Category Archives: Fiscal Freedom

Liz Truss is not the first Conservative prime minister to see her carefully cultivated self-image quickly clash with political reality.

Boris Johnson was the prime minister who compared himself to the reckless mayor in Jaws who kept the beaches open despite shark attacks but then had to order the British population to lock themselves up at home during the Covid pandemic.

David Cameron initially sought to compete with Labour on entering office by pledging increased expenditure on education and the NHS but then oversaw brutal austerity cuts that pared back public services to the bone.

And on Thursday, Liz Truss, who has spent the summer promulgating the economic benefits of the small state, will announce one of the biggest government handouts in generations, topped only by the Covid response of up to 400bn, in her first week in office.

The new prime minister is regularly described as the most ideological in a generation, making no secret of her desire to emulate Margaret Thatcher through fiscal discipline, attacks on the unions, culture wars and a variety of outfits featuring fur hats and pussy-bow blouses.

She rejected calls from all wings of her deeply divided party to appoint a unity cabinet, surrounding herself with loyalists like Kwasi Kwarteng, Thrse Coffey and James Cleverly and bringing on board rightwingers including Suella Braverman and Jacob Rees-Mogg. While her team protest that she has handed out roles to some of her original leadership rivals, she conducted a brutal clear-out of every senior Rishi Sunak backer. Just a peppering of more minor roles were offered to his allies.

Her first international calls were to Ukraines Volodymyr Zelenskiy, who she reassured that Britain would remain a staunch ally and discussed the need to strengthen global security, and to US president Joe Biden, with the pair although never likely to emulate Thatcher and Reagans close bond reflecting on the special relationship and the shared values of freedom and democracy.

And at her first prime ministers questions clash with Keir Starmer on Wednesday, the domestic political dividing lines were drawn as the Labour leader attacked her on the Tory fantasy of trickle-down economics, establishing clear policy differences on a windfall tax on energy firms and cuts to corporation tax.

But despite all that, she will turn up in the House of Commons on Thursday to announce a massive public spending package that would be applauded by statists and goes against all of the instincts of her neoliberal free-marketeer clique.

What her announcement shows us is that even the most ideologically rigid politicians have to be willing to defer to pragmatism when faced with the harsh, cold realities of government in this case the cost of living crisis and the prospect of millions of families struggling to pay their bills this winter.

Archie Bland and Nimo Omer take you through the top stories and what they mean, free every weekday morning

Truss will be aware that the energy emergency is the single biggest issue facing her government, and if she gets the strategy to deal with it wrong when so many in her party were arguing for a different approach her days in No 10 will almost certainly be numbered, either by yet another brutal putsch or at the next general election.

That she is willing to go from rejecting handouts to announcing a huge one of her own believed to be costing somewhere in the region of 130bn hints at a political dexterity that not many, including in her own party, have credited her for.

But they shouldnt be too surprised, as Truss, who U-turned during her leadership campaign over regional pay boards, has a long history of taking firm policy positions and then backtracking, whether it was suggesting steel tariffs when trade secretary or campaigning for Remain before becoming a fervent Brexiter.

Those who have worked with her insist that she has always been a logical thinker, focusing on practical solutions to problems across the various Whitehall departments she has led. The tensions between her ideological vision and the need to be flexible look likely to continue.

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Liz Trusss energy price cap handout will put her talent for U-turns to the test - The Guardian

AMMAN Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi on Tuesday participated in the 158th regular session of the Arab League Council at the ministerial level in Cairo, according to a Foreign Ministry statement.

Beginning his speech, Safadi said, We meet again, in a difficult time for Arabs, in which crises intensify, and others erupt.

The prospects for solutions are absent. The suffering of brotherly peoples increases, and our entire region bears the consequences of these crises: Security threats and economic pressures, the displacement of millions, and the loss of generations, he added.

He stressed the importance of launching an initiative joint Arab action which dedicates resources and exerts effort to overcome crises afflicting the Arab world, achieving stability, development and prosperity.

Safadi warned of the danger of undermining the two-state solution, adding that the continuation of occupation pushes the region towards more conflict, where there is no peace, security or stability without meeting all rights of the Palestinian people.

The foreign minister described any proposal for a solution that does not meet Palestinians' right to freedom and an independent, sovereign state on their national soil as absurd fantasies".

He stressed that "the apartheid inevitably dooms the two-state solution, calling it a hideous, inhumane condition, and a path to conflict, not peace".

Palestinians are still suffering from the scourge of occupation. Their land is plundered. Their economy is restricted. Their right to freedom and a sovereign state is violated. Our Jerusalem and its sanctities are facing the threat of identity change under Israeli violations, he said.

Safadi said that the two-state solution, which the majority of the world agreed to be the only way to peace, is being undermined by illegal Israeli measures, including constructing settlements, plundering lands, and displacing Palestinians.

Intensifying joint efforts is a must to push for a return to real negotiations to achieve peace on the basis of the two-state solution, which embodies the independent, sovereign Palestinian state, with Jerusalem as its capital, on the lines of June 4, 1967, he continued.

Undermining the two-state solution will cause more regional injustice, oppression and conflict, he warned.

The Kingdom, as you have chosen, has chosen peace as a strategic objective, he said, adding that we want a lasting, just and comprehensive peace to achieve security and stability and provide necessary conditions for cooperation and development.

Addressing regional challenges necessitates regional cooperation, he said.

Such cooperation is conditioned by materialising a just solution to the Palestinian issue, as there is no development without stability, he said, noting that there is no stability, no security, and no peace without fulfilling the rights of Palestinians.

Turning a blind eye to the Palestinian issue is an illusion, he said, noting that UNRWA must continue to provide its vital services to Palestinian refugees, in accordance with its UN mandate.

UNRWAs fiscal deficit threatens its ability to fulfil its duties and eliminating that deficit requires Arab and international contributions to UNRWAs budget, he said.

Turning to the Syrian crisis, Safadi stressed the importance of crystallising an Arab mechanism to resolve the crisis in a manner that preserves Syria, protects its people, and prioritises its interests over conflicting regional and international agendas.

Let us protect the right of Syrian refugees to live in dignity. Aid for them is dwindling, but their needs are growing. Host countries cannot bear this responsibility alone. Meeting the needs of refugees is an international responsibility, he said.

Safadi highlighted the need to resolve crises in Libya and Yemen and prevent further deterioration in Lebanon.

Supporting Iraq's stability and security is an Arab duty and a necessity to preserve the stability of the region, he said.

He also referred to Egypt's water security as an integral part of our national security.

Stressing the need to end the tension in the Arab Gulf region through a dialogue that ensures good neighbourly relations based on the principle of non-interference in the internal affairs of Arab countries, Safadi described the security of Jordan and the Arab Gulf states as indivisible.

He called for building relations with Iran in order to enter a new era of cooperation.

The Kingdom will remain a partner in activating joint Arab action, calling for comprehensive Arab cooperation, supporting Palestinian rights, devoting all its capabilities to protecting Islamic and Christian holy sites in occupied Jerusalem, which constitutes a priority for His Majesty King Abdullah.

We will work to confront climate challenges, achieve health and food security, increase economic cooperation that creates job opportunities, achieve Arab integration and comprehensive development, he said.

In addition, Safadi met with Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry, Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal Bin Farhan, Kuwaiti Foreign Minister Sheikh Ahmed Nasser Al Mohammed Al Sabah and Algerian Foreign Minister Ramtane Lamamra to discuss regional developments and furthering bilateral relations.

Safadi also held a meeting with Moroccan Foreign Minister Nasser Bourita and Libyan Foreign Minister Najla Mangoush.

The Jordanian foreign minister discussed bolstering cooperation with Oman Foreign Minister Badr Busaidi, Tunisian Foreign Minister Othman Jerandi, Bahraini Foreign Minister Abdullatif Bin Rashid Al Zayani, Yemeni Foreign Minister Ahmed Bin Mubarak, Somali Foreign Minister Abshir Omar Huruse, Mauritania Foreign Minister Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed and Arab League Secretary-General Ahmed Aboul Gheit.

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FM stresses joint Arab action to overcome regional crises - Jordan Times

Voting is the most precious right of every citizen, and we have a moral obligation to ensure the integrity of the voting process Hilary Rodham Clinton.

In civilized democracies around the world, the constitutional architecture of public offices rightly prioritises the office of the president, prime minister, governor, mayor, member of parliament etc. Now, none of those offices would exist but for those who put them there and, therefore, to whom they are ultimately accountable: citizens.

The hypothesis therein is that the office of the citizen or, the citizen, is, upon the singular criterion of the power to hire and fire; more important that of the president, prime minister, mayor, governor, member of parliament or national assembly member!That is because all those office holders can be impeached for criminality, wrongful acts or omissions or a combination thereof by citizens, through their elected representatives. More importantly, sovereignty belongs to the people (citizens) of Nigeria from whom government derives all its powers and authority by virtue of section 14 (1) of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999, as amended, (the Constitution). What would be the point of any government without citizens anyway?

Who then is a citizen? The Constitution specifies 3 categories of citizenship; first, by birth; second, by registration, and third, by naturalisation. Citizenship, by virtue of section 25 (1) (a), (b) and (c), encompasses; every person born in Nigeria before independence, 1st October 1960, either of whose parents or any of whose grandparents belongs to, or belonged to, an indigenous Nigeria community. It includes every person born in Nigeria post-independence, either of whose parents, or grandparents, or any of whose grandparents is a Nigerian citizen; and every person born outside Nigeria either of whose parents is a Nigerian citizen.

Subject to the provisions of section 26 therein and strict residency requirements, a person, whether single, or married to Nigerian citizen, may be registered as a Nigerian citizen if such a person is of good character, establishes a clear intention to be domiciled in Nigeria, takes the statutory oath of allegiance to the country. Section 27 of the Constitution also establishes the modus operandi of citizenship by naturalisation upon similar foundations as that of registration.

Thus, a de facto social contract is established by the Constitution between citizens and government in that the security and welfare of the people shall be primary purpose of government, and the participation by the people (citizens) in their government shall be ensured in accordance with the provisions of this Constitution Section 14 (1) (a), and (b) therein, establishes that on the one hand; and, the fact that the people must abide by the laws of the land and, when abroad, obey the laws of those countries, on the other hand. That social contract in turn entitles, upon compliance with the relevant laws, people to the fundamental rights embedded in sections 33 through 43 inclusive of the Constitution. These include the right to: life, dignity of the human person, personal liberty; private and family life; freedom of thought, conscience and religion; freedom of expression and the press; peaceful assembly and association; freedom of movement; freedom from discrimination; and the right to acquire and own immovable property anywhere in Nigeria. These rights are not inviolable and may lawfully be derogated pursuant to section 45 (1) (a) and (b) of the Constitution in the interest of defence, public safety, public order, public morality or public health.

Today, September 7, 2022, Nigerian citizens domiciled abroad that is, Nigerians in diaspora, are not legally allowed to vote in Nigerian elections from their countries of domicile. In other words, they have been, and are being, disenfranchised and discriminated against.

This is a clear and present violation of the explicit provisions of section 42 (1) (a) which establishes that a citizen of Nigeria of a particular community, ethnic group, place of origin, sex, religion or political opinion shall not, by reason only that he is such a person be subjected either expressly by, or in the practical application of, any law in force in Nigeria or any executive or administrative action of the government, to disabilities or restrictions to which citizens of Nigeria or of other communities, ethnic groups, places of origin, sex, religions or political opinions are not made subject.

The extant discrimination against Nigerias own citizens by the state, in violation of established constitutional provisions is perplexing and raises several pertinent questions.

One, is diaspora voting technology rocket science in the 21st Century? Alas, it is not! Afterall, if todays smart encryption technology enables natural and unnatural persons to undertake secure financial transactions on a variety of portable devices, across continents and diverse time zones, why not electronic voting in diaspora?

Two, is there an absence of political will? Self-evidently! The International Institute for Democratic & Electoral Assistance (IDEA) affirms that Belgium, Canada, United Kingdom, USA are some of the western nations with a mature diaspora voting mechanism. IDEA also establishes that Angola, Benin, Burkina Faso, Kenya (as recently as 2022!), Morocco, Togo and South Africa et al have implemented diasporan voting into their electoral practices. The implication is that if the identified African countries, including a neighbouring state, can implement diaspora voting, there cannot be an objective rationale for discriminating against established Nigerian citizens who wish to exercise their rights to participate.

Three, is diasporan voting a back burner issue, which should not be prioritised? Again, the answer is no! Progressive nations consistently advance the security and welfare of their people (citizens), economic development, prudently manage public finances and, concurrently, discard outmoded practices and policies through innovative reforms. Put differently, citizens rightly expect performing governments to multi-task, and successfully deliver, on cross cutting themes impacting their lives whether its fiscal or monetary policy, national security, healthcare transformation, infrastructure development, education policy and electoral reform, the subject of this treatise.

Besides, the Nigerian Diaspora Commission estimates that there are approximately 17 million to 20 million Nigerians in diaspora who remit in excess of $ 25 billion annually to the Nigerian economy. If Nigerians in diaspora are good enough to remit billions to the home economy, which fuels economic growth in agriculture, education, healthcare, real estate, generates fiscal revenue for all tiers of government and, therefore, increasing GDP, upon what rational logic are they barred from participating in elections from their places of domicile?

To put this into some global perspective, the right to vote was routinely denied African- Americans and women in swathes of America, British and South African history. So, although the American Declaration of Independence was adopted on 4th July 1776, and the U.S. Constitution ratified on June 21, 1788, it took the abolition of slavery in 1865, through the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution in 1866, for citizenship to be granted to all persons born or naturalized in the United States, including former slaves and established equal protection of the laws for all citizens.

Whilst the 15th Amendment in 1870 enunciated that voting rights could not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of race, colour or previous condition of servitude, women only received the right to vote in the mid-19th Century with the adoption of the 19th Amendment; which impeded voter discrimination on the grounds of gender.

In the United Kingdom, women were only accorded full voting rights via the Representation of the People (Equal Franchise) Act 1928. This statute gave women equal voting rights as men irrespective of their age and property-owning status. And, after decades of apartheid in South Africa, free and fair multiparty elections were administered for the first time in 1994, which produced Madiba Nelson Mandela as the first indigenous President of that country.

The above abridged historical detour is necessary in order to afford legislators and policy makers a broader and deeper understanding of, and the rationale for, the robust quest for electoral reform manifested, in part, in the extant advocacy for diaspora voting rights. After all, it took centuries for African Americans, all South Africans and women, around the world to gain the right to vote. It would be perverse to turn a blind eye to this pressing issue which, arguendo, will reinforce greater participation by a wider critical mass and, by deduction, reduce perennial voter apathy. The inescapable corollary is democratic credence and not democratic deficiency.

Paradoxically, the Electoral Act 2022 is silent on the question of diaspora voting. Section 9, Part III, of the latter statute, on the National Register of Voters and Voter Registration, does not expressly define a voter. It only makes reference at section 9 (1) (a) and (b) to persons: entitled to vote in any Federal State, Local Government or Federal Capital Territory Area Council election and with a disability status disaggregated by type of disability. A reasonable inductive interpretation to this provision is that persons therein assumes the same meaning as Nigerian citizens with the 1999 Constitution (supra), who have attained majority and suffer no legal impediments to participation in elections.

Synthesising the foregoing, it is recommended that: (1) legislators, irrespective of ideological leanings, seize the political will and enact the necessary reforms to place diaspora voting on the statute book without further delay; (2) amendments be made to the Electoral Act and expressly define a voter for drafting precision; (3) because the legal impediments to diaspora voting either wittingly, or unwittingly, creates two categories of citizens. That is, those within Nigerian borders and those domiciled abroad; that dichotomy constitutes an affront to the rule of law and the equality of persons. There cannot be two categories of citizens within the 1999 Constitution. Therefore, the lacuna created by the electoral disenfranchisement of Nigerians in diaspora should be tackled urgently.

Paraphrasing Hilary Clinton above, morality dictates that the integrity of the voting process will be enhanced, not diminished, with diasporan voting.

Ojumu Esq is the Principal Partner, Balliol Myers LP, a firm of legal practitioners based in Lagos, Nigeria.

Link:

The contract of Nigerian citizenship and diaspora voting - Guardian Nigeria

(The Center Square) According to a new study, most Michigan cities rank below the national average in a new index of economic freedom.

The Mackinac Center for Public Policy released the study Economic Freedom in the City: Ranking Michigans Labor Markets, which grades metropolitan areas on three major policy areas: labor market regulations, taxes, and government spending.

Midland received the states highest overall freedom score, while Ann Arbor and Grand Rapids-Wyoming also performed well.

The study uses data from 2017 to rank the nations 383 Metropolitan Statistical Areas by the level of economic freedom, accounting for taxes, government regulations, minimum wage burdens, bureaucracy size, and union influence.

Midland beat out all other areas statewide, with an overall economic freedom score of 6.76 out of 10 the state's only metropolitan area that scored above the national average. Ann Arbor scored a 6.66 and Grand Rapids-Wyoming followed with a score of 6.56. Bay City, Flint, and Battle Creek were the worst performers among the states 14 MSAs, with respective scores of 5.62, 5.98, and at 5.99.

Economic freedom can vary widely from nation to nation and from state to state, but it can also vary across local economies within states and across the country, study co-author Dean Stansel, a research associate professor at the Bridwell Institute for Economic Freedom and Mackinac Center adjunct scholar, said in a statement. Academic scholars have produced hundreds of papers using similar national and state-level indexes, finding generally that greater economic freedom is associated with better outcomes on a wide variety of measures. This newer index for metropolitan statistical areas has allowed that research to be expanded to the local level as well.

The study says that there is a strong correlation between greater freedom and economic well-being. It argues that there are positive connections between economic liberty and outcomes such as lower unemployment rates, higher employment, and population growth.

Nationally, Florida received eight of the top 10 scores.

If lawmakers want to attract talent and keep people in the state, it is critical to pass policies that benefit individuals and businesses, MCPP senior director of fiscal policy and study co-auther Michael LaFaive said in a statement. Reducing unnecessary regulations and limiting tax burdens are just a few of the steps that local and state policymakers can take to give individuals access to greater economic prosperity.

Neither Grand Rapids nor Detroit Michigans two large MSAs appeared in the top or bottom 10 of the 52 largest MSAs in the country for economic freedom. The Center Square has previously reported how the Motor City requires 77 steps and more than $6,000 in fees to open a restaurant.

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Study ranks Midland as top economic freedom area in Michigan - The Center Square

Good Wednesday evening. Can you believe its already September?

Life expectancy in the U.S. has fallen by nearly three years since the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic, according to new provisional data from the Centers for Disease Control.

In 2019, before the pandemic began, life expectancy at birth was 78 years and 10 months. In 2020, it fell to 77 years, due largely to deaths from Covid-19. In 2021, life expectancy fell for a second consecutive year, to 76 years and 1 month about the same level it was a quarter century earlier.

Only half of the loss in life expectancy in 2021 can be attributed to Covid, even though the death rate from the virus was higher in 2021 than in 2020. Other contributing factors include drug overdoses, heart disease and suicide all of which had been weighing on life expectancy before the pandemic began. Drug overdoses hit a record high in 2021, killing about 109,000 people.

Its a dismal situation, University of Pennsylvania demographer Sam Preston told the Associated Press. It was bad before and its gotten worse.

Unusually large decline: Life expectancy rose in the U.S. during much of the 20th century, although the annual increase was typically small, measured in fractions of a year. The decrease recorded in 2020 and 2021, by contrast, was extremely unusual, and the largest change in life expectancy in nearly 100 years.

The decline could have been even worse, too. Death rates from influenza and pneumonia decreased during the pandemic, and if they had been more typical of the pre-pandemic era, the drop in life expectancy would have been even larger.

Some groups worse off than others: Americans have fared worse than citizens in most other high-income countries, the great majority of which saw a rebound in life expectancy in 2021 following a Covid-driven decline in 2020.

None of them experienced a continuing fall in life expectancy like the U.S. did, and a good number of them saw life expectancy start inching back to normal, Dr. Steven Woolf, director emeritus of the Center on Society and Health at Virginia Commonwealth University, told The New York Times. Those countries vaccinated a higher percentage of their populations and took additional steps, such as widespread mask-wearing, that reduced death rates. The U.S. is clearly an outlier, Woolf said.

Within the U.S., some groups saw larger declines than others. Native Americans and Alaskan Natives were hit particularly hard, with average life expectancy dropping by four years just in 2020, and 6.6 years overall. Life expectancy now stands at 65 for that group, about the level recorded for all Americans in 1944 during World War II. Covid complicated long-standing health issues among native populations, including diabetes and a lack of access to health care.

Black Americans were also strongly affected, seeing a four-year drop in life expectancy from 2019 to 2021, to 70.8 years. White Americans saw a smaller decline of 2.4 years during the same period, resulting in a life expectancy of 76.4 years in 2021.

President Joe Bidens plan to cancel billions of dollars in student debt has divided Americans, but the controversial idea has more support than opposition among registered voters, according to a new Politico/Morning Consult poll.

The poll finds that 48% of voters support the cancellation of between $10,000 and $20,000 of student loan debt for individuals making less than $125,000 and couples making less than $250,000. A slightly smaller share of voters, 43%, opposes the idea. More than seven in 10 Democrats back the plan, while 67% of Republicans are against it. By a margin of 47-42, independents lean against the plan.

The poll also finds that more than half of voters, 56%, back Bidens extension of a pause on student loan payments until the end of the year. And more than three-quarters of voters, including 86% of Democrats and 68% of Republicans, support the idea of developing a plan to address the high cost of college.

The state of Texas has spent nearly $13 million to bus migrants to New York City and Washington, D.C., according to data from the Texas Division of Emergency Management reported by CNN, which obtained the figures through a Freedom of Information Act filing.

CNNs Polo Sandoval and Andy Rose report that released migrants are usually responsible for the cost of their own travel through the United States, but under GOP Gov. Greg Abbott, Texas has been paying to relocate thousands of migrants to those northern cities. The program is a political move meant to highlight the Biden administrations immigration policies and what Republicans call a border crisis. "Before we began busing migrants up to New York, it was just Texas and Arizona that bore the brunt of all the chaos and all the problems that come with it," Abbott told ABC News earlier this month. "Now, the rest of America is understanding exactly what is going on."

As of August 9, Texas had paid more than $12.7 million to Wynne Transportation, the charter service bussing the migrants. The El Paso Times notes that the spending total amounts to about $1,300 per person, whereas one-way, same-day tickets from El Paso to New York or Washington D.C. cost around $300 and same-day flights run less than $400.

Texas has solicited private donations to help pay for the cost of the bus trips, but the state had only received $167,828 as of August 17, CNN says. At a news conference in April announcing the program, Abbott acknowledged taxpayers were likely to end up with part of the bill.

CNN reports that Arizona has spent about $3.5 million bussing migrants, according to Republican Gov. Doug Duceys office.

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Another Shocking Decline in Life Expectancy | The Fiscal Times - The Fiscal Times

Liz Truss is Britains new Prime Minister, The election of a new leader in place of Boris Johnson in the internal election of the Conservative Party was overwhelming.

The formal transfer of power from Boris Johnson to the truss will take place this Tuesday in the presence of Queen Elizabeth II, In his first message after the campaign, Truss reaffirms that reduction in taxes will be their priority to boost the national economy, but made it clear that they would take the necessary measures to help with energy prices that doubled in early October. We believe in freedom, low taxes, and personal responsibility to deal with life. I campaigned as a conservative. And Ill rule as a conservative. Im going to tackle the energy crisis, on both bills. which households receive and in long-term problems of energy supply, Truss said.

https://content.jwplatform.com/previews/N0zOA8mq-buQgiLVC

The truce plan in a week should go into detail for the issue that keeps the British awake: the tariffs that await them in the weeks before the harsh British winter. According to The Times and Daily Telegraph, Truss is analyzing the possibility of a price freeze, a proposal made weeks ago by Labor and rejected by conservatives at the time and until this weekend. Social pressure and new price increases this morning in the United Kingdom and the European Union following the Russian announcement to close the Nord Stream 1 gas pipeline are forcing a change in direction in mono-thematic proposals for a truce. Taxes for corporations and the wealthy) as a solution to all socio-economic problems.

In an interview published this morning by the Financial Times, The truces almost certain finance minister, ultra-neoliberal Quasi Quarteng, indicated that he understood the need to take decisive action on electricity and gas bills. And they will do so by adopting responsible fiscal policies (British public debt has risen from 60 to 90% of GDP since the pandemic). There is speculation at the moment that they will seek a moratorium on rates for the most neglected sectors, without knowing what will happen to the middle class and small and medium-sized companies that have been sunk by the rise in prices.

The social environment doesnt make much difference. In recent months, workers in transport, mail, waste pickers, telecom, Amazon and call centers have gone on strike. In the coming weeks, nurses from the National Health Service and the education sector will vote to decide whether to join this wave of strikes.

And its not just about energy rates. Inflation exceeded 10% and according to analysts, will reach 18% next year. Wage arrears and freezing in some sectors of the conservative government of the past 12 years has slashed purchasing power to its lowest level in decades. The unified term that has been used for the current situation is the cost of living crisis. But in the context of industry, for example, pay cuts have been made. I feel like the Conservatives dont know whats going on, Sharon Graham, general secretary of one of Unites most powerful British unions, told The Guardian. A sign of the times, during a solidarity visit with Felixstow Dock Strikers Statements were made.

Trusss economic program and the promises he made (tax cuts of 27 billion, increased defense and health budgets, fiscal balances, etc.) concern the Tories themselves. David Davis, a former minister in Theresa Mays government, told the Financial Times that conservative principles are at stake. Liz Truss has to think carefully about what shes going to do. The worst outcome of your economic program could be that tax cuts become a dirty word by applying them at the wrong time, Davis said.

Paul Johnson, director of the Institute for Independent Financial Studies, went ahead. What he proposes may not only force us to increase credit in a significant way in the short run, but it will further add to inflationary pressures. He is right that the economic growth of the last 15 years has been disastrous. But taxes Cutting in is not a growth strategy, Johnson said.

Continued here:

Liz Truss Has Been Elected As The New Prime Minister Of The United Kingdom. Replace Boris Johnson - Nation World News

In 1967, Martin Luther King Jr. spoke at Harlems Riverside Church to a crowd of thousands that flowed out the door as far as 120th Street. King publicly condemned the Vietnam War because it had broken and eviscerated the civil-rights and anti-poverty movements at home. The American government was the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today.

Read: Martin Luther King Jr. on the Vietnam War

In 2022, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky invoked another MLK speech while asking Congress to help his country repel the Russian invasion. I have a dream. These words are known to each of you today. I can say, I have a need: I need to protect our sky. Two months later, Democrats voted unanimously in favor of a $40 billion package of arms and other assistance to Kyiv.

These two moments capture an important shift in how the American left thinks about the U.S. military and war more generally. Progressives typically see war as inherently murderous and dehumanizingsapping progress, curtailing free expression, and channeling resources into the military-industrial complex. The left led the opposition to the Vietnam War and the Iraq War and condemned American war crimes from the My Lai massacre to Abu Ghraib. Historically, progressive critics have charged the military with a litany of sins, including discrimination against LGBTQ soldiers and a reliance on recruiting in poor communities.

Meanwhile, for decades, the right embraced Americas warriors. Defense hawks were one of the three legs of the Reagan stool, along with social and fiscal conservatives. The military itself leaned right. One study found that from 1976 to 1996, the number of Army officers who identified as Republican increased from one-third to two-thirds. In 2016, according to a poll in the Military Times, active service members favored Donald Trump over Hillary Clinton by a margin of nearly two to one.

In the past few years, however, these views have started to change. From 2021 to 2022, the share of Republicans who had a great deal or quite a lot of confidence in the military fell from 81 to 71 percent, whereas for Democrats, the number increased from 63 to 67 percentcutting the gap from 18 points to four. And the militarys views shifted in tandem. In 2020, dozens of former Republican national-security officials endorsed President Joe Biden because Trump had gravely damaged Americas role as a world leader. In one poll before the 2020 election, more active service members backed Biden than Trump (41 to 37 percent).

Why has this happened? Two big reasons are Trump and Ukraine.

Trump saw the military as a symbol of power and surrounded himself with a phalanx of generals. But when he realized they were not a Praetorian Guard that would do his bidding, defend him against all enemies foreign and domestic, and keep him in office by force if necessary, he soured on the military. Trump trampled on its most sacred beliefs and rituals, saying that U.S. generals were dopes and babies who want to do nothing but fight wars. Americans killed in battle, he said, were losers and suckers. Trump suggested that Gold Star families had spread COVID at the White House. He railed against American prisoners of war: I like people who werent captured. He pardoned three service members accused or convicted of war crimes, even though military leaders said it would erode the militarys code of justice. In his testimony to Congress, Trumps acting defense secretary, Christopher Miller, said that Trump had told him to ready the National Guard to protect his supporters on January 6, rather than Congress itself. All of this created a fundamental clash with the militarys code of honor and its commitment to the Constitution. Trump wondered why American generals couldnt be more like Hitlers generalsby which he meant the loyalist fanatics who battled in the ruins of Berlin, not the Wehrmacht officials who tried to assassinate the Nazi dictator.

Since he left office, Trump has fueled the conservative belief that Biden is indoctrinating the armed forces with liberal ideas. Republican Senator Ted Cruz said the U.S. military is suffering from a woke cancer and is in danger of becoming a bunch of pansies. The Fox News host Laura Ingraham suggested defunding the military until it abandons its diversity programs: Go after their budget.

Its true that the military has moved left, and not just because of Trump. After George Floyd was murdered in 2020, Kaleth Wright tweeted: Who am I? I am a Black man who happens to be Chief Master Sergeant of the Air Force. Last year the Pentagon warned, To keep the nation secure, we must tackle the existential threat of climate change.

This shouldnt be so surprising. The military is the epitome of big government, with egalitarian wages, socialized medicine, and the best government-run child-care system in the country. No wonder General Wesley Clark joked that its the purest application of socialism there is. Now progressives are expressing a new gratitude for an institution that understands the value of diversity, cares about the rule of law, and was willing to stand up to Trump when the future of democracy was most in danger. At a time of rampant conspiracy theories like QAnon, liberals appreciate that the military operates in a world of tangible threats and complex logistics and has a basic respect for reality. George Orwell said people often cling to falsehoods until the lie slams into the truth, usually on a battlefield.

Then came Russias invasion of Ukraine. No foreign conflict since the Spanish Civil War has so captured the imagination of the left. Nearly a century ago, many progressives saw Spain as a pure fight between democracy and fascism. Ernest Hemingways novel For Whom the Bell Tolls and Pablo Picassos painting Guernica captured the horror at fascist brutality. About 3,000 Americans traveled to Spain to fight in the international brigades. Today, many on the left see Ukraine as another contest between fascism and democracy, and that rare thing: a good war. Thousands of Americans have gone to join the struggle.

Russian President Vladimir Putin is the antithesis of everything the left stands for. Not only did he launch an unprovoked attack on a sovereign democratic nation, but he has also disparaged LGBTQ rights, multiculturalism, and immigration, and claimed that the liberal idea has outlived its purpose. Zelensky, in contrast, has built bridges with the global left. He addressed the Glastonbury music festival, in the U.K., where the revelers chanted his name to the tune of The White Stripes Seven Nation Army. In Germany, the Green Party led the charge to supply weapons to Kyiv, overturning decades of German wariness about intervening in foreign wars. LGBTQ protesters in Berlin also demanded that Germany step up arms shipments to Ukraine, so that a Pride parade can, one day, be held in the Russian-occupied city of Mariupol. Ukrainian liberalsartists, translators, teachers, filmmakershave joined the struggle. As one writer put it: All our hipsters in Ukraine fight.

To be sure, theres a leftist fringe in the United States that still considers America the worlds evil empire and remains deeply hostile to its military power. That fringe includes the linguist and political activist Noam Chomsky, who praised Trump as a model statesman for pushing for a negotiated peace in Ukraine. But the bulk of the left has shown remarkable solidarity with the Ukrainian cause. Liberals who once protested the Iraq War now urge Washington to dispatch more rocket launchers to defeat Russian imperialism. Representative Jamaal Bowman of New York, a member of the progressive caucus, tweeted: We unequivocally stand with the global Ukrainian community in the wake of Putins attack.

The main opposition to helping Ukraine has come from the right. Trump, who has long praised Putin as a genius, questioned why Americans were sending so much money to Ukraine. Most congressional Republicans backed the aid package to Kyiv in May, but 11 Republican senators and 57 House Republicans opposed it. Republican Representative Matt Gaetz tweeted that if the GOP takes the House in the upcoming midterms, support for Ukraine will end. The Fox News host Tucker Carlson claimed that Ukraine is an American puppet state, and that his real enemies are not in Moscow but on the American left: Has Putin ever called me a racist?

In March, Democrats were 10 points more likely than Republicans to say that Washington has a responsibility to protect and defend Ukraine from Russia. By July, this gap had grown to 22 points. Another recent survey found that Democrats were more supportive than Republicans of sending weapons to Ukraine as well as of accepting Ukrainian refugees in the United States. A remarkable 42 percent of Democrats favored deploying American troops to Ukraine, versus 34 percent of Republicans.

Progressives have always viewed foreign conflicts and domestic struggles as connectedwith war being either a dangerous contagion or a righteous crusade. A poster from the Spanish Civil War showed the image of a dead child: If you tolerate this, your children will be next. A generation later, the pendulum swung, and King saw intervention in Vietnam as a threat to civil rights in America. Today, the pendulum has swung back, and the left sees the march for freedom in America and the battle to defend Ukraine as elements of the same global fight for democracy. After all, the aggressor in UkrainePutinalso meddled in the 2016 election to help Trump.

Will the alliance between the left and the military last? Progressives may grow nervous about escalation in Ukraine or lose interest in the war. The economy remains the most pressing issue for most Americans. Perhaps, like Orwell in Catalonia, some American volunteers in Ukraine may decide that the struggle is not as pure as they thought. The lefts underlying concerns about the U.S. military have hardly disappeared. Republicans may one day shove Trump offstage and try to get the 80s band back togetherdefense hawks, social conservatives, and fiscal conservatives.

But for now, Trump remains the dominant force in the Republican Party. The Ukrainian cause remains resonant. And the left may worry about another authoritarian great power that threatens a smaller democracy: China mobilizing against Taiwan.

An era of liberal hawkishness should not mean an unthinking embrace of the military. America needs a strong progressive voice to check the rampant waste in the military-industrial complex (which ran to hundreds of billions of dollars in Iraq and Afghanistan). The military has very real problems, like the crisis of sexual assault. It doesnt benefit from the sort of soft-focus Thank you for your service reverence that has prevented people from asking tough questions about Americas disastrous wars in the past. On Ukraine, liberals can channel Washingtons policy in a more progressive direction, stressing human rights, pressing for investment in green technology to reduce reliance on Russian energy, and going after Moscows dirty money.

In the end, the U.S. military is the worlds anti-fascist insurance policy. The insurance premiums may be outlandish. And most of the time we dont need the policy. Until one day we do. If you need to ship M777 howitzers to Ukraine, the military-industrial complex has its uses.

In 1967, King was right to see Vietnam as a catastrophe for America, at home and abroad. If Americas soul becomes totally poisoned, part of the autopsy must read: Vietnam. But today we face a different world, and a stark choice. Zelensky, Ukrainian progressives, and the European Union? Or Putin, Trump, and Tucker Carlson? The left picked the right side.

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Why the Left Is Learning to Love the Military - The Atlantic

Bob Mackin

Almost 27% of taxpayers money the B.C. Legislative Assembly spent in 2021 on salaries and suppliers was hidden in the institutions annual report.

Clerk Kate Ryan-Lloyd (Association of Former MLAs of B.C./John Yanyshyn)

The annual disclosure report, published in the Aug. 30 B.C. government public accounts, shows almost $60.7 million was paid out during the last fiscal year, which ended March 31. Of that, individual recipients of aggregate payments totalling $16.28 million are not shown because they do not meet reporting thresholds and the freedom of information law does not apply to the seat of government.

A list of named and titled employees shows $11.38 million in salaries over $75,000. But another $12.58 million was paid in salaries under the $75,000 mark. The report does not include salaries and wages paid to constituency assistants on behalf of MLAs.

The list also shows payments totalling $33,017,841 to suppliers for goods and services, as well as other provincial and federal departments for taxes and pensions. There is an unknown number of suppliers who were paid $24,999 or less last year, for a total of $3,696,443.

NDP House Leader Mike Farnworth promised in early 2019, after Speaker Darryl Plecas and chief of staff Alan Mullen discovered corruption by the clerk and sergeant-at-arms, that the Legislature would finally come under the 1993 Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act. Three Legislature-appointed watchdogs, including Information and Privacy Commissioner Michael McEvoy, had publicly called for new transparency and accountability measures to prevent another spending scandal.

Green house leader Sonia Furstenau (left), NDPs Mike Farnworth and BC Liberals Mary Polak in 2019 (Mackin)

However, more than three-and-a-half years later, the NDP has still not acted on Farnworths promise. In June, an all-party committee recommended the law be extended to cover the Legislative Assemblys administrative functions, which would include spending.

There is no reason why the Legislative Assembly should not, in respect of its administrative functions, be subject to the same transparency and accountability rules as the more than 2,900 public bodies across the province, McEvoy said in April 7 testimony to the committee.

It is time for the Legislative Assembly to adhere to the same standards.

Clerk Kate Ryan-Lloyd was the highest-paid employee last year, at $284,504, followed by law clerk and parliamentary counsel Suzie Seo at $225,860 and executive financial officer Hilary Woodward, at $206,780.

Woodward was apparently terminated June 22 after a sudden meeting with Ryan-Lloyd. Ryan-Lloyd refused to comment, calling it a personnel matter. Replacement Randall Smith began June 23. There was no mention made about Woodwards departure during the open portion of a Legislative Assembly Management Committee meeting the following week.

B.C. Legislature beancounter Hillary Woodward (BC Leg)

Woodward was the last witness at the fraud and breach of trust trial of Ryan-Lloyds mentor Craig James. Ex-clerk James, found guilty of spending almost $1,900 of taxpayers money on a custom suit and shirts for personal use, was sentenced in July to a month of house arrest and two months of curfew.

The biggest private sector supplier to the Legislative Assembly was computer support contractor Tecnet Canada Inc. at $1,049,556, followed by Microsoft Canada for $804,135. There were $312,316 in severance payments, but the number of recipients and their names and titles were not disclosed.

Suppliers included NDP advertising agencies Romar Communications ($184,800) and Now Communications Group ($145,606). McCarthy Tetrault LLP was the top-paid law firm ($105,097). The list did not include any payments to Fasken, the Vancouver law firm that defended James at his B.C. Supreme Court trial.

Otherwise, the three biggest payments were $7,392,604 to B.C. Pension Corp., $2,202,211 to Receiver General for Canada, and $1,514,428 to the B.C. Public Service Agency. The Legislature paid $929,365 for the employer health tax in 2021-2022.

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Millions of dollars spent secretly at B.C. Legislature - theBreaker - theBreaker

NEW DELHI: India had surpassed UK as the fifth-largest economy as early as December 2021, according to a State Bank of India report. The share of Indias GDP in global GDP is now at 3.5%, as against 2.6% in 2014 and is likely to cross 4% in 2027, the current share of Germany, according to the SBI report. The path taken by India since 2014 reveals it is likely to get the tag of third-largest economy in 2029, a movement of seven places upwards since 2014 when India was ranked 10th. India should surpass Germany in 2027 and most likely Japan by 2029 at the current rate of growth, Soumya Kanti Ghosh, group chief economic adviser at SBI, said in the research note. The Indian economy is forecast to grow by 7-7.5% in the current fiscal year while the UK economy has been battling a sharp slide in growth and record high inflation. Latest data showed the Indian economy grew by 13.5% in the quarter ended June. The IMF has forecast India to grow by 7.4% due to the impact of the slowing global economy, inflationary pressures and monetary tightening. The IMF forecast has shown India will retain its tag as the fastest growing major economy in the world. The news of India surpassing the UK to emerge as the fifth-largest global economy triggered a range of responses on social media with some saying there is a huge gap still to be filled when it comes to per capita income. Proud moment for India to pip UK, our colonial ruler, as the 5th largest economy: India $3.5 trn vs UK $3.2 trn. But a reality check of population denominator: India: 1.4 bn vs UK: 068 bn. Hence per capita GDP we at $2,500 vs $47,000. We have miles to go Lets be at it, Kotak Mahindra Bank CEO Uday Kotak said on Twitter. Anand Mahindra, chairman of Mahindra group, also hailed the milestone. The law of Karma works. News that would have filled the hearts of every Indian that fought hard and sacrificed much for freedom. And a silent but strong reply to those who thought India would descend into chaos. A time for silent reflection, gratitude, he tweeted. RBI deputy governor Michael Debabrata Patra had last month said currently, India is the third-largest economy in the world in terms of purchasing power parity (PPP), with a share of 7% of global GDP (after China (18%) and the US (16% )). He said Indias GDP in market exchange rates is expected to reach $5 trillion by 2027. By that year, Indias GDP in purchasing power parity terms will exceed $16 trillion (up from $10 trillion in 2021). The OECDs 2021 calculations indicate that the Indian economy will overtake the US by 2048. This would make India the largest economy in the world after China, Patra had said in his speech at a function in Bhubaneswar.

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Economy forecast to grow by 7-7.5% in current fiscal Times of India - English Bharat Times

K.N. Balagopal, the Kerala finance minister, recently wrote a detailed letter to the Union finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman in the backdrop of the grave financial crisis that state governments are facing currently. The letter states that the Union Ministry of Finance has arbitrarily, in the name of off-budget borrowing, made a reduction of approximately Rs 4,000 crore in the net borrowing limits of the state.

According to Balagopal, in all, the Kerala government alone would have to contend with a reduction of Rs 23,000 crore in the financial resources available to it for financing the budget in the current financial year, which would seriously impact the governments ability to finance its welfare expenditure, including for targeted schemes for the poor, for housing, education, and healthcare.

The letter also raises some serious issues with respect to the governing dynamics of Centre-state federal relations when it comes to allowing autonomy to states like Kerala to manage their own fiscal position vis--vis the Centre, and with respect to the constitutional interpretation of clauses provided under Article 280, often referred to by the Finance Commissions for regulating sub-national borrowings.

Balagopals letter says:

Article 293(3) of the Constitution fetters the states power to raise loans. Under this provision, if there is still any part of a loan made to the State by the Government of India or in respect of which the Government of India has given a guarantee, State is forbidden from raising any loan without the consent of the Union Government. The words any loan in this chapter must be read in light of the accepted canons of Interpretation of Statutes.

In simple terms, the words any loan appearing in Article 293 (3) must be read as any loan advanced by the Union government. This was reasonably well settled in the 1987 Supreme Court judgment of Chandra Mohan vs State of UP (1966). Any different interpretation of the words any loan would cut at the root of the nations federalist core, which is part of the basic structure of the constitution.

More importantly, Article 293(3) can be legitimately used for imposing conditions related to a request for borrowing of a State Government. This cannot be used to control or administer the borrowing of the State Government. Under the Constitution, these are matters that exclusively remain in the domain of the State Government.

The Union governments coercive attitude remains consistent in its treatment and interpretation of clauses with other non-BJP ruled states too. Recently, the Telangana and Tamil Nadu governments too made similar observations about the need to preserve constitutionally safeguarded state-autonomy in being able to manage its fiscal priorities (including for borrowings made).

Article 283(2) confers on the states the powers of regulating its Public Account under law made by the legislature of the state. The Public Account of the states reflects its internal financial transactions where constitutionally the State plays the role of a banker to itself. As Balagopal rightly argues:

..Without a valid legal or financial basis, Government of India, by deciding to arbitrarily exclude amounts in the Public Account in assigning the net borrowing ceiling, has attempted to make serious inroads into the constitutional financial powers of the State Governments while at the same time seriously impairing the ability of the State to manage its liquidity from time to time.

This seems contemptible and is likely to lead to longer term conflicts in the federal relations between other BJP and non-BJP ruled states.

Another key bone of contention for state governments is the fact how the (Union) Ministry of Finance has now stipulated that along with balances maintained in the Public Account of a state government, all borrowings of state government entities receiving budgetary support from the state budget will also be taken into consideration while setting the borrowing limits of the respective state government.

While the Union government has failed to consistently share its outlay-ed plan of fiscal compensation (from GST and other sources) with most states, it is now imposing additional restrictions to minimise state-capacity to borrow to finance their needs, through differed interpretations of existing constitutional provisions. At the same time, it does not impose any such limits on its own borrowings by taking into account the borrowings of the agencies set up by it.

Further, the scope of Article 293(3) and (4) are limited to the state as defined under Article 1 (1) of the constitution. It cannot be extended to include the debt of government agencies, including companies and statutory bodies. It must also be emphasised how under the given federal-state financial architecture in the constitution, the constitutional structure for making any such recommendations is the Finance Commission.

Balagopal adds:

None of the previous fourteen Finance Commissions have made any such recommendation that could serve as the basis for the decision made by the Department of Expenditure. It would be (therefore) wrong to interpretatively and selectively use Article 293(3) to undermine the federal character of the Constitution.

Kerala finance minister K.N. Balagopal.

Protecting states fiscal space

To put into context, it must be realised that during most of the last two years, despite a pandemic wreaking havoc on almost all states fiscal positions, exacerbating the public debt levels of states and that of the Union government, the Modi government offered little direct support for the most affected state governments to meet their financial needs.

Any assistance offered was in the form of liquidity support with the opportunity to borrow through the RBI or Centre, if the need arises. As we see from Balagopals letter here too, the loss of (fiscal) autonomy to state governments is further likely to make state governments even more skeptical of any Union-offered support, which is unfortunate, given the troubling macro numbers available on Union and state-deficits, debt, and other liabilities (see below).

Source: Handbook of Statistics on Indian Economy (RBI) and Union Budget Documents, 2012-23

Source: Handbook of Statistics on Indian Economy (RBI) and Union Budget Documents, 2012-23

As Pinaki Chakraborty argues in EPW, on the fiscal consolidation story between 2020-21 (the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic) and 2022-23, the fiscal challenges for the Union-states have eased but remain present as they navigate economic recovery in uncertain times. The reasons are many.

First, it is difficult to predict the impact of the ongoing war between Russia and Ukraine on the fiscal situation as we move to the fiscal year 202223. Second, between 2020-21 and 2022-23 (BE), the reduction in the revenue deficit has been substantial, that is, from 7.3% to 3.8% of the GDP. Third, compositionally, revenue deficit continues to be more than 55% of the fiscal deficit and management of such a deficit has a few important considerations for revenue expenditure, that is (i) interest payments and (ii) allocation under various centrally sponsored and central sector schemes. In 2021-22 (RE), interest payment is 25.7% of the revenue expenditure and 39.14% of revenue receipts.

As a percentage of the GDP, it increased from 3.1% to 3.6% of the GDP during 2012-13 to 2022-23 (BE). This implies corresponding reduction in the fiscal space for primary expenditure for discretionary development spending. Within the discretionary development spending, changes in allocation within the centrally sponsored schemes (CSSs) basket receive a great deal of attention after every budget.

However, the fundamental point, as per Dr. Chakraborty, is that resources flow to the states in the form of CSSs are still substantial. Aggregate allocation under centrally sponsored and central sector schemes as per the 2022-23 (BE) is 3.83 lakh crore and the interest payment cost of the union government is 9.56 lakh crore. Beyond scheme-wise allocations, it is also important to consider the CSS allocation as an issue of macro-fiscal management at the union and state levels, especially when it is contributing to a high revenue deficit of the union government and binding state resources for matching contributions, thereby increasing states deficit.

In managing the swelling fiscal deficit and public debt levels (including of fiscally weak states), the public expenditure composition and fiscal priorities must be more clearly understood, due to differed constitutional assignment of functions for the Union and state governments. Most redistributive expenditures critical for welfare outcomes are in the functional domain of states.

A contraction of such expenditure at the state level can have adverse distributional consequences, with a regression being already observed in performance outcomes state-level performance on access to education, healthcare, social security, particularly for the vulnerable and marginalised sections. Welfare driven expenditure needs arent part of revdi politics but more about securing a governments basic responsibility to its people and the larger citizenry.

Hence, state governments (irrespective of their party affiliation) need all the support they can get at this point to either borrow more freely under a mutually agreed fiscal roadmap for their developmental needs, or be otherwise supported to manage their finances on their own, or through borrowing financed support offered by the Union government.

In either of the scenarios, fiscal cooperation and transparent functioning is vital for protecting states fiscal space and enhancing macroeconomic stability. There is no room for an ad hoc arbitrary decision making mechanism, nor selective partisan constitutional interpretations, which might trigger more direct confrontation between State governments and the Union Ministry of Finance going forward.

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The Union Government Is Arbitrarily Squeezing States Fiscal Freedom To Borrow - The Wire