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The difficult task facing Governor Jerry Brown of making the painful cuts in education, the state's university system and social services, as he faces a $15.7 billion gap in the state budget. The Republicans in the legislature have made it difficult for governors in the state to get the two thirds majority to increase taxes, and the Democrats have opposed the spending cuts, leading to chronic budget shortfalls. Governor Brown says unless temporary tax increases, including quarter percent rise in sales taxes and income tax surcharge on the wealthy are passed, California will have to make cuts of $6 billion in January 2013. This would include cuts in public schools and the university system. This would be in addition to cuts of $8.3 billion he has proposed for cuts in welfare, social services, and health care for the elderly. Experts say the political culture in the state is a problem, and is proving to be impervious to this governor's long years of experience and considerable skills. Jerry Brown says California, and the U.S. are both living beyond their means and need to take the medicine....

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The labor force participation rate in Canada dropped by only about a half of the drop in the U.S. since the 2008 financial crisis, even though the population in Canada is slightly older there than in the U.S. This suggests that discouraged people who have stopped looking for work is more of a factor in the decline.

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Many Italian university graduates lack proficiency in foreign languages or computer skills. Lack of on adequate on the job training programs compounds the problems as graduates are not able to pick up the skills at work. This discourages hiring of new graduates, especially graduates outside of engineering and technical areas. Technical graduates face another problem- the slow level of technological improvement and application in Italian business relative to Germany or the UK. R&D spending in Italy is only 0.7% compared to 1.4% in France and 2% in Germany, according to the OECD. Only 41% of Italian university graduates work in specialized areas, 44% in Spain, compared to 60% in the UK and Germany. Being overqualified is common for young people, or lacking other business type skills with a overemphasis on the humanities.

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This France24 report looks at the question of whether the policies of four term German chancellor Angela Merkel emboldened Russia under president Putin to launch the invasion of Ukraine. FR24's interview with the vice president of the German Marshall Fund and head of its Berlin office, Thomas Kleine-Brockhoff, shows there are many reasons why Merkel's policies were serious errors that ignored caution from past experience and from other western leaders in the US and Eastern Europe. Kleine-Brockhoff says that "Europe did not go wrong, Germany and France did. France and Germany tend to speak for the rest of Europe. Bit these mis-assessments were made in Paris and Berlin, not elsewhere. Eastern Europe didn't go wrong. Northern Europe did'nt go wrong."  Kleine-Brockhoff says the war in Ukraine calls for an urgent re-assessment of the German and French policy towards Russia. "Not only is the post Cold-War order crumbling before our eyes, so are the strategies employed by Germany and France." Under particular scrutiny comes Merkel's policy, and policy supported by Steinmeier of the SPD, that took German dependence on Russian energy supplies from 36% during the annexation of Crimea to 55% in March 2022 with the invasion of Ukraine. Germany's conservative Die Welt has this to say- "What Germany and Europe have experienced over the last days is nothing short of the reversal of the Merkel policies of guaranteeing peace and freedom through treaties with despots," describing Merkel's policies as "an error." About France Kleine-Brockhoff says there were lofty ambitions under Sarkozy and Macron of European strategic autonomy, which did not correspond to reality, to fantasies of European armies when there was nothing but NATO. It is not dialogue with Putin and Russia that was a problem, says Laure Delcour, international relations expert at the Sorbonne Nouvelle in Paris. Some form of dialogue is necessary she says, but the dialogue has to have clear objectives. We must not confuse cause with consequence, she says. We know  that NATO enlargement had a big impact on Russia's perceptions, but the real problem is how Russia responded to enlargement. "In this case the problem is the consequence."  ...

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Lina Nilsson, the innovation director of the Blum Center for Developing Economies at the Universityof California, Berkeley, says female engineers are attracted to programs and research that focusses on achieving societal needs and goals, humanitarian projects, and meeting the special needs of developing economies. Better engineering that helps people improve lives attracts the involvement of women. She cites enrollment at the Blum Center for Developing Economies programs, PhD. minors in development engineering at UC Berkeley, undergraduate international minors at University of Michigan, the D-Lab at M.I.T., humanitarian engineering programs at Arizona State University, University of Minnesota, Penn State, Santa Clara University, Princeton's Engineers Without Borders chapters and clubs, where women's enrollment exceeds that of men. She contrasts this with the low numbers of women engineers in general- less than 20% of tech engineers at Google and Apple, and less than 14% in the U.S. workforce. Her advice- make work meaningful to society and women will enroll in large numbers, not just in computer engineering, also in mechanical and chemical engineering....

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Teva Pharmaceutical plans to acquire the generic drug business of Allergan in 2015. Teva's sales of generics were $9.1 billion in 2014, according to EvaluatePharma, over 50% of its total sales, and 12% of global market. Alergan had $6.6 billion in generic sales in 2014. Allergan's strategy is to move up the market to branded drugs because of price competition from India in generic drugs. Teva's strategy is to increase the size of its generic business to better tackle pricing issues.

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The dire drought situation in East Africa from Ethiopia and Somalia to Kenya, where millions of people face hunger and thirst. Shortages of food aid as only $24 million is available in the UN World Food Programme for Kenya when $300 million is needed for the next 6 months. The price of maize, a staple has doubled, and as most of the electricity in Kenya and Ethiopia is from hydroelectric dams the electricity supply has been interrupted lowering growth rates in both countries.

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Ford showed a profit of $1.6 billion in the third quarter of 2012. Profit of $2.3 billion in North American operations with North American profit margins of 12% helping overcome pretax losses of 468 million in Europe. In comparison to earlier years Ford held incentives down and maintained North American profit margins, earning $3500 on every vehicle sold in N. America. By comparison operating margins for Chrysler for third quarter were 4.6% and GM's margins in 2012 are about 7.4%.

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Deutsche Post is reinventing itself for the digital world. Germany's postal agency sold off all but 24 of the 29,000 post office buildings. It is located within "partners" buildings, in banks, convenience stores, and in rural areas a shopkeeper or homeowner acts as postmaster. Because of the surge in online shopping Deutsche Post has expanded its package delivery. It acquired delivery provider DHL in 2002. Deutsche Post provides a model for the U.S. Postal Service as it faces a similiar transformation.

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British Airways and Iberia Airlines made the winning bid for British Midland International (BMI) from Lufthansa for 172.5 million pounds. The acquisition is only for BMI's mainland carrier which serves Europe, the Middle East and Africa. This gives British Airways 56 additional daily takeoff and landing slots at Heathrow airport where it has 45% of commercial airtraffic. Lufthansa paid 223 million pounds for BMI in 1999 and when it purchased the remaining 50% of founder Michael Bishop's share in the airline in 2008.

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Twitter, Facebook, Groupon, LinkedIn, Pandora and other names command large valuations. Twitter's curent valuation is estimated at between 8-10 billion dollars. Twitter has sales revenue for 2010 of $45 million, and it had a loss as it invested heavily in data centers and hiring. Estimates of revenue for 2011 are between $100 million and $110 million. Twitter is trying to build its ad revenue with a 20 person sales team headed by Mr Bain, a former Fox Interactive Media president.

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Stefan Jacoby, a former head of VW USA, will be the new CEO of Volvo, after its acquisition with 100% ownership by Geely of China. Geely paid $1.3 billion cash for Volvo to Ford Motor, the original price was $1.8 billion but adjustments were made for retirement funds and working capital. Ford originally acquired Volvo for $6 billion. Ford has debt of $27 billion and will be able to reduce some of this debt wit cash from the Volvo sale.