Items on this page are fromAug. 31 tthrough Sept. 5. Some links
may no longer be active.
Vice President Biden
declared that the $787 billion economic
stimulus program is playing a major role in lifting the nation's economy out of the worst financial downturn since the Great
Depression.
Offering an assessment of the program 200 days after its enactment, Biden said that the legislation has moved the country
from the edge of a financial abyss into what increasingly looks like an economic recovery.
"The Recovery Act has played a significant role in changing the trajectory of our economy and changing the conversation
about the economy in this country," Biden said in a speech at the Brookings Institution in the District. "Instead of talking
about the beginning of a depression, we are talking about the end of a recession."
The pace of U.S. job losses slowed in August as signs emerged that the recession is ending, while the
unemployment rate reached a 26-year high, underscoring threats to consumer spending gains in the recovery.
Employers cut 216,000
from payrolls, fewer than forecast, after a 276,000 drop in July that was larger than previously reported, Labor Department
data showed today in Washington. The jobless rate jumped to 9.7 percent from 9.4 percent.
KEEP CELEBRATION ON HOLD!
As the world's top finance officials gathered Friday in London, an assembly of top business leaders and
economists echoed the cautious but spreading optimism of politicians - while warning against prematurely celebrating the end
of the world's economic woes.
Among the concerns aired at the Ambrosetti Forum on the rainy shores of Italy's Lake Como:
_A winding down of government stimulus plans might not meet rebounding consumer demand, sparking a double-dip recession;
_Lasting consumer weakness in the West might not be made up by new demand from emerging markets;
_Political and corporate pressures to expand the money supply might fuel growth-squelching inflation;
_Complacency and relief might kill momentum for tougher financial regulation to prevent another collapse.
OECD upgrades global
economic outlook
A recovery in the world’s economy now looks likely to come earlier than had been expected just a few months
ago, although the return to normal conditions is likely to be slow and protracted, according to the Organisation for Economic
Co-operation and Development.
In its interim assessment of the economic outlook for this year, the OECD warned that there are considerable headwinds
that will weigh on recovery. “It is important not to get carried away,” said Jorgen Elsmskov, acting head
of the OECD’s economics department...
For most G7 nation economies, the OECD is now forecasting a smaller contraction than it had made in June, with aggregate
gross domestic product expected to decline by 3.7 per cent this year against a forecast of 4.1 per cent made just three months
ago.
Paul Krugman on HOW DID ECONOMISTS GET IT SO WRONG?...here’s
what I think economists have to do. First, they have to face up to the inconvenient reality that financial markets fall far
short of perfection, that they are subject to extraordinary delusions and the madness of crowds. Second, they have to admit
— and this will be very hard for the people who giggled and whispered over Keynes — that Keynesian economics remains
the best framework we have for making sense of recessions and depressions.
Third, they’ll have to do their best to incorporate the realities of finance into macroeconomics.
Many economists will find these changes deeply disturbing.
It will be a long time, if ever, before the new, more realistic approaches to finance and macroeconomics offer the same kind
of clarity, completeness and sheer beauty that characterizes the full neoclassical approach. To some economists that will
be a reason to cling to neoclassicism, despite its utter failure to make sense of the greatest economic crisis in three generations.
This seems, however, like a good time to recall the words of H. L. Mencken: “There is always an easy solution to every
human problem — neat, plausible and wrong.”
When it comes to the all-too-human problem of recessions and depressions, economists need to abandon
the neat but wrong solution of assuming that everyone is rational and markets work perfectly. The vision that emerges as the
profession rethinks its foundations may not be all that clear; it certainly won’t be neat; but we can hope that it will
have the virtue of being at least partly right
Merkel de Alemania: emisión dinero debe disminiuir tras
La canciller alemana Angela Merkel dijo el martes
que las condiciones de crédito deberían endurecerse una vez que la crisis económica global haya terminado.
Las denominadas "estrategias de salida" de las medidas que
los encargados de política han usado para mitigar el impacto de la crisis económica y financiera no deberían ser implementadas
hasta que la economía haya llegado al punto en que estaba antes de que la crisis empezara, agregó.
Pero dijo que una vez que tales estrategias de salida estén
implementadas, tendrían consecuencias extensivas para la política financiera global.
"El abastecimiento de dinero tendrá que ser reducido", dijo
Merkel a la radio Bayerische Rundfunk. "Eso tendrá efectos en la política de tasa de interés. De manera que las políticas
de tasas de interés cero o de 1 por ciento ya no serán posible".
Sí hay recursos para invertir; crisis no es financiera:
Slim
- El empresario Carlos Slim aseguró que no hay crisis financiera en México, sino solamente económica,
toda vez que sí hay recursos en el sector privado para invertir "en toda la infraestructura que requiere hoy todo el país".
En entrevista para Grupo Imagen, el magnate mexicano indicó que se debería
aprovechar la situación para utilizar el capital privado que no ha sido afectado por la crisis, en obras de infraestructura
y desarrollo, para generar empleos, amortiguar la caída económica y salir más rápido del trance económico.
Slim destacó que es realmente la iniciativa privada la que genera los empleos
y "le está dando de comer a la gente" y exhortó a la inversión privada y al gobierno a enfocarse en atender "las consecuencias
de la economía real, principalmente sociales, en el empleo".
Comentó que el gobierno y los inversionistas pueden hacer mucho por el empleo, ya que hay diversas áreas donde se
puede trabajar, y que para ello, la administración podría recurría a la inversión pública y privada ante la caída de los ingresos
fiscales.
Reiteró que la crisis es económica,
y que el sector financiero, la moneda, los mercados, las reservas, "están bien". No hay crisis financiera en México, reiteró.
Resalta SELA ejemplo del ALBA ante crisis financiera
El secretario permanente
del Sistema Económico Latinoamericano y del Caribe (SELA), José Rivera Banuet, destacó hoy aquí el ejemplo del ALBA como mecanismo
para enfrentar la crisis financiera internacional.
Una integración como la Alianza Bolivariana para los pueblos de Nuestra América (ALBA) es digna
de subrayarse, señaló el funcionario al inaugurar en esta capital un foro de consulta para buscar respuestas ante el flagelo
global.
Según Rivera Banuet, iniciativas como la moneda de compensación de pagos
Sucre ilustran en el contexto actual la importancia del bloque formado por Bolivia, Ecuador, Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua, Honduras,
Dominica, San Vicente y las Granadinas y Antigua y Barbuda.
Dicha propuesta puede tener un efecto relevante, estimó el experto, quien apostó por la integración regional para superar
la crisis.
Fed Officials More Confident Recession is Ending
With the economy on the mend, Federal Reserve policymakers last month felt comfortable slowing the pace of one of its
economic revival programs and not changing any others, according to documents released Wednesday.
Minutes of the central bank's closed door deliberations, held Aug. 11-12, also showed Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and his
colleagues striking a much more hopeful note about the economy's prospects compared with an assessment made in late June.
Many Fed officials saw "smaller downside risks," the documents stated.
Fed officials expected the pace of the recovery to "pick up" in 2010, but there was a range of views —
and considerable uncertainty — about the likely strength of the upturn because of concerns about how consumers will
behave.
After being pounded by the recession, consumer spending finally appeared to be leveling out, the housing market was firming
and manufacturing was stabilizing, the Fed said. Plus, the outlook for other countries' economies improved, auguring well
for the sale of U.S. exports.
The number of unemployed in the euro
zone now exceeds 15 million following a sharp decline in productivity
The jobless rate in the 16-nation eurozone rose to 9.5% last month, its
highest in a decade, as experts warned many more people would lose their jobs in
the months ahead.
The number of unemployed rose 167,000 in July to
just over 15 million people, the European Union's statistics office
said today. That rise was, however, a lot smaller than the half million a month
seen
around the turn of the year.
Although the jobless rate across the bloc rose only slightly, there were
significant differences in individual countries. Spanish joblessness, for
example, rose to 18.5% from 18.1% in June and 12.5% a year ago. Ireland, another
of the zone's worst-hit economies, saw the unemployment rate rise to 12.5% from
12.2%.
The Federal Reserve will be unable to
prevent the trillions of dollars in
government stimulus pumped into the U.S. economy from stoking inflation over the
next decade, a survey of business economists showed.
The price gauge tracked by the central bank will rise 3 percent a year on
average from 2014 through 2018, according to the median estimate in a poll taken
by the National Association for Business
Economics. The rate exceeds the 2 percent pace that the respondents said was
the Fed’s unofficial target.
The report is in line with surveys of consumers and indicates the central
bank may have to work harder to damp inflation expectations after pouring more
than $1 trillion into credit markets in a strategy known as quantitative easing.
Economists in the survey also said the Obama administration’s $787 billion
stimulus program would push consumer prices higher.
“An excessively stimulative fiscal policy and a complicated exit from its
quantitative easing policies over the medium term will result in the Fed
tolerating a higher level of inflation than it desires,” according to a
statement issued by the Washington-based group today.
Economía de EE.UU va bien; el dólar es el que flaquea
La economía de Estados Unidos muestra señales de recuperación de la crisis financiera, pero el futuro
de su moneda está menos claro.
El miércoles, por primera vez
en 16 años, el dólar se volvió oficialmente una opción más barata que el yen, una de las monedas con el rendimiento más bajo.
“By
a continuing process of inflation, governments can confiscate, secretly and unobserved, an important part of the wealth of
their citizens.... The process engages all the hidden forces of economic law on the side of destruction, and does it in a
manner which not one man in a million is able to diagnose.”..John Maynard Keynes
NEVADA...12.5% LAS VEGAS...13.1% CALIFORNIA...11.9%
OREGON...11.9% NEW YOR
STATE...8.6% NEW YORK CITY...9.6%
Unemployment Rates Rose
in 26 U.S. States, Dropped in 17 in July
"No pretendamos que las cosas cambien,
si siempre hacemos lo mismo. Lacrisis es la mejor
bendiciónque puede sucederle a personas y países, porquela crísis trae progresos.La
creatividad nace de la angustia, como el día nace de la noche oscura. Es en la crisis quenace la inventiva, los descubrimientos y las grandes estrategias.Quien supera la crisis, se supera a sí mismosin quedar
"superado".
Quien atribuye a la crisis sus fracasos y penurias, violenta
su propio talento y respeta amás a los problemas que a las soluciones.La verdadera crisis, es la crisis de la incompetencia. El inconveniente de las personas y los países
la pereza para encontrar las salidas y soluciones.Sin
crisis no hay desafíos, sin desafíosla vida
es una rutina, una lenta agonía. Sin crisis no hay méritos. Es en la crisis donde aflora lo mejor de cada uno, porque
sin crisis todo viento es caricia. Hablar de crisis es promoverla, y callar en la crisis es exaltar el conformismo. En vez
de esto,trabajemos duro.
Acabemos una vez conla única crisisamenazadora, quees la tragedia de no querer luchar por superarla...
En los momentos de crisis, sólo la imaginación es más importante que el conocimiento".
Albert Einstein
EINSTEIN ON "CRISIS"
"Let's not
pretend that things will change if we keep doing the same things. A crisis can be a real blessing to any person, to any nation.
For all crises bring progress.
Creativity is born from anguish, just like the day is born form the dark night. It's
in crisis that inventive is born, as well as discoveries, and big strategies. Who overcomes crisis, overcomes himself, without
getting overcome.
Who blames
his failure to a crisis neglects his own talent, and is more respectful to problems than to solutions. Incompetence is the
true crisis.
The greatest inconvenience of people and nations is the laziness with which they attempt to find the solutions
to their problems. There's no challenge without a crisis. Without challenges, life becomes a routine, a slow agony. There’s
no merit without crisis. It's in the crisis where we can show the very best in us. Without a crisis, any wind becomes a tender
touch. To speak about a crisis is to promote it. Not to speak about it is to exalt conformism. Let us work hard instead.
Let
us stop, once and for all, the menacing crisis that represents the tragedy of not being willing to overcome it...
In
times of crisis, only imagination is more important than knowledge."
Albert Einstein
Why the deficit will raise taxes
The nation's debt must be brought to heel, and doing so will require tough
choices beyond spending cuts, experts say.
By Jeanne Sahadi, CNNMoney.com
senior writer
A $9 trillion federal deficit over 10 years may be too hard to comprehend. But this part is easy: Such unwieldy amounts
of debt could have an impact on Americans' bottom line one way or the other -- if not tomorrow, then the day after.
The U.S. government has been spending
a great deal more than it has been taking in, and it is on track to do so well beyond the next 10 years. It has been borrowing
money to make all that spending possible and it has to pay the money back with interest. How, you ask? By borrowing more.
The solution is straightforward if unpleasant:
Shy of finding a fairy willing to leave trillions under Uncle Sam's pillow, lawmakers will have to raise taxes and cut spending.
The more the country lives on a credit
card, the more it makes itself beholden to the demands of its creditors -- many of which are overseas. The danger is thatbuyers
of U.S. debt could become concerned that the country is running too high a balance. If so, they will demand higher interest
rates -- thereby making the country's debt problem worse -- or they'll put their money elsewhere.
At that point, things would get ugly.
"Taxes would rise to levels that would make a Scandinavian
revolt. And the government would not be able to provide anything but the most basic public services. We would no longer be
a great power (or even a mediocre one), and the social safety net would evaporate," tax policy expert and Syracuse University
professor Len Burman wrote in a recent op-ed cheerfully titled "Catastrophic Budget Failure.
CNNMoney.com's bailout tracker
The government is engaged in a far-reaching - and expensive - effort to rescue the economy. Here's
how you can keep tabs on the bailouts.
In addition
to updating their deficit estimates, the White House and CBO updated their economic forecasts.
Unemployment
Real GDP
2009
CBO
9.3%
-2.5%
OMB
9.3%
-2.8%
2010
CBO
10.2%
1.7%
OMB
9.8%
2.0%
2011
CBO
9.1%
3.5%
OMB
8.6%
3.8%
2012
CBO
6.4%
4.7%
OMB
7.7%
4.3%
Source:White House budget office, Congressional Budget Offic
FDIC's Fund Plunges 20%
Banking Industry Posts Loss
1,000 Banks May Fail In Next Two Years
With bank failures rising, the government's deposit insurance fund fell 20 percent to $10.4 billion
in the second quarter as U.S. banks lost $3.7 billion.
The
Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. said Thursday that surging levels of soured loans at banks dragged down profits in the April-June
period. The $3.7 billion loss compared with profits of $7.6 billion in the first quarter, and $4.7 billion a year ago.
The FDIC also
said the number of banks deemed to be in trouble jumped to 416 from 305 at the end of the first quarter. That's the highest
number since June 1994 during the savings and loan crisis.
Total assets of troubled institutions surged to $299.8 billion from
$220 billion in the first quarter
The US banking system will lose some 1,000 institutions over the next two years, said John Kanas,
whose private equity firm bought BankUnited of Florida in May.
“We’ve
already lost 81 this year,” he told CNBC. “The numbers are climbing every day. Many of these institutions nobody’s
ever heard of. They're smaller companies.”
Failed banks tend to be smaller and private, which exacerbates the problem
for small business borrowers...
“Government money has propped up the very large institutions as a result of the stimulus package,”
he said. “There’s really very little lifeline available for the small institutions that are suffering.”
This comes at
a time when the FDIC has established new rules on bank sales. Private equity, for instance, would have to hold double the
capital of their competitors in order to buy such an institution, said Kanas.
Newspapers' 2Q advertising sales
plummet 29 percent, reducing revenue by $2.8B from last year
Newspapers' financial woe worsened in the second quarter as advertising
sales shrank by 29 percent, leaving publishers with $2.8 billion less revenue than they had at the same time last year.
It's the deepest downturn yet during a three-year free fall in advertising
revenue -- newspapers' main source of income. The magnitude of the industry's advertising losses have intensified in each
of the last 12 quarters.
Which countries are most in danger from the global recession?
While the collapsing U.S. housing market may be at the root of the global economic recession,
the downturn's effects are being felt hardest overseas. Take Iceland, for instance. Its biggest banks failed, its economy
may shrink 10 percent this year, its government fell, its central banker was sacked, the country was bailed out with a $2.1
billion IMF loan, and 7,000 people (in a country of 300,000) took to the streets in protest...
U.S.News looked at some countries that are currently facing severe economic disruption
that endangers their standards of living, attractiveness to foreign investors, and political stability.
What countries will come out of
the global financial crisis on top?
United States The United States had a large trade deficit during the expansionary
period, allowing it to adjust relatively easily to declining global demand. However, as a result of international capital
inflows, it also had significant overinvestment in financial assets and real estate. The Obama administration responded relatively
aggressively to the crisis by taking action to clean up the financial sector and implementing a $787 billion fiscal stimulus
plan, but spending has been slow to materialize. The US economy is forecast to contract by 2.6% in 2009 and show only minimal
growth in 2010, as individuals and firms paying down their debts remain a drag on economic growth. But compared to the major
trade surplus countries, the United States' relatively fluid economy will likely to adjust to the new global environment more
smoothly and rapidly.
Japan Japan's
exposure to the current crisis has been exacerbated by its efforts to sustain trade surpluses, but its economy had already
been adjusting before the crisis began, with production increasingly moving overseas. Moreover, when the global decline in
demand hit, Japanese firms decreased production and rapidly leveled off at much lower output. In addition, the 30 August elections
are expected to displace the long-ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), bringing to power a government that is more interested
in protecting the interests of consumers rather than producers. This situation is reducing Japan's dependence on exports,
providing a more stable base for growth.
China The
global slowdown has hurt demand for Chinese goods and threatened the vitality of China's export-oriented economic growth.
While exports are unlikely to return to their previous levels in the near to medium term, Beijing's massive stimulus spending,
relaxed monetary policy, and export promotion will partially counter the collapse in demand. If China is to secure long-term
growth, however, efforts to rebalance the economy toward greater domestic consumption -- by putting more income in workers'
pockets-must be considered.
Germany The
export orientation of the German economy and tight integration with the wider European economy limits the government's ability
to stimulate domestic demand. Moreover, liabilities in the banking sector are worrying. While the government has fiscal room
to maneuver, focus on the upcoming election and fears about the cost of potential interventions in both the real and financial
sector have constrained Berlin. Most importantly, the government is averse to policies that would lead to a structural change
in the country's export orientation. While this could begin to erode after the 27 September elections, any shift in German
policy will be limited by concerns about government debt levels.
1) Japanese
data released on Thursday showed that exports fell yet again in July. They are down 39.5pc to the US, and 26.5pc to China.
Japan is the world’s second biggest economy. It lives on exports. It
is also a key part of the supply chain for the Chinese economy. How can this hard data be reconciled with the extreme V-shaped
recovery already priced in by the markets?
By
the way, Toyota is suspending a key production line at its Takaoka plant in central Japan. It is cutting global capacity by
1m vehicles.
2) The Baltic Dry Index
measuring freight rates for bulk goods and commodities has been falling almost continuously for eleven weeks, dropping from
4,290 to 2,778 on Thursday.
Is this just
a glut of ships or is this telling us what the Shanghai market is also telling us, that credit tightening by the Chinese government
is pulling the rug from underneath the latest commodity bubble?...
...EXCESS PLANT is
still at the highest level since the Great Depression (capacity use is 70pc in Europe, 68pc in the US, 65pc in Japan, and
as low as 50pc in some countries, according to the World Bank’s Justin Lin). Companies will have to cut jobs and investment.
Soaring “confidence”
indicators have decoupled from reality. The world economy is still prostrate. GDP has shrunk 4pc, 6pc, 8pc, even 12pc or more
in a large group of countries...
The level of economic activity is years away from full recovery.
Como enseña la historia, uno de los grandes peligros es
errar el diagnóstico y pensar que se está saliendo de la crisis cuando, a lo sumo, se está consiguiendo un leve respiro.
En 1936-37 la reserva federal estadounidense evaluó que la crisis
había pasado, apretó las clavijas de la política monetaria para evitar "una explosión incontrolable del crédito" y provocó
una abrupta contracción económica.
"El verdadero riesgo hoy
se encuentra en cómo se plantea la estrategia de salida de la crisis. El peligro es que por la preocupación que hay con la
deuda pública se estime que lo primordial es reducir a toda costa el gasto fiscal", indicó a BBC mundo el director del Instituto
de Estudios Laborales de la Organización Internacional del Trabajo (OIT) Raymond Torres.
Los economistas, que no anticiparon la crisis, intentan predecir cómo será esta recuperación y para visualizar
las distintas posibilidades usan letras del alfabeto: U, V, W y L son las favoritas.
Los ingresos dejados por las exportaciones
en América Latina caerán un 25% al final de 2009, advirtió este martes la Comisión Económica para América Latina y el Caribe
(CEPAL).
LA CEPAL calcula que los precios de los productos básicos que exporta América Latina bajarán en 29%.
Este será el peor resultado para los países de la región en los últimos 72 años, agregó
la CEPAL, el organismo técnico dependiente de las Naciones Unidas que tiene su sede en Santiago de Chile.
Los efectos de esta crisis en el comercio exterior latinoamericano son "de proporciones
superiores a los provocados por la Crisis Asiática (de 1998) y la crisis de la Deuda Externa (1982)", de acuerdo al informe.
Osvaldo Rosales, director de la división de Comercio Internacional
del organismo, dijo a BBC Mundo que en el primer semestre de 2009 el valor de las exportaciones ha enfrentado una contracción
inédita de 31%.
US durable
goods orders and new home sales both soared last month, the latest positive indications of the state of the world's largest
economy.
Orders for goods expected to last more than three years increased 4.9% in July, beating analyst expectations of a
3% gain, said the Commerce Department.
Durable goods orders were lifted by the popularity of the government's "cash for
clunkers" car scrappage scheme.
This helped US car orders rise 0.9%, recovering from June and May falls.
At the same time,
the annual rate of sales of new US homes rose 9.6% last month, also ahead of market targets.
This was the biggest rise in sales
of new houses since September last year.
June Data Indicate Bottoming Out, a Key Condition for Recession to End
New data
suggest the decline in world trade flows could be bottoming out, a key condition for the global economy to emerge from recession.
Trade volumes in June increased by
2.5% from May, the biggest increase in a single month since July 2008, according to figures published Wednesday by the Netherlands
Bureau for Economic Policy Analysis, an independent research institute. The survey is based on data from governments of 23
developed economies and 60 developing economies.
Despite the surge in June, overall trends in world trade remain dismal. Exports from trade powerhouses
Germany and Japan were down more than 30% Reigniting
trade is essential to getting economies rolling again, because domestic demand remains relatively weak, especially in the
U.S. and Europe.
The US federal
government faces exploding deficits and mounting debt over the next decade, White House and congressional budget officials
projected Tuesday in competing but similar economic forecasts.
U.S. politicians...believe
that as soon as the banks have sufficient dollars to grease the machinery of the productive apparatus, everything will march
toward an idyllic and never-dreamed of world.
Reflexiones de Fidel Castro al cumplir 83 años
Políticos
norteamericanos creen que tan pronto los bancos dispongan de suficientes dólares para engrasar la maquinaria del aparato
productivo, todo marchará hacia un idílico y jamás soñado mundo.
...the Bretton
Woods agreement emerged in 1944, giving the powerful country the privilege of printing hard currency at a time when the rest
of the world was bankrupt. The United States possessed more than 80% of the world’s gold. I do not need to recall
what came afterward, from the dropping of the atom bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki – the 64th anniversary of that act
of genocide has just passed – to the coup d’état in Honduras and the seven military bases that the government
of the United States proposes to install in Colombia. The real fact is that, in 1971, under the Nixon administration, the
gold standard was eliminated and the unlimited printing of dollars turned into the greatest fraud of humanity. In virtue of
the Bretton Woods privilege, by unilaterally suppressing convertibility, the United States is paying with paper for the goods
and services that it acquires in the world. It is true that, in exchange for dollars it also provides goods and services,
but it is also a fact that, since the elimination of the gold standard, that country’s dollar bill, quoted at $35 per
troy ounce, has lost almost 30 times its value and 48 times the value that it had in 1929. The rest of the countries of the
world have suffered those losses, their natural resources and money have financed rearmament and, to a large extent, underwritten
the empire’s wars. Suffice it to note that, according to conservative calculations, the quantity of bonds supplied to
other countries are in excess of $3 trillion, and the public debt, which continues growing, is in excess of $11 trillion. While
competing amongst themselves, the empire and its capitalist allies have made people believe that the anti-crisis measures
constitute formulas of redemption. But Europe, Russia, Japan, Korea, China and India are raising funds not by selling Treasury
bonds or printing money, but by applying other formulas to defend their currencies and their markets, sometimes with great
austerity for their populations. The overwhelming majority of the developing countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America are
the ones who are paying for the broken dishes, by supplying non-renewable natural resources, sweat and human lives. The
North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) is the clearest example of what can happen to a developing country in the jaws
of the wolf: in the most recent summit, Mexico was unable to obtain solutions for its immigrants in the United States, nor
permission to travel to Canada without a visa. However, under the crisis, full force is being acquired by the largest FTA
[Free Trade Agreement] on a world level: the World Trade Organization, which grew under the triumphant notes of neoliberalism
to the lofty heights of world finances and idyllic dreams...
En virtud del privilegio de Bretton
Woods, Estados Unidos, al suprimir unilateralmente la convertibilidad, paga con papeles los bienes y servicios que adquiere
en el mundo. Es cierto que a cambio de dólares también ofrece bienes y servicios, pero también lo es que desde la supresión
del patrón oro, el billete de ese país, que se cotizaba a 35 dólares la onza troy, ha perdido casi 30 veces su valor y 48
veces el que tenía en 1929. El resto del mundo ha sufrido las pérdidas, sus recursos naturales y su dinero han costeado el
rearme y sufragado en gran parte las guerras del imperio. Baste señalar que la cantidad de bonos suministrados a otros países,
según cálculos conservadores, supera la cifra de 3 millones de millones de dólares, y la deuda pública, que sigue creciendo,
sobrepasa la cifra de 11 millones de millones.
El imperio y sus aliados capitalistas,
a la vez que compiten entre sí, han hecho creer que las medidas anticrisis constituyen las fórmulas salvadoras. Pero Europa,
Rusia, Japón, Corea, China e India no recaudan fondos vendiendo bonos de la Tesorería ni imprimiendo billetes, sino aplicando
otras fórmulas para defender sus monedas y sus mercados, a veces con gran austeridad de su población. La inmensa mayoría de
los países en desarrollo de Asia, África y América Latina es la que paga los platos rotos, suministrando recursos naturales
no renovables, sudor y vidas.
El TLCAN es el más claro ejemplo
de lo que puede ocurrir con un país en desarrollo en las fauces del lobo: ni soluciones para los inmigrantes en Estados Unidos,
ni permiso para viajar sin visa a Canadá pudo obtener México en la última Cumbre.
Adquiere, sin embargo, plena vigencia
bajo la crisis el más grande TLC a nivel mundial: la Organización Mundial de Comercio, que creció bajo las notas triunfantes
del neoliberalismo, en pleno apogeo de las finanzas mundiales y los sueños idílicos.
1. The full impact of the world crisis has yet to hit the
popular classes – it began late in 2008 and only began to register increased unemployment in the first quarter of 2009. 2.
The current crisis, at first, did not hit the lower middle classes, public employees and skilled workers. It has been highly
segmented, thus weakening cross class solidarity and alliances present in earlier crises. 3. Unlike the previous period,
the crisis takes place in many countries, which are ruled by ‘center left’ regimes with an organized social base
backed by the social movements. These regime-movement linkages neutralize mass protests, out of fear of a return to the hard
right. 4. The mass movements on the left have responded to the crisis with relative passivity – in part because the
governments have intervened with economic stimulus measures and some social ameliorative policies. The continuation and deepening
of the crisis and the inadequate coverage of moderate public interventions could eventually lead to the resurgence of mass
struggles. 5. The increasing economic vulnerability of the incumbent center-left regimes and the relative passivity of
the progressive social movements has opened political space and opportunities for rightwing mass mobilizations, combining
electoral and street politics to build a base for a return to power. 6. The crisis will likely accelerate the lumpenization
process, as long-term unemployment sets in and if alternate movements fail to organize the chronically unemployed in consequential
struggles. 7. As the bourgeoisie and its political supporters find few legitimate sources for profiteering available,
they will likely serve as intermediaries and ‘protectors’ of the narco-traffickers and other criminal syndicates
and rely on them to eliminate left social movement leaders and activists. 8. The rise of the ‘lumpen-Right’
may lead to a virtual ‘dual power’ situation in which legitimate and illegitimate power configurations cooperate
in repressing social movements and compete for influence. 9. The relative passivity of the social movements is likely a
transitory phenomenon, influenced by the convergence of circumstances. If the crisis deepens and extends over time and rightist
regimes return to power, recent past historical experience strongly suggests that the massive increase in poverty and unemployment,
combined with repressive rightist regimes, could lead to mass rebellions on the part of the previously ‘passive’
popular classes.
DEPRESION 2010 - HAZ CLIC PARA NUEVA PRESENTACION
LA DEPRESION CULEBRA
China replacing U.S. as top trade partner in Latin
America
Whenever you find you
are on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect
--- Mark Twain
We have never observed
a great civilization with a population as old as the United States will have in the twenty-first century; we have never observed
a great civilization that is as secular as we are apparently going to become; and we have had only half a century of experience
with advanced welfare states...Charles Murray
Kella
This is a personal website containing personal information and some news and personal opinions on
certain issues affecting democratic governance of interest to me and my friends, associates and seminar participants. The
financial information, charts, etc., consist of items I find interesting. Draw your own conclusions from it.
Copyright Notice: In accordance with Title 17 U. S. C. Section 107,
any copyrighted work on this website is distributed under fair use without profit or payment to those who have expressed an
interest in receiving the included information for nonprofit research and educational purposes only. Ref.: http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html
![[090901+industrial+production.jpg]](http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_eB31NsfANe8/Sp1ePbYRCBI/AAAAAAAABAA/8Y_wZGrW64Y/s1600/090901%2Bindustrial%2Bproduction.jpg)
![[history lessons]](http://s.wsj.net/public/resources/images/NA-AZ916_OUTLOO_NS_20090823173250.gif)
![[capital]](http://s.wsj.net/public/resources/images/NA-AZ659_Capita_NS_20090812233109.gif)
