LyrArc Article Gist
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. ...

LyrArc Article Gist
Speaking at the Brookings Institution Biden senior adviser Jake Sullivan laid out the "foreign policy of America's middle class." What he means by this is "President Biden's core commitment- indeed his daily direction to us- to more deeply integrate domestic policy with foreign policy." "After the Second War the United States led a fragmented world to create a new international economic order. It lifted hundreds of millions out of poverty. It sustained thrilling technological revolutions. And it helped the United States and many other nations around the world achieve new levels of prosperity. But the last few decades revealed cracks in these foundations. A shifting global economy left many Americans and their communities behind. A financial crisis shook the middle class. A pandemic exposed the fragility of our supply chains. A changing climate threatened lives and livelihoods. Russia's invasion of Ukraine underscored the risks of overdependence. So this moment demands we forge a new consensus." "When president Biden took office the coutnry from our perspective faced four fundamental challenges. First America's industrial base had been hollowed out. Second economic integration with a large non-market economy did not work out. Third, an accelerating climate crisis, and the urgent need for a just and efficient energy transition. Finally we met the challenge of inequality and its damage to democracy."   ...

LyrArc Article Gist
Mr. Trump proposes a 10% tariff on all goods imported into the US at Columbia, South Carolina, says this report in WSJ. A universal tariff of this type is similar to Herbert Hoover's Smoot Hawley that brought on the Great Depression in the 1930's in outright beggar thy neighbor policies which don't work, says WSJ. This opinion describes the impact of such a tariff in failing to reverse the trade deficit which is $951 billion in 2022, but fails to point to the lack of effectiveness of tariffs alone in bringing back American manufacturing jobs. As president Biden has pointed out the Trump administration made much talk about returning American jobs but did not accomplish much for American manufacturing to lead the world in the way the Biden administration has done. To do this the Biden administration passed laws to fund a entire new electric car industry, renewable energy industry, and promoting other industries in advanced technologies, including aerospace, to bring back America's leadership in manufacturing of most of the twentieth century with a bold vision for the future. Mr. Trump lacks the experience on this issue and is simply playing the rhetoric to his base without any plan to deliver the goods to sections of the American public that have already suffered the most from decades of neglect of manufacturing by Republicans going back to Reagan and Bush, Democrats Clinton and Obama. ...

LyrArc Article Gist
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. ...

LyrArc Article Gist
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.    ...

LyrArc Article Gist
Of the 45 million US student loan borrowers in 2025- only 11 million are on time with payments. The rest seeing sharp credit score declines that limit their access to home loans, other credit, or increase the costs of access to credit. This limits access to housing, and other needs for this group, it also affects demand in the economy. A recent WSJ report showed Moody Analytics research that 80% of US consumer spending is now done by 20% of the top income earners in the US. Decline in demand from this group will affect the economic growth in the US and how well the stock markets do. This will affect the job growth in the economy month to month.  This means with inaction from the DJT administration and the SCOTUS lack of comprehension of the economic aspects of this issue in ruling out action taken by the Biden administration- that this failure to take action on relief poses added risks to the US economy in 2025. It also means uneven and unbalanced growth where some groups upper income are favored by the virtue of the way the economy operates leaving many young people out of the benefits of growth. This adds to the general feeling of frustration and discontent after the pandemic and after cost of living surges in 2022-2024. It also means university education is no longer affordable or accessible to young people. Other issues play into this such as the surging cost of university education and action needs to be taken to bring this into line with earlier post 1945 patterns where university education was affordable and taken up. The increase in apprenticeship programs is a good thing, yet the gradual turning away of young men from college education is a serious danger to the cultural literacy in the US in 2020-2030. Leaving aside Ivy leagues making state college and universities affordable is one of the big problems needing to be solved as a priority in the US.  ...

LyrArc Article Gist
Questions and Answers about Islamic State on the BBC website give a short and simple look at Islamic State or ISIS in Syria and Iraq, its origins and how it developed upto the Iraqi government's efforts to retake Mosul in northern Iraq in Dec. 2016.

LyrArc Article Gist
Over 50 countries have asked for negotiations with the US over reciprocal tariffs imposed by the US on April 2, 2025. US president DJT says- “There will be fair deals.” DJT says a number of foreign leaders have contacted the White House since April 2nd.  Israel, Japan, Taiwan are beginning negotiations with the US over tariffs. Britain, South Korea and India will follow. The European Union is waiting for an opportunity to do the same. “They’re offering things to us that we would have never even thought of asking them for, Nobody but me would do this.” With China the situation is different and China is unlikely to negotiate. "We have stressed more than once that pressuring or threatening China is not a right way to engage with us,” says the Chinese embassy in Washington DC. After DJT said he would impose a 50% tariff on China over and above the 34% of April 2nd if China does not take back its retaliatory tariffs. This would happen on Wednesday April 9. China says it would f"ight this to the end." A sign that the USTR will try to get other nations to come up with deals and tackle China separately. ...

LyrArc Article Gist
This story by Emmarie Huetteman describes the effort of three Republican women in the U.S. Senate who had the courage to listen to the different voices in their home state and use their informed judgement in deciding how to vote on a Republican healthcare bill or Affordable Care Act repeal effort. Especially when they heard that it would hurt people in their state, the elderly, low income and other vulnerable people without offering alternatives. Even when this meant resisting pressure from fellow Republicans. The senators are Capito of West Virginia, Collins of Maine, and Murkowski of Alaska. This is particularly significant at a time when too much polarization has led to paralysis in coming up with informed discussion and good solutions to problems. It is also significant that senators from the midwestern states such as Iowa- Mr Grassley, and Kansas- Mr. Moran, also joined the effort to listen first to people back home in their districts before making up their mind. 

LyrArc Article Gist
Limit China's involvement in your economies for reduction in reciprocal tariffs- this is the message from US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who leads the negotiations with Japan, Taiwan and South Korea. The Trump statement read yesterday April 14 by Katherine Leavitt was as follows- “The ball is in China’s court. China needs to make a deal with us. We don’t have to make a deal with them. China wants what we have…the American consumer,” Leavitt said when reading Trump’s statement.  The idea is to reduce any leverage China has to ignore the US interests in restoring its lost industrial base shipped by American companies to China, in one of history's astonishing happenings that make economic theories useless. It is only a common sense and fairness that can provide a solution to this problem, the kind of fairness that the US has given throughout its history since 1800 to other nations. ...

LyrArc Article Gist
GE's consolidated tax rate from 2005 to 2009 was 11.6%, including foreign, local and state taxes.

LyrArc Article Gist
G.E. reported profits of $5.1 billion from operations in the U.S. in 2010. Its American tax bill? G.E. paid no taxes, claiming a tax benefit of $3.2 billion. G.E. does this by lobbying for tax breaks, aggressive strategies for reducing taxes including concentrating its profits offshore, and innovative accounting. G.E. has a large tax department, which some call the nation's largest tax law firm. Other firms are following the same practices The corporate share of the U.S. tax receipts has fallen steeply over the years- down to 6.6% in 2009 from 30% in the 1950's. This raises all sorts of questions in the current budget deficit situation facing federal and local governments.

LyrArc Article Gist
The corporate income tax rate for American companies is 35%. But many American corporations do not pay 35%. G.E. is likely to pay no federal income tax in 2010. G.E. Capital lost billions during the financial crisis and it is using a tax loss carry forward. It is also using a tax break called the active financing exception which allows U.S. companies to avoid taxes on overseas profits if those profits are made by actively financing some activity or deal, a tax loophole created in 1997 that G.E. lobbies hard to keep. For G.E. the worldwide tax burden was 7.4%. Google also pays a low tax rate. Robert Willens, a corporate tax expert, says the typical multinational corporation pays about half the stated tax rate.

LyrArc Article Gist
A recent book "The Spirit Level" has become popular in Britain. It says that countries with greater disparities in income also do worse in a number of social indicators, from higher murder rates to lower life expectancy. It also affects the consensus in society which is a necessary underpinning for sustained economic development and economic growth. Inequality when it affects the middle class and reduces the size of incomes in the middle, or creates stagnation in incomes, poses large risks for society and affects economic growth. In the US the home foreclosure crisis and the lack of bargaining power of wage earners in the middle class has created this problem. This is exacerbated by the banking crisis and bad loans in the banking system. Studies show that slow growth in college graduating rates in the USA after 1970 compared to the period 1900-1970, has increased inequality, especially with today's knowledge economy. Germany is also affected by this problem as wages for workers have remained stagnant with the labor reforms. Interestingly a combination of economic growth and payments to the poor have increased the size of the middle class and its incomes in Brazil. The austerity policies in Britain will affect incomes and income growth in Britain for the middle class. In China the gap is widening quickly between the urban areas and the rural areas. And the policy of residency permits- the hukou system-which limits internal mobility from rural areas to the cities and towns, makes the inequality all the more glaring. The lack of democratic election makes the situation worse in China compared to Brazil, because free elections in Brazil enabled leaders from the working classes such as Luiz Inacio Da Silva and Ms. Rousseff to emerge as heads of government. These leaders pursued policies that would explicitly bring a more shared prosperity in Brazil compared to the leadership in China. In China policies are determined by entrenched interests in its model of development- the state-owned companies and banks and their managers, local and government officials of the Communist party, and businesses with the networks and connections with the Communist party and local governments. This is why the ginni coefficient which measures inequality has dropped significantly in China, putting it in the rank of developing countries with poor records in equality. Inflation in China, India and Africa also affects the poor and lower middle classes to a greater extent. Current trends suggest that rebuilding the middle class in the developed countries and providing fairer distribution in developing countries will be of serious importance in coming years. Especially with the likelihood of more economic crises which tend to adversely affect the middle and lower classes disproportionately....

LyrArc Article Gist
What does transformational liberalism mean? What does fairness mean? What does it mean to have unemployment insurance, to have health care, to have jobs, to open the door to the middle class for a college education. Is this transformational liberalism? Or is this "transformational liberalism" a part of a vocabulary of cliches that have lost meaning as the nation confronts job losses of the magnitude of 500,000 a month, and this is only the beginning. Much of the increased debt the nation is occurring is going to provide government help to financial institutions like the $177 billion that has gone to AIG so far, just one company, and there are the Citigroups and other companies like AIG. What does it mean to have "burden sharing," when the rest of the country is frightened, scared, losing jobs, losing savings, and at this juncture cliches may have lost meaning, as its those who profited most and got us into this crisis like the investment bankers and senior management of companies in industries like the mortgage industry, auto industry who will be paying their larger share not because of redistribution, but because they may be the ones who can most bear this burden wihtout great sacrifices like cutting down on necessities and basics. See the link to Countrywide's Kurland who plans to profit both by overselling mortgages and creating the tinder that started this fire, and now to profit by buying distressed properties at pennies on the dollar, with $200 million from Black Rock as an investor, and $200 million on stock he sold before the crisis. Is a Kurland who has not been subject to any regulatory action, or management of AIG, or Citigroup or GM or the other companies receiving federal money by the hundreds of billions of dollars about to ask the half amillion of unemployed and the others threatened with job loss each month, for "burden sharing"? Nobody wants to see any of this happen, what has happened, including the debt, but it has happened, and it was not engineered in the new budget or in the few weeks since early January 2009....

LyrArc Article Gist
NATO was formed in the days of the Truman administration on 25th July 1949, following the Berlin Blockade, the coup in Czechoslovakia by Soviets, and the efforts to set up pro soviet governments in Turkey and Greece. It accomplished its purpose by pushing back against the Soviet effort securing democracy in Greece and Turkey in the 1950's. Much of this was achieved under Heads of NATO from the US- Gen. Eisenhower, Gen. Ridgway, Gen. Guenther and Gern Norstad proteges of Ike all from West Point by 1964, when Brezhnev was new head of Soviet Union and by 1991 Warsaw Pact of Soviets setup in 1955 was dissolved yet NATO was not. The US interests shifted to Asia - Gen MacArthur leading a UN effort in Korea and the US leading its own effort in Vietnam in the 1960's. The Soviet threat actually receded after 1964 when Brezhnev became head of Soviet Union till 1982. During that period in the 1970's till today the face of NATO as today was from a series of heads of governments of Dutch Stikker in 1970's or other small European states such as Norway Stoltenberg and Rutte Netherlands again in 2025. It could be said that none of these leaders  of small EU countries represented US interests- or even European interests- a point the DJT administration is trying to make. It hurt the US in Venezuela as Russia propped up a regime which led to millions of refugees entering the US illegally. And it hurt Europe as Russia propped up the Syrian regime with millions of refugees entering Germany and destabilizing its political structure. Going back if a new defense institution was set up to replace NATO by the Europeans in 1970's this would have been the right step which would have not led to Russia propping up regimes in the Americas or the Middle East. A goal that is being discussed with Russia by the DJT administration to refocus American efforts in a new direction and pause not just the Ukraine war but also put the US  and Russia in a new direction with the new competition from 3 billion people in China and India. WSJ Editorial Board takes the British position on the Ukraine peace proposals with centuries old skeptical attitude on Russia's intentions. The US government position put forward by DJT is that there are constructive discussions with Russia, and the need to settle the underlying issues behind the conflict. This includes NATO's future. NATO setup in 1949 for Soviets,  on the borders of Russia in 2025 after the end of the Cold War when its rival the Warsaw Pact set up in 1955 of the Soviets was disbanded in 1991. The British position comes from centuries of conflict in Europe and its interests in protecting its Empire till the 1950's remaining unchanged, and cannot reflect American interests in the 21st century as its economy competes with China and India and the EU, and seeks to do this by keeping former colonial powers out of the Americas including Russia, and China.   ...

LyrArc Article Gist
Americans loaded up with debt may be turning to older thriftier ways of an earlier generation. This this will affect consumer spending, have an impact on Chinese exports, and on the Japanese economy which is dependent on China for growth. Some argue that there is a culture of consumer spending that runs through recent American history. Even after one boom was over the stock boom was replaced by a housing boom, each boom and easy credit offering free spending and borrowing lifestyles. Is it going to change now? But it could be that a point has been reached where the finances of households and of the nation's credit system can only go so far, and culture won't matter if banks tighten up credit. There is a limit for the Fed to act to lower rates, and household debt has reached highly serious proportions. The savings rate went from one tenth of income in 1984, to 5% in 1994, to slightly negative in 2008. Today for those who borrowed against their homes in 2003-2007, 34 million households or one third of the US households, savings rate was negative 13% in 2006 June. Thhis came down to 7% in end of 2007, according to Moody's Economy.com, which suggests that the cutback in consumer spending from this group of people had already begun. What will this mean for consumer spending in the USA? It means that even though the top fifth of American earners who generate half of all consumer spending according to Barclay's Capital, will continue spending though a bit more carefully than before. The rest of the American people will be cutting back, especially the one third of the nation that is heavily in debt, and the unemployed if job numbers aren't that good. Which could be why Goldman Sachs predicts that Japan is already in recession using the Japanese definintion of decline in output, and China may be slowing down more significantly than is understood because of the poor data that is coming out of China. The Chinese economic activity too chaotic to accurately measure, and with large time lags before what is actually happening is detected and quantified correctly. ...

LyrArc Article Gist
The conditions of Iraqi industry, mostly state run industries, hobbled by corruption, poor infrastructure, poor roads , sporadic electricity, and bound by bureaucracy and central planning. This makes it hard to compete with cheap imports fromIran, Turkey and other countries. Iraq's chairman of the national investment commission, Sami-al-Araji, says he is after gradual change to an open economy.Currently Iraqi law forbids foreign company participation through owning equity. And $60 million investment deal from an Egyptian consortium for an electirical products factory here fell apart after the global crisis. The US stepped in with agrant to keep it running and its 3400 workers employed and not turning to the insurgency.

LyrArc Article Gist
Coca-Cola is introducing to the US an blended unsweetened tea called Sokenbicha. This tea was originally developed for health conscious young Japanese women. Sales of tea drinks are up 15.6%, while soft drinks are down 5.6%, for the first 10 months of 2010. Soft drinks still make up 47% of ready to drink beverages in the US, according to Beverage Digest, even with the increasing emphasis on the dangers of obesity in the US.