18/05/2022
SYDNEY and KUALA LUMPUR, May 17 2022 (IPS)* – Central bank policies have often worsened economic crises instead of resolving them. By raising interest rates in response to inflation, they often exacerbate, rather than mitigate business cycles and inflation.
Neither gods nor maestros
US Federal Reserve Bank chair Jerome Powell has admitted: “Whether we can execute a soft landing or not, it may actually depend on factors that we don’t control.” He conceded, “What we can control is demand, we can’t really affect supply with our policies. And supply is a big part of the story here”.
Anis Chowdhury
Hence, decisionmakers must consider more appropriate policy tools. Rejecting ‘one size fits all’ formulas, including simply raising interest rates, anti-inflationary measures should be designed as appropriate. Instead of squelching demand by raising interest rates, supply could be enhanced.
Thus, Milton Friedman – whom many central bankers still worship – blamed the 1930s’ Great Depression on the US Fed. Instead of providing liquidity support to businesses struggling with short-term cash-flow problems, it squeezed credit, crushing economic activity.
read more »
Posted in Africa, Asia, Latin America & Caribbean, Market Lords, Middle East, Others-USA-Europe-etc., The Peoples |
Leave a Comment »
05/02/2022
The Inter Press Service co-founder is part of a vanishing breed
.
Dr. Roberto Savio is somewhat unique as an eyewitness to history and builder of institutions, a man who turns his visions into reality | Image from Wall Street International.
5 February 2022 (Wall Street International)* — We are sitting in the heart of Rome, Via Panisperna, where Dr. Roberto Savio has had his office for the last 58 years. His energy and activity, both mental and physical, belies his age.
At 87, he walks the 7 kilometres from his house to his office building and climbs two flights of stairs to reach his office.
read more »
Posted in Africa, Asia, Climate Crisis, Latin America & Caribbean, Market Lords, Middle East, Migrants and Refugees, Mother Earth, Others-USA-Europe-etc., The Peoples, War Lords |
Leave a Comment »
01/02/2024
Siddarth Kara’s book exposes the exploitation behind the Fourth Industrial Revolution.
Photo Courtesy of Siddharth Kara
“Unspeakable riches have brought the people of the Congo little other than unspeakable pain.” So writes Siddharth Kara in Cobalt Red, How the Blood of the Congo Powers Our Lives. It’s one of the many poetic phrases that make this book easy on the ear but hard on the heart and mind.
There’s pleasure in turning the pages of such finely crafted prose, pain in knowing that, if you have half a heart, you’ll never be able to see your smartphone, laptop, tablet, solar power system, or electric car quite the same way again, that you’ll see blood all over the supply chain that put them in your hand, on your roof, or in your driveway.
read more »
Posted in Africa, Asia, Latin America & Caribbean, Market Lords, Middle East, Others-USA-Europe-etc., The Peoples, War Lords |
Leave a Comment »
06/12/2023
Industry influx escalates call to protect talks from Big Polluters
.
LONDON 5th December 2023: At least 2456 fossil fuel lobbyists have been granted access to the COP28 summit in Dubai, signalling an unprecedented presence at crucial climate talks from representatives of some of the world’s biggest polluters, according to a new analysis from the Kick Big Polluters Out (KBPO) coalition.
read more »
Posted in Africa, Asia, Climate carnage, Latin America & Caribbean, Market Lords, Middle East, Migrants and Refugees, Mother Earth, Others-USA-Europe-etc., The Peoples |
Leave a Comment »
22/05/2023
ROME, May 22 2023 (IPS)* – Two shocking findings have just been revealed: the G7 countries owe low- and middle-income countries a huge 13.3 trillion USD in unpaid aid and funding for climate action, at a time when one billion people now face cholera risk, precisely because of the staggering reduction and even non-payment of committed assistance.
This money could otherwise be spent on healthcare, education, gender equality and social protection, as well as addressing the impacts of climate change, says Oxfam. Credit: Jeffrey Moyo/IPS
Such an inhuman reality also reveals that the G7 (Group of the seven wealthiest countries), who represent just 10% of the world’s population, continue to demand the Global South to pay 232 million USD –a day– in debt repayments through 2028, on 17 May 2023 revealed a new analysis from Oxfam ahead of the G7 Summit in Hiroshima, Japan (May 19- 21, 2023).
read more »
Posted in Africa, Asia, Climate carnage, Latin America & Caribbean, Market Lords, Middle East, Migrants and Refugees, Mother Earth, Others-USA-Europe-etc., The Peoples, War Lords |
1 Comment »
25/01/2023
May Others Learn to Avoid That Fate
Jan Oberg
The first Cold War played out between the East and the Western Occident and the East lost with the demise of the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact.
Both built – more or less faithfully – on Western mechanical thinking, one on Marx and other socialist/communist philosophers, the other on twisting moral philosopher Adam Smith into a God’s hand individualist utility market prophet and pair him with various types of liberal, parliamentary democracy thinking.
The Soviet and East European system had come to the end of its history, but what about the twin Occidental brother, the US-EU system? The latter had not only survived or ”won,” it had also forced the Soviet Union to spend an unsustainable proportion of its resources on the military.
And now the Second West is destined to follow suit.
read more »
Posted in Africa, Asia, Latin America & Caribbean, Market Lords, Middle East, Migrants and Refugees, Mother Earth, Others-USA-Europe-etc., The Peoples, War Lords |
1 Comment »
24/10/2022
SYDNEY and KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 18 2022 (IPS)* – Preoccupied with enhancing their own ‘credibility’ and reputations, central banks (CBs) are again driving the world economy into recession, financial turmoil and debt crises.
Anis Chowdhury
Wall Street ‘cred’
Most CB governors believe ‘credibility’ is desirable and must be achieved by fighting inflation at any cost. To justify their own more harmful policies, they warn inflation is ‘damaging’.
They argue CBs need ‘independence’ from governments to pursue ‘credible’ monetary policy. Inflation targeting to ‘anchor’ inflation expectations is supposed to generate desired ‘confidence’. But CBs have been responsible for many costly failures.
The US Fed deepened the 1930s’ Great Depression, the 1970s’ stagflation and the early 1980s’ contraction, besides contributing to the 2008-09 global financial crisis (GFC). Hence, CB notions of ‘credibility’ and ‘independence’ need to be reconsidered.
read more »
Posted in Africa, Asia, Latin America & Caribbean, Market Lords, Middle East, Mother Earth, Others-USA-Europe-etc., The Peoples |
Leave a Comment »
14/07/2022
Jan Oberg
Let’s look at NATO’s reaction to Russia’s ill-considered and international law-violating military action in Ukraine.
From a conflict-analytical point of view, it is reasonable to say that Russia is responsible for the war but that NATO with it reckless expansion against all promises given to Russia and a series of expert warnings is responsible for the underlying conflict.
It can safely be concluded that the Western/NATO response has moved beyond the proportionality principle, beyond rationality and a realistic image of the world and its own role in it:
NATO leaders express limitless hatred of everything Russia; historically hard and time-unlimited economic sanctions have been imposed – using the illegal method of collective punishment; weapons for an estimated US$ 60-100 billion will be pumped into Ukraine to defeat Russia there.
NATO has added US$ 350 billion in military expenditures since the US-instigated regime change in Kiev in 2014 and, since then, prepared Ukraine for a role in NATO. The 2% goals is now a floor, not a ceiling.
read more »
Posted in Africa, Asia, Latin America & Caribbean, Market Lords, Middle East, Migrants and Refugees, Mother Earth, Others-USA-Europe-etc., The Peoples, War Lords |
Leave a Comment »
10/05/2021
8 May 2021 (Wall Street International)* — This paper is not going to be academic or conceptual, but a long article. I thought that my best contribution would be to give a testimony I have lived through of the triple process of decolonisation, the Non-Aligned Movement and the Group of 77, in which I actively participated.
I believe that I am one of the few survivors left from the Bandung Conference (1955) and that communicating my experience of the process of the creation and development of the Third World, its vision and values, may be the most useful thing I can do.
read more »
Posted in Africa, Asia, Latin America & Caribbean, Market Lords, Middle East, Migrants and Refugees, Mother Earth, Others-USA-Europe-etc., The Peoples, War Lords |
Leave a Comment »
09/01/2021
People, planet and prosperity
9 January 2021 (Wall Street International)* — Italy has been given, for 2021, the Chairmanship of the Group of 20, which gather the 20 most important countries of the world. They represent, on paper, 60% of the world population, and 80% of the World’s Gross Domestic Product.
While the shaky Italian government will somehow absorb this task (in the general indifference of the political system), fact remains that this apparently prestigious position is in fact very deceiving: the G20 is now a very weak institution, that does not bring anything to the rotating chairman.
read more »
Posted in Africa, Asia, Climate Crisis, Latin America & Caribbean, Market Lords, Middle East, Migrants and Refugees, Mother Earth, Others-USA-Europe-etc., The Peoples, War Lords |
Leave a Comment »
HUMAN WRONGS WATCH 