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British prime minister Theresa May makes a bid for working class votes in the 2017 election, just as the Labor party under Jeremy Corbyn announces its own manifesto seeking working class votes. May has proposed increasing the minimum wage to 60% of median earnings by 2020, and increased funding for the National Health Service by 8 billion pounds over 5 years. Corporate taxes will be reduced from 19 to 17% compared to Labor Party raising it to 26% under Corbyn's manifesto. Some of the Labor Party's supporters in the north of Britain are leaving the party because of dissatisfaction with Labor's leadership.

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With Amazon taking customers from specialty retailers on the basis of price questions are raised about the future of Best Buy. Best Buy competed by having tech savy salespeople and moderately lower prices. Borders lost sales to Amazon. Now this is happening in electronics as Amazon increases share. Customers can visit Best Buy to check out electronic goods and then buy on Amazon for the lower price, making Best Buy Amazon's showroom. Amazon's electronics and nonmedia revenue went up by 66% in 2010 to $18 billion. With Sony selling through Costco another advantage is eroding. Even with Circuit City out of the market Best Buy was losing market share (December 2010 figures show) in the key television and computing segments.

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Huawei launches its smartphone model the Ascend P6 at the historic performing arts location Roundhouse in London. Huawei is using the same marketing tactics used by Apple and copied by Samsung to get customer attention. Huawei, the second largest supplier of telecom equipmen after Ericsson of Sweden, is not known for its consumer products. This is the first time it is adopting high profile marketing strategies to upset the duopoly of Apple and Samsung in the smartphone market. Other competitors are LG, ZTE, Sony and Lenovo, each trying to take market share from Apple and Samsung. Apple lost over 5 points of market share in smartphones in 2012 and Samsung gained close to 4 points by coming up with a low priced range of smartphones. Apple now has 17.3%, Samsung 32.7%, LG 4.8%, Huawei 4.6%, ZTE 4.2%, for 1st quarter 2013. Samsung now faces competition in the lower priced segments from Huawei, Lenovo, ZTE and HTC, companies in China with products for this segment.

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Diesel prices are regulated and subsidized by the Indian government, but gasoline prices are deregulated since 2010, resulting in gasoline costing 64% more than diesel in India. As a result buyers are staying away from gasoline cars and shifting to diesel creating distortions in demand. The government is considering a tax on diesel cars and SUV's of between $3000 to $4600 to correct the distortion. Because lower income people woud be hurt by increasing the price of diesel it continues to be subsidized. Because of the uncertainty car manufacturers are shutting down production to reduce growing inventory of gasoline vehicles. High interest rates of 12% on car loans also reduces demand. Suzuki Maruti sales declined 6% in May 2012, Ford and GM showed sales declines of 14% and 20%. The year ending March 2012 shows Indian car sales growing only slightly by 2.2% to 2 million cars. Sales were rising at 29% only about a year ago. Gasoline costs 68 rupees a liter in New Delhi after a 11.5% increase in May 2012, compared to 41 rupees per liter for diesel. The increase in gasoline prices is a result of the government having difficulty paying the rising imports of oil, costing $141 billion for the year ending March 31, 2012. The sharp slowdown in the car industry and the problems in the energy sector have affected India's growth rate....

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Ruth Bender's interview with France's low cost phone provider Iliad's CEO, Xavier Niel, in August 2014. Iliad made a bid to acquire T-Mobile U.S. He says even though he has no experience in the U.S. market, he has a good sense of what the public wants as it struggles to pay high subscription prices. He sees several years of growth in the French market where he brought prices down significantly. The U.S. move he sees as preparing for growth ten years from now.

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Airlines are learning to price aggressively, and sophisticated pricing models are helping to improve revenues. Online buying and search habits of travellers aim at getting lower prices, even as the airlines are using pricing models to price aggressively by monitoring passenger buying throughout the day. Further consolidation, as for instance a merger of Delta with US Airways, would further shrink airline fleets and raise prices as seat capacity is filled up. Southwest Airways continues to expand its fleet and is moving in the opposite direction, but it is also expanding routes flown and is increasing its presence in the market visa vis the other airlines. Overall, with 80 to 100% of capacity filled, airlines are finally obtaining some of the pricing power to operate at a profit. Note that leisure fares and business fares are moving in the opposite direction. Leisure down 9% year over year, business up 20% year over year. After the seats fill up the unsold seat is discounted as a filled seat vs a unfilled seat, means at the margin pure profit for the filled seat even at highly discounted rates. It also raises the capacity filled per flight to a higher level....

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The Angus Reid Insititute in Canada poll shows 65% of Canadians think it is too much to handle for Canada to take in the 31,000 refugees that have come to Canada since the Trump administration took office. In July 2018 58% of Canadians think the refugee policy of prime minister Trudeau is "too generous" compared to 53% a year earlier. 

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A new family sedan will come out of a new manufacturing plant VW has built in Chattanooga, Tennessee, in 2011. The plant will turn out a new version of the Passat to compete with the Toyota Camry and the Honda Accord. Production capacity will be 150,000 A new Beetle will also be introduced. This is the first time VW has built a car specifically designed for the U.S.. During its previous efforts in the 80's VW used European designs and transferred them to the U.S. Its plans are to sell 400,000 VW's in the U.S. by 2013. VW sold 213,000 cars in the U.S. in 2009, so this means doubling sales in 4 years. At it height VW sold 577,000 cars in 1970, but this was before the Japanese and the Koreans entered the market in a significant way, and now the potential is there for Chinese and Indian imports at the low end of the price scale. Another factor making this goal difficult to achieve is the smaller car market and lower economic growth. By 1992, sales had dropped to 49,000, after the boxier replacement to the bug- in its Rabbit and Golf models- never took off. The new Beetle's introduction in 1998 improved sales, which reached 356,000 in 2001, and then declined as a result of too few new models, declining quality and a weakening dollar. There is a feeling among VW's American dealers, that VW's European headquarters staff is not giving the US the priority it deserves. The revolving door change in CEO's for the US operations, has only reinforced this impression. Mr Browning of GM's European operations replaced Jaccoby recently. Jaccoby joined Volvo as its new CEO. Steps taken to address these issues are to revamp the Jetta model for American customer preferences, and advertising that appeals to price conscious customers with the line: "Great for the price of good." Another innovative effort is an ad strategy that tries to capture Hispanics in the US market, with ads on Spanish language television networks. A sign of how much German management is involved in the detail of the new Jetta, is the discussion at the management board level about whether the new model should have American style cup holders. This meant pushing the brake two inches forward towards the driver, a decision that was made to do so after some deliberation at the management board. This will lead to intense competition in the US market, with Asian, European and US manufacturers all vying for the same price conscious customers....

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According to a study by Goldman Sachs, an supported by other experts, the USA is only half way through the housing crisis. Goldman estimates that there will be a 18-20% correction overall with about 11-13% further price declines expected. In some states a decline of 25% is expected. These are states that saw huge runup in prices- Virginia and Maryland, Florida, California and Arizona, and New Jersey.

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In nominal terms China's currency, the yuan, appreciated by 3.7% in 2011. The real effective exchange rate, measured on a trade weighted basis and adjusted for relative consumer prices is the more significant rate. The real rate shows the yuan up by 5.3% in 2011, according to the Bank for International Settlements. In November 2011 the yuan appeared to be weakening, and China's prime minister, Wen Jiabao, says China wants to see the renminbi more flexible "in either direction."

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Two readers opinions cast doubts about Vickie Tillman's defense of S&P on the editorial page August 31, 2007. That article by an S&P employee looked like a PR effort.

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The U.S. market has better prospects than emerging markets according to some analysts. This is because a large number of U.S. tech and blue chip companies have good earnings and cash positions, and lower valuations. Commodities prices are volatile because China is raising interest rates to control inflation, slowing growth. Many emerging markets like Russia and Brazil are dependent on commodities exports making them riskier as China's growth slows.

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James McIntyre's book about Gordon Brown, (title is Power with a Purpose) who like Jimmy Carter, was more respected in retirement for doing good work humbly and not getting into a revenue generating speaker's circuit or consulting, or boards of directors of companies. McIntyre looks at his career, the involvement of Mandelson as Business Secretary, the failures of Mandelson and Blair in New Labour, and Gordon Brown's failure to revive the Labour Party. The Times says Gordon Brown has grown in stature since leaving No. 10 Downing Street. Under Blair, Brown was No.2 and headed the British Treasury as finance minister. He only became prime minister at the end of his career during the 2008-2009 financial crisis. He started the effort to redefine Labour Party after Margaret Thatcher defeated the Labour candidate from Plymouth Mr. Foot and swept out socialist Labour and the trade unions. Then followed privatization and changes in the British economy which were followed by Reagan in the US by 1980. Through this period Brown and Blair tried to create the concept of New Labour which won in landslides as Britain switched back to Labour as the alternative. As the Blair magic withered Brown was left tackling the 2009 financial crisis but failed to define what Labour was- his Business secretary was Peter Mandelson who unlike Brown was in Labour but in for his own purpose and had a cynical attitude to politics as a way to retire in some privileged business position on boards of directors. The result is well known Cameron and the conservatives who were even less qualified than an earlier generation of Conservative politicians, their decision to call the Brexit referendum, the verdict of yes on Brexit leading to Cameron's replacement by Boris Johnson, and Britain having 4 prime ministers in a span of five years as discredited austerity drive was replaced by Keir Starmer's Labour. This project with McSweeney as Starmer's campaign manager cleared Labour of socialist outlook Corbyn supporters, won in a landslide in 2024, only to fail to define the purpose for which Labour stood for and Starmer's ratings dropping to new lows of 18% support as Reform UK's Farage took up the issue of migrants and the culture that enabled migrants to enter the UK. Britain has been let down by two generations of less competent, poorly qualified for public service politicians over three decades since the 1990's- through Blair/Brown, Cameron, Boris Johnson and left struggling with Keir Starmer. Sixty years after decolonization of an Empire in the 1960's, Britain has not gained in purpose and strength, only drifting along as new powers emerge in Asia and the world changes. ...

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US Defense Security Cooperation Agency in State Department approves sales of Javelin and Excalibur missile systems to India November 19 2025, at a price tag of about $95 million. This increases US military sales to India to over $20 billion. FOr India to get a good trade agreement with the US, the US government set two conditions - increase purchases of US products and stop funding Russian attacks on Ukraine by reverting to the situation in 2019 when India purchased about 4% of its oil from Russia. India's purchases of discounted oil from Russia are a recent development. Indian and Chinese refiners have cut purchases of Russian oil, according to recent reports in WSJ. The increasing arms purchases from the US is a development that has taken place throughout the Modi administration since 2014 cutting dependence on Russian supplies including India's building its own capacity for defense products.

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China's Producer prices declined by 3%, Consumer prices flatlined, and imports and exports are both down 6.2% in September 2023. Growth is expected not to exceed 5% in forecasts by IMF and others.

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A striking change is coming over US airlines as they turn their focus from operating costs to taking out unprofitable routes, reducing the size of their plane fleets, and increase the number of seats filled on a flight. The numbers bear this out. According to ATA the airlines reduced fleets from 3469 aircraft to 2747 aircraft from 2000 to 2005. American Airlines is typical in discontinuing 27 MD-80 aircraft which are older and gas guzzling. Delta and Northwest used the bankruptcy period to to get court approval to return many planes to leaseholders by breaking the leases- before breaking the lease parking the planes was more expensive than flying them at a loss. As a result according to ATA US airlines filled an average of 77.6% up from 75.4% in 2004. With this strategy airlines recovered some of their pricing power. US Dept of Transportation statistics show prices are higher than at any time since Sept 11, 2001 and the Air Travel Price Index, increased by 9.1% in 4th quarter 2005 over 4th quarter 2004. And airlines are being more restrained in getting into new routes just because some other airline has eliminated that route. Airlines however have to be careful to increase prices just enough but not too much that demand starts falling, and this is possible with fewer seats on more popular routes. Other methods the airlines are using are sophisticated O&D origin and destination revenue management systems which reduce the number of inexpensive, and unprofitable seats available on the internet. Larger airlines have tried to get back corporate customers by reducing the extremely high fares they used to charge and instead raising last minute fares because corporate customers see this as a price burden they are willing to shoulder. Larger airlines are doing better in relation to the price discounters like Southwest and JetBlue. With Southwest's hedging strategy against fuel price increases not as useful as in prior years it too faces need to raise fares....

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The increasing price of wheat and the failure to modernize Pakistan's agriculture is the subject of this report in The Indian Express. The floods and the Ukraine war, lack of development in agriculture, have created a food crisis in Pakistan.