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In the third Democratic presidential debate in Dec. 2013 Hillary Clinton came out looking much stronger than Sanders and Malloy. She described the Sanders government programs to make helath care and college free as too expensive requiring a 40% increase in federal spending, or $18 trillion-$20 trillion. Clinton said "we have to be really thoughtful about how we're going to afford what we propose." And said she would not increase taxes on those making less than $250,000 a year. On foreign policy issues she differed with Sanders and Malloy on the Assad regime and civilian deaths in Syria, saying Sanders had supported the removal of the Qaddafi regime in Libya. She used her long experience as Secretary of State to display a better command of the issues. On Hillary Clinton's comment about Donald Trump's statement for barring Muslims from entry into the U.S., that it was becoming a recruiting tool for ISIS videos, a NYT fact check shows no proof of this. Clinton said she preferred not to turn the issue of terrorism into a clash of civilizations with Islam, as her Republican opponents have done....

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What Krugman makes of the $1.089 trillion dollar U.S. deficit for fiscal year ending in Sept. 2012. He points out that the U.S. can have a stable to declining debt to GDP ratio with $400 billion debt. He cites the Clinton years (1992-2000) when the debt to GDP ratio declined from 49% to 33% with steady growth. What about the remaining $600 billion. He attributes this mostly to temporary factors which are reversible as growth picks up. Of this remaining excess deficit he says $400 billion is from lower tax payments to Treasury because of the 2008 economic crisis and the recession that followed. This includes the payroll tax cut which is also temporary to keep up consumer spending in the recession. The $150 billion is from unemployment insurance, food stamps, and other aid which is also reversed once growth picks up. He places emphasis on restoring economic growth as early as possible and reducing unemployment and using the recession for business to continue to invest in R&D, productivity, and government to preserve the social fabric, invest in education, and provide incentives for growth. S&P Nov. 8 report says the net government debt to GDP ratio is estimated to be over 80% in 2013. It will have to stabilize at current levels for S&P to preserve the U.S. credit rating, says S&P executive Chambers. The higher debt to GDP ratio in 2013 and lower growth rates expected makes the situation different from the lower debt to GDP ratios during the Clinton period. Britain, France and other major industrialized nations with political parties at either end of the political specrum have also chosen to stabilize or reduce debt to GDP ratios rather than take on the risks of them going much higher. The U.S. has the added problem of health care costs out of control with an aging population and about 17.9% of GDP going to healthcare costs in 2010 expected to increase significantly, as Medicare actuaries estimate enrollee numbers jump to 80 million in 2030 from 50 million in 2012. Democrats and Republicans have largely sidestepped this underlying problem in fiscal cliff negotiations....

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Colombia's GDP is $350 billion, in 2025 Venezuela's is $50 billion. Socialism under Chavez imitating Simon Bolivar as shown here starts out well with more housing, health care reaching poorer neighborhoods and parts of the population that were ignored. But only till 2011 in the early years. As mismanagement, corrupt cronies take over the nationalized enterprises, petroleum company fails to invest, and mismanagement of the economy sets in, educated classes leave the country in the class warfare, the results are disastrous. As much as 20-30% of the population leaves, hyperinflation, bad relations with the US, leading to the worst humanitarian disaster in the American continent since 1900.  It shows that the educated classes of every nation bear a major responsibility to  create a healthier society at the beginning so that the glimmers of hope of free services lead to the wrong people ending up in power and mismanagement on a massive scale destroying everything. New York City's educated classes should shoulder the responsibilities that people like Felix Rohatyn as head of MAC describes in his book- Bold Endeavors, that is the true spirit of the Nation (2009). ...

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Samuelson warns that turning seniors into a protected class making no sacrifices whatsoever, will mean shrinking all other social programs, defense and investments in education and infrastructure. This is the reality of the budget deficits facing the U.S. He cites the Congressional Budget Office projections that even with cutting defense and non defense discretionary spending by a third, the U.S. risks a deficit in 2023 of about 6.75% of the economy or gross domestic product (GDP). To cover this would require $1 trillion in higher taxes, an increase of a third above the 1970-2011 average. He says Democrats are using demagoguery and intimidation on this issue, and ironically even Paul Ryan's proposal reflects a desire not to touch seniors benefits and willingness to pass on the costs to the young to pay for these programs. Social Security and Medicare are a critical part of the American fabric, and no one wants to dismantle them, it is about modernizing them to reflect higher life expectancy and larger wealth accumulated by the elderly compared to previous generations, and to reduce the burden on the young. ...

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How diagnostic tests in portable toolskits, that patients can use themselves, are being developed at low cost in developing countries like China. This creates the kind of care appropriate for poor countries, where patients need something they can afford, and something that does not require repeat visits to doctors offices or clinics. Ustar Biotechnologies is a Chinese startup, that says it has the technology, costs that the founder says "no one can compete with," and affordable prices for poor countries. The sales of such diagnostic test portable devices or kits is expected to soar in coming years. Quimin You, the inventor and founder of Ustar, graduated in North America and worked with multinationals. His proposals for cheap diagnostic technologies were turned down by multinationals, who in their narrow focus saw these thechnologies undermining their existing products. Now Qimin is back in China with a startup that will do this.

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Work requirements is one area in which Biden and McCarthy have a point of agreement in the debt ceiling discussions. Biden says he has supported work requirements in the past. Biden also says he would do nothing that affects health benefits. Under Biden the jobs market is the best it has been for over two decades which makes it easier to have some sort of work requirement for people able to work before they can collect government aid benefits. This makes an agreement possible in which Biden and McCarthy continue discussions with Biden building some form of rapport with a Congressman he has known in the past from his days in the US Congress. An agreement he pulls together would then have the support of most Republicans and be passed with the help of all Democrats. This would meet with opposition from a small faction of the Republican party, opposition that McCarty has become accustomed to including the prolonged voting it took to get himself elected as Speaker. McCarthy and most Republicans are in favor of Ukraine and the EU support for Ukraine at a critical time. They including Mitch McConnell who is present in the negotiations would not want to do anything that spirals America into a financial crisis during a Ukraine counteroffensive with Biden and Scholz's support that could end the war in Ukraine. Biden probably shared the concerns of his G7 counterparts with the Republicans about this. McCarthy and Biden could then simply say they only worked to do the possible and move on to the bigger battle in 2024. ...

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US president Biden proposes to reduce the US deficit by $2 trillion by increasing taxes on American households worth more than $100 million that would apply to their earned income, and their unrealized gains on liquid assets like stocks. Biden also plans quadrupling the tax on stock buybacks by companies, a tax approved in the Inflation Reduction Act of 2021. The deficit in 2023 will be about $1.4 trillion and rise to about $2 trillion, so that Biden's plan is to practically eliminate the  large deficit if the Republicans come on board. Republicans prefer cuts in spending. US companies have engaged in a dramatic increase in stock buybacks in recent years leading to calls for increasing the tax on stock buybacks. Biden says even high income households will not see an increase in their taxes, only the wealthiest households with over $100 million who have benefited vastly through the Reagan type policies of the last two decades. These households with over $100 million in assets will not be affected in the same way as students, workers, and middle income households are affected in shouldering a large part of the burden of these Reagan type policies that did not adequately fund education, healthcare, and manufacturing in communities across America. This was a period when Democrats in Congress awed by Reagan type policies failed to vigorously oppose policy that increased the US deficit and burden on households for health costs by not allowing Medicare to negotiate prices with pharmaceutical companies. A senior AARP official says that when we talk about the Biden Inflation Reduction Act of 2021 the key component is the Medicare price negotiation with companies that is now law. Why Republicans and Democrats before Mr. Biden allowed such a gross distortion for two decades since 2001 that burdened ordinary  working Americans while neglecting American manufacturing, till Mr. Biden assumed the presidency, says much about the policies of the last two decades and how it has affected ordinary working families. Shriveling factory towns and creating much distress in these communities with these distortions that are a legacy of Reagan type laissez faire policies that government should do little. The result of these policies is that manufacturing is concentrated in only one country for the whole supply chain something that would never have happened with a thoughtful policy planning process. India and Vietnam are only today seen as alternatives for the supply chain in 2023 when policies were in place in these countries since 2014 for the supply chain to be distributed in a way that would be a win-win situation for all countries, avoiding the national security threats of today with overconcentration of manufacturing in China. This has not benefited China or the US because of the rancor and tension it has created. It was the fall of the Berlin Wall that created some of this awe for Reagan, when looking at it objectively it was nothing more than a course correction in Europe after the Hungarian revolution suppressed in 1956, Czech in 1968. It had little to do with what policies the US should pursue for workers and families, just as the war in Ukraine today remains another course correction in a different direction in Europe, and does not affect domestic policy in the US to build a better society for workers and families that Mr. Biden is doing. ...

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About 53% of the uninsured Americans disapprove of the Obama health care law, in comparison to 51% of the insured with health care coverage who disapprove of the new law. About 35% of the uninsured say they are likely to pay the penalty for not carrying insurance, and six of ten uninsured say it will make their health better. Overall the approval of the law is at 39% and disapproval at 50% in the Dec. 2013 poll. A striking part of the poll result is that 57% of the uninsured say it will increase their health care costs, compared to 52% of the insured. Only 20% say it will decrease their health care costs. This reflects the lack of serious controls on the surge in healthcare spending in the law. A separate research shows that more of the costs are passed on to users who will pay higher out-of-pocket costs after the law.

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Biden's very conservative choices for his cabinet which one British reader of The Times calls UK One Nation type choices. Many of the cabinet members could easily have served under a Republican administration before Trump or a Democratic administration in the tradition of Harry Truman in the 1950's. No members of the cabinet belong to the Bernie Sanders wing of the Democratic Party.  A look at the Truman administration after 1950 shows John Wesley Snyder, who headed a bank in St Louis and worked for the Reconstruction Finance Corporation under Franklin Roosevelt performing a key role for integrating 8 million GI soldiers into the economy, and implementing the Marshall Plan. A similar job awaits another banking official Janet Yellen in Biden's cabinet to keep people employed during the pandemic. Xavier Becerra, currently attorney general of California, and formerly Congressman for 24 years, who endorsed "medicare for all" is the new Health Secretary. He grew up in a one room apartment with his Mexican parents. Secretary of State goes to Anthony Blinken, Dean Acheson was in this role under Truman as the Cold War surged with the Berlin crisis and the Iron Curtain in Eastern Europe. Today the challenges from Russia and China are taking the shape of a revival of tensions. George Marshall who led American forces in the war, was secretary of defense. This position is given to a soldier Gen. Lloyd Austin who led forces in the wars in the Middle East. This has the potential to deliver better results after the years when America veered off course under the administrations of Reagan, Clinton, Bush and Obama, following the Truman, Eisenhower administrations that setup the recovery after World War II. Today after the banking crisis of 2009, disastrous healthcare and infrastructure neglect in the U.S., followed by the pandemic, a recovery like the one after World War II is needed.   ...

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Kathleen Sebelius, a former Governor of Kansas, pushed forward implementation of the Obama Healthcare Law as U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary, 2008-2014. She resigned in 2014 after IT problems made it difficult to use the government's Healthcare.gov website in 2013.

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Key takeaways from XI's speech to the 20th Party Congress of the CCP, China's Communist Party, are shown in the Guardian. Xi presented a vision of continuity. Goals that were seen as significant were self-reliance in science and technologies and building China's capacity for innovation by building up its capabilities in science education. This was stated as the main driver of future growth. It does not favor decoupling with the US even though the US sees it in its own interest and that of its working class to bring home manufacturing and rebuild supply chains for American self reliance - the pandemic showed the weakness of free markets approaches that ignored this. A promise to step up regulation on income distribution and wealth accumulation, to cut down the growing inequality gap that developed in the last two decades of hypergrowth.  To focus on the quality of economic growth after lessons learned on climate change. To double down on the zero covid policy. He lauded the "all out war on the virus." To continue the battle against "corruption on a scale unprecedented in our history." "Corruption is the biggest cancer that harms the vitality and affects the combat effectiveness of the party, and anti-corruption is the most thorough self-revolution. As long as there is the soil and conditions for corruption, the fight against corruption will not stop for one moment." ...

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AstraZeneca PLC showed a net profit decline of 8.3% in fourth quarter 2011, on sales that remained stable at $8.66 billion compared to $8.62 billion in the prior year quarter. AstraZeneca is facing competition from low cost generics and cuts in government health care spending similiar to the rest of the industry. The company has announced new job cuts of 7,300 job for 2012, which brings total job cuts to 30,000 for the last 5 years. Most of the job cuts are in the U.S. and Europe. Hiring has continued in emerging markets leaving the net job cuts over the last 5 years at 9,600. Of the 7,300 job cuts planned for 2012, 2,200 will be in R&D departments, 1,350 in manufacturing and 3,750 in sales. AstraZeneca is changing the way it will do research and development with these changes. It will close the neuroscience research laboratories in Sodertalje, Sweden and in Montreal. It will have in its place "virtual" neuroscience units, small groups of 40-50 researchers working with academic groups and scientists outside to utilize the best science in the field. This is one of the most radical changes in R&D practices among pharmaceutical companies. In marketing the approach has shifted from having full time sales people call doctors offices to using online marketing tools and telemarketers. This approach is also being adopted for emerging markets....

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Brooks says no to the current health reform bill as most experts say it does little to control the bulging healthcare cost curve which will take it from 17% of GDP to 22% and beyond. He goes over the pros and cons. Passing this gets little done for health care reform in a fundamental way that is so badly needed today. Says Brooks the system today is rotten to the bone with opaque pricing and insane incentives, with consumers insulated from the costs of their decisions, this won't change with the current health care bill. In fact he says according to the chief actuary for Medicare it will cause health care spending to grow faster. At this rate we will be giving more money to insurance companies and programs that have great social value like expanded preschool and other needs that America has will be shoved aside. In coming years as the population of America ages there will be growing needs for health care. With no increase in supply, and the perverse incentives still in place, prices will continue to grow rapidly without the focus on efficiencies that is badly needed. Brooks points out that its not the politics is the chief obstacle to reform as most people say, but the reverse is the truth, unless one gets the fundamental incentives right politics will be terrible forever. ...

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Judith Warner coins the phrase "dysregulation," for the cultural phenomena that may be behind the lack of restraint exercized in everthing that relates to personal lives like obesity, to the lack of regulation in the gulf and financial crisis. Citing Whybrow's book, "American Mania: When More Is Not Enough," she points to a disturbance in the national psyche, something that disturbs some inner clock or mechanism, that disturbs some inner balance that is built into us from the beginnings of man in the universe.

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A study done by the Hudson Institute shows an increase in sales of 5.5% on average in same store sales of restaurants which increased lower calorie items on the menu. The reverse is taking place for restaurants that have neglected to do this, with these restaurants experiencing a decline in sales. This was based on research firm NPD and restaurant data at 21 fast-food and sit-down restaurant chains between 2006 and 2011. Chains that include lower calorie counts on menus include Panera, McDonalds, Denny's and Au Bon Pain chain. Federal regulations will require restaurants with 20 or more outlets to post the calorie counts in early 2014. The process of moving Americans away from eating habits that lead to obesity is moving at a slow pace. Margo Wootan, director of nutrition policy at the Center of Science in the Public Interest, says large serving sizes at restaurants lead to overeating and obesity. Frequency of eating at restaurants is another problem, with studies showing women who eat out more than 5 times a week take in about 290 calories each day compared to women who do not eat out that often. The healthy options at restaurants are still restricted to a small portion of menus and healthy choices are limited....

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G-7 nations reach agreement for a global minimum tax of 15% a floor for taxes that the Biden administration finds acceptable. This agreement was reached at a meeting of the Treasury chiefs of the 7 G-7 countries in London on June 5, 2021. The G-7 countries are Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, UK, and US. Next agreement from Russia, China, India and Brazil in the G-20 nations would establish new ground rules for the major economies. The G-20 meeting is in Venice July 9-10. The OECD is steering the international efforts to achieve that goal. For the agreement to be effective a number of small nations that use tax rates of below 15% to attract business have to be part of the new rules. One of these countries is Ireland with a tax rate of 12.5%. For the Biden administration in the US the goal is a significant one as president Biden seeks business to pay its fair share so that long neglected priorities for education, healthcare, infrastructure, post pandemic improvements can be met. France and other nations in the EU face similar needs in the post pandemic environment. By setting a floor the Biden administration is both creating a new cultural concept of fairness in taxation and making it possible to finance the $2 trillion spending programs for these priorities of president Biden. Behind this are important facts that have left the large tech businesses paying little or no tax depriving governments of the very revenues that are needed for infrastructure and services for a modern well run state. The Biden administration seeks to include the tech businesses as well as all businesses in the new tax rules so that a uniform idea of fair taxation applies across the whole economy for the first time in two decades. In this way it makes up for the missed opportunities in the OBC administrations of Obama, Bush, Clinton that have led to loss of faith in the state and institutions in the US. A similar situation prevails in the UK,  France and Germany where previous administrations failed to address this important issue of fair taxation and financing infrastructure and priorities in health, education, and critical needs of the people.   ...

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Huge losses sustained by sovereign wealth funds. Estimated $350 billion for Gulf foreign reserve funds and SWF's, according to RGE Monitor's Rachel Ziemba, or 27% of assets. Sovereign Wealth funds are either using their funds for supporting their local banks as in the Gulf areas, or buying back stakes of cash strapped western banks like RBS in the case of China. Russia, China and other countries are using their SWF's for stimulus spending. And Russia, Gulf economies that are dependent on oil prices, are looking at possible sale of foreign assets at oil prices between $50 and a deterioration to $25. Only China has a surplus that is sustained through the last quarter of 2008, but this is changing quickly as imports pick up after the stimulus kicks in, and exports drop precipitiously in 2010. South Korea and Russia have also learned of the need to have liquid safe investments preferably in dollars in the current crisis, as they have learned how large capital outflows can get in a short time. And the US is not looking at these large capital inflows from overseas as a benevolent thing, because it overvalues American assets, and leads to all sorts of distortions in liquidity and pricing of risk that contributed to the current crisis. In short the whole situation with SWF's has a suprising ending, as with everything in the current crisis, nothing worked out as expected or planned....

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Japanese Dads are taking on a bigger role and changing parenting. BBC Future shows this story about Japanese dads from a new generations that are taking on the joys, difficulties and responsibilities of parenting.  A new kind of superhero in Japanese manga comics is Ikumen, a Japanese term (from ikuji for childcare) for young dads actively spending time with their children compared to an earlier generation of fathers who spent most of their time at work, and rarely took on family responsibilities. During the sixties and seventies as Japan emerged from the wartime recovery and modernized Japanese culture defined men's role to spend most of the time at work, even getting allowance for spending from their wives who controlled the family budget.  In 2010 the Japanese Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare started the Ikumen project to increase paternal involvement in child caring. This was a major cultural change and was part of the change in culture needed for the Third Arrow of Japan's Abenomics project to get women's participation up to western country levels. Today the women's participation rate in workplaces exceeds that of the U.S. Even in the 1980's men spent on average about 40 minutes with their children mostly during the family meal in the evening and even had to have their wives find their clothes. The common saying was - "jishin, kaminari, kaji, oyaji," earthquake, thunder, fire and father, remote and given respect. Women's reaction was not positive as they postponed marraige for later, then even not marrying at all for the next generation, leading to reduced childbirth rates. The Ikumen project projected fathers in a masculine role of heroes for taking on parenting, like the t-shirt logo "Strength for Society" portraying them as saving society, saving the  country. About 45% now support the idea of "men should work, women should stay at home" compared to 60% in 1992- drop of 15%. The statistics do not quite tell the story because during this period women participation in the workplace has jumped to western country levels as part of Abenomics Third Arrow to revive the economy. The problem that is still being tackled is that of bosses in the workplace who lack awareness and discourage taking paternal leave which has risen from 2% to 7% in five years 2012 to 2017. ...

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The situation in nursing homes and eldercare is a huge black eye says this report from Canada. The situation is poor also in the U.S. and Britain. All the Anglo-Saxon countries appear to have the same problem of neglect of eldercare and homes for older citizens compared to say Japan, Germany or France with different healthcare systems and more invested in these areas of health and older citizens.Look at the numbers- in Canada 80% of deaths from coronavirus among older people in nursing homes. Next Ireland at 62%, and the U.S. at 40%. This report says these elder care facilities in Canada are run down, poorly equipped and understaffed. Canada's armed forces sent medics to the nursing homes in Quebec and Ontario and their reports are described as distruging and worrisome by prime minister Trudeau. In these countries lawmakers and policymakers have failed, and the culture of investing in areas other than health and public services and infrastructure, has failed the people. A poor scorecard for this generation of politicians, lawmakers, and leaders both in business and the government. ...