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The political risk in China as the change of leadership takes place in 2012, and with the removal of Chongqing party chief Bo Xilai. The slowing of manufacturing activity and slowdown in growth expected in 2012-2014. Export growth declines to 6.8% from 14.2% in the fourth quarter of 2011. Quarterly surveys by the central bank shows demand for loans is dropping. And the HSBC purchasing managers index shows a reading of 48.1 in March, declining from 49.6% in February, showing shrinking manufacturing activity in China- anything less than 50 means contraction is taking place.

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A 93 year old hero of the French Resistance, Stephane Hessel, publishes a pamphlet called "Indignez-Vous!," released by a small publishing house from the publisher's home. He calls for resisting the "international dictatorship of the financial markets" and "defending the values of modern democracy." He protests France's treatment of illegal immigrants, the influence on the media by the affluent, cuts to the social safety net, French educational reforms. It was first published in October, and now has sold 1.5 million copies, all through word of mouth advertising. It has been translated into Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, and Greek. New editions are planned for Slovenian, Korean, Japanese, Swedish and other languages. In Britain, it was published with the title "Time for Outrage." The pamphlet is about 4000 words and only 14 pages of text. Its timing is good, as the French are debating what to do in their politics with an election approaching and Sarkozy's standing at new lows. The short length and low price are a big plus, at $4 it made a convenient Christmas gift. Britain, Spain, Portugal and Greece are going through austerity cuts. Public sentiment has been aroused by the cuts, and by the overarching influence of financial markets on the economies of these countries. Some of these countries referred derisively as piigs- Portugal, Ireland, Greece, Spain -countries in the financial markets. The economic impact has fallen disproportionately on the young, with high jobless rate for young people from Italy to Spain, and cuts in funding for universities and schools in the UK also fall heavily on young people. A sense that something has gone wrong in the free market system and the western world. Austerity cuts in spending in the U.S. create a similiar feeling and joblessness among young people is also high in the U.S....

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Individual investors reacted strongly to declining prospects for emerging markets with slowing growth, depreciating currencies, corruption and political uncertainty in 2013. As of the beginning of June, retail investors pulled $18.1 billion from emerging market bond funds, about one third of the amount that went in to emerging markets since the financial crisis in 2007, according to fund tracker EPFR Global. Institutional investors have pulled out less, about $9.3 billion, or 10% of their investments in emerging markets bonds since 2007. A similiar pattern is seen for investment in the stock markets of emerging market countries. The U.S. Federal Reserve's monetary expansion helped pull more money into emerging markets such as India, Indonesia, Brazil and Turkey. As the Fed shifts away from these policies in 2013 emerging market countries have large current account deficits and less money to finance imports and debt.

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Janet Yellen, Fed chairwoman, says the financial system is safer now after the financial regulation, stress testing, living wills and other changes that the Federal Reserve has implemented. She says there is no need for a reduction in these key regulatory rules. One of the changes is that banks now use a safer mix of financing- equity financing has doubled for capital, and wholesale borrowing is cut in half, since the 2008 financial crisis that took the U.S. and with it the global financial system to the brink of disaster. The appointment of Randall Quarles to the Fed by the Trump administration was intended to  reduce regulation, and this is Yellen's response to such proposed ideas. 

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David Brooks of the NYT describes the approach taken by British prime minister David Cameron and his Conservative Party government to help the working class poor in Britain, and tackle the social roots of poverty. He says an American adaptation similar to this is badly needed in the Republican Party, with the candidates in the election providing solutions from an old rulebook. Only after Trump's popularity with appeals to less educated older Americans has the Republican leadership responded, with Speaker Ryan helping organize a forum on poverty under the Jack Kemp Foundation- emphasis was placed on education, work, opportunity and accountability for anti-poverty programs in the discussion moderated by Ryan and Senator Tim Scott. Less attention was paid to the other social aspects mentioned here by Brooks, and cited by Cameron when he described the inadequacy of traditional solutions from the right and left of the political spectrum. Cameron outlined the principles of his anti-poverty plans called "Life Chances Strategy," in a speech on Jan. 11, 2016, in north London, with the entrie transcript on the gov.uk website. Cameron acknowledged in the speech that social issues including single parent families, and other social problems such as long term unemployment, can make it harder for some people to use self-reliance and personal responsibility in a growing economy as a way to grasp opportunities. Cameron proposes a combination of economic, social and job growth strategies. His second term plans include 30 hours a week of free childcare for 3 and 4 year olds so both parents can work, parental maternity leave, expansion of Troubled Families Program, in addition to the introduction of National Living Wage, tax cuts, universal credit. In tackling social aspects of the problem Cameron cited the need for development in the early years of childhood, the huge importance of family, social connections and experiences, informal mentors, cultural experiences, broadenend horizons, that enable young people to acquire language skills, character and resilience. Second term projects include expanding reach of high performing schools to deprived areas, emphasis on core English, math, science, history, geography Ebacc skills, a 1 billion pound investment in the National Citizens Service by 2021, a plan to transform housing estates including rebuilding from scratch, additional 1 billion pounds to provide mental health treatment including treatment within 2 weeks in homes and communities. Throughout Cameron's "Life Chances strategy" is aimed at tackling not just the material dimensions of poverty, but also what he describes is broken in Britain- "the paucity of opportunity."...

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The Congressional Budget Office report in 2011 shows after tax resource flow that a family has to pay for consumption, a better approach to measuring the growth in incomes since 1970 including government help to lower income people and gains in the stock market for upper class Americans. This report shows after tax resource flow for the top 1% in the U.S. tripled from 1970 to 2011. For the middle fifth of the distribution families experienced real net income gains of 36 percent, and the bottom fifth of the distribution real net income gain of 50 percent.This suggests gains of about 10 percent a year if averaged over 30 years for the top 1 percent compared to 1% a year for the middle fifth and 1.5% for the bottom fifth. The report was done in 2011 and this could skew the results. Between 2011 and 2015 the stock market recovered and this would suggest a much higher gain for the top 1% of incomes and the top 10%, while also providing improvement in incomes for the middle fifth and the bottom fifth as unemployment decreased. Working class and minimum wage slowly recovered, and interest income on savings extremely low, with large student and other household debt, so that even at 10-12% gains per year for the top 1%, and 1-2% for the middle fifth of the distribution and 1.5-2% for the bottom fifth the last three decades have not been good for working class and middle income Americans compared to the the period 1950-1970 early postwar period recovery....

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The northeastern region of Brazil, the poorest region of Brazil, has benefitted from the economic expansion in Brazil. The region's GDP went up by 4.2% a year for the last ten years compared to 3.6% for Brazil. Bolsa Familia, President Lula's anti-poverty programme has benefitted the northeast, but the Getulio Vargas research institute shows three quarters of growth coming from earnings and expansion of export based agriculture in soyabeans and other products and from mining export industries. Projects in the northeast include development of the port and industrial area around Suape. A petrochemical plant, a shipyard and a Petrobras refinery, are under construction. A new railway will link Suape to the interior. Much of the development is for export industries in soyabeans and iron ore, and for the rail and port infrastructure that supports these exports to China. As a result the development looks similiar to what is happening in Australia with the huge expansion in rail and port infrastructure in that country to support iron ore and other mining exports to China. Any slow down in China will affect Brazil as the IMF has recently warned, because of an overdependence on commodity exports to China. Alexandre Rands of local Datametrica consultancy points to this when he says that infrastructure booms while helpful are not enough to sustain development. Big firms train the workers they need which is how Brazilian companies cope with a weak educational system. Schools in the northeast are however not getting the financial support to improve education, a situation that affects Brazil as a whole, but is even more evident in the northeast....

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Voter turnout exceeds 70% in the 2014 state assembly elections in Jammu and Kashmir, India. Voters weary of years of conflict voted in favor of economic development and infrastructure building in the state.

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Prime minister Mario Monti responded with humor to the remark of former prime minister Berlusconi before the June 2012 summit of European leaders that he could unplug the Monti government, by saying that his government was not a home appliance. In August Monti's long intervew with the Wall Street Journal is published in which he says the Italian bond spreads with German bonds would be 1200 or something if Berlusconi was still running the government. Angelinia Alfano, of Berlusconi's party, the People of Freedom party, calls this "nonsensical" and the parliamentary whip calls this a "stupid provocation." WSJ's Alessandra Galloni intervewed the Italian premier. Monti's office says he called Berlusconi saying he regretted the "banal and abstract extrapolation of a trend in spread values, which was included in a wide ranging interview with the WSJ, was taken as a political consideration, which was not at all the intention."

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People who worked with Romney in the Mormon church describe the experience of Romney who started as an "iron rodder" walking the straight path, and gradually learning of other people's experiences that led to learning and growth and showing a new openness. In contrast to his "47%" remark about people dependent on the government, here he is seen telling another church member Barlow, that what bothers him most and what he has thought a lot about is how to genuinely help the poor in his church. Over the years he learned to compromise with Mormon feminists who sought larger roles in the church and was able to make the progress from being less flexible to being open to other ideas and perceptions. In other situations he allowed unorthodox progressives in the Mormon church to play a part in the organization and teach. The outreach efforts Romney participated in actively included efforts in the inner city and working with immigrants from Haiti, some of whom were illegal immigrants. This is a detailed well researched account from talking to many people active in the church organization and in the church community by Jason Horowitz of the Washington Post. It is one of the rare glimpses of the life of Mitt Romney inside the church. Because of the public perception of Mormonism there is a distance kept with accounts of life in the church, and Romney has shown the same reticence to talk about the church. Seen as a church it is is like other churches, Catholic or Protestant, with the same challenges that face all churches- keeping up the size of the congregation, the poor, immigrants, church organization, raising contributions, getting people to donate hours of work to the church activity. It is one of the ironies of the 2012 presidential campaign that Romney as a member of a Mormon church in a predominantly Catholic and Protestant world has remained reticent about his experiences and how it shaped him. And also remained reticent -till the last months of the campaign with the demands for authenticity growing strident- about how the experiences as governor of the liberal state of Massachusetts had shaped him, this time as the number of Republican politicians in sharply liberal states were a distinct minority in the Republican party. To voters this meant not knowing who he was beyond Bain Capital, the perceptions of which doggedly pursued Romney till the reticence became unbearable in the final weeks of the campaign....

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Prime minister Abe of Japan and President Jinping of China meet for 25 minutes on the sidelines of the Asia Africa Summit in Indonesia, on April 21, 2015. In a sign of thawing in relations both sides take an active interest in improving relations. This is the 60th anniversary of the Bandung conference in Indonesia, and Japan restated its pledge during the 1955 meeting of Asian and African leaders to not use force in territorial disputes. Abe said he had "deep remorse" for Japan's role in World War II. Xi Jinping's speech covered China's effort to build the "Silk Road" infrastructure projects in Asia and Africa, and said the AIIB bank was seen positively by the international community. Jinping emphasized the joint responsibility of both countries for peaceful development and regional stability. Abe suggested that a communications system for emergencies be established between the two countries and a defense dialogue be setup.

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Kessler in the WP corrects Obama's claim that he created 800,000 jobs. He says this is clever arithmetic as it takes a low point in Feb. 2010 following the financial crisis. Kessler points out that according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. manufacturing jobs were 12.56 million in Jan. 2009 when Obama became president. In Nov. 2016, early estimates show there were 12.26 million manufacturing jobs, a loss of 300,000. This loss does not reflect the problems in the U.S. auto industry and older industries in the midwestern states as a result of trade and globalization that speeded up with the rapid industrialization of China. And led as Greg Ip pointed out in a recent WSJ report to a rapid acceleration of job losses in a decade that did not happen in the same scale during Japan's industrialization and urbanization in the sixties. This aggravated the situation in Michigan, Ohio, Wisconsin, Indiana, and Pennsylvania, and was met with a feeble response from Democrats. Even a economist like Krugman favoring the Obama administration's efforts came to the conclusion that TPP did not add much to gains from trade as most of the gains had already been realized. More of the gains went to tech and IT in California, at the expense of the auto industry based in the midwest. A report in WP show a president too close to IT in California and failing to grasp the situation in the midwest. Voters punish whoever is in power, regardless of being Conservative or Liberal, in Canada the hollowing out of manufacturing under Harper in Ontario and Quebec led to the win by Trudeau's Liberals.  ...

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Andrew Roth describes a situation in Russia where president Putin is more popular than the ruling party. The United Russia Party was shown having support of 45% in pre election polls. The election campaign used Putin posters and the slogan "the party of the president," to increase voter support.  Some voters see Putin working really hard to improve the economic situation. Samuel Greene, director of the Russia Institute at King's College, London, says that even after efforts to increase support United Russia Party has failed to generate voter enthusiasm. Voter turnout was low especially in Moscow and St Petersburg. The election result is seen by experts as a way to give Putin support to tackle the economic problems facing the country, and ensure stability. About 343 members of the parliament out of total 450 are from the United Russia Party. The budget shortfall of 3% is being met by the government  by using state funds, and one of the sovereign funds is likely to be exhausted in 2017. One of the options is to cut back on social entitlements, increase the pension age. Prime minister Medvedev has already said state pensions cannot be indexed because "we don't have the money right now." ...

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After over two decades of focus on GDP growth targets, China under prime minister Li Keqiang is giving more emphasis to job growth and problems of air pollution, education, and quality of life indicators. Premier Keqiang tells a news conference in Beijing in March 2014 that China needs to create 10 million new jobs each year. More bond defaults can be expected as the financial system is being changed with new rules. Li says China will no longer be "preoccupied" with GDP growth targets. Li made the new priorities clear-"The GDP growth we want is one that brings real benefits to our people, helps raise the quality and efficiency of economic development and contributes to energy conservation and environmental protection."

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Uncertainty in China's stock market with the ban on stock selling by large institutional investors. Goldman Sachs estimates that $184 billion in shares could be put up for sale if the ban was unambiguously lifted. The price swings on the market would be accentuated say analysts because of a decline in trading volume.