Economy | Le·gal In·sur·rec·tion - Part 33
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Posted by Mary Chastain on January 17, 2017 11 Comments
Three more American companies have announced plans to add and keep jobs in America on the heels of President-elect Donald Trump's inauguration on Friday. Walmart wants to add 10,000 jobs in 2017 across the country while General Motors (GM) will invest $1 billion into several factories to help more than 1,000 jobs. With Walmart, the company will add these new jobs by building new stores, expansion, and adding more e-commerce services. The construction of the new stores will add 24,000 construction jobs:
"Walmart is investing to better serve customers,” said Dan Bartlett, Walmart executive vice president for corporate affairs. “With a presence in thousands of communities and a vast supplier network, we know we play an important role in supporting and creating American jobs. Our 2017 plans to grow our business – and our support for innovation in the textile industry – will have a meaningful impact across the country.”

Posted by Fuzzy Slippers on January 08, 2017 60 Comments
Following the news that Ford had cancelled its planned $1.6 billion auto assembly plant in Mexico, Mexican officials are concerned about the impact this will have on their economy. The Wall Street Journal reports:
Ford Motor Co.’s decision to cancel a planned $1.6 billion assembly plant in the Mexican industrial city of San Luis Potosí caught the nation’s elected officials off guard and represents a major blow to one of the main engines of Mexico’s economy.

Posted by Mary Chastain on January 03, 2017 13 Comments
Ford has announced the company will cancel the $1.6 million plant it planned to build in Mexico. Instead, the company will invest $700 million in Michigan:
Ford (F) CEO Mark Fields said the investment is a "vote of confidence" in the pro-business environment president-elect Donald Trump is creating. However, he stressed Ford did not do any sort of special deal with Trump. "We didn't cut a deal with Trump. We did it for our business," Fields told CNN's Poppy Harlow in an exclusive interview Tuesday.

Posted by Fuzzy Slippers on October 15, 2016 8 Comments
The economic crisis in Venezuela canaptly be described as a centralized control crisis, a crisis socialist and communist states know and for some reason insist on repeating.  Over and over.  We've seen the reports on shortages ranging from toilet paper to food, and rather than risk a revolution that would topple government, the Venezuelan government has decided that it will ease up on price controls on food and other essentials (like toilet paper). NPR, in October of last year, wrote about the problems with Venezuela's price controls and the firm grip the government had its citizens access to food.
For Caracas housewife Anny Valero, today is grocery day — whether she likes it or not. Here's why: It's Monday, and if Valero doesn't go now, she'll have to wait four more days to buy food. In Venezuela, government supermarkets sell price-controlled food, making them far cheaper than private stores. But Valero explains that people are allowed in state-run supermarkets just two days per week, based on their ID card numbers. The system is designed to prevent shoppers from buying more than they need and then reselling goods on the black market at a huge markup.

Posted by Mike LaChance on October 04, 2016 11 Comments
It looks like putting the left wing Syriza Party in control of Greece hasn't changed much. The country is still broke, still struggling to make cuts and there is still unrest. In fact, recent pension cuts nearly led to rioting. The Telegraph UK reports:
Greek police pepper spray protesting pensioners Greek police on Monday fired pepper spray at pensioners protesting against cuts in their state income. Thousands of pensioners responded to a protest call by the communist opposition and tensions increased as their protest march approached the prime minister's residence.

Posted by Leslie Eastman on September 04, 2016 10 Comments
There is another disturbing report related to the spread of the Zika virus; however, this one doesn't involve birth defects or neurological problems. Millions of honey bees were killed after areas of South Carolina were sprayed to kill the mosquitoes that transmit the pathogen.
"On Saturday, it was total energy, millions of bees foraging, pollinating, making honey for winter," beekeeper Juanita Stanley said. "Today, it stinks of death. Maggots and other insects are feeding on the honey and the baby bees who are still in the hives. It's heartbreaking." Stanley, co-owner of Flowertown Bee Farm and Supply in Summerville, South Carolina, said she lost 46 beehives -- more than 3 million bees -- in mere minutes after the spraying began Sunday morning. "Those that didn't die immediately were poisoned trying to drag out the dead," Stanley said. "Now, I'm going to have to destroy my hives, the honey, all my equipment. It's all contaminated."
Truly, the images of the bee-keepers assessing the loss of both their bees and their livelihoods are heartbreaking:

Posted by Fuzzy Slippers on September 04, 2016 9 Comments
Brexit has caused quite the kerfuffle among the countries of the European Union (EU), and amid the dire warnings of lasting DOOOM!, the Polish Finance Minister notes that Brexit shows that the EU is not the only option for the nations of Europe. CNBC reports:
The U.K.'s Brexit vote may have changed attitudes to the European Union across the continent, Polish Finance Minister Pawel Szalamacha told CNBC Friday, adding that the decision showed that the EU is "no longer the only choice for the nations of Europe." Szalamacha suggested that more countries could be prompted to leave the 28-nation bloc, such as those "with a strong sense of identity, some of the Nordic countries," or even some countries who may "feel that their destiny … is no longer within their hands." He added, "I don't think it's a sensible policy just to rely on the decisions of the major international players," not least because "some policy mistakes were committed."
Szalamacha goes on to say he supports decentralizing the EU's power base in Brussels so that countries can have more control over their own economies and markets.

Posted by Fuzzy Slippers on August 27, 2016 19 Comments
In a move that is being hailed as cementing his conservation legacy, Obama has, with the stroke of his pen, expanded a national marine monument off the coast of Hawaii to over 582,578 square miles.  This move will, however, destroy commercial fishing and potential drilling and mineral collection in a vast expanse of our waters. The Hill reports:
President Obama on Friday morning created a massive national monument off the coast of his native Hawaii, the world’s largest protected area. The declaration expands more than threefold the size of the Papahānaumokuāke Marine National Monument, surrounding the outlying northwestern Hawaiian islands. The move in Obama’s final months further cements his legacy of using unilateral executive authority to protect far more land and water as national monuments than any other president.

Posted by Fuzzy Slippers on July 31, 2016 18 Comments
Minimum wage hikes sound great on the surface, but as we've been reporting here at LI, such hikes tend to do the opposite of their proponents' stated intention.  From forcing businesses to fire employees, cut hours, and find technological replacements for workers, minimum wage hikes are counter-productive, even destructive to low-income workers. For example, a new study from Seattle shows that "there was almost no effect on workers' average total earnings" due to a combination of factors including fewer hours and a more difficult time finding a second job to make up those lost hours. The Washington Post reports:
[T]he actual benefits to workers might have been minimal, according to a group of economists whom the city commissioned to study the minimum wage and who presented their initial findings last week.

Posted by Fuzzy Slippers on June 06, 2016 14 Comments
We've been hearing a lot about the movement toward a cashless world, and Sweden now appears to be leading the race to become completely cashless. The Guardian reports:
“I don’t use cash any more, for anything,” said Louise Henriksson, 26, a teaching assistant. “You just don’t need it. Shops don’t want it; lots of banks don’t even have it. Even for a candy bar or a paper, you use a card or phone.” Swedish buses have not taken cash for years, it is impossible to buy a ticket on the Stockholm metro with cash, retailers are legally entitled to refuse coins and notes, and street vendors – and even churches – increasingly prefer card or phone payments. According to central bank the Riksbank, cash transactions made up barely 2% of the value of all payments made in Sweden last year – a figure some see dropping to 0.5% by 2020. In shops, cash is now used for barely 20% of transactions, half the number five years ago, and way below the global average of 75%.

Posted by Leslie Eastman on June 05, 2016 13 Comments
I am taking a few moments from my "Crazy California" and science coverage today to hit a topic that will be critically important in November: Jobs. Yesterday, the media coverage I followed was focused on San Jose. Interestingly, for those of us who have been following the Facebook trending news saga, San Jose completely failed to appear in the trending items. In fact, here is today's list: LI #53 Facebook Tredning And while I am grateful to see news about the Great Pyramid, I also noticed that another critical story is also absent:

Posted by Mike LaChance on June 04, 2016 11 Comments
Most people can do without certain luxuries and conveniences for a significant amount of time. Temporary power and internet outages due to storms are common in many parts of America and people get through it. Food on the other hand, is a different story. As any student of history can tell you, when people can't find food things get ugly pretty fast. Venezuela is quickly entering that danger zone. Reuters reports:
'We want food!', Venezuelans cry at protest near presidency Venezuelan security forces fired teargas at protesters chanting "We want food!" near Caracas' presidential palace on Thursday, the latest street violence in the crisis-hit OPEC nation.

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on May 12, 2016 37 Comments
Being replaced by machines is probably not what the Raise the Wage! crowd had in mind, but here we are. Again. For almost two years, McDonald's has been flirting with automated ordering machines, and has introduced the new mechanical overlords to some of its locations. I blogged about this back in 2014:

Posted by Mike LaChance on April 29, 2016 20 Comments
The American economy is off to a horrible start in 2016. GDP grew a measly 0.5 percent in the first quarter of this year. No wonder Democrats want to talk about transgender people and bathrooms. Bloomberg reports:
U.S. Economy Expands to 0.5% Pace, Weakest in Two Years The U.S. economy expanded in the first quarter at the slowest pace in two years as American consumers reined in spending and companies tightened their belts in response to weak global financial conditions and a plunge in oil prices.

Posted by Mike LaChance on April 20, 2016 38 Comments
New York's new minimum wage is being cited as the main reason that a popular Albany restaurant is closing its doors after serving the community for decades. Mental Recession reports:
Beloved Upstate Restaurant Closes, Cites Minimum Wage Hike As Major Reason An Albany area fish fry restaurant is closing its doors after nearly 70 years in business, and the owner is pointing to New York’s $15 minimum wage as a major reason for his establishment’s downfall. Bob and Ron’s Fish Fry, described by New York Upstate as an “Albany institution” featuring “the best fish fry in the Capital Region,” announced they’d be closing their doors in less than two weeks.