US and EU.

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The VW emissions scandal lingers on five years after the rigging of of millions of diesel vehicles to cheat emissions tests. Now former CEO Martin Winterkorn is ordered to face trial on charges of defrauding customers. It is interesting to note how it all started was a grandiose ambition set by Winterkorn according to this report in the WSJ, to make VW the largest auto company in the world ahead of Toyota and General Motors and push sales of diesel vehicles in the U.S. with "clean diesel vehicles." At this time of pandemic it is appropriate to note that the world has changed since 1946 when the wages of top managers were 2 times that of a Caterpillar company worker, and reached level of 400 times a worker for some executives of companies before the pandemic.  Even in supposedly egalitarian countries where worker representatives are on boards such as Germany, the wages had pushed way upwards to about 170 times the salary of the average worker at VW in 2015 when the emissions crisis erupted. This VW episode shows that the grandiose ambitions of executives were another part of the problem before the pandemic. Today the VW disaster has led to a completely opposite result. Diesel is not taking over the U.S. it is now the now the no go in Germany, as diesel vehicles are being phased out. Instead Germany's auto industry is now making large investments in the electric car industry. Significantly chancellor Merkel and the CDU no longer see the automobile industry in Germany as having some kind of special status and the shift to electric is being made with the planned loss of jobs and a restructuring to replace lost jobs with other jobs over 10 years. And the SPD has called for a legal ratio of the average ratio of a company's top managers  in relation to a workers wage at the same company. The pandemic has put things in perspective on a number of fronts, from wage relationships, health, healthcare and wellbeing, healthy lifestyles, mental health, making clear that health and a commonsense idea of fairness, good infrastructure, and sensible wage relations all go together in this world that the creator made. ...

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Issues of inequality and lack of upward mobility came up in the last presidential election. A Federal Reserve Survey for 2018 shows the financial fragility facing many Americans. One quarter of working individuals say they do not have any retirement savings. About 17% of households say they cannot pay all their monthly bills. About 40% of Americans say they do not have enough cash to cover an unexpected $400 expense, and would have to rely on credit cards balances or loans from family to make the payment. This survey by the Federal Reserve is done each year since 2013, after the financial crisis hit in 2009 it became more important. Still Americans are showing unusual resilience and upbeat spirit. About 75% say they were doing Ok or living comfortably up from 63% in 2013. And two out of three described lovcal economic conditions as "good" or "excellent."  This shows that the financial vulnerability resulting in the loss of jobs in the U.S. both from jobs lost in manufacturing going overseas,  jobs lost through automation or industrial decline in some sectors, and the hit from job loss during the financial crisis and its aftermath years of 2009-2014 is still leaving a lot of families financially vulnerable. Low interest rates and stagnant wages also meant savings growth for ordinary Americans was less than it should be in a healthy economy without booms and busts. This is also the environment in which the U.S. is tackling challenges to its technological leadership in 5G following a decline in sectors such as autos and electronics, with job losses to Japan and South Korea. New trade agreements are focussed on correcting the imbalance, first with Mexico, South Korea, and now with China. Focus is also on fair wages and labour overseas to raise American wages in key sectors. The damage done by a low interest rate to savings of ordinary Americans outside the stock markets is also being seen as a downside in the boom bust cycle, that includes loss of jobs for vulnerable American families. The rise of the tech sectors has diluted the traditional protections of working class Americans with the shifts and realignment of the major parties. ...

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Issues of work-life balance are growing for doctors as more doctors ages 40-54 years face burnout or negative effects on health. Nearly half of doctors in the U.S. 40-54 years of age in a survey of 15,000 physicians report feeling burned out from work hours and administrative tasks. Younger doctors 25-39 years, and older ones 55-73 years also reported high rate of burnout at 38% and 39%. Overall for all physicians about half of all physicians said they would take a substantial pay cut to get a better work-life balance. What this survey and report by Medscape shows is that no age group, career stage, gender or specialty is immune to this problem, says Colin West, professor of Medicine and researcher on physician well being at the Mayo Clinic.

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The pandemic brings together companies in three countries U.S, Italy and France with the merger of Fiat Chrysler with PSA. Fiat Chrysler is owned by the company Exor owned by the Agnelli family in Italy. PSA is owned by the Peugeot family in France. In addition the government of France and Dongfeng Motors in China have stakes in PSA.  During the 2008-2009 crisis Chrysler merged with Fiat with the help of the Obama administration which pursued a policy of promoting small cars. Instead the merger saved jobs but led to the PR effort for small Fiat cars and the focus on the Jeep Cherokee and SUV's like the Dodge Ram. Today one hardly ever hears about small Fiats from Fiat Chrysler that was the basis for government help on the merger. 

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Amy Coney Barrett and Barbara Lagoa are two judges Mr. Trump is considering for appointment to the U.S. Supreme Court to replace Justice Ginsburg, as he proceeds to nominate a Justice "without delay." 

Barrett is a Judge who has served for 2 years on the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals. She is a devout Roman Catholic and a legal scholar from Notre Dame University in Indiana. Lagoa is a judge on the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals and the first Latina on the Florida Supreme Court. Trump's nominee is likely to be confirmed quickly by the Senate as Republicans have 53 members in the Senate from a total of 100 members. Democrats want the nomination to be done after a president is elected in January 2021.

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When Ruth Bader Ginsburg started law school in 1956 women represented 3% of the legal profession in the U.S. It is about one third today.

A piece of advice from her mother in law has served Ginsburg well all these years. She told Ginsburg "in every good marraige it helps sometimes to be a little deaf." Meaning that if an unkind word or thoughtless word is spoken to you best to tune it out and go on anyway. This helps in the workplace. Reacting to someone's unkind words will not advance one's ability to persuade. This is why people of all kinds of persuasion and opinions liked Ginsburg including at the court her complete opposite Justice Scalia. Something we can all learn from Ginsburg.

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Tensions on the India China border as India builds roads and infrastructure in the mountainous Himalayan area close to the border in Ladakh to match the Chinese buildup of roads in the region over the last decade. India has also built up its troop presence in the region to match China's troop presence along the border in Ladakh.

India has supported a call from Australia for an investigation into the early origins of the coronavirus. The call was supported by many countries around the world and by the U.S., Japan and France. The 350,000 deaths from coronavirus and the 5.5 millions confirmed cases, the economic damage, most of them in western nations in North America and Europe, have  led to growing tensions between China and the rest of the world. 

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Economies have fallen back sharply but banks have not had to recognize bad loans as government support and repayment moratoriums have covered a quarter of all outstanding loans for companies and households. As a result there is a strange crisis in which defaults have not happened. Banks have not had to recognize bad loans. The question is what will happen once this government support and other support ends.

The European Central Bank says bad loans in eurozone could go as high as 1.4 trillion euros or $1.7 trillion, if the economies face further setbacks in the second wave of the coronavirus. European government support has been more generous than the U.S. In Italy over 25% of loans to businesses and 15% to households, totaling 300 billion euros were given payment holidays, according to Scope Ratings.

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Eighteen year old Bianca Andreescu, part Romanian, playing for Canada in the U.S. Open Tennis Championships, a teenager with poise and creativity, wins against veteran player Serena Williams 6-3, 7-5. Martina Navratilova, who with Margaret Court is one of the women's tennis great players, describes Andreescu's game as so refreshing and old fashioned because it is the creative game that was played by fellow Romanian Ilie Nastase and players like Rod Laver and John Newcombe from another era. In a highly creative game with poise and variety of shots Andrescu is bringing back the game to what it once was. In today's game, says Navratilova, players stay on the baseline and play similar shots till something happens. Andrescu intelligently and creatively used a variety of shots, making it fun to watch her play.

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The president's Council of Economic Advisors puts out a report on the homeless in California that makes points that both sides, liberals and Trump supporters can agree on. It says California has 12% of the population of the U.S. and half the unsheltered homeless in the country. The blame for the housing situation in the state is placed on "not-near-me" residents that want to prevent housing being built near them by supporting strict environmental and zoning restrictions. Residents selfishness looking at only their own interests and keeping out newcomers is seen as the problem behind the lack of new housing units. The tech industry pushing up housing prices has further aggravated the availability of affordable housing leading to a worsening of access to decent housing in the state.

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A detailed story on Fethullah Gulen, once an ally of president Erdogan in his effort to reduce the influence of the nation's military but now seen by him as a rival. Gulen lives in Pennsylvania. The recent coup in Turkey, and the efforts by Erdogan to reduce the influence of Gulen supporters in Turkey, has increased tensions between Turkey and the U.S. This is happening just as Turkey's relations with Germany are worsening after the failed coup, the  Erdogan response, and what is seen as a drift to authoritarian rule. Earlier corruption inquiries in 2014 critical of the Erdogan government by judges in the Gulen faction of the AK Party led to the split between the two factions, followed by Erdogan controlling judicial appointments and controlling the media.

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Chinese companies are building railways, power projects, airports and other infrastructure in East Africa. This report looks at work in Uganda building infrastructure projects and exploring for oil near Lake Albert. Chinese state owned banks provide access to financing for projects and other infrastructure companies build projects using about 60% of labour from China, on low interest rates but with payment over shorter periods than with World Bank projects. The U.S. lags far behind in investing in African infrastructure which badly needs modernization. 

The drawback of debt load is being balanced by exploring for oil in Uganda and keeping the debt load manageable. CNOOC is exploring for oil near Lake Albert. Uganda received $1.4 billion from 200 to 2014, in 2015 another $1.9 billion for 2 dams, and now $2.2 billion loan for new railways.

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Venki Ramakrishnan, head of the Royal Society and a Nobel laureate in Chemistry says that even with all the growing evidence of the importance of mask use Britain is way behind in mask use. Only one fourth of Britain's use masks compared to two thirds in the U.S. On public transport many people do not use masks in Britain.

The Royal Society has put together a scientific advisory group to look at the evidence on pandemics.

Ramakrishnan says it was once normal to have a few drinks and drive home, and normal to not wear seatbelts. Today this is considered not socially acceptable behaviour, the same has to happen for use of masks. It is as important as handwashing and social distancing, says the Royal Society.  

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In the most recent Global Financial Stability Report out in Sept. 2011, the increase in the ratio of a country's outstanding credit to GDP is highlighted as a key warning light indicator for country economies. An increase in this ratio of over 5% signals a warning light according to the IMF. It tells us that borrowing is expanding at significantly faster rate than the growth of the economy. Using this indicator would have set a warning light up for the U.S. before the 2008 mortgage crisis, and a warning light well before the financial crises in Greece, Portugal and Ireland. The outstanding credit to GDP ratio went up for China by 24 percentage points in 2009, with 4% percentage point increase in 2010. The ratio was up 30 percentage points in Hong Kong for 2010. The warning light is also up for Turkey and Vietnam. Capital inflows into countries that can be suddenly reversed, and overvalued currencies are a danger for emerging market countries and act as supplemental indicator warning lights. Brazil and South Africa have overvalued currencies. Turkey has high capital inflows. Only a small portion of this is foreign direct investment, the rest helps support a high amount of lending and credit provided by the banks. That a significant portion of this is in short term borrowing poses additional risks, as evident in the 1997 Asian financal crisis for S. Korea, Thailand and Malaysia....

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Eisinger says the Federal Reserve's staff plays an important role in regulatory reform. He quotes Cornell law professor, Robert Hockett, who says the general counsels tend to become more conservative over time and inclined to support the status quo. This makes required regulatory changes such as increasing the capital reserves at banks and reducing leverage more difficult. Eisinger describes the position of the U.S. Federal Reserve's general counsel, Scott Alvarez, on disclosure of lending by the Fed during the banking crisis, and on capital reserves, which veered more to the position of the banks which preferred less information be released and capital reserves be left at the 5% level than the 6% proposed by the FDIC and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency. Comments by Alvarez in nonpublic hearings to Congressional staff members on May 18, 2012, about the JP Morgan London Whale trading losses, according to Eisinger, shows lack of awareness of the overall implications of the breakdown in financial controls and supervision inside the bank....

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The number of supercommuters is up significantly as a result of the drop in home prices and high unemployment. It is up 60% in Manhattan since 2002, up to 59,000 or 3% of the workforce. In the Philadelphia- New Jersey corridor- it is 7.3% according to NYU. Houston saw a large increase between 2002 and 2009. In Maricopa County near Phoenix, 131,000 people or 8.6% of the labor force supercommutes. About 13% of the workforce or 427,000 people supercommute in Texas. Prof. Mitchell Moss of New York University, defines a 100 mile plus commute to get to work as a supercommute. His work at NYU's Rudin Center for Transportation shows 1.15 million people supercommuting in 10 major U.S. metropolitan areas. Employers are showing flexibility not wanting to have to dispose off properties, and employees prefer not to uproot families.

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The Treasury Department Report to U.S. president Reagan in Nov. 1984 offers an approach based on fairness that has great relevance to today's effort at tax reform. This approach resulted in the the Tax Reform Act of 1986. Similiar families with the same income were expected to pay the same amount in taxes in the interests of fairness. The tax revenues were set without any loopholes or exemptions, and the question was asked how much does marginal rates of everyone have to go up so that a particular group gets its exemption or loophole supported by its lobbyist?

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This article in the New York Times makes an extraordinary report about Rod Rosenstein, U.S. Deputy Attorney General and his views on president Trump following Trump's firing of FBI Director Comey. New York Times says it has based its report on meetings in which Rosenstein participated with Justice Department and FBI officials. Mr. Rosenstein and Mr. Sessions, the Attorney General, attended a meeting at the White House last year with Mr. Trump in which he agreed to write the memo cited by Mr. Trump for firing Mr. Comey. Rod Rosenstein had no idea at the time that Mr. Trump would cite his memo, and felt afterwards that he had been used by Mr. Trump, according to this report in the NYT. Leading Democrats were very critical of Mr. Rosenstein for providing the memo that served as the basis for firing Mr. Comey. Mr. McCabe who succeeded Mr. Comey and others also left the Justice Department and the FBI, and the events of that time has created dissension in the FBI and the Justice Department, leading to the release of this information to the New York Times.  Mr. Rosenstein according to this report based on internal meetings with Justice Department officials, was concerned about the chaotic situation in the White House following the firing of Mr. Comey of the FBI. During this time it is reported here Mr. Rosenstein suggested recording of the president and invoking of the 25th Amendment. The 25th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution provides for removal of the President by the Vice President and cabinet officials on certain grounds such as when the president "is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office." Mr. Andrew McCabe, who was head of FBI following Mr. Comey's firing was also fired, and he has memorialized his interactions with Mr. Rosenstein in memos that are now with the Mueller investigation.  Not everyone thinks this is a constructive step as a letter in the New York Times questions the wisdom of such a report leading to the departure of Mr. Rosenstein. Mr. Rosenstein is seen by some as defending the Mueller investigation into Russian interference in the U.S. presidential election. But even this may be overstated or in doubt as the criticism of Democrats leading to the the release of the report by the NYT on Rosenstein shows. Mr. Rosenstein says in response to the NYT report that he sees no need for invoking the 25th Amendment. ...

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Not much about industry, manufacturing, job creation, services. With 7% annual growth and neighboring India Pakistan under its current Prime Minister, a senior manager at Citibank at one time, must be writng its own story of economic growth struggling with all the problems facing India and on top of that facing the problems of religious extremism. The entrepreneurs here still represent efforts at retailing and other ventures after years of stagnant growth.