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South Korea face population decline for the first time in its recent history. The lack of job opportunities for young people, the burden of providing an elite education that parents aspire to for children limiting families to one or two children, and women marrying later at age of 33 years instead of 29, are some reasons for the decline. The pandemic has worsened the situation creating more insecurity. 

With this trend comes an aging society as in Germany and Japan. Statistics Korea predicts average age of population will rise from median 43 in coming decades.

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Burning of stubble from the rice harvest to clear land for the next year's cultivation in the Punjab creates 25% of the pollution over New Delhi. Automobile pollution adds more pollutants. This toxic mix of pollutants is trapped by the cooler air during the winter over much of northern India. At one point the pollution index reached 643 in New Delhi, by comparison it was hard to breather with an index of 116 from the wildfires in Canada's northern region that sent smoke all the way into Washington D.C. 

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Almost all countries have lower commissions for real estate sales. In the US about 3-4 houses are sold over a lifetime. At 6% commission this amounts to a cost of 25% of the sale price of these homes. This adds to the cost of living for American people and reduces their savings for investment in quality of food, education, health and leisure activities. By comparison in the UK it is 1.3%, in Netherlands 2%, in China 2.5%. In most countries only 33% of sales are done by buyer agents in the US 89%, in the UK less than 5%.

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Netherlands is becoming a much more crowded country with housing scarcity and high rents with increasing immigration. At this pace the population which was only 10 million in 1950 and 14 million in 1980 is now 17.2 million and expected to hit 22 million. By 1950 Queen Juliana in her parliament speech was calling for migration to ease congestion, says The Times. 620,000 people migrated to Canada, Australia. and 450,000 returned from Dutch East Indies, now Indonesia. Most parties now oppose the high level of immigration into the urban sprawl of Rotterdam, Utrecht and Amsterdam home to about 9 million people.

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Paul Hannon in the WSJ tells the story of how the Swiss now support the 15% corporate minimum tax. 78% of Swiss voters support the new tax in a referendum. Switzerland is now trying to change the bad reputation it had gained as a place companies moved to shift profits to low income tax locations. Switzerland now joins 35 countries implementing the 15% corporate tax in 2024 and 2025, including the 27 members of the European Union, Australia, Japan, France and the UK. 15 other countries say they will do so in that time frame.

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China's share of US imports reached 10% in 2019. It collapsed during the pandemic after 2019. It then recovered in February-March 2021 to about 15%, and surged afterwards to 42%, and is down close to 15% in November 2024. The incoming DJT administration is bringing back a focus on tariffs- a tariff as high as 60 percent is unlikely as American companies are likely to oppose this. A smaller tariff increase of 20-30% would bring the share of US imports from China back to less than 10% that existed in 2019. 

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Only 2 migrants were sent to Rwanda under a British government program of the Tories party to send migrants to Africa. The program if it took off was to spend 490 million British pounds to send migrants to Rwanda from Britain. A payment of 120 million pounds was made to Rwanda. WSJ says it is a huge waste of money. Each of the 2 migrants were paid $3000. Meanwhile record numbers of migrants entered Britain through the English Channel. Over 500 migrants crossed over in small boats each day in 2024, a 23% jump.

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Ford car inventory April 2025 is 568,000 vehicles, 8% higher than in 2024. Only Dodge has more vehicles in inventory.  Ford From America For America car discounts give the price discount given to employees to customers in April 2025. This will displace some of the German and South Korean cars that face a 25% import duty on Liberation Day April 2, 2025. German and South Korean cars are made in their home country or a third country about 60% for South Korean makers Hyundai/Kia and over 70% for German carmakers VW Audi, BMW, Benz.

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Wind and solar tax credits to phase out end of 2027 instead of 2032 under Senate version of US Tax Cuts Bill. This gives less time for renewable projects in solar and wind to get these tax credits and places them in a difficult situation. Senator Tillis of North Carolina who voted against the bill plans not to run again. The 3B Tax Cuts Bill is being considered in Congress this weekend to be placed on president's desk before July 4th weekend. The generous subsidies of the Biden administration are being questioned by the new Energy Secretary Chris Wright.

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About 86% of the total value of cash in circulation was affected by the withdrawal of 1000 and 500 rupee notes by the Modi government on Nov. 8, 2016. This is about 22 billion bills. The effect on the economy will take about a year to work its way through. The government has removed restrictions effect a March date for withdrawals from ATM machines previously limited to Rs 2500, as it says it has enough new bills printed in Rs 2000 denomination.

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Jack Ma of Alibaba is a very different person in 2023. This WSJ report looks at his activities in 2022 which included a stay in Hakone, Japan, visits within Japan, visit to Netherlands, Fiji. His current interest is in food production and meeting the agricultural needs in China over the next 20 years. Most of the time he is anonymous and people in the vicinity have no idea that this is Jack Ma.

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President Biden whose ancestors are Irish will visit Northern Ireland in an effort to hail the 25 year old deal that brought an uneasy peace between the two communities in Northern Ireland, the Catholics and the Protestants. The Catholics were discriminated against for centuries and wished to join Ireland, and the Protestants identified with Britain and wanted to remain part of Britain. Joining him will be the prime ministers of Britain and Ireland.

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The day and routine of a stocker at Kroger grocery supermarket. He has added 20 hours to a 40 hour workweek. He starts at 4 am, three hours earlier than the typical time. Paper products, bottled water, canned food are moving fast. Customers appear stressed, but some come in more than one per cart as a way to get out. He spends a third of the day stocking online orders.

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Johnson and Johnson vaccine is 66% effective in a single shot, a 44,000 trial study has shown. Remarkably it is 85% effective in serious illness and prevents all deaths 28 days after it is given. It is also shown to be as effective in serious illness and deaths in South Africa and 57% effective overall. The South African variant was a cause for concern in the second wave in 2021.

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The European Commission says that 70% of adults in the European Union have now been vaccinated with 2 doses, about 256 million people in 27 countries. In the US this figure is 63% for persons 18 and over, in UK 77% are fully vaccinated for 16 and over. There is a wide variation between countries in Europe- with Portugal at the high end and Bulgaria at the low end for vaccination.

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Sweden's elections show that the problems of crime, immigration, and healthcare affect the northern European countries. Sweden's Social Democrats are still the largest party. Sweden Democrats anti-immigration party gets about 20% of the vote,. The Moderate Party becomes the third largest party with its leader choosing to form a government of the centre right parties if these parties get a slight majority in the final results.

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A big change in the new Tax Law is the doubling of the Standard Tax deduction to $12,000 per person and $24,000 for a married couple filing jointly, if itemized deductions are not used. State and local income tax deduction is limited to $10,000. This will shift 20 million more people to not use itemized deductions. There will no longer be value in charitable deductions if one is using the standard deduction.

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British prime minister Theresa May calls a surprise general election for June 8, 2017, with the hope of winning a new mandate for Brexit negotiations larger than the slim 17 vote majority in the House of Commons. Experts say the disarray in the Labor Party improves chances of Ms. May winning a large parliamentary majority. A YouGov PLC poll shows Conservatives at 44% support, Labor at only 23% and Liberals at 12%.

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Germany's chancellor gives her support to French president Macron's call for agreement before the summer holidays on a 750 billion euro rescue package. Merkel told 27 leaders of EU countries Europe faces "very, very difficult times" and even said that she was not sure the gravity of the situation was truly understood. The value of the economies of some states could drop by 10% in 2020.

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BBC News on the Los Angeles protests as Immigration enforcement takes place against illegal immigrants in the US. ICE enforcement took place with arrests resulting in protests in Paramount a town 20 miles south of Los Angeles which is 82% Hispanic. Much of the protest activity took place in the city of Los Angeles itself near the Federal Building resulting in the president calling in the California National Guard.

 

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As U.S. money market funds have reduced lending to French banks, and lending maturities have shortened to seven days, French banks are facing a shortage of dollars. According to the Federal Reserve, foreign banks and their branches provide 25% of the commercial and industrial loans in the U.S. In its response to this BNP expects to reduce dollar denominated loans by $42 billion by the end of 2011 and another $40 billion in 2012, according to BNP officials. Societe Generale CEO, Frederic Oudea, says his bank will pull back on making loans to shipping, aircraft, real-estate and leveraged finance in the U.S. This will reduce credit growth in the U.S. economy.

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In a television debate Jan 18, 2017, Benoit Hamon, a 39 year old former Education minister is seen as the most effective of the French Socialist presidential candidates. He proposes a universal income that particularly supports and creates work for young people ages 18-25 years.

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This editorial in the NYT says it is time for both sides to take a deep breath and agree on extending the deadline of March 29, 2019 for Britain to leave the European Union. More time is needed to work out deep and contentious issues. 

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Share purchases on credit using margin financing doubles between July and December 2014 to $130 billion for the Shanghai and Shenzen stock exchanges. Retail investors open 370,000 accounts in Nov. 2014 alone. The Shanghai Stock Exchange share index went up by 25% in November 2014, and 50% since July 2014. The Securities Regulatory Commission made new restrictions on the use of riskier lower rated bonds as collateral for short term borrowing, and warned investors about rampant speculation. The sudden rise in the Shanghai index comes as investors shift away from investing in a cooling off property market, but creates its own set of risks especially with margin financing which could lead to quick downward spiral. A 5.4% drop in the Shanghai index on Dec. 9, 2014, leads to a 1-2% decline in global markets, at a time when oil prices decline added to uncertainty in the financial markets.

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Exports have increased in Portugal to 41% of GDP in 2013 from 28% in 2008. Shoe companies exported 1.7 billion euros, according to the Portuguese Footwear Association, and shoe exports are a bright spot in the trade balance. Portuguese companies have invested in the industry to improve quality and are able to command higher prices. Portugal now expects 1.2% growth in 2014, according to EU and IMF forecasts.