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How a small business like Tiny Prints which makes high end greeting cards -from the likes of which Google gets most of its revenues of $11 billion in the USA and $22 billion globally- manages its search marketing budget. This is the way a business like this gets online clicks and sales. Google search ads act like a huge hose over the internet commerce place to generate clicks and sales for online companies.

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Is this a sign of things to come, after all the Japanese economy has seen sagging consumption for years with a two tier economy with full time workers and parttime workers with no benefits. The parttime labor force increased from 4.13 to 4.79 million according to the Labor Department and its the highest since 1993. Now people are doing this not by choice but for economic reasons. And employers like Kroger are doing this so that they can hire more parttimers with no benefits and pay benefits to fewer employees. There are also computerized scheduling systems for parttimers that are becoming popular with retail stores that use a lot of partimers.

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A report on the Status of German Unity from the German cabinet, says the eastern part of Germany, formerly the German Democratic Republic, suffers from a declining population and could have benefitted from the addition of young people as immigrants. As it stands the area with the lowest number of refugees or immigrants is where most of the xenophobia anti-immigrant sentiment exists.  It says the eastern part of the country including cities like Dresden need to develop a more receptive culture to attract young people for economic progress.

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Robert Reilly, an assistant to President Reagan, former director of Voice of America, says don't underestimate the importance of what the younger Bush as president called "the vision thing." Efficiency experts like Hoover, and Republican candidates who had business and other professional experience but could not grasp the moral imperative in politics such as Alf Landon (1936), Wendell Wilkie (1940), Thomas Dewey (1944 and 1948) failed to convince voters. Democrats presented ideas like the Fair Deal, New Deal (FDR), New Frontier (Kennedy), Great Society (Johnson) and captured this "vision thing" to win. This is why he is skeptical about Romney as business and management consultant coming in and bringing change with a number of management consultants. Reagan also presented the choice in moral terms which were then translated into how the government would function to fulfill the moral imperative, says Reilly.

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Eighteen year old Bianca Andreescu of Canada wins the U.S. Open 6-3, 7-5 defeating 37 year old veteran Serena Williams as she attempted a comeback. The intelligent game with a whole range of shots and use of creative game mixing up the shots was a feature of Andrescu's style that made it fun to watch the game. Martina Navritolova says Andrescu's style is so creative that its great to have a new player like her in the game.

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Researchers in the U.S. and China team up to shows difference in the way boys and girls use their smartphones and computers. The boys tend to favor video games and the girls preferring social contact spending time going through social media programs. Evidence shows women less likely to develop internet gaming disorders, and women using programs like Pinterest, Facebook, Instagram more often than boys. Girls feel the ill effects of using these programs more than boys, often driving parents crazy.

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Elina Svitolina of Ukraine wins in three sets over Iga Swiatek of Poland to make it to the semifinals of Wimbledon. Svitolina says the war made her stronger, and also made her mentally stronger. "Mentally I don't take difficult situations as like a disaster you know? There are worse things in life." The Ukraine war is a women's war as millions of women became refugees in different parts of Europe including Swiatek's Poland. 

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Comments from readers of WSJ about the interview with Rubin at Citigroup (Ken Brown, David Enrich, NYT, Nov. 29, 2008), and his defense of $115 million in compensation since 1999 on its pages. Readers expressed strong sentiment after the housing foreclosures, bank bailouts, and the shock to the nation's financial system. One reader says history will find Rubin, Greenspan and Barney Frank in the financial scrap heap, another says he is incredulous at the way Rubin condescendingly points to his opportunities to do better elewhere, another says Rubin uses a lot of B school mumbo jumbo like risk book and inflection points and laments the failure of Wall Street executives to take responsibility for errors of judgement.

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Harry Kane Jude Bellingham and Marcus Rashford put England ahead in a 4-2 win over Croatia -openers in World Cup Soccer 2026, Harry Kane had 2 goals and was close to getting the third for a hat trick. It was an exceptional performance by Kane matching that of the French Bleu's Mbappe and Messi the day earlier. In the first half England and Croatia were 2-2. Coach Tuchel gave the English team a pep talk they took to heart to be the best they could be, "to be brave, courageous and tenacious on the front foot, and just go for it." This is what Tuchel told them in the words of Harry Kane- “He told us to take the shackles off, calm down and let’s go. He said what’s the worst that can happen? Show the world who we can be.” “We came out in the second half full gas and they couldn’t live with it, and that’s the level we have to set in every game. The way we controlled the game once we went ahead, we never really looked like we were in danger and then scored on the counterattack. We had a spell where we could have scored three or four. Credit to everyone: the first game of the tournament and a great result against a tough side.” This is how coach Tuchel described his pep talk to the team at half time- “I told them to calm down. We just conceded the goal. To calm down, calm their nerves. And encourage them to do it our way. I told them that my perception of them in the last 17 days will not change no matter what the result is. I want them to do it their way. Our way. I want them to be brave, courageous and tenacious on the front foot. And just go for it.”   ...

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During the Ozzie and Harriet era of the 1950's Americans saved 8% of their disposable income. Now thrift is becoming popular again. And one estimate is that as Americans go back to saving like this again about 10% of disposable income may be saved. This is also because of the need to pay down debt. And this means consumption will be much lower and businesses slow to add jobs.

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Mr. Eike Batista's EBX Group companies were one of the prime beneficiaries of huge government investments in mining, oil and other commodities. The fading of the commodities boom is resulting in large losses for these companies. Street protests in Brazilian cities shows the weakness of the Brazilian economic model that neglected public services in transportation, health care and education and concentrated on infrastructure and mining projects.

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How the failure of the world trade talks may affect other negotiations of world issues like global warming and efforts to cut emissions worldwide. How livelihood security could play out in areas like global warming and emissions control.

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Its not so much about the repeat of the Great Depression, but of a lost decade like that in Japan, or some variation of a very difficult economy. Especially if the jobs picture worsens, the dollar weakens, and the Fed's exit strategy from quantitatve easing is ineffective and leads to further declines.

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The surprise in Sweden is the culture ethic in the country that is universal that having and leading ordinary lives is best for all and the best way to live. This starts with everyone including the wealthy living like ordinary people as shown in a recent French Television TV5 Monde show on a weekend in Stockholm.There are many billionaires for a small country but they are seen as bringing industry and inventiveness in the country, and still living ordinary lives like everybody else. You could not tell the difference between the classes in the restaurants and the parks and along the green areas near the water on the many islands that make up Stockholm. This is a unique feature of this country found rarely elsewhere in the world. From the bicycles everywhere as the standard form of transportation throughout the many islands and bridges and parks that make up the country.  Personal income tax is 61.5% in Sweden in 2019. This helps finance public services and benefits that benefit ordinary and working class people in a way that reduces the impact of other aspects of concentration of capital in industry. Much more than this is the attitude that respects a culture ethic of everyone having good opportunities in life. ...

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Areas for growth for the Indian drug Industry include the large growing domestic market, the outsourcing by US drug manufacturers, and sales in other developing countries of Asia, Middle East, Latin America and Africa. Analyst estimates are that India will spend $30 billion a year on drugs to improve care for its people in the next 10 years up from $8 billion today. And the distribution network is being developed by drug companies insdie India to reach more people. Also companies like Pfizer plan to double outsourcing of manufacturing drugs from 10% today to 20%.

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Boris Johnson wins the race to lead the Conservative Party and become the next prime minister of Britain. Several ministers resigned underlining the problem he faces lacking support from the Conservative party members who do not support exit from the European Union without some deal or arrangement with the EU. He will lead a minority government that could fall with the loss of support from within the Conservative Party itself. Boris Johnson beat Jeremy Hunt by 92,153 votes to 46,656. He now has a margin of only three votes with the help of the Unionist Party of Northern Ireland and faltering support from members of the Conservative Party who see Boris Johnson's idea of simply leaving the EU on October 31st deal or no deal as problematic. 

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American folk singer continued the folk song tradition set by Woody Guthrie with songs such as "Good Night Irene." He came from a family deeply committed to music, with his father a music teacher and mother a concert violinist. His own career spanned the period from the 1940's when he toured with Guthrie as part of the Almanac Singers, all the way to 2009 when he sang "This Land is Your Land," with Bruce Springsteen at the Lincoln Memorial. The key to the future said Seeger is to find the optimistic stories and let them be known. He lived in a wood cabin on 17 acres near the Hudson River in New York, and was the inspiration for other contemporary singers like Bob Dylan and Bruce Springsteen.

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NYT reporter Neuman takes a17 hour road trip across the island of Cuba in a 1956 Ford Fairlane. He heads west from Havana near the west end of the island to Guantanamo on the east end. He sees a changing Cuba with houses for sale, little sign of ideological signs in the countryside, old cars, oxcarts, horsecarts, a Cuba that looked like it was stuck in the past. In the five years that Raul Castro took over from Fidel Castro, money and business have gradually taken the place of politics. The average salary of $20 a month is not enough for most workers even with free healthcare and education, and most people dream of making more money to enjoy a better life. Many rely on relatives abroad for additional funds, or buying and selling on the black market, or a second job.

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Social media is doing irreparable damage to health. Julie Jargon in WSJ says self-harm, sad posting, disordered eating videos abound on TikTok. It's worse because it is doing the most damage to young people. When only 20% of 8th graders can get a passing grade in civics and history, most can't read proficiently, what does social media like Facebook as shown in a WSJ investigation, and TikTok as shown here do but damage health, damage global literacy levels, hurt democratic forms of government that require civic education, limit exercize and outdoor living, and the ability to think or concentrate essential to lead a healthy productive life? 

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The takeaway from Calgary to go big and go bold applies to American cities. Calgary's downtown like many downtowns in large cities in the US had about 30% vacant office space. The 2014 oil price crash had already hit the city before the pandemic hit. Calgary responded with a plan to convert 6 million square feet of vacant office space into apartments. Developers were to be given $75 per square foot as an incentive out of a $200 million fund setup by the city. Calgary is now a fourth of the way through this transformation after getting broad community buy-in and support. Permitting process is less than 2 months.

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With a straw hat, Japanese hat for a helmet, a young carpenter from Japan covers most of Japan on a small scooter. He is now doing this in Australia. Something like this could only happen after Covid when there is a sense of release from everything that happened and a sense of discovering something new. Ryokei Mifune simply did not want things to get complicated so he says he chose Australia simply because he says he wanted to get out of Japan for an adventure and Australia looked that large. He is setting off from Melbourne to Sidney than up the coast to Cairns, a journey of 2000 miles from the southernmost airport to the easternmost one.

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About 14 million people or 16% of Turkey's population is in the earthquake zone. Much of the area is in rubble and people say there is not the equipment and support to find family members trapped in the damaged buildings. Millions are homeless, sleeping in tents, cars, and next to open fires in the wintry cold, says this report in WSJ. Criticism is mounting says this report that the response in the first 48 hours was slow and uncoordinated leading to loss of lives. Turkey which faces 200 earthquakes above magnitude 4 each year has faced earthquakes before, and knew that one like that in 1999 could happen again.

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India's foreign minister S. Jaishankar says a lot has been done at the G-20 meetings in India. He says 95% of the countries agree on the communique put out by the G-20. The idea that peace in Europe can be achieved at G-20 meetings in India is not realistic he says as the G-20 was not designed for this purpose of tackling troublespots like Ukraine. What the G-20 has done is bring countries in Europe and North America together with India to understand the problems stemming from the conflict in Ukraine on food security and from the debt crises in some parts of Asia. 

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US president Biden calls on intelligence agencies in the US to complete an inquiry into the origins of the coronavirus in 90 days. Biden said he would publish the results of the 90 day inquiry. During the last months of the Trump administration the idea of the virus originating in a Wuhan lab was supported by parts of the US intelligence community. 

The WSJ reports show the intelligence community in the US saying that 3 members of a key Wuhan lab in China were taken to hospital with covid like symptoms before the first case of covid patient was recorded in Wuhan in early December 2019.

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Fear of homelessness is a big problem for Ukraine refugees among the elderly. Many people who are in their 80's, with little in savings and no relatives in the western parts of the country refuse to leave. Some have not left when the Russian army is only two miles away as shown in towns like Bakhmut near the front lines in Donetsk eastern part of Ukraine. One elderly woman says they would drop her off at the station at Lviv or Dnipro, and then what, where was she to go. Rescue units volunteers take people to safety every day in these towns. Some leave when the artillery shelling becomes unbearable.