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This report in The Times shows that from April to October the Tory red wall seats in the north of England have been hit hard by the coronavirus, much harder than the south of England. The infection rates in October are about three or four times in the north of England. The second lockdown came earlier in the north, in Liverpool Greater Manchester and Yorkshire. The result is that instead of levelling up the great disparities in wealth and income that are seen between the south, London and the north of England the gap is widening under the impact of coronavirus. Deindustrialization in the north after their prominent role in Britain's industrial revolution was followed by the same type of decline seen in parts of the American midwestern states. Imports from China and globalization, hit these areas in a sort of second wave, just as America was hit first by the wave of Japanese imports, followed by an even bigger wave of imports from China and complete loss of manufacturing. With it the loss of well paying jobs for workers in manufacturing and the decline of industrial cities. Influx of cheap labor from other parts of the European Union also affected the north. The result is that the popularity of Boris Johnson and the Conservatives with 58% approval rating in April in the north of England is replaced by a rating of about 31% in October 2020. The 40 Tory MP's in the Northern Research Group expressed their serious concern to the prime minister. ...

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American, Alaska Airlines, and Southwest Airlines are the only 3 airlines that never filed for bankruptcy. Analysts say that this has left it with a higher cost structure, and estimate that American's costs would be $600 million lower if it has the contracts Delta and Continental have. Delta Airlines merger with Northwest in 2008, and the planned merger of Continental and United, does not affect American Airlines management. CEO Arpey sees American as more nimble and trying to build something profitable, and sees being smaller than these newly merged competitors an advantage. American is focussed on markets around 5 major cities- Dallas, Chicago, Los Angeles, Miami and New York. In international travel it has One World partnerships with British Airways and Japan Airlines.

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As David Ignatius points out in his trip to China, the China of post 2010 is a lot of things depending on who you talk to in China- cocky, scared, anxious. He comes away perplexed by the range of questions that come up in his mind. The wealth of the coastal cities is stunning, and at the same time as the leaders insist China is still a poor country with deep regional imbalances, and what is less mentioned, the rising inequality in society. How to pull it all together to make possible a transition to development that is evened out across all regions and sections of society and to allow freedom of expression, is a challenge for the new leadership of Xi Jinping in 2011.

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The breakdown of railways in Iraq. A major contribution of the European powers was the rail systems built throughout the Middle East and Asia. Iraqi Railways which once connected farflung provinces in the Middle East in Syria, Iraq and Turkey, is now in a dilapidated state after years of wars and conflict. Tim Arango visits the Baghdad Central Railway Station as a new Chinese built train leaves Baghdad for Basra. Most of the rest of the country is now not reachable by train. Mosul and the north is in a war zone with the ISIS and Kurdish army engaged in battles. A project manager at the station shows plans for a $60 billion new rail system that connects all of Iraq's cities.

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Reports from the Sixth China North-South Lung Cancer Summit meeting of 300 experts focusses on controlling tobacco use and promoting early detection and treatment of lung cancer. Lung cancer is now the leading form of cancer in China, with 22.7% of cancer deaths each year. Currently about 1 million die in China from smoking related illness each year. CCTV reports this is increasing by 26.9% a year. Causes cited are aging population, air pollution, and widespread smoking. About one in three of China's people smoke, or about 350 million. Awareness of the dangers of tobacco use is not high outside two or three major cities. China manufactures about 1.7 trillion cigarettes a year, according to CCTV, and tobacco contributes 7-10 percent of state revenues.

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Toyota is seeing declining sales and has cut its temporary workforce by more than 20% from 8,800 in March to 6,800 in September. Sales declined 4% in the July-September quarter. The whole area in Toyota city with 76,000 jobs connected to the auto industry and the area around Nagoya is being affected. And emerging markets are not making up for steep declines in the American market. Analysts at Credit Suisse and UBS predict Japan's economy could contract by 1% in 2009. Sales at major department stores in Nagoya dropped 8.7% in September, the largest decline among 10 major cities in Japan, and there is a fivefold increase in the number of distressed businesses seeking government loans according to a report by the local chamber of commerce.

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The China Banking Regulatory Commission points to dangers of the Non Performing Loans ratio rebounding and serious risks in the financial sector from bad loans. CBRC chairman, Liu Mingkang, points to the risks associated with local-government financing platforms, and the real estate sector and industries with excess capacity, in the 128 page report for 2009 shown on its website. And he points out that fundamental cracks and flaws internationally, that were exposed by the global financial criis of 2008, have still to be resolved. He cites the regulatory issues, "too-big-to-fail" issue for large financial institutions, cross-sector and cross-country risk contagion toxic assets, and the budget deficits facing European countries, as major issues posing systemic risk.

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Laura Marshall-Andrews is a GP, a General Practitioner doctor, in Brighton, England, with a different approach to patients and health care. She takes into account the whole patient, the patient's mental condition, putting back some of the things that reduce isolation, increasing feelings of self-worth, bringing more community and nature interactions of a positive nature that can affect the patient's health. In some situations having a doctor who listens and is willing to take the time to talk to and know the patient, and being aware of the patient's whole condition as opposed to fragmented areas based on fields of medicine can make a huge difference. Don't look for a diagnosis, treat the whole person,  says Laura Marshall Andrews in her new book- What Seems To Be The Problem? She believes social prescribing takes a whole load off the National Health Service in Britain. This includes art, photography classes, dance classes, singing classes. A study by the University of Westminster shows the GP visits go down by 30% and emergency A&E visits by 25% with social activity prescribing. Yoga, meditation, gardening, nature walks, are also part of the same activities that can help people improve how they feel and think and bring the sense of peace in their lives that brings better health with it. In the loneliness and isolation, community dislocations and pressures of life in today's cities, all these activities are immensely important to the idea of whole health of the whole person. Dr Andrews says that if you keep a community happy and creative, then you are not going to need a lot of expensive hospital treatments." "Cum Scientia Caritas" the motto of the Royal College of General Practitioners means Science with Caring. ...

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There may be psychological hurdles in China's growth with the effects on mental health from lockdowns in major cities, the revolt in the property sector with home buyers losing confidence in developers, the loss of confidence of foreign investors from US and EU. The dependence on the property sector to carry so large a burden of growth for the last 2 decades in China may now look like an error. The dependence on foreign investment may also be an error as the loss of confidence could mean some withdrawal and a lack of sustained investment.  It could even be said that restraints on both sectors property and foreign investors could have created alternative paths to growth, and reduced the shift of factories from the US and Europe to China that have now caused trade friction and and a reverse shift of investment back to home countries of US and EU. Trade friction has it appears backfired in a way that extends to the overall relationship which could have been prevented by preventing the hyper growth that happened. Greg Ip of the WSJ has argued that compared to Japan's growth in the sixties and seventies from a country of 100 million the hyper growth for a country of 1 billion for 2 decades created a massive impact on communities in US and EU that were dependent on factories that were lost to China. This has alienated large sectors of the public in the US and EU which could have been prevented by restraints on hyper growth in China. Ip says the growth was too large and too fast for the US to cope. It may have permanently damaged the relations between the two countries showing that trade and globalization had unintended effects when left to business and governments staying away from keeping an eye on how it was happening. ...

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Hancock County, Iowa, is one of those rural counties in the American heartland that did not support Mr. Trump in 2016. This county now supports Trump by a large margin because they see his policies benefitting rural America, and see him as a way for the Republican party to be back in power to pursue a conservative agenda. WSJ reports from Hancock County in Iowa. The American voting system gives more importance to states with smaller populations in the Electoral College relative to larger states. States with large farming communities such as Wisconsin, Michigan and Iowa play a larger role in elections in the US than population alone would suggest. John McCormick of the WSJ talks to farmers in this rural county in Iowa with a higher proportion of less educated voters than the rest of the counties in Iowa. One of five voters have a bachelors degree in Hancock County compared to one in three in Iowa as a whole and 38% nationally. The median age is 44 years compared to 39 years nationally and in Iowa. This part of rural Iowa is also in farmland that is many miles away from large cities and urban areas and more isolated and homogenous as 9 out of ten people are non-Hispanic and white. About a fourth of these voters are supporting his candidacy over Nikki Haley because they see it as more likely to win because of polls, even though Haley is according to the WSJ editorial opinion the stronger candidate for Republicans across the suburbs critical for 2024, which are slightly younger, more educated, and less isolated from the rest of the country. Biden and Obama are a sharp contrast when it comes to rural America. Where his own Agriculture secretary felt rural America was neglected by president Obama, Biden truly cares for rural America and has huge investments in rural America as part of the rural infrastructure effort. ...

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How is the push by Toyota to hybrids making up 50% of its cars- including shift of RAV4 and Camry entirely to hybrid cars- affecting revival of US manufacturing and advanced technologies for electrification of cars? Toyota will invest $14 billion in a battery plant site in North Carolina, at a site located between Greensboro and Raleigh.The plant will make batteries for EV's and hybrids so that Toyota can respond to market demand and regulatory changes. This North Carolina plant will supply factories assembling cars, hybrids, plug ins that travel short distances before switching to gas. Hybrids including plug in hybrids make about 15% of US sales, a sector Toyota dominates. How does it affect tariffs risk? Currently Toyota plays a 15% tariff to import plug-in hybrids. The North Carolina plant will build capacity for batteries to put in 74,000 plug in cars, 45,000 EV's, 600,000 hybrid cars. How will it fight climate change? Toyota has always believed that hybrids with twice the mileage of gas cars are a good way to fight climate change, even when EV's were the rage in the days of the Biden administration. Hybrid Camry at $25,000 and RAV4 at $29,000 give 51 and 41 mpg. This strategy is now turning out to be the right one because of cost of living concerns balancing climate change concerns as priorities. It was alone in this view and took a lot of criticism for this. Now that rare earth metals that are hard to access from China are needed for EV's it is proving doubly right- giving Toyota the opportunity to double down on hybrids and also move into EV's with short range distances using gas after that. Future design of cities that are self sustaining in smaller distances, eliminating long commutes, could make this an interesting option, a style of living being tried out in Nordic countries and in Germany, France. With India and China burning coal and investing in renewables at the same time this was overlooked by the climate change planners in US and EU- the solution being natural gas and renewables including hybrids for the US and EU/ Japan advanced nations.   ...

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A advisor to U.S. president Obama lists the gains in U.S. healthcare made by March 2014, after the passing of the Affordable Care Act or Obama healthcare law. He cites on access to care the reduction of the percentage of uninsured Americans from 18% in the middle of 2013 to 15.9% in the first quarter of 2014, according to a Gallup poll.

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Indian Finance Minister Sitharaman gives the following remarks in parliament on the White Paper presented to the 18th Lok Sabha in January 2024, describing the dire condition of the Indian economy by 2013 with mismanagement and "big ticket" corruption. India's Finance Minister Sitharaman describes the situation in three key areas by 2013 that left the economy of India in a fragile state, with projects stalled, development delayed, and capital investment not taking place. She gives as 3 main points of focus- the state of affairs at Defense Ministry, at the Environment Ministry, and for Energy supplies. At the outset she says PM Modi had suggested the need for such White Paper by 2015 so that future generations would know what had happened in India that failed the country at a time when China had already joined the community of developed nations. The issues go back to the coal scandal when coal auctions had to be cancelled by the Supreme Court for irregularities, the misuse of state owned banks leading to a large increase in non performing loans, and the mismanaged Commonwealth Games under government before 2014.  Sitharaman told parliament this had the effect of national security being compromised, Environment as a Ministry becoming a bottleneck, and the leadership failing the country. In the military there was a critical shortage of ammunition and equipment. She cites the Defense Minister at the time having the attitude that independent India has had a policy for many years not to develop the border areas, as an undeveloped border was better than a developed border. She also says Ministry stated that 92% of the Defense Budget was used up and major acquisitions have to wait for the military. Following this Sitharaman cited the scandals of that period and leakages of funds that weakend the country and failed its people. She compared capital expenditures today of 6.22 lakh crores in 2024 thre times the number in 2013 of 2.53 crores. HAL now makes Tejas jets and helicopters in Made in India production. At the Environment Ministry the delays that were 86 days reached a high of 316 days by 2013 for approval of development projects, with 355 projects pending, the nation brought to a standstill with the effects of the coal supplies to thermal power plants being wholly inadequate and Coal India in poor shape. The root of this was said Sitharaman- what everyone in Indian business knew, the term "genteel facts," as the cost of business going up. She cites the changes since then of aiming for Balance and Development- Transparency, Online Green Clearance, Standardized Environment Impact Studies, A new Department of Climate change, International Solar Alliance 2015, Mission Life 2022, Green Hydrogen, Namami Gange, Rooftop Solar. India set ambitious goals at the last Climate change Conference.    ...

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Gilberto Hinjosa was state head of the Democratic Party in Texas. He resigned and said he would not run for reelection after he said that Democrats should take moderate positions on social issues like transgender. Ken Martin the new head of the Texas Democrats says the party has to show that it is present and give people a sense that we give a damn about their lives. Democrats are seen as paying little attention to South Texas. This report in NYT says Texas is urbanizing and 5 of the 15 largest cities in America are San Antonio, Dallas, Fort Worth, Houston, Austin. Another 2 million population increase in Texas in last 4 years, by 2030 in redistricting 4 more seats in Congress could be added for Texas. For Democrats to be competitive the road runs through Texas says this report in NYT. A lot depends on understanding that Latinos are conservative on cultural issues, immigration border issues affect all people in Texas, Latinos and Whites alike.

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This NYT report cites safety experts saying that Norfolk Southern's excessive focus on profits may be partly to blame for derailments and accidents like the one in Ohio. Norfolk Southern made $3 billion in 2022, invested $2 billion in its railways and operations, up a third from 2021. But says the NYT Norfolk invested only half of the $18 billion it put into stock buybacks and dividends for its railways and  operations over a five year period. One environmental group says the railways have fought all kinds of basic safety regulations- modern braking systems, stronger tank cars for explosive, even information on what's on trains from passing to communities. Senator Maria Cantwell of Washington now leads an investigation from the Senate Commerce Committee. She said- Over the past five years the 7 railroads "have cut their workforce by nearly one third, shuttered rail yards where rail cars are traditionally inspected, and are running longer and heavier trains." Concerns about staffing shortages and rail road scheduling policies led to workers not being able to take medical leave leading to workers deciding to go on strike. This was averted by president Biden on December 2, 2022 by imposing a contract for pay raises and better terms for workers on the railroad companies only about 3 months before this train disaster. ...

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Neelman, who founded airline Jet Blue, is now starting an airline in the country where he grew up as achild of Mormon missionaries. The country Brazil is vast with a rickety transportation network, and he feels ideally suited to alow cost airline. At this time 85% of traffic in the air is controlled by 2 airlines which have no incentive to reduce prices. With 12 Embraer planes and the name Azul, Neelman is off to a start, and prices on some routes are lower than acomparable bus fare. The same approach worked to link up cities with low fares in India by pioneer Jet Airlines, though some of those fares in India are up from where they used to be with the losses in the Indian airline industry.

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This WSJ editorial after the riots in Baltimore, points out that the "blue city model" is not working. Baltimore has 8.4% unemployment compared to the 5.4% unemployment in the state, and 21% unemployment in the neighborhood of African- American Freddie Gray in Baltimore. It says failing public schools, economic decline with people leaving the city, and a general lack of opportunity, are causes for the breakdown in the city leading to the call of the National Guard by the governor to maintain law and order. The editorial emphasizes the need for private economic development, "broken windows" policing of the type encouraged under Mayors Giuliani and Bloomberg in New York City, a culture of personal responsibility, and school choice, as a way out of the crisis in American cities such as Baltimore that are failing.

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Demonstrations across France in cities like Paris, Lyon and Marseilles, by private and public trade unions drew an estimated 2.5 million people. They are protests that President Sarkozy's government is not doing enough to provide stimulus to the economy and protect jobs. THese are the largest nationwide demmonstrations in more than 20 years. France lost the most jobs in 40 years in the last quarter of 2008 and Sarkozy's government has only announced a$35 billion stimulus. Germany and France are also holding back on large stimulus spending , including significant help for Eastern European countries, and this will become an issue at the April 2, 2009 G-20 meeting. Ted Truman at Treasury is articulating aforceful response for the Obama administration calling on the EU countries to come up with astrong stimulus plan. See link.

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The consumer confidence index of the Conference Board declined to 61% in September 2008 and to 38% in October 2008 in a survey of 5000 households. THe index reache 100 in 1985 and 38 is the lowest its recorded since the index was started in 1967. The survey showed more than half the respondents worried about the job market deteriorating further. About 760,000 jobs were lost for the 9 months to September 2008, the Labor Department reports. And home prices declined 16.6% in August compared with a year ago for 20 cities, the biggest annual drop in the history of the Case Shiller Index, for Home Prices released by Standard and Poors. Phoenix and Las Vegas declined by 30% and Los Angeles,Miami, San Diego and San Francisco decline by 25%.

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Pico Iyer cites Nicholas Carr's book "The Shallows," about the negative effects on our lives of the relentless exposure to new devices and methods of communicating from Twitter to text messaging and email, iPhones and iPads. He talks about the need for quiet time and stillness to clear the mind and get in touch with oneself, in the midst of this barrage of distractions.

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Martin Feldstein points out why the recent agreement for a "fiscal compact" is no more than an empty statement about fixing the eurozone's finances. In this respect it is no different than the Stability and Growth Pact it replaces, with serious weaknesses. Feldstein cites the weaknesses in the language of the agreement. Each eurozone country is required to limit its"cyclically adjusted" budget deficit to 0.5% of GDP and bring its debt down to 60% of GDP. Compliance will be performed by the European Court of Justice and fines imposed. In practice the questions loom large- for a country like Spain with a 23% unemployment rate, isn't all of the 6% budget deficit cyclical? Again the agreement says deficits are calculated "net of one-off and temporary measures." Under this provision a lot of the stimulus programs would be considered in the category of "one-off." Other language lets eurozone countries frame budgets based on "exceptional circumstances" and "periods of severe economic downturn." Italy has declining economic growth, does it make sense to have a large budget surplus in that situation to lower debt to GDP, and how does that goal relate to "exceptional circumstances."...

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This report cites experts in California that mask use was less than 50% in the state beaches and parks after it reopened. The medical officer of Orange County an affluent community near Los Angeles even resigned after mandating the use of masks in public after protests. On one day June 20, the day after bars reopened in Los Angeles County a WSJ report shows 500,000 people went to bars in the county. As of July 17 the state has 365,000 cases and about 10,000 a day. At one time it was much lower than Michigan at less than 50,000, adding to the complacency in California and a false sense that California had somehow come up with a new way around the virus. Michigan today is at about 70,000 cases, showing that careful attention to the process is important more than anything else, not some new strategy or approach that someone comes up with to beat the virus that does not meet the essentials and common sense. Even adversity can be overcome with sound attention to the basics, where complacency and a lack of fellow feeling can lead to disaster. ...

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Stephen Bosworth was appointed by Hillary Clinton as U.S. Representative for North Korea Policy. He is one of America's best diplomats who served in several postings overseas before becoming Dean of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, Tufts University, Medford, Massachusetts. Prof. Drezner points to the work done by Bosworth in keeping dialogue with North Korea alive, till a solution can be found. He also cites Chinese analysts who say pressuring China comes from a worn playbook, that China would not agree to reunification on the Korean peninsula, to bring U.S. influence right up to its borders. South Koreans have been wary of reunification because of the decade long experience of integrating East Germany. As a result new solutions need to be found and the valuable work of diplomats like Bosworth is badly needed to keep dialogue alive for a solution to be found.

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On one hand Chinese environmental officials are aware of the pollution problems in Beijing and Shanghai and other cities. Levels of nitrogen dioxide in Beijing exceed the WHO clean air guidelines by 78%. On the other hand the newly emerging middle class is seeking car ownership, and the local government officials need growth in the car industry to show good GNP and GDP growth numbers on which their performance is judged. Beijing and Shanghai and Anhui province local governments are part owners of some auto companies. About 416,000 people are employed in the Shanghai area auto industry alone and the auto industry in Shanghai pays about 900 millon dollars in taxes, according to government figures. At seven cars per 1000 population car sales are just beginning to take off. And with China's population its clearly not going to be possible to have the same level of ownership as in the US. The same is true for India. This would increase by many times the current demand for crude oil and increase emissions to the point of creating a disaster. And even today because of lax enforcement, and older models on the road, about 40% of vehicles in Beijing have no pollution controls and the other 60% have varying degrees of pollution controls. Experts say changes to the subsidized oil price policy, refineries that produce cleaner gasoline, policies to build more mass transit which has lagged behind in China as car sales took off (and probably more GNP impact from car plants than mass transit which act as inducement for local officials), and stricter fuel efficiency and auto emissions standards are needed....

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During the coronavirus the market is pushing some buyers out of the market while other buyers are willing to pay higher prices. Limited stock, cheap financing, and low fuel prices are pushing buyers into more expensive models with higher prices. The average new vehicle sold in August in the U.S. was at $35,420 according to J.D. Power. The auto market is following the housing market in this sense where limited supply is pushing up prices. Auto sales declined by 20% in August. Younger buyers are being priced out of the new vehicle market and auto makers are focusing on higher margin vehicles.