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There are about the same number of borrowers 3.6 million instead of 3.4 million yet over 10 years Parent Plus Loans have grown by 61% or $44 billion to a whopping $115 billion burdening parents and students. Yet no one mentions that it is the colleges that are causing much of this increase with their failure to control costs. The government is now stepping in and it is up to parents to do their homework on school value so that this overburdening with debt that colleges take for granted becomes a thing of the past. If colleges cannot control costs they should feel public dissatisfaction and be ruled out. Colleges and Universities act as if they are not in a market system economy where costs cannot be simply passed on, costs have to be managed or consumers of a service will turn down that product.

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The US government shutdown ends with Republicans + 8 Democrats in Senate voting to end shutdown on November 10, 2025. This keeps the filibuster voting rule which requires 60 votes to pass. Support of some Democrats was essential to make this happen. After bipartisan negotiations 7 Democratic Senators and Angus King Independent from Maine split with their party leaders Schumer and Jeffries of New York who called for a 1 year extension of Obama ACA healthcare subsidies which the Republicans opposed.  Democrats ensured the funding for SNAP benefits continues to Sept 2026 and the 4000 federal layoffs would be reversed and prevent future layoffs in the federal workforce. Democratic Senators voting with Republicans were Cortez Masto and Jacky Rosen of Nevada, Jeanne Shaheen and Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire. Tim Kaine of Virginia and Dick Durbin of Illinois joined the Senators from New Hampshire and Nevada. John Fetterman who has voted independently of the Democrat party to meet views of Pennsylvania constituents supported the move. This splits New Hampshire, Maine, Nevada, Illinois and Pennsylvania from the Schumer-Jeffries leadership from New York. Tim Kaine voted with Republicans by getting them to agree to reverse federal workforce layoffs, get back pay and stop layoffs. King, Hassan and Shaheen formed the core of Democrats who believed there was no chance Obama ACA subsidies would be extended for another year as long as shutdown continued whereas there was some chance after it ended. Both Senators from Nevada Rosen and Masto were following the needs of their constituents, and so was Fetterman of Pennsylvania. ...

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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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British MP raises issue of Arab Gulf countries providing 37% of China's oil imports, excluding Iraq 27%, vs 11% from Iran and 20% from Russia- 2024 US EIA. Tom Tugendhat says China has to balance its interests in the region after the closure of the Straits of Hormuz, between Iran, Gulf monarchies, and Russia. China also faces a more credible choice of accelerating the development of renewable energy in the same way that India and the European Union face. US will act as a supplier of last resort  adding Venezuelan and other supplies but temporarily as the entire Middle East region poses quandaries for China, the US, and India, European Union. The quandary stems from the irreconciliable differences between religious sects in the region, post 1950 ideological and religious militancy,  in which neither China, India, the US, Russia or the European Union wants to get drawn into after 5 decades of bitter experience in the Middle East.

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What is in the biggest climate bill in history, the Biden $369 billion Climate Bill, also called the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022? The WSJ looks at the bill that passed the US Senate and now heads for passage in the House of Representatives this weekend. 

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This Economist magazine editorial says the Republican plan for health care with its roll back of Medicaid expansion by limiting funding to states after 2020, and by scaling back subsidies especially for older Americans and not basing them on income levels, is likely to have its own problems just as the Affordable Care Act. One concern is that keeping healthy people in the market with a mandate that everyone have insurance is present but in a milder form with premiums going up by 30% in one year if they change their mind. There is concern that this may not work among insurers leading to an increase in premiums, pricing people out of the market in "a death spiral." This could lead to more people being priced out of the market as premiums rise. About 12 million people were added to Medicaid by increasing eligibility level to $16400, or 138% of poverty line- this reduced the uninsured from 16% in 2010 to 8.8% today. The Economist concludes that the Republican health care bill has its own problems, and that this bill does not clear up the problems in Obamacare by substituting Ryancare as the Republican bill is called. Peggy Noonan writing in the WSJ says this may have negative consequences for the new Republican base shift to populist support. Critics on the right like Rand Paul see even the reduced subsidies as an entitlement program, yet the Republicans can only change parts of the Affordable Care Act as they need 60 votes in the Senate where they only have a small majority.   ...

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This editorial in the WSJ describes the sharp increase in premiums under the Affordable Care Act of president Obama. The average premium increase is about 24.2% according to a Barclay's analysis, and as high as 43.9% in states such as Illinois. Bill Clinton calls it the craziest thing with small business affected, and some premiums doubling. Of the 17 million people in the individual market eight million buy without subsidies. One in five enrollees cannot qualify for subsidies. Democrats say subsidies are too small. Hillary Clinton has proposed to have a Medicare "buy-in" for people ages 55-65, and a "public option" government run plan. Republicans want to rewrite the law. But this depends on which party wins the Senate, with the election in Missouri giving Democrats an opportunity to maintain a Senate majority.

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The difficulties in making a merger of equals work. The 50-50 merger of ad agency groups Publicis of France and Omnicom of the U.S. The problems at EADS with co-CEO arrangement and Daimler-Chrysler with different cultures. The problem of cultures may be less acute than appears because each group has ad agencies with different cultures, and the nature of the ad business with clients from different regions of the world. The problem of tackling the digital revolution in the ad business is common to both companies and the industry, which caused the merger to take place. Finding the best solutions for the agencies to tackle digital should be the focus of management.

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Japan's prime minister, Shinzo Abe, is taking carefully planned steps during his second effort as prime minister. Abe is determined to avoid the mistakes of his first effort. This time Abe has focussed on the economy and getting Japan moving again. Nationalist policies are moderated and not allowed to affect trade and economic relations with China. Abe is focussing on winning the upper house elections and creating the stability that eluded other prime ministers.

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Mediators Pakistan, Turkey sought to separate Iranian nuclear issue to a second stage with a vague Iranian commitment to discuss the issue and future dragging of feet by Iran. The US DJT administration has made this the only issue that must be settled first before a settlement can be reached, and not by a repeat of the half hearted effort by the Obama administration that led to reconstituting Iran's nuclear effort a second time with US financial assistance. For a day on Saturday it appeared that mediators Pakistan and Turkey had accomplished for Iran just that, to the alarm of Republicans in general and in particular senior Senator Graham. Many sections of the media including the WSJ and the business community, see this as a repetition of the mistakes made by Obama and his administration. Not only did Obama not act to work with Republicans on a border policy- simply protecting himself from Republican attack by deportation policies. Obama continued the war in Afghanistan/Iraq for the same reason to protect his chances for reelection. He also used immigration policy to get the Hispanic vote in the closing months of the reelection year. Obama's other foreign policy failure was in believing Iran had been persuaded to give up nuclear weapons, and gave Iran the financial backing that could easily be shifted from economic to military uses and rebuild the nuclear program,  which he has handed to a future Republican adminstration. Obama also ignored how this would affect the economic wellbeing of the Iranian people with the kind of protests and suppression that has happened in 2026. Democrats and the media, some Republicans, are simply ignoring these errors and have never really faced up to the problems in the Middle East and asked the question why there are 5 decades of wars in the Middle East, and coups, strife, wars for the entire period since 1950. In this situation the US, China, India, EU, Brazil and other nations can learn from this experience and act to secure alternative sources of energy, speed up renewable energy transition, and rapidly end all dependence/intervention on a perpetually strife ridden Middle East, which much of the US and international media in a baffling way ignores or does not say outright. ...

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Pharmaceutical companies in the US will be required to provide rebates to buyers if they increase prices above the inflation rate. This is one of the provisions in the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 also called the Climate and Tax bill. Medicare recipients total out of pocket costs for drugs will be capped at $2000 under the Biden bill.

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The day by day account of events in Europe tht led the ECB to act and a similiar account of events in the USA that led the Federal Reserve to act. How the key players in the US, the individuals directly invoved at the Fed and on Wall Street discussed the developing crisis, monitored it and finally agreed on steps. A key event in the crisis in the USA is the sudden drying up in demand for commercial paper which could lead to a cycle of continuing credit contraction. See the related article by Brian Wesbury in todays WSJ, who sees the Bernanke Fed's actions in a macro perspective as being just the right steps for now. See

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The state of India's fight against Tuberculosis is shown here by AID's Atul Gawande in NYT. He visits a homeless shelter in New Delhi and asks what can be done to prevent the number one infectious disease in India and globally. The disease affects 1 in 38000 in the US and 1 in 500 in India a huge contrast as poverty and poor health conditions increase spread of TB. It grows with depleted immune systems and poor food intake. This alone shows how important it was and continues to be that prime minister Modi put forward no cost (free) allocation of foodgrains, lentils and vegetables during the pandemic to hundreds of millions of needy households. This and Clean India campaign Swacch Bharat + Har Ghar Jal Clean Water Every Household  play a critical role in providing the basic environment for health in India at the ground level for nutrition+ clean water, and sanitation. India has allocated $1.7 billion for TB prevention and treatment. 4-5 TB vaccines are in test stages.  Nearly 90 percent of estimated TB cases are now being diagnosed with treatment success rates high, says Gawande. Prevention is also at a similar level.   ...

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The Classic Learning Test is an alternative to use of ACT and SAT. It includes Christian thought and classic writings from English and American literature and culture. It tests reading comprehension in different ways than the ACT and SAT to make certain key concepts in an essay are correctly understood. Today two thirds of American 4th grade children do not pass the ACT reading comprehension test making a campaign for reading comprehension practice essential.