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Average wage gains for rural areas about 5% between 2001 and 2003, and a loss of 2.5% in wages for the poorest 10% of the people in China are shown in information from the World Bank. This will be of concern to Chinese government as it moves forward with current policy.

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U.S. presidential candidate Mitt Romney is questioned about the depth of his beliefs by John Harwood, at the November 9, 2011, Oakland University, Michigan, televised presidential debate. Harwood asked Romney if his positions on issues "are rooted in something deeper than the fact that you are running for office." Romeny's response was that he had been married for 42 years, and "been in the same church all my life," and worked at the same firm Bain & Co. and Bain Capital, for 25 years, that he was a man of steadiness and constancy." On key economic issues such as revival of the auto industry and foreclosures, both major issues in Michigan, Romney continued to maintain that the loans made by the government to Chrysler and GM were a mistake. Oakland University is only half a mile from Chrysler headquarters. This view was challenged by Rick Snyder, Republican governor of the state of Michigan, who said- "it wasn't just one or two companies that were at risk, but the entire national suply chain." On foreclosures Romney maintained his position that the government should let the market work, even if this means millions of foreclosures. Romney said: "Markets work. When you have government play its heavy hand, markets blow up and people get hurt," putting the blame for the housing crisis on Fannie Me and Freddie Mac, agencies with a government guarantee that encouraged indiscriminate housing loans. ...

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A WSJ interview with Jose Socrates, the prime minister of Portugal. Socrates says he supports more European integration in economic matters. The context for this is the meeting of 26 leaders of European nations in Brussels on February 4, 2011. Germany is pushing for major changes in the way the European Union works so that economic integration is coupled with the political integration process. This is now thought to be the only way to make the EU work, and both Germany and France are pushing for this. This is also the price of German financial support to countries like Ireland, Greece, Portugal and Spain. In an earlier interview with WSJ, Spain's finance minister, Elena Salgado, offered her support to the German plan. Aspects of the economic coordination Socrates supports are pushing up the standard retirement age to 65, which Portugal has done. He is less supportive of de-linking wages to inflation. There he pointed to the 5% public sector pay cut to go into effect this year. Socrates says the challenge for Portugal is "not to be more competitive with lower salaries." He also provided statistics that show that " this is a modern country." Statistics on electronic government tenders, the ratio of computers to children, the percentage of energy from renewable sources. And said people are talking who have preconceived ideas and don't know anything about Portugal. ...

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German chancellor Anglea Merkel selected her chief economic advisor, Jens Weidmann to head the Bundesbank, the German central bank. Weidmann replaces Axel Weber. Merkel prefers the quieter demeanor of Weidmann to the outspoken behaviour of Weber. Weber was Weidmann's tutor at the university, and at 42 is the youngest Bundesbank president. He headed the monetary analysis department at the Bundesbank and did a stint at the IMF, before joining Merkel's circle of close advisors. Weidman has a sense for markets and politics, and a close understanding of Merkel's policies. This would help Merkel as Germany sets the eurozone on a new path of reforms to build a firm foundation for the euro.

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Views of East Germans in the city of Erfurt on the eve of the 20th anniversary of Germany's reunification. Disparities remain after over a trillion dollars were invested to improve conditions in East Germany, yet the positive changes are visible. In this city of Erfurt the burning of lowgrade coal for heating homes made the air less breathable. It could take years just to buy a car. Still Germans in the east are disappointed, as their expectations were high during reunification. Wages in the east are 80% of wages in the west and unemployment is 12%, and the average wealth of east Germans is 40% lower than west Germans. Young people have immigrated to the west, leaving older people and retirees. Because of this the term reunification is less used than the term "die Wende"- meaning the turn or the change. A sense of the loss of the old values forged in a socialist state is still felt deeply by some east Germans and the change has been largely positive but wrenching in terms of a loss of identity, a sense of being treated as immigrants in their own country....

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Wal-Mart has removed same store sales as a metric on which managers and executives are measured for performance based compensation. As a result CEO Duke sees his compensation increase in the last fiscal year from what it would be under the previous arrangement. Same store sales have declined for seven consecutive quarters at Wal-Mart. The new metric used instead of same store sales is total sales, which increased 3.4% in the last fiscal year. Duke's compensation was $18.7 million, of which $16 million was performance based, for the last fiscal year. Morgenson asks if Wal-Mart executives are being opportunistic when it comes to setting the metrics for performance based compensation.

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Morgenson looks at the aspects of GM's culture that led to the recall crisis of 2014. She looks at the lack of accountability in a culture where managers were more concerned about preserving and protecting their own positions and less concerned about doing the right thing. The culture became ingrained over time to the point that there were terms referring to the way managing is to be conducted in the company- a "GM nod" referring to an action plan where everybody says OK but plans to do nothing, a "GM salute" where people crossed their arms and pointed to others meaning the responsibility is some one else's. Training about writing on safety issues required employees to write "smart" by not using words such as "problem" or "defect" and using instead "issue," condition or "matter."

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Improving relations between Turkey and Iran after the election of Rouhani as president of Iran. Efforts by both sides leading Sunnis and Shiites to head off an increase in sectarianism in the Middle East, especially in Syria and Iraq. Both countries agree on the importance of democratically elected governments in the Middle East and reducing conflict.

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Krugman puts it best when he says in the NYT that he's got a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach. Its just that the Republican challenge of not a single vote in the House for the $789 billion Stimulus bill just makes it harder to go back for more money which most definitely will be needed. The Congressional Budget Office predicts that over the next 3 years there will be a $2.9 trillion gap between what the economy could produce and will actually produce. $789 billion won't be enough, and more so because the weightage shifted in the direction of tax cuts from the original version. And considering the accelerating nature of the crisis on the housing front and in layoffs and consumption, the absence of a clear action plan with specifics to deal with the bad debt in the banking system, is what gives this sick feeling in the stomach. Because as is stated on these same pages by experts from Japan on February 12, NYT, see the link, Japan went through this same soul searching, public anger, controversy, and political leaders were afraid to take strong action for years from the mid 1990's till 2003 after Koizumi's election. Each action or set of actions each year during that period before 2003 was behind the curve, and did not match what was needed. For the USA this has happened already for 2007, 2008 and is heading in that direction for 2009, with a lack of consensus for the strong action needed. Would 4 million new jobs be generated by the current stimulus if that is a measure of success, as Obama indicated at his first press conference? With less going into spending for education, infrastructure, energy and other green projects, in favor of tax cuts and the AMT, and the feeling that going to Congress for more money will be harder and a partisan affair, will this become difficult to achieve? ...

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This report in the NYT says Hillary Clinton has studied policy briefings, academic papers and taken advice from 200 policy experts, including experts from Bill Clinton's administration such as Alan Blinder, all in an effort to define her own policy positions on issues facing the U.S. This happens at a time different from the period of slow growth when Bill Clinton ran against George H.W. Bush. Since then middle class families face the added problems of not being able to keep up with the rising cost of college education, health care, child care, low interest rates on savings and volatile markets dampening savings growth. For working class Americans in the middle class during Bill Clinton's time in office the problems take the shape of a sharp decline in the manufacturing wages that once supported a middle class life in industrial states of the midwestern U.S., with global competition doing the damage, and few solutions available except improving technology and technical skill of the workforce to compete in higher end products. Consider the points made by Janet Yellen, the Fed chairwoman at a Boston Fed conference in Oct. 2014- Fed information for 2013 showing the average net worth of the lower half of American families representing 62 million households is $11,000. Only this conceals the situation facing one fourth of these families who have zero wealth or negative net worth, and a significant fraction owing more on their homes than they are worth. Hillary Clinton told a audience at the New School in Greenwich Village in New York, this is the defining economic challenge of our time. " We must raise incomes for hard-working Americans so they can afford a middle class life. This will be my mission from the first day I'm president to the last."...

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Alan Mulally talks to Charlie Rose about cost competitiveness, negotiations with the UAW, creating jobs, and the repayment of $20 billion of the $23.5 billion borrowed in 2006. Mullaly points out that 70% of R&D is connected with design and manufacturing- all the technology that goes into designing and building and the associated R&D.

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Aizenman in this must-read describes the National Soda Summit and the presentation of one man Todd Putnam, a former executive from Coca-Cola that throws light on one of the truly important things that happened in the lives of Americans in the postwar period of development and growing prosperity. This is the development of marketing and advertising and its singular application in the case of Coca Cola to promoting sugary drinks. It is also related to what even business people describe as the single biggest problem in America. And it is happening at a time when the story is being repeated in developing countries such as China and India. Putnam describes the exhilaration, he and other Coca-Cola managers felt when the graphs at internal presentations showed Coke passing milk in consumption per capita in America. Several other facts stand out in Putnam's description of his experience- the ignorance on health issues among his marketing peers, the huge marketing prowess and dollars brought to bear once a goal such as increasing per capita consumption of sugary drinks was set- he was hired out of Purdue by P&G and worked at Disney before joining Coca-Cola- and the focus on the 12-24 demographic with 90% of all soft drink marketing targeted at this segment. What he regrets most is the focus on minorities who suffer some of the highest levels of obesity in America. No mention is made of the efforts underway in developing coutnries such as China and India which are seeing a surge in obesity rates and diseases such as diabetes. Coca-Cola says 41% of its sugary drinks are low calorie, but compared to milk, fruit juice and other healthier alternatives where does this rank? The cost to the nation's health care system alone would show that the performance of Coca-Cola's stock price over the postwar period came with a price tag that was never even thought about, when healthier alternatives as health drinks companies have found sell well when well marketed and formulated for different groups....

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A new CBS-New York Times opinion poll in June 2012 shows 44% of those polled approve the job the Supreme Court is performing and about three fourths say the decisions of justices of the court are influenced by their political and personal views. By comparison only 15% approve of the job done by the U.S. Congress in the most recent poll. Only one in eight say the justices make decisions based solely on legal analysis. About 60% say they agree that life tenure for justices is bad because it gives too much power to justices. On the health care law two thirds of those polled say they hope some or all of the 2010 Obama health care law is overturned.