Emerging market rout is too big for the Fed to ignore

The US Federal Reserve has told Asia, Latin America, Africa and Eastern Europe to drop dead. 

 

 This has the makings of a grave policy error: a repeat of the dramatic events in the autumn of 1998 at best; a full-blown debacle and a slide into a second leg of the Long Slump at worst.

Emerging markets are now big enough to drag down the global economy. As Indonesia, India, Ukraine, Brazil, Turkey, Venezuela, South Africa, Russia, Thailand and Kazakhstan try to shore up their currencies, the effect is ricocheting back into the advanced world in higher borrowing costs. Even China felt compelled to sell $20bn of US Treasuries in July.

"They are running down reserves by selling US and European bonds, leading to a self-reinforcing feedback loop," said Simon Derrick from BNY Mellon.

READ MORE:  http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/comment/ambroseevans_pritchard/10272285/Emerging-market-rout-is-too-big-for-the-Fed-to-ignore.html

New Jersey’s Boomerang Generation

Newark, New Jersey (My9NJ) - 

Is 27 the new 18 when it comes to living at your parents' house?

According to the US census Bureau, at least 1 in 4 N.J. adults, ages 18-31 live at home and 42% are 24 or older. Experts call it an "epidemic" of millennials leaching off their parents, but does a bad economy and student loan debt crisis justify the situation?

A new survey from Coldwell Banker says parents in the Northeast region are more lenient on this than anywhere else in the US on children moving back home.

But, according to the survey, more than two in three Americans believe that too many adults living at home with their parents are avoiding responsibility, and 65 percent believe too many young adults who move back home after college are overstaying their welcome.

READ MORE:  http://www.my9nj.com/story/23158585/new-jerseys-boomerang-generation

Poverty Isn't Just in City Ghettos; It's Hit the Land of Picket Fences, Too

Poverty is often associated with inner city ghettos, fenced-off projects, or neighborhoods ridden with vice and crime. But the fastest growing poor population actually resides in the land of minivans, picket fences, and big box stores: suburbia.

According to a recent Brookings Institution analysis, major metropolitan suburbs became home to the largest and fastest-growing poor population in the country in the 2000s. Poverty levels increased in nearly every congressional district in the nation, hitting Republican and Democratic districts alike.

So why is poverty moving beyond major city limits?

READ MORE:   http://abcnews.go.com/ABC_Univision/News/poverty-growing-suburbs/storyNew?id=19947415&singlePage=true

NBC NEWS: Businesses, Unions, Colleges all say employee hours being cut over Obamacare but WH says “no evidence”

NBC News contacted around 20 small businesses and other entities for this report and found that employee hours are being cut to 29 hours because of Obamacare, despite the delay of the employer mandate. But the White House, NBC News reports, says that there is no systematic evidence that this is because of Obamacare and dismisses the report as anecdotal.

READ MORE AND WATCH: http://therightscoop.com/nbc-news-businesses-unions-colleges-all-say-employee-hours-being-cut-over-obamcare-but-wh-says-no-evidence/

In Need of a New Hip, but Priced Out of the U.S.

WARSAW, Ind. — Michael Shopenn’s artificial hip was made by a company based in this remote town, a global center of joint manufacturing. But he had to fly to Europe to have it installed. 

Mr. Shopenn, 67, an architectural photographer and avid snowboarder, had been in such pain from arthritis that he could not stand long enough to make coffee, let alone work. He had health insurance, but it would not cover a joint replacement because his degenerative disease was related to an old sports injury, thus considered a pre-existing condition. 

Desperate to find an affordable solution, he reached out to a sailing buddy with friends at a medical device manufacturer, which arranged to provide his local hospital with an implant at what was described as the “list price” of $13,000, with no markup. But when the hospital’s finance office estimated that the hospital charges would run another $65,000, not including the surgeon’s fee, he knew he had to think outside the box, and outside the country. 

READ MORE:  http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/04/health/for-medical-tourists-simple-math.html?src=me&ref=general&_r=0

The Dishonor System

There are three types of fraud worth considering, each reflecting different motivations and degrees of risk tolerance among the hypothetical individuals considered.

Let me stipulate that I do not condone fraud in any form. Moreover, I assume all Weekly Standard readers are law-abiding citizens who would neither commit fraud themselves nor encourage others to do so. My purpose is to inform such readers just how tempting fraud on the Obamacare health insurance exchanges will be in light of the recently announced delays in employer reporting and employer mandates.

There are three types of fraud worth considering, each reflecting different motivations and degrees of risk tolerance among the hypothetical individuals considered.

READ MOREhttp://www.weeklystandard.com/articles/dishonor-system_741026.html?utm_campaign=Washington+Examiner&utm_source=washingtonexaminer.com&utm_medium=referralhttp://www.weeklystandard.com/articles/dishonor-system_741026.html?utm_campaign=Washington+Examiner&utm_source=washingtonexaminer.com&utm_medium=referral

Report: Household income below end-of-recession

The average American household is earning less than when the Great Recession ended four years ago, according to a report released Wednesday.

U.S. median household income, once adjusted for inflation, has fallen 4.4 percent in that time, according to the report from Sentier Research. The report is based on an analysis of Census Bureau data.

The median, or midpoint, income in June 2013 was $52,098. That's down from $54,478 in June 2009, when the recession officially ended. And it's below the $55,480 that the median household took in when the recession began in December 2007.

READ MORE:  http://www.cnbc.com/id/100980411

Saudi Prince: Fracking Is Threat To Kingdom

As the fracking revolution eases demand for the kingdom's oil and gas, a billionaire prince warns his nation to find new income.

A Saudi prince has warned that his oil-reliant nation is under threat because of fracking technology being developed elsewhere around the world.

Billionaire Prince Alwaleed bin Talal said the Gulf Arab kingdom needed to reduce its reliance on crude oil and diversify its revenues.

His warning comes as rising shale energy supplies in the United States cut global demand for Saudi oil.

In an open letter to his country's oil minister Ali al Naimi and other government heads, published on Sunday via his Twitter account, Prince Alwaleed said demand for oil from Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec) member states was "in continuous decline".

READ MORE:  http://news.sky.com/story/1121610/saudi-prince-fracking-is-threat-to-kingdom

Space for all: Small, cheap satellites may one day do your bidding

This is how free enterprise works.  Great advancements come by accident.   "We had no idea CubeSats would go so far," Jordi Puig-Suari, an engineering professor at Cal Poly who is considered one of the inventors of the CubeSat concept, told NBC News.

AN FRANCISCO — Someday, swarms of satellites the size of a tissue box will be snapping pictures, taking environmental readings and broadcasting messages from orbit — but the entities controlling those satellites won't be governments.

Instead, they'll be hard-core hobbyists and elementary-school students, entrepreneurs and hacktivists. In short, anyone who can afford a few hundred dollars to send something to the final frontier.

The technology for this outer-space revolution already exists: It's a type of satellite known as a CubeSat, which measures just 4 inches (10 centimeters) on a side. The CubeSat phenomenon started out as an educational experiment, but now it's turning into a crowdsourcing, crowdfunding movement of Kickstarter proportions. And not even the sky is the limit.


READ MORE:  http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/space-all-small-cheap-satellites-may-one-day-do-your-6C10488674

Lloyd's Risk Index 2013

The slowdown in growth has made the world a newly challenging place for the more recently developing nations

 

FOREWORD BY DR RICHARD WARD

When the first Lloyd’s Risk Index was published in 2009, few thought that the world would not yet be emerging from the economic crisis that gripped it at the time.  Four years on, not only is much of Europe still at a very low economic ebb, previously buoyant growth  projections for economies including China and India have been revised downwards.   A global recovery remains stalled, customer

demand is in the doldrums and we have had glimpses of social unrest on the streets of the worst hit nations. The ‘state of flux’ affecting the global economy described in our 2011 Risk Index now appears to have become more entrenched than anyone anticipated.

It is against this backdrop that we asked Ipsos MORI to carry out the third Lloyd’s Risk Index, a survey of global business leaders’  perceptions of the greatest risks to their businesses and the level to which they believe they feel prepared to deal with them.

The 2013 Lloyd’s Risk Index reveals a great deal, but three key themes have emerged:

READ THE FULL REPORT:  http://junksciencecom.files.wordpress.com/2013/07/lloyds-risk-index-2013report100713.pdf

Individual health insurance rates to rise 30-40% next year under new law, Florida insurance chief says

Health insurance rates in Florida will rise by 5 to 20 percent in the small-group market, and 30 to 40 percent in the individual market, as the Affordable Care Act’s guaranteed coverage rule takes effect next year, Florida’s insurance commissioner said Monday.

It’s a measure of how tough Florida’s insurance market has been for adults with pre-existing conditions that the state’s rates will rise so much for individuals, Insurance Commissioner Kevin McCarty said in an interview with The Palm Beach Post. McCarty said the impact on people with large-group insurance will be negligible.

Read More:  http://www.mypalmbeachpost.com/news/news/individual-health-insurance-rates-to-rise-30-40-ne/nY7Rg/?icmp=pbp_internallink_invitationbox_apr2013_pbpstubtomypbp_launch

Wrinkle in Health Law Vexes Lawmakers’ Aides

WASHINGTON — As President Obama barnstorms the country promoting his health care law, one audience very close to home is growing increasingly anxious about the financial implications of the new coverage: members of Congress and their personal staffs.

Under a wrinkle that dates back to enactment of the law, members of Congress and thousands of their aides are required to get their coverage through new state-based markets known as insurance exchanges. 

But the law does not provide any obvious way for the federal government to continue paying its share of the premiums for the comprehensive coverage. 

If the government cannot do so, it could mean an additional expense of $5,000 a year for individuals and $11,000 for families under some of the most popular plans. 

READ MORE: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/30/us/politics/wrinkle-in-health-law-vexes-lawmakers-aides.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&hp&

Individual health insurance rates to rise 30-40% next year under new law, Florida insurance chief says

Health insurance rates in Florida will rise by 5 to 20 percent in the small-group market, and 30 to 40 percent in the individual market, as the Affordable Care Act’s guaranteed coverage rule takes effect next year, Florida’s insurance commissioner said Monday.

It’s a measure of how tough Florida’s insurance market has been for adults with pre-existing conditions that the state’s rates will rise so much for individuals, Insurance Commissioner Kevin McCarty said in an interview with The Palm Beach Post. McCarty said the impact on people with large-group insurance will be negligible.

READ MORE: http://www.mypalmbeachpost.com/news/news/individual-health-insurance-rates-to-rise-30-40-ne/nY7Rg/?icmp=pbp_internallink_invitationbox_apr2013_pbpstubtomypbp_launch

Detroit Bankruptcy: As Its Own Worst Enemy, the City Got What It Deserved

If the residents of the city of Detroit want to blame any person or organization for its Chapter 9 filing, they only need to look as far as the unions that controlled labor there and the politicians who ran it over the past four decades. Detroit earned its bankruptcy the easy way — through greed, the desire for political power and poor planning.

 

Kevyn D. Orr, the city’s emergency manager, offered all interested parties a likely way to avoid the bankruptcy filing just weeks ago. Employees of Detroit, past and present, could share the pain of the restructuring of financial obligations with bond holders. Each blamed the other for the city’s problems. Each said the other should absorb the brunt of a restructuring. Neither budged. Orr ran out of options, as two city pension funds went to court to try to protect their assets, motivated by a final grab for Detroit’s money.

READ MORE: Detroit Bankruptcy: As Its Own Worst Enemy, the City Got What It Deserved - General Motors (NYSE:GM) - 24/7 Wall St. http://247wallst.com/politics/2013/07/19/detroit-bankruptcy-as-its-own-worst-enemy-the-city-got-what-it-deserved/#ixzz2bx05HRGM

North Dakota sees increases in real GDP per capita following Bakken production

In recent years, North Dakota has seen significant gains in real gross domestic product (GDP) per capita, coinciding with development of the Bakken shale play. In 2001, North Dakota's GDP per capita was well below the U.S. average, ranking 38th out of 50 states. Starting in 2004, the state's GDP per capita rose consistently each year, eventually surpassing the U.S. average in 2008. By 2012, its real GDP per capita was $55,250, more than 29% above the national average. Even though the state appeared to be closing the gap on the U.S. average before Bakken production began, the rising oil and gas production likely contributed to the economic growth the state has enjoyed.

In 2012, North Dakota reported the highest annual increase in real per capita GDP of any state in the country for the second consecutive year. In 2012, real per capita GDP in North Dakota increased by nearly 11% from the previous year, according to statistics released June 6, 2013 by the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA). This is considerably higher than the national growth rate of less than 2% and is more than three times as large as the growth rate in Texas (3.27%), the state with the next highest annual growth.

READ MORE:  http://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.cfm?id=12071

Detroit bankruptcy: Is it a warning sign for America?

How Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder has dealt with financial crises in the state – and how he will handle the Detroit bankruptcy – could hold lessons for the rest of the US.

Gov. Rick Snyder (R) of Michigan could be forgiven for sounding like a bit of a cheerleader when discussing Detroit's bankruptcy Sunday on NBC's "Meet the Press."

"I'm very bullish about the growth opportunities of Detroit," he said.

On one hand, finding the silver lining of perhaps the worst fiscal disaster in the history of America's cities is his job – it's hard to imagine Michigan truly thriving so long as its largest city is an economic millstone. Yet, on a much more personal level, it seems like Governor Snyder sincerely believes he was built for this.


READ MORE:  http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Politics/2013/0721/Detroit-bankruptcy-Is-it-a-warning-sign-for-America-video

Australia plans to scrap carbon tax

Key greenhouse gas emitter to replace fixed price on emissions with floating rate a year earlier than planned.

 

Australia will scrap its carbon tax and bring forward an emissions trading scheme a year earlier than planned, Treasurer Chris Bowen said, a policy shift certain to be a focal point in the forthcoming election.

Under current plans, Australia would move from the current fixed price on carbon - essentially a tax assessed on larger companies entitling them to produce carbon emissions - to a floating price in July 2015.

Bowen on Sunday confirmed media reports that the fixed $21.9 per tonne carbon tax would be dumped in favour of a floating price of between $5.5 and $9.1 per tonne from July 1, 2014, to ease cost of living pressure for families and help support the non-mining sectors of the economy.

Australia is among the world's worst per capita polluters due to its reliance on coal-fired power and mining exports and introduced a carbon tax in 2012, charging big polluters for their emissions.

READ MORE:  http://www.aljazeera.com/news/asia-pacific/2013/07/201371454545395460.html

Do Hurricanes or Obama Policies Cause Lower Production in the Gulf?

The Institute for Energy Research compared the impacts of hurricane activity and the Obama Administration’s oil policies on production in the offshore Gulf of Mexico to see which has the larger and more lasting impact. Although the shorter-term impacts of both are similar in size, Obama’s policies seem to have a more lasting effect. The Energy Information Administration (EIA) forecasts that offshore oil production in the Gulf of Mexico will not reach its peak 2010 production level at least through 2014, the farthest year out in the agency’s Short-Term Energy Outlook.

The graph below shows annual historical crude oil production in the Gulf of Mexico from 1994 through 2012, and projected crude oil production for the Gulf of Mexico in 2013 and 2014 based on EIA’s July 2013 Short-Term Energy Outlook. Oil production in the Gulf of Mexico took a downturn in 2005 due to hurricanes Katrina and Rita and then again in 2008 due to hurricanes Gustav and Ike. Another downturn occurred in 2011 because of the moratorium on drilling in the Gulf of Mexico that was instituted by the Obama Administration after the oil spill occurred there in April 2010 due to the Macondo accident, the Obama Administration’s subsequent moratorium on offshore drilling, and the Administration’s de facto moratorium (the “permitorium”) that continued once the original moratorium on offshore drilling was lifted. Oil production in the Gulf of Mexico has still not returned to pre-moratorium levels and the EIA is projecting that it will not return to pre-moratorium levels through 2014.

READ MORE:  http://www.instituteforenergyresearch.org/2013/07/12/are-hurricanes-or-obamas-oil-policies-causing-lower-production-in-the-gulf-of-mexico/

Detroit not alone under mountain of long-term debt

WASHINGTON — Detroit may be alone among the nation’s biggest cities in terms of filing for bankruptcy, but it is far from the only city being crushed by a roiling mountain of long-term debt.

At the heart of Detroit’s problem is a growing unfunded debt on benefits owed to current and future retirees — some $3.5 billion, according to its emergency manager, Kevyn Orr — which mirrors a circumstance being seen across the U.S.

From Baltimore to Los Angeles, and many points in between, municipalities are increasingly confronted with how to pay for these massive promises. The Pew Center for the States, in Washington, estimated states’ public pension plans across the U.S. were underfunded by a whopping $1.4 trillion in 2010.

READ MORE:  http://www.freep.com/article/20130721/NEWS06/307210073/

Exclusive: Signs of declining economic security

WASHINGTON (AP) — Four out of 5 U.S. adults struggle with joblessness, near poverty or reliance on welfare for at least parts of their lives, a sign of deteriorating economic security and an elusive American dream.

Survey data exclusive to The Associated Press points to an increasingly globalized U.S. economy, the widening gap between rich and poor and loss of good-paying manufacturing jobs as reasons for the trend.

The findings come as President Barack Obama tries to renew his administration's emphasis on the economy, saying in recent speeches that his highest priority is to "rebuild ladders of opportunity" and reverse income inequality.

READ MORE: http://bigstory.ap.org/article/exclusive-4-5-us-face-near-poverty-no-work-0

The state of the union is not strong, Americans say

A new survey finds that 42 percent of Americans say capitalism isn't working well, and they complain about the encouragement of greed, the lack of equal opportunity and the creation of poverty and lasting inequality.

[OPINION: No, Capitalism Is Not Evil]

The survey illustrates the country's deep polarization. In a positive finding for Democrats who favor a strong government role in society, most Americans say government should do more to reduce inequality. But Republicans who want to limit government will find encouragement in that most Americans don't have confidence in government's ability to function effectively.

READ MORE : http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/Ken-Walshs-Washington/2013/07/18/the-state-of-the-union-is-not-strong-americans-say

Economic Fairness

63% View U.S. Economy As Unfair to the Middle Class

 

More voters than ever view the U.S. economy as unfair, particularly when it comes to middle-class Americans.

Just 38% of Likely U.S. Voters now consider the U.S. economy at least somewhat fair, and that includes only four percent (4%) who say it’s Very Fair, according to a new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey. That overall figure is down seven points from 45% a month ago. Fifty-six percent (56%) view the economy as unfair, with 19% who think it is Not At All Fair. (To see survey question wording,click here.)
(Want a free daily e-mail update? If it's in the news, it's in our polls). Rasmussen Reports updates are also available on Twitter or Facebook.

READ MORE:  http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/business/general_business/economic_fairness