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Young people in the job market and retirees making less than Rs 60,000 a month will not pay any tax under the Budget for 2023 for India. Growth will be generated through capital spending on infrastructure improvements that is 33% higher in 2023 than in 2022. By keeping the fiscal deficit under 5.9% the government is encouraging private industry to invest for growth. This report in The Indian Express says the Modi government and finance minister Sitharaman are acting with fiscal prudence and yet maintaining momentum for future growth.

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Democrat Gretchen Whitmer wins the race for Governor in Michigan with a double digit lead. Democrats also win the state house and Senate. This report in Politico looks at Whitmer and how she has helped change Michigan since the days of Trump's win in 2016. For Whitmer it is about delivering on good roads, infrastructure, investments in electric car production, and protecting women's rights. Michigan is on track to have fixed more than 16,000 lane miles of roads and 1200 bridges, according to her office.  

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This years pension hike of 5.35% in Germany is being completely eaten up by the inflation of 5.1% leaving pensioners in the same situation as before after many years when no adjustments were made. The catchup factor for meeting cost of living changes and inflation was put on hold by chancellor Merkel in 2018, another way social goals were not met under Merkel while infrastructure and child care were also neglected. Only now under a SPD Greens coalition are these problems of falling standard of living being tackled.

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The clash in Arunachal Pradesh comes from new Chinese roads in the area of the Line of Actual Control in the Tawang area. This Times of India shows the specific area and how the new Chinese capabilities replacing dirt roads with sealed roads is leading to clashes such as the one on December 9. India is only beginning serious infrastructure and roads in this region and in the entire border region with China in this decade. The coming decade will see an acceleration of India's efforts.

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Growing pressure from within the government from the Green party and the FDP, and from the CDU in the Opposition party, for Chancellor Scholz of the Social Democrats to allow Poland to send Leopard tanks to Ukraine to stall Russian advances. That could lead to a return to peace talks and a settlement is also the idea behind additional military support to Ukraine. Western powers also seek to prevent any further losses on the Ukrainian side and show support after attacks on its electricity infrastructure left most of Ukraine in the dark.

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US law now supports turning back migrants at the border. Under public health policy Title 42 migrants are denied asylum, a federal appeals court ruling supporting this. It is also now supported by the Biden administration. It is a key tool used by both the Trump and Biden administrations to combat illegal border crossings. It also reduces one more area in which differences were mistakenly created between Republican and Democratic parties, that distracted from focus on much needed infrastructure and other priorities for the American people.

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Both Valerie Pecresse of the Republicains and Anne Hidalgo of the Socialists each win a small share of the vote. Pecresse less than 5% in France's presidential elections, Anne Hidalgo about 2%. These 2 parties dominated French elections for the postwar period for 6 decades. They have stumbled into a complete loss showing how they failed to connect with voter's concerns about high cost of living, jobs, manufacturing outshoring, neglect of infrastructure, and neglect of rural areas, much the same as in the US.

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Cobalt and nickel mining in the Democratic Republic of Congo is increasingly under the control of a few countries. Much of this metal goes into Electric Vehicles. One expert told a US Senate Committee hearing in June that China was building one EV megafactory a week compared to one every 4 months by the US. The money committed to supporting the electric vehicle industry in Biden's infrastructure package in 2021 still leaves the US lagging behind, says this report in The Guardian.

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The German labor union GDL is negotiating with Deutsche Bahn. It seeks a 35 hour work week, the reduction of work week for shift workers in rail transport to 35 hours from 28 hours a week. It is also seeking collective agreement for parts of rail infrastructure in Germany. Deutsche Bahn has not accepted this. GDL says there were confidential details of the negotiations leaked to the press including the Bild, and quit negotiations in the recent turn of events. Two strikes affected the rail system as talks fail to reach an agreement.

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NYT provides an extraordinary display of working age population demographic data in graphics for the world and individual countries to 2050. India, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Egypt and African countries are given the opportunity to make progress similar to South Korea, Japan and China over the next 25 years. India with 1.4 billion people and a determined federal government can set the stage for the type of progress that can modernize the country and build a level of infrastructure that compares with the best in Europe, the US and Japan.

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Aging US dams are a problem like this one that was almost taken out in Midwestern states floods. The Rapidman dam in southern Minnesota was in "imminent failure condition" when floods hit last week. With the average of American dams at 60 years it looks like things will get worse. This dam 90 miles southwest of Minneapolis was built in 1910 on the Blue Earth River. With extreme weather events becoming common these dams are one more part of our infrastructure that needs rebuilding.

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David Barboza of NYT describes the hidden subsidies China gives to Foxconn for its plant in Zhengzhou, in a poor region of China. The factory there makes about half a million iPhones a day. These subsidies include incentive packages, infrastructure building, local government help of about $1.5 billion. As a result Apple has high margins. For a 32 gigabyte iPhone 7 that costs $400 to make, the retail price is about $649 in the U.S.  The hidden subsidies is why Apple can maintain dominance as profits are reinvested. And the result is that with only 12% of the smartphone market Apple can take in 90% of the profit, according to Strategy Analytics. Barboza looks back at Apple before co-founder Steve Jobs left in 1985 as focussing on manufacturing at plants in Colorado and California. By 2001 with iPod sales soaring the move to China under Cook, who previously worked for Compaq, was underway. With the introduction of the iPhone in 2007, the move to China for manufacturing accelerated. The reason: only China offered the kind of subsidies, the speed of approval and building of infrastructure facilities, the local government support, the hundreds of thousands of workers, and the best tooling engineers, to produce in huge volumes with speed, and maintaining quality levels. Earlier plants including one in Colorado Springs that this Lyrarc editor was invited to visit just prior to Jobs rejoining Apple had many quality problems, so much so that Apple had a large part of the manufactured personal computers set aside for rework. The quality levels were dismal, defects were unbelievably high. This is the Apple manufacturing process and plant that Jobs must have seen when he returned, and which he hired Cook to fix. Not only were costs higher in the U.S., (subsidies in China came later) when Jobs looked at the manufacturing quality and the inability to get the quality he needed from American workers and engineers at that time in the 1990's, only then did he turn to China- and the more he saw what was possible to accomplish there he sensed an unusual opportunity to finally put the ghosts of memories from competition with Microsoft at rest, and to surpass everything that had been done in Silicon Valley. The result one of the most ingenious and large manufacturing networks in the world, huge profits for an American company, except for one thing- it would not do much for American workers. ...

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The Chinese government is concerned that lack of a safety net, fears about a general access to health care, and lack of other assistance for the farmers, elderly, rural poor, lack of unemployment protections and welfare, all are making Chinese to cramp up and spend less. Chinese households save a quarter of their income in normal times, now unless the government steps in a big way, which it has done only in small faltering steps, savings will increase even more in response to fears about the future. Lu Mai, secretary general of the China Development Research Foundation, says China has reached a point where it has to make a big decision, does it spend more on security and the police or on social benefits. He put out a report last week which estimates the government needs to spend 2.6 trillion yuan or 380 billion dollars by 2012 for the first phase of a social safety net. With a further spending of $838 billion dollars by 2020 to complete the improvement of health care, education, pensions for the elderly, low income housing, disability benefits, unemployment protections and welfare for the poorest. And these estimates may be low depending on the assumptions made, as the situation has taken a steep descent from the time these estimates were probably made. In the last few months tens of millions have been added to the jobless, and the severe drought has created a difficult situation on the farms in rural areas, even while millions of migrants return to these rural areas as businesses dependent on exports collapse in cities in coastal areas. What is the government allocation at this time? A target for health care overhaul of $124 billion was set recently. But the actual stimulus package is heavily skewed in favor of infrastructure and investment in construction. About 1% of the big stimulus package that was announced goes to health care and 7% to public housing. Says Zhuang Jian, an economist with the Asian Development Bank, this excessive investment in infrastructure, heavy industry and manufacturing will cause serious problems, if there is not strong consumption to match it. And Eswar Prasad of Cornell University, who was head of the China division at the IMF, says that an ambitious agenda is needed for higher social spending to take away the fears of average Chinese about the future. Chinese premier Wen says the government needs to do more, but the instincts of China's planners, and decades of development with built in incentives for promoting investment in construction, infrastructure and industry, have left China with huge unsustainable underinvestment in basics like education, health care and social benefits....

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Another danger for Labour comes from Rachel Reeves being exactly the wrong attitude person for this time giving too much deference and authority to Office of Budget Responsibility, which was set up for austerity rules under John Osborne. It is not set up to give Britain the public investment in infrastructure that it needs today and its members thinking ios from that era. Labour Good Growth Foundation, Common Wealth and Labour group Progress are advising Labour party to change before it is too late. Langleben of Progress says-“The OBR was created for an era defined by austerity, and while it can clearly count the upfront cost of investment, it too often misses the long-term value, whether that’s a healthier workforce, better housing or modern transport." It now appears that Rachel Reeves is really the wrong person for the job of Finance minister and that Keir Starmer had another problem in addition to McSweeney, where he was stuck with 5 billion pounds cuts to welfare spending losing some of the Labour base to Greens, as seen in byelections and in polls showing a mere 18% approval rate for Starmer. It now appears that Yvette Cooper at Home Ministry stuck on the old asylum rules, Rachel Reeves stuck on the austerity period OBR assessments and making cuts in payments for Labour's base, and McSweeney with his lack of honest conviction to help Labour's base, Mandelson, were all the wrong people appointed to the wrong positions that risk's losing the base of Labour by fracturing it and sending it to Reform UK on immigration, on budget cuts to the Greens, and on a sense of lack of true conviction and sincerity to the Liberal party. ...

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Most people hae not heard the name Radhabinod Pal the sole dissenting judge at the Allied Tribunal who questioned its legitimacy in a dissenting opinion. Here we learn that Judge Pal's opinion sealed a friendship between him and Abe's grandfather Nobusuke Kishi charged with war crimes but never tried. Mr Abe visited the Netaji Subhas Bose museum in Calcutta and said that he was determined to strengthen Japanese Indian bilateral relations that Bose wanted to see. Appears to be an emotional bond and a visit that aroused old feelings from a family tie for Abe. Note that India and Japan vowed to seal a economic partnership by December. Small as this seems this may be a big turning point for South Asia. See the details of the Japanese investment plans in India especially in infrastructure projects in related article.

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The failures of German engineering at the Berlin Brandenburg airport with 4 billion euros over budget, 9 years behind schedule and technical issues.

As India takes on the role of pharmacy of the world during the pandemic, and builds world leading infrastructure in time, no longer can it be assumed that the old ideas are true about German, Japanese, American or Chinese engineering.

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Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) CEO, Natarajan Chandrasekeran, says rapid adoption of new technology will play a significant part in the plans of the Modi administration in India. The release of infrastructure projects worth over $100 billion that are in the pipeline but stalled because of lack of leadership and direction would give an immediate boost. The careful selection of new projects for the greatest impact on growth, rapid technology adoption, and the synergy between technology, human resource development and invested capital, could generate additional percentage points to the growth rate in India. Old myths on what is and is not possible will have to be discarded along the way.

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The epitome of massive distortions in the way capital is allocated in capital markets of the last two decades even as healthcare, childcare, manufacturing technologies and infrastructure was starved of captal funding is Masayoshi Sen and Softbank which posted a $23 billion loss in the April-June 2022 quarter. This is one and half times the loss in the first quarter. Heard on the Street in WSJ dismisses Mr. Sen's contrition on these losses as this will continue into the future it says, and is simply the style of these types of extreme speculation funds. It obscures a larger problem in society and in America and Europe of capital markets giving the pass on such wasteful use of capital on huge scale amounting to trillions of dollars and not funding desperately needed healthcare, education, infrastructure, childcare and other needs of the 900 million people in these countries. Even the claims of profits hangs hollow on the necks of these investments, with dubious selection of many projects. Capital returns are insignificant or zero as the WSj says many of Softbanks funds have net zero gains since 2017. Yet extravagant demands for capital are met with extravagant supply where the needs or reasoining are the least credible in today's distorted capital market allocations causing egregious harm to the 900 million people of the US and Europe.   ...

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Officials of 130 countries met virtually to agree on a global minimum tax rate. A minimum tax rate of 15% would be paid by corporations in each of the countries in which they operate so that tax avoidance is prevented. The Group of 20 major economies including India and China also agreed to this change in taxation to ensure that all companies pay their fair share of taxes. It is also part of the Biden plan for tax revenue generation to fund the infrastructure and human needs in health, education and public services that were neglected for so long. US president Biden says- "This will level the playing field and also make America more competitive. And it will allow us to devote the additional revenue we raise to make generational investments, which are necessary to keep America's competitive edge razor sharp in today's global economy." This tax change was needed to prevent companies shopping for low tax locations such as Ireland. This kind of locating in low tax rate locations worked badly for the major G-20 economies for decades as it prevented the generation of revenues needed for essential services and infrastructure investments. Tax changes include Biden's plan to increase the corporate tax rate to 28% from 21%, and raise the minimum tax on US based companies foreign profits to 21% from 10.5%.  ...

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India's GST tax collections - which finance infrastructure -reach the 1.40 lakh crore mark  (about $20 billion) for 3 months in a row in 2022. Increase in tax compliance culture, audit analytics, and actions against tax evaders, helped increase GST revenue collections. Revenues from import of goods and revenues from domestic transactions were 44% higher than the same month in the prior year. The increased economic activity and creating tax compliance culture are good indicators for economic growth in addition to the GDP numbers showing about 8% growth in 2021, the highest in the world surpassing China by a wide margin.  The growth slowed to about 4% increase in GDP in the 1st quarter yet the events of the first quarter such as the war in Ukraine increasing food and oil prices, depressing economic activity, have some other indicators unique to India that are entirely positive and hold promise for a surge in economic growth in this decade to 2030. With the pandemic years 2020-2021 pointing to shift in supply chains of US and Germany away from China towards India and other Asian nations, the Russian invasion of Ukraine with support of China will only make this shift move faster. At a time when Indian logistics and infrastructure improvements under the PM's Gati Shakti Master Plan will create the right conditions for massive foreign investment in the Indian economy. ...

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Greg Ip says in WSJ that China turned to lender after 2010 and financed loans for development, for roads, highways and infrastructure in Asia and Africa. Between 1970 and 1990 the World Bank was extensively involved in infrastructure projects, by 1990 it retreated from this role and China after 2010 was lending at double the rate of the World Bank for it Belt and Road Initiative programs. At G20 New Delhi, India, Biden and Modi, leaders of Brazil, and South Africa, agreed on advancing the World Bank's loan capacity by $100 billion for next decade under leadership of Ajay Banga. Thjis is happening at the meeting of finance leaders in Marrakech, Morrocco in 2023. The IMF and the World Bank were set up after World War II under the agreements signed at Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, as postwar finance system. The IMF was to serve as lender to countries facing short term finance crises, and the World Bank to finance development in poor countries such as India, Indonesia and after 1990 China. The largest borrowers from the World Bank were India, China and Indonesia. India is at $37 billion loans outstanding in 2021, China at about $21 billion after repaying much of its loans. By 2010 Brazil, Mexico, China and India had shifted to international capital markets for development support. Total outstanding debt of World Bank is $460 billion in 2021. ...

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Perpignan, France, is a small town at the foothills of the Pyrenees, near Spain. It was called Perpignan Catalan. Its mayor is Aliot who is from the RN National Rally party. It is one of the poorest regions in France. The RN was elected after several tries in which the other parties banded together against RN till it did not work anymore. This report in The Guardian looks a the change the RN brought and says it was about more police, cleanliness, and television. No structural changes have happened that would reduce poverty or bring more jobs and opportunity to the area, or improve the infrastructure and public services. As a result it is more visual but as one resident says I kept my doors open anyway, so that no real change happened. This change for the better has not happened under Macron and it is this frustration that led voters to give Aliot and RN a chance in Perpignan. Yet this report shows it has not changed much, that the poverty and lack of opportunity is real and other solutions than RN are needed. And still the LR and Macron's Renaissance party keep making derogatory remarks and labelling the alternatives from the Socialist parties as unrealistic even though the Socialist Alliance calls for investing $140 billion in infrastructure, public services and cost of living action to improve the lives of ordinary working people and families. ...

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The expected EU turnout in 2024 is at a high of 68 percent. Over the years since its formation the early enthusiasm and vision was replaced by dry directives issued by bureaucrats in Brussels leading to lethargy. 1979's 62 percent voter turnout contrasts with 2014's 48% voter turnout. Boris Johnson, Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin have each in their way created new surge of interest in EU and the parliament in Strasbourg, says Caroline Gruyter from her conversations in France, Switzerland, Netherlands, Czech Republic. Today 74% of EU citizens polled say they support the European Union. Similar numbers even in the UK as Labor party is about to come back in a big way.  What happened? The war in Ukraine, Russia and NATO, US and NATO, the UK drift back to EU in sentiment, Italy's conservative parties called Right wing are supporting the EU under Meloni. Another reason for the sense of EU coming back to life comes from my visit to Germany, where after decades of disinvestment in infrastructure the rail station in Frankfurt is being rebuilt and new infrastructure is being built all over the city. Posters all over Frankfurt for EU parliament elections show a new spirit for Respect for workers, working families, and a sense that the FDP, SPD, CDU and Greens can take the decisions to give new vigor to the German democratic process.    ...

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Laurent Berger is the likely candidate for bringing together all social democratic and socialist parties in France.  French Socialist parties and leaders Melenchon, Glucksmann, and others in Greens party join together to contest the Assembly elections June 30, July 7. This means the socialist parties have finally made the decision to come up with ways to tackle the cost of living crisis, loss of manufacturing, lack of investment in infrastructure that can make a difference in the daily lives of working people. This was missing in Macron's plan as En Marche was built by Macron based on his detecting an opportunity during the last year of Socialist Hollande's term in 2017, not with a well thought out plan for renewal in France. The years of the presidential first and second terms did not work from a plan to tackle the issues facing working class families and benefitted as much from the alienation that had driven working class votes in different directions from the failures of Socialist or Social Democratic leaders. This happened in Germany with Scroeder, in Britain with Gordon Brown, and in France with Hollande, in the US with Clinton and Obama. The path that president Biden has taken to invest in infrastructure with bipartisan support, to invest in manufacturing with bipartisan support is what the Social Democratic and Socialist parties in France with bipartisan help now need to take up. ...

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About 30 rail routes in Germany will be renovated under a massive renovation program of Deutsche Bahn that begins July 15. Repeated delays and cancellations of an antiquated rail system is causing frustration for rail users in Germany. Deutsche Bahn's deficit is euros 2.4 billion and the debt euros 34 billion. It paid 133 million euros just for delays over 60 minutes to customers last year, up by 43%. Germany is not investing in the rail system as it should because of a culture that has spread since the 1990's that investment in public infrastructure and public services is not essential. The CDU party and the FDP have adopted this culture as their own, and the people have not voted this out as the FDP is part of the currrent coalition of the Socialists and the Greens under Scholz and FDP's Lindner controls the Finance Ministry. This is the challenge facing Europe and the US, dismantling a culture step by step that does not believe in investment in public services and infrastructure for far too long allowing it to fall apart when financial markets invest and waste capital in dubious projects. In the US inventing a new golf ball gets 100 million dollars in this dysfunction in financial markets in the EU and US, the list is endless which adds up to tens of billions of dollars.  ...