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Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen is pushing for a large pandemic stimulus package to ensure the recovery of ordinary Americans after suffering through this pandemic. Yellensays: "We need to make sure that people aren't going hungry in America, that they can put food on the table, that they're not losing their homes and ending up out on the street because of evictions. We really need to address those forms of suffering, and I think we should'nt compromise on it." Mr. Biden has a $1.9 trillion stimulus package for the pandemic related recovery to relieve suffering people and businesses. Yellen and Biden feel it is really important to do this immediately. A recent picture in the NYT shows Stephen Schwarzmann of American finance with Mr. Trump showing him as one who stuck with Mr. Trump to the end. Much of this play as Shakespeare calls it, is the result of Democrats of the old tradition like Yellen trained by economists from the New Deal and Johnson era, who have not walked the talk and forgotten the suffering of American workers. Yellen held a Conference on Equality at a branch of the Federal Reserve during her time at the Fed, used strong language about the neglect of American workers but did little under the Clinton or Obama administration about the underlying structures of tech and shift of American jobs overseas that led to the destruction of America's manufacturing. Today they are faced with the picture of food insecurity in American homes once a situation that afflicted China and India. ...

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Peter Coy says that as long as unemployment numbers keep going up and foreclosures keep increasing as aresult of the job losses housing prices will keep falling. He says that they may have to fall 20% more than the level they are at today. And that the foreclosure levels could become atidal wave if it becomes easier for alot of people to just hand their keys to the banks. This was what Martin Feldstein warned aginst in the WSJ oped pages several times in 2008. As more people are under water it makes sense to just hand the keys to the banks, and as long as this goes on, the economic recovery will be put off. A study cited by Coy done by Reinhart and Rogoff shows that housing crisis of this magnitude last about 6 years before all the bad effects wear off. And in addition to housing there are other things at work in this crisis especially in the job loss rate which is increasing (663,000 jobs lost in March), and the readjustment in savings rate upto 6.4% according to BW for 2009 till March, which suggests a serious drop in the consumption rate is underway and may go on for several years crimping demand and increasing unused manufacturing capacity. The stories in the media and other information reinforce this statistical information. The bit of good new from hard hit housing markets in California and Nevada and other staes has to be seen as no more than a limited play in the foreclosure markets, that does little to the broad brush strokes that are ocurring on the national and world landscapes in job losses and consumption. Coy a veteran analyst who has covered the housing market and warned during the boom of the likelihood of abust in a cover issue at the time, brings experience and reflection to the developments, and urges serious caution in interpreting signals that may have no broad meaning....

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900 million eligible voters in India means this is the largest election ever. The election will take place in 7 phases in April and May from April 11 to May 19. Votes will be counted on May 23. The election is for 543 seats in parliament, the Lok Sabha. Turnouts are high with 66% turning out in the last election that brought Mr. Modi and the BJP to power.  Unlike elections in Britain a lot is spent in each election, about $5 billion in the last election and double that this time. The U.S. elections in 2016 had spending of $6.5 billion as a comparison. Women vote at about the same rate as men and more women than men are expected to vote this time. Prime minister Modi won the last election with promises of development and infrastructure. He is delivering on infrastructure but building manufacturing and generating jobs in the formal sector remains a tougher task for any administration in 4 years. During the first term Mr. Modi made needed changes including introducing the GST tax to integrate India's fragmented market and get rid of a patchwork of regional state taxes. He introduced a whole range of projects and yojanas which are setting the stage for widening the middle class, and improving living conditions. Some of the problems such as the bad loans in the banking system date back to previous administrations and the government has taken steps to clean up this problem by refinancing banks and introducing a bankruptcy law. This has slowed GDP growth to about 7%. However this would have happened under any administration.  The brief war with Pakistan in February 2019 has added another dimension to this election with questions about whether this may help Mr. Modi because of his strong stand against terrorism camps in Pakistan.  In the end it all comes down to whether the public still believes the BJP party under Modi is best qualified to develop the infrastructure to modernize the country and improve services, and whether it can create enough of the manufacturing capabilities to generate jobs needed. It may not be that the BJP under Modi has  not made mistakes in the process of learning how best to tackle development, but whether a patchwork of regional parties led by the opposition Congress party is in a position to provide the strong decisive direction to make quick decisions on development. Getting the agreement of a number of regional parties such as the party in West Bengal state or the Uttar Pradesh state when it was under a previous administration of Mrs Mayawati means an even slower rate of decision making as it leads to lack of speedy decision making. Whether voters have short memories and forget the slow rate of infrastructure development under previous administrations or have a willingness to give the BJP a chance to show what it can do under Modi for development can eventually decide this election. An example of what this means is in how the Mumbai Metro is being pushed through to timely delivery- Metro Rail's head Mrs. Ashwini Bhide simply says she feels for the people of Mumbai who have suffered from delays in development of needed infrastructure for so long, with millions doing appalling rides in a creaky old rail system. In her view it should have been done yesterday. It is this attitude that can make or break the current administration, and whether it can get this message through to voters one more time. Most who have this attitude are aware that China is now laying enough concrete every two years than America did in the whole 20th century, as reported in the Guardian newspaper, and are equally passionate about delivery of services and rapid development of badly needed infrastructure.         ...

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Germany is trying not to choose sides in the trade and security disputes between China and the U.S. Yet it owes a lot to the U.S. from the days of the Marshall Plan and U.S. taking on the role of defending Germany after the Berlin Wall. China was then a partner with the Soviet Union in the Cold War.  Today China is Germany's top market for its car industry. Yet the U.S. export market is much larger than China at $119 billion with China's at $96 billion. In Germany 28% of jobs are linked to exports, and in manufacturing this goes up to 56%, according to Germany Ministry of Economic Affairs. Germany supplied much of the factory  equipment from its engineering companies and the infrastructure that powered up the China transformation. A transformation now underway in India.  There are signs of a shift as engineering companies in Germany grew faster in the U.S. than China, increasing by 6-10% a year. India remains a key growth market for Germany over the next 10-15 years as growth in China slows and India accelerates with its younger demographics and investment in infrastructure. Much of the infrastructure in China is built and it is approaching the saturation Japan reached in the 1990's with additional investments adding little in the way of productivity. Longer term Germany has more potential for growth in countries in South and South East Asia  that will need to make huge investments in infrastructure and technology for manufacturing to meet the aspirations of the people there. Other issues related to freedom going back to the Berlin Wall and the rebuilding of Germany after World War II will emerge. German companies are running out of patience says this report in the WSJ with the bureaucratic obstacles, forced technology transfers, subsidies by state model to extinguish competition, and protectionist approach to home markets, even as state funded companies in China put other companies in Europe, Asia and the U.S. at a disadvantage. Germany will need to transition to a shift in its global relations, a process that is only now taking place. Just as with austerity policies in which it has now made the shift from going with the northern European countries (Sweden, Denmark, Netherlands, Finland) to the Southern European (France, Italy, Spain) in favor of common solidarity even at the short term cost of common debt, Germany now is facing the shift for solidarity with the U.S. for its support of Germany from the period of the Berlin Wall in the 1950's, for the U.S. and European solidarity in the face of the post-coronavirus world. The U.S. showing its generosity and openness to Germany and war torn Europe even as it took on the added responsibilities for creating a new alliance with Europe.   ...

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With some aspects of Marie Le Pen's programme possibly violating the French Constitution and some parts of the programme leading to France being forced to leave the European Union, what was not looked at carefully in the first round vote is now happening for the second round. The Le Pen draft law on "immigration, identity and citizenship," is seen by multiple analyses cited by The Guradian, as violating the principles of equality enshrined in the French Constitution. Constitutional experts say this would also violate European law and lead to a progressive or indirect exit from the European Union. Le Pen's proposal to lower the retirement age to 60 was coming under scathing scrutiny, with Jean Tirole, the 2014 Nobel prize winner in Economics saying it would cost 68 billion euros and "permanently impoverish the country." Countries such as Brazil that lowered the retirement age in this manner have found that it seriously affects public finances, leading to the deep economic crisis in Brazil following the commodity price collapse a few years ago. Macron has moved in the opposite direction to raise the retirement age gradually and now with a proposed national consensus, at the cost of losing some support, simply to shore up public finances. So that needed investments in infrastructure and climate change can be made. For this reason it may become evident to undecided voters that Le Pen's proposals have some serious flaws if implemented, weakening the French economy and yet not tackling the deeper problems of younger people. These problems The Guardian says in a separate report are the precarious and low pay jobs, asset based inequality, and rural urban regional differences developing as a result of the offshoring of manufacturing to China, and are common to Britain, France, Germany, and the US. These problems are beginning to be addressed after the lessons learned from the pandemic by western nations.   ...

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President Xi's struggle to bring 43 million people out of extreme poverty in China in 3 years as shown in this BBC video. Xi Jinping's focus is on the people left out in the boom years in which the wealth gap expanded to astounding levels and many were left behind. Communist era society under Mao went for leveling up after the 20's and 30' capitalism under the Nationalists. Then came the Japanese invasion in 1931 and chaos out of which Mao built Communist China by 1947. The years with the Nixon opening in 1971 led to another experiment with capitalism to modernize China under Deng and Jiang Zemin in the 80's and 90's to this day after the experiment under Mao had collapsed by 1976. This led to a fading away of the Communist Party's ethos and reason for existence till its revival under Xi Jinping. For Jinping the efforts to guide China's progress started by Deng appeared to derail with the widening wealth and inequality gaps in China, the sense of corruption and misuse of power at local levels that people could see, and the gradual sense in America that the experiment of outsourcing manufacturing and jobs to China was failing for Americans. From 2013 to 2017 a complete rethinking was underway which shaped Jinping's ideas for the future for China. Some of it may be still underway after the realization that Russia and China had diverging views of the world also, following China's sense that the prolonged war in Ukraine affecting its relations with the European Union does not help a country such as China as a middle income country with large pockets of poverty. Russia was seen as a non colonial power in the Soviet era yet it was a major part of the western colonial powers that suppressed the first revolution for an independent China in 1901.   ...

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It may come as a surprise that even a conservative Republican Senator Lindsay Graham of South Carolina, talked recently on CSPAN television about the US needing immigration in an organized manner to meet the growing shortage of workers in the coming years in the US. This report by Alicia Caldwell in the WSJ looks at the city of Topeka, Kansas, home to University of Kansas in nearby Lawrence, which is trying to attract immigrants who are allowed to work to meet 6600 worker positions that remain unfilled. Mayor Michael Padilla of Topeka is a cross between a liberal Republican and a conservative Democrat as are many immigrants from countries in South America. The Greater Topeka Partnership is looking to attract Spanish speaking people to fill these jobs, because of stagnant population and a lower unemployment rate than the US average. This effort in Spanish language has resulted in 10,000 resumes submitted. Another effort for Uniting with Ukraine has brought 160 Ukrainians to Topeka. These efforts are happening since 2019 and in some cases the city has offered $15000 a person for relocation costs. Citywide the effort is being welcomed including the business community. Topeka, a town of 126,000 is home to 17% Spanish speaking residents. Molly Howey who heads Go Topeka and the Greater Topeka Partnership is shown here, and says Topeka had already had success with its Spanish speaking population when it started welcoming new immigrants.  The rapid recovery of the US after the pandemic and its resilience for growth over the next decade is creating a recognition among Republicans as well as Democrats, among economic planners and business of the need to fill shortages of workers as the US invests trillions of dollars in its economy in coming years in infrastructure, manufacturing and and new technologies. It is an effort that is unprecedented since the post war effort to build a modern economy in the 1950's. ...

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US president Biden campaigns in Nevada. His focus is on the cost of living actions and has proposed 15,000 affordable housing rental units on underused federal land repurposed for housing, action which can be taken on presidential orders. Other cost of living action is being prepared by Biden and he closely follows the mortgage rate increases from 3% to 8% that are leaving families stuck without owning an home. Biden is also focussing on the threats to democracy coming from the former president's rhetoric and actions, something that he devoted time to in his address in Philadelphia's Independence Hall, where the founders of this Union gathered together to draft the Constitution. This happened early in his first presidential term and in the 2020 campaign Biden focused on this threat to democracy. Peter Baker points out that Biden is best qualified to convey a sense of hope to America, yet what the NYT, W. Post and WSJ, and the television news channels -that are not watched as much by the core 25-54 years with a shift to digital- fail to do is to do their own introspection on how Biden has forged the consensus in Congress from his vast experience and wisdom to make the multi trillion dollar investments in America's future through infrastructure, job creation, manufacturing, chips and science. Not since FDR has America seen this happen and it shapes 2030. ...

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Robert Lighthizer was one of the early voices on unfair and imbalanced trade with other nations subsidizing their industry at the expense of American jobs in manufacturing long before DJT took up the issue in 2015-2016. Lighthizer as US Trade Representative negotiated the new USMCA that replaced NAFTA agreement for North American trade with Mexico and Canada. 

Lighthizer was seeking a larger role than USTR, either Commerce or Treasury, yet he was reluctant to campaign for this or go to Mar-a-Lago to make his case. As a result says WSJ, he was passed over as Luttnick and Bessent tried to get DJT's attention. Another reason he was passed over is that DJT is  sees the continuing flow of fentanyl and the migrant flows from Mexico, the sourcing from China, as serious issues that require using trade as part of the solution by 2024 if Mexico, Canada and China do not cooperate and hurt US interests.

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Most of it is because of Donald Jr. and his affinity for Vance, a bonding that developed once the former president left office. Donald Jr. championed Vance choice over Burghum and Rubio. For the former president the choice was natural because his style fitted that of Vance of saying directly with candor what he thought. Vance's criticism that a second Trump administration focused on tax cuts and not investing in the American economy would not lead to economic growth still rings true as shown in the adjoining article on the US dollar, on inflation moving up with tariffs and job growth affected by lack of the government investing in the economy and American manufacturing. Even in the Depression years Republicans stuck to their idea that governments should stay out, are they likely to change that today? Vance's criticism was made before he became senator, in 2016. It would lead to another lost decade for the American economy and people, and put America just where the Tories have left Britain today so that Keir Starmer's Labour cannot bring immediate relief to the British people struggling with cost of living in 2025, with the mess the Tories have left behind.  ...

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The Gallois Report commissioned by the new government in France to restore France's manufacturing competitiveness. Louis Gallois is the former head of aerospace firm EADS. It calls for a 30 billion euro cut in payroll taxes to help French companies compete in global markets. Gallois proposes 22 main measures to "stop the slide and support the economy." He called this a "competitiveness shock." Gallois points to France's 70 billion euro trade deficit in contrast to booming German exports. The cost to the economy was 2 million French jobs over 3 decades, says the report. Unemployment today is around 10%. Measures suggested include the payroll tax cuts of 1.5% of GDP for salaries upto 4900 euros a month, and employee representatives to sit on board of directors of French companies similiar to Germany.

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Jonathan Ive, Apple's design chief, talks about what it is like working as part of a very small team that included Steve Jobs and Tim Cook for two decades. Jobs complete focus was on creating great products. The innovative products were created through the work of very small teams, says Ive. Two attributes the team members had to have are being inquisitive and curious. Making the product, manufacturing it using new technologies for materials like light weight titanium, was not something tacked on at the end, but something that was addressed as part of the design at the outset. Form, material, process- the design development and making- are intertwined thorughout, says Ive. For titanium that meant complete redesign, discovering new partners to work with, and hiring a new organization. This put Tim right at the heart of things and deeply involved right from the beginning. Ive repeats the idea focussed small team effort, and says this is no platitude. Titles, organizational structures are insignificant in this setup. Today Ive meets 3 times a week with Tim Cook. Tim sees design as an effort to articulate how a user sees the object, and credits Cook with a unique ability for giving this special attention and working to understand how an object is perceived....

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The transformation of towns in Iowa like Newton, once the place where Maytag and washing machine plants were located, and now with many of these plants closed the shift to making parts like blades for wind energy. The transformation of Toledo, a location for the auto industry factories, and now with the closing down of these plants the shift to manufacturing solar panels for solar energy. In all a transformation that is expected to generate 3 or 4 million jobs in the midwest in energy related products, to replace the jobs lost in the auto industry and in industries like appliances, like the Maytag plant in Newton that closed. Along the way there is hope and optimism and awe at the new product being built for wind and solar energy, which is cutting edge and not easily outsourced because of the size of the blades and the structures in wind energy generation. The struggles are chronicled of the people in Newton, Iowa and a whole generation of workers who even without a college education were able to live middle class lives because of Maytag plants in the area. And the distress caused as these plants cut employees and let the plants get antiquated, and finally the distress with the shutting down of the plants....

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This is a WSJ special report on Nissan and the failure of Carlos Ghosn's management style at Nissan leading to deep discontent in management ranks and employees, and also in Japan. Ghosn failed to invest in Japan seeing it as an aging society, and preferred the U.S. for investment. This was an affront to many Japanese, not just Nissan employees.  A big problem was that Ghosn's salary was larger than that of all nine top Nissan executives combined. Even during the 2008 financial crisis and cost cutting Ghosn's salary was understated by using accounting methods not approved by its auditor Ernst & Young. Under new Japanese rules oversight on compensation was given to Mr. Imazu who had to uncover the different shell companies that were used to shield the compensation and benefits going to Ghosn from public view. Lack of transparency and frugality was a major issue as one Nissan executive put it- "where is the transparency, and where is the frugality." New laws introduced in Japan in 2015 required release of compensation for any company executive making more than $800,000. Under these rules Japanese prosecutors were able to investigate the situation at Nissan.  In the end when the CEO of Nissan, appointed by Mr. Ghosn announced the arrest and detention of Mr. Ghosn, the Japanese audience applauded, showing how deep the discontent was in Japan. On November 19, in a carefully managed operation that would make a detective type story Japanese prosecutors arrested Mr. Ghosn as his plane landed in Tokyo, and arrested his assistant Mr. Kelly on the same day after his plane landed and his car was taken off the road to a rest area. Ghosn story has also its management lessons as this type of hard driving management with time spent jet-setting more than in contact with people and employees of the company is becoming unpopular. It is bad for employees and presents a rather unhealthy lifestyle, lacking any kind of role model for the rest of the company and society where the company is located. In this case not just Yokohama, but all of Japan, which resented the way it was treated. Recent articles have highlighted the situation at other companies. The General Electric story about the failure at GE in the U.S. - also explored this week in the WSJ -tells a story of hard driving management style of some executives that is increasingly becoming unpopular. A more thoughtful management style, with mindfulness, not based on personality or ego, is more productive leading to better decisions after taking in all views and enabling participation of other top and middle managers. ...

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Leonhardt points out in the NYT that Hillary Clinton actually won in the popular vote by a substantial margin, by more than 2 million votes and more than 1.5 percentage points. He says that Democrats need to pay more attention to the working class in midwestern states- the job losses, crumbling infrastructure, and the plight of communities such as Detroit, Michigan which suffered through the bankruptcies of Chrysler and GM, and again with the foreclosure crisis, the financial crisis of the City of Detroit. With a similar situation in the neighboring states of Wisconsin and Ohio, in places like Toledo and other parts of communities facing industrial decline. While the Silicon Valley centred region powered the economy in California, and the financial industry and real estate powered New York, older midwestern communities never really recovered from a long decline stretching over 2 decades. The result was the loss of faith in Democrats among union workers and young people, leading to the loss of Wisconsin, Ohio and Michigan. For most of its history the Democratic Party was based on its union and working class base including a large number of white voters. Only under Obama because of his unique candidacy was the coalition so dependent on the minorities vote. Before minorities were part of the Democratic coalition, but not in the way under the Obama candidacy. A return to its historic and normal base among whites in unions and working class communities, liberals, minorities, is a way to go back to the historic and natural base of Democratic support. In a sense dependence on tech communities for election funding and the tech booms, globalization, may have distorted Democrats sense of their historic role as champions of the working class and middle class communities throughout the country. There is now an opportunity to restore this lost mission of protecting the interests of the middle and working class who have seen huge drop in net worth as reported by Janet Yellen of the Federal Reserve at the Inequality Conference on October 17, 2014-"62 million households with a net worth of $11,000 for the year 2013." Poorly covered in the media and not made the utmost priority by Democrats (or Republicans). In the words of Janet Yellen, this was in the past several decades "the most sustained rise in inequality since the 19th century after more than 40 years of narrowing inequality since the Great Depression." She added the shocking words "by some estimates, income and wealth inequality near their highest levels in the past hundred years, and probably much higher than much of American history before then." Even discussion in the media goes back to the Obama coalition and treats it as a way forward for Democrats, when history shows it was different and the situation described by Yellen calls for a serious response. ...

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This article in the NYT explains why the loss of jobs particularly in the auto industry to Mexico, with the experience of NAFTA passed by president Bill Clinton, has caused widespread opposition to the TPP trade agreement proposed by president Obama. Both Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump in 2016 oppose the TPP.

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Xi Jinping is seen in this WSJ report as putting China on a course as a competitor of the US compared to other leaders such as Hu Jintao and Jiang Zemin, yet these prior leaders faced a enoromous gap in technology and capital to make it ludicrous. The shrinking of this gap is a result of free markets theory that took no account of the national interests of the US or of the European Union in shifting manufacturing lock stock and barrel to China.  A deeper look at China requires looking at it from putting oneself in China's situation since the period of the 1912 revolution and the 1919 May 4th movement for Science, Modernization and Democracy, to better understand its motives and realities. Jiang Zemin could not pose the question of competing with the US at the time because China's per capita GDP was less than $100 in 1990 and by 2000 during Hu Jintao's term still about a tenth of American per capita GDP.  Even today with population in North America of about 500 million in the economies of US, Canada and Mexico, China lags far behind in technology and capital resources. The Biden administration does not believe in this idea of free markets theory, wrong from the beginning that prevailed incredibly and puzzingly for too long, that it does not matter where you make as long as it is made at the least cost anywhere. It ignored what China and the US under Biden both believe for the US or China that the US is its people and the people is the country. For the US the Civil war itself as Lincoln said in rallying people to the Union, was fought because labor was more important than capital. When looked at the situation in China as stated by Xi at the party congress recently is for having made progress for the overriding goal of Modernization to build a moderately prosperous socialist economy. Huge problems in China remain hidden- ensuring self governance that is honest and accountable to the people, creating jobs and opportunities for hundreds of millions of young people even as supply chains shift after the pandemic in Europe and the US, India and other countries to their home countries for Made In USA, Made in Europe, and Made in India. China is not such a believer in the flawed free markets theory of the non existence of national interest to not grasp the natural aspects of the US and EU, India wanting to build their own manufacturing up again to the fullest. In this situation it also probably realizes the need for a pause to the rampant free markets type of growth that has damaged China's water, air and environment as much as it has damaged the world through climate change. Quality of growth is the new ethos and this gives the US and China, India, the EU and other countries a common frontier to shoot for. The nuclear aspect is also there and managing this well is a common interest for all countries exercizing responsible leadership. ...

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This report in the WSJ says several forecasts for GDP growth in the U.S. economy for the third quarter show seasonally adjusted annual growth of over 3 percent. This includes Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta with GDPNow model predicting 3%, Macroeconomic Advisors 3.1%, Oxford Economics predicting 3%.

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DJT tariffs are selective and reciprocality makes them fair. This also cushions the impact on consumers and countries. Countries who have blatantly unfair tariffs for decades can then decide as in EU, China, India, Japan, S. Korea, Mexico and Canada, can decide how they will respond by looking at what they need to do for fair trade. Some tariffs are intended also as domestic policy for failure to control of fentanyl into the US as with CMC countries Canada, Mexico and China. US producers will make goods sourced from these countries at home and as DJT says about autos from Mexico this will lead to American producers in Detroit picking up production and bringing manufacturing back home to USA. Most goods Americans use were made in the US in the postwar period from 1950-1980, American manufacturing will get the boost it so badly needs after unfair trade practices from other countries in the EU, Japan, Taiwan and China. By April this policy will be in place, by June in 6 months the policies will be fully operational at entry ports in the US including Los Angeles and Long Beach. All tariffs are selective, carefully evaluated for individual countries and products and regions based on reciprocality a principle that is fair to all countries and the principle on which the world trading system is founded. Individual companies and industries that gain this or that benefit may present it differently saying is good or bad based on their interest and profits- for the US and American people the principle of reciprocality provides a yardstick that is both fair and in the long term interest of bringing jobs and higher wages to the US. ...

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The U.S. Labor Department report shows 156,000 jobs added in September 2016. The unemployment rate increased by a tenth of a percentage point to 5.0%, because of the increase in the total pool of workers, The labor force increased by 3 million workers over the first 9 months of 2016. The labor force participation rate was up by half a percentage point to 62.9% for the year 2016, as it drew more workers who were earlier discouraged to look for work. Wages grew by 2.6% over the year.

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Hurt looks at the study of the impact of changes at Boeing between 1996-2006, by Greenberg, Grunberg, Moore and Sikora, in a book titled: "Turbulence: the Pain of Change at Boeing." Boeing is an iconic American company, a pioneer in aviation manufacturing, and one of only two such companies in the world. How have workers and managers felt about the changes from teams (concept imported from Toyota), outsourcing of manufacturing to different locations around the world, and other changes, and how has this impacted the company that is Boeing. The authors tracked 525 workers and managers at Boeing in 4 separate surveys. Many workers worry that outsourcing will lead to giving away the farm, as one engineer with 27 years of experience put it. Eventually Boeing would put work out to 135 sites in two dozen countries to cut costs and gain access to foreign markets. It ends up pushing the Dreamliner 2 years behind schedule. Many managers worry about the loss of engineering and jobs to global partner companies, which would hurt the US in the long run. Even the team model imported from Toyota has a negative effect, by affecting employee morale. The career ladder becomes compressed and opportunties for advancement are no longer there. Employees expressed a sadness that the old feeling of the value of contributions, as a source of the company's competitive advantage was missing....

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New legislation introduced in the U.S. Congress by Senators Orrin Hatch and Ron Wyden giving fast track and trade promotion authority to president Obama faces intense opposition from Democratic Party members of Congress. Only about a dozen House Democrats are considered to be supporting the legislation. Senator Schumer says "I don't believe in these agreements anymore, I've changed." Senator Warren on the left opposes the legislation. Senator Bob Casey of Pennsylvania says the legislation "as paving the way for another Nafta style deal that costs jobs." The deal if it passes the Senate, would face Republican opposition in the House where 50 or more Republicans are reported to be against the fast track approach and giving too much authority to president Obama without Congressional input. Fast track legislation would allow free trade pacts such as TPP to pass Congress without amendments or procedural delays. Labor groups and auto, other manufacturing companies, oppose the legislation because of the impact on manufacturing, West Coast groups in IT industries favor the legislation. Projections made by Petri, Plummer and Zhao at the Peterson Institute of International Economics, show the impact of Trans Pacific Pact (TPP) free trade pact would be $109 billion in added manufacturing imports to the U.S. to 2025 and $ 53 billion in exports, a net U.S. unfavorable of $56 billion. For IT and services sector the added U.S. exports to 2025 are projected at $42 billion and imports at $8 billion, for net $34 billion. U.S. favorable. Because of the dominant position of the U.S. in IT how much of this $42 billion might still happen without TPP. Other societal impacts also figure in the discussion, such as which sector needs the largest help and impacts the largest number of Americans for a sustained economic recovery in the future. ...

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Fed chief Bernanke's childhood home in Dillon County, South Carolina, a home in which his grandparents lived after building it on purchased land in 1945. The home was transferred to his parents and remained in the family till 1996. The town with its tobacco and textile industries is suffering decline and unemployment is 14%. The dropout rate at Dillon High School where Bernanke studied, graduating in 1971, is 40% for the ninth grade. Bernanke's grandfather Jonas, a pharmacist, opened Jay Bee Drug Company on Main Street in 1941. Ben's father and uncle ran the drug store. Now the home has ended up in foreclosure and was bought recently from foreclosure for $83,000, by a 25 year old working in a bank who grew up in the neighborhood. Mohawk Industries closed a plant making yarn for carpeting, Wix Manufacturing cut hours and jobs at its automotive filter factory, and Smurift Stone Container making corrugated cardboard filed for bankruptcy in Dillon county. The house has an interesting mortgage history. The owner who could not make the payments had a 10.1% 30 year fixed mortgage, well above the rate for a prime loan, with their payments on the $123,000 home at $1088. When Mrs Rogers lost her job at a shoe store the couple could not make the payments. The couple broke up under the financial strain. Landmark Mortgage which made the original loan transferred the loan to Option One Mortgage Corporation, which packaged it with other mortgages into a $818 million security. ...