CNN (August 22)
“Fires are raging at a record rate in Brazil’s Amazon rainforest, and scientists warn that it could strike a devastating blow to the fight against climate change.” If the Amazon is “the planet’s lungs,” then they are turning black. Brazil’s space agency estimated “more than 1½ soccer fields of Amazon rainforest are being destroyed every minute of every day” and 1,700 miles away Sao Paulo was engulfed in mid-afternoon darkness with “the sky pitch-black…the sun blanketed by smoke and ash.”
Tags: Amazon, Brazil, Climate change, Devastating, Fires, Raging, Rainforest, Sao Paulo, Scientists, Smoke
USA Today (August 21)
“The labor market seemed to defy gravity last year, generating more than 200,000 jobs a month despite a historically low unemployment rate that made it harder for employers to find workers. Turns out job growth wasn’t as robust as it appeared.” The Labor Department just issued its “largest downward revision in a decade.” Total job gains in the year ended March 2019 were revised downward by half a million. Based on this average monthly job growth was closer to 170,000, than the initial estimates of 210,000.
Tags: Defy, Employers, Gravity, Job growth, Labor Department, Labor market, Unemployment rate, Workers
Wall Street Journal (August 21)
“Water crises are unfolding all across India, a product of population growth, modernization, climate change, mismanagement and the breakdown of traditional systems of distributing resources. India is running out of water in more places, in more different ways, putting more people at risk, than perhaps any other country.” Though it is “the 13th most water-stressed country in the world,” India has a population three times “the combined population of the other 16 countries facing extremely high water stress.”
Tags: Climate change, Crises, India, Mismanagement, Modernization, Population growth, Resources, Risk, Traditional
New York Times (August 20)
“Nearly 200 chief executives, including the leaders of Apple, Pepsi and Walmart, tried on Monday to redefine the role of business in society—and how companies are perceived by an increasingly skeptical public.” The new inclusiveness of multiple stakeholders sounds appealing. Still, “for companies to truly make good on their lofty promises, they will need Wall Street to embrace their idealism, too. Until investors start measuring companies by their social impact instead of their quarterly returns, systemic change may prove elusive.”
Tags: Apple, CEOs, Idealism, Inclusiveness, Investors, Pepsi, Redefine, Role of business, Skeptical, Society, Stakeholders, Wall Street, Walmart
Fortune (August 19)
“Given the immense power large companies exercise in society, the new social consciousness of business surely should be seen as a step in the right direction. At a time when the nation’s political leadership is tied in knots…business leadership is filling the leadership vacuum.” The Business Roundtable, which always prioritized shareholders, “has redefined its mission” to include all stakeholders. In fact, shareholders aren’t even mentioned until word 250 of the 300-word Statement on the Purpose of a Corporation.
Tags: Business, Business Roundtable, Corporations, Leadership, Mission, Power, Shareholders, Social consciousness, Stakeholders
Los Angeles Times (August 17)
“More than seven decades later, the dispute over who should pay for the suffering…is at the heart of a downward spiral in relations between South Korea and Japan that has spawned a trade war and ignited massive protests and boycotts in South Korea,” putting much at risk. “An $80-billion bilateral trade relationship is in jeopardy, as is a military information-sharing agreement between the two countries that has been valuable for the U.S. and its allies against the North Korean threat.”
Tags: Bilateral trade, Boycotts, Dispute, Downward spiral, Japan, Jeopardy, North Korea, Protests, South Korea, Suffering, Threat, Trade war, U.S.
Washington Post (August 17)
“American consumers are increasingly propping up the global economy,” but it’s unclear that they can keep playing this role or even continue propping up the U.S. economy. “A number of signs point to a possible downturn in the United States, economists are growing more skeptical that consumers will continue to open up their wallets as freely. A failure to do so could hasten the arrival of the first U.S. recession in a decade.
Tags: Consumers, Downturn, Economists, Failure, Global economy, Skeptical, U.S., Wallets
Wall Street Journal (August 17)
North Korea’s “spree of weapons tests—six in just three weeks, including one Friday—carry a potential downside for Pyongyang: diminished returns…. Its provocations don’t appear to be working. The shock value from the North’s military flourishes seems to be lost on President Trump, the key figure in the cash-strapped country’s campaign to shed economic sanctions.”
Tags: : diminished returns, Cash-strapped, Downside, North Korea, Provocations, Pyongyang, Sanctions, Spree, Trump, Weapons tests
Bloomberg (August 15)
“China has already endured plenty of economic pain, and isn’t as desperate for a trade deal as the U.S. may think.” Trump appeared to panic, extending an olive branch to China. “While Trump may think his olive branch is a big deal, the message to Washington is: Don’t think you’ve got China on the ropes. Xi was panicking a year ago; he can afford to wait now.”
Tags: China, Desperate, Economic pain, Olive branch, Panic, Trade deal, U.S.
South China Morning Post (August 14)
“The crisis in Hong Kong appears to be careening towards a devastating climax.” But China “must pick the least bad option to resolve Hong Kong crisis” and that’s not a PLA crackdown. The PLA would be treated “as invaders, and resistance would be fierce and casualties unavoidable.” Furthermore, “an exodus of expats and elites would follow, and the Hong Kong economy – still a bridge between China the rest of the world – would almost immediately collapse.”
Tags: Careening, Casualties, China, Collapse, Crackdown, Crisis, Devastating climax, Elites, Exodus, Expats, Hong Kong, Invaders, PLA, Resistance
