STOCK MARKET WATCH -- Tuesday, 3 September 2013

[Tansy_Gold]

[font size=3]STOCK MARKET WATCH, Tuesday, 3 September 2013[font color=black][/font]

SMW for 30 August 2013

AT THE CLOSING BELL ON 30 August 2013
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Dow Jones 14,810.31 -30.64 (-0.21%)
S&P 500 1,632.97 -5.20 (-0.32%)
Nasdaq 3,589.87 -30.43 (-0.84%)


[font color=red]10 Year 2.79% +0.03 (1.09%)
[font color=green] 30 Year 3.70% -0.01 (-0.27%) [font color=black]


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[font size=2]Market Conditions During Trading Hours[/font]
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[font size=2]Euro, Yen, Loonie, Silver and Gold[center]

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[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Market Data and News:[/font][/font]
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Economic Calendar
Marketwatch Data
Bloomberg Economic News
Yahoo Finance
Google Finance
Bank Tracker
Credit Union Tracker
Daily Job Cuts
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[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Economic Blogs:[/font][/font]
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The Big Picture
Financial Sense
Calculated Risk
Naked Capitalism
Credit Writedowns
Brad DeLong
Bonddad
Atrios
goldmansachs666
The Stand-Up Economist
The Automatic Earth
Wall Street on Parade
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[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Essential Reading:[/font][/font]
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Matt Taibi: Secret and Lies of the Bailout


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[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Government Issues:[/font][/font]
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LegitGov
Open Government
Earmark Database
USA spending.gov
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[font color=black][font size=2]Handy Links - Videos:[/font][/font]
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Charlie Rose talks with Roubini
Charlie Rose talks with Krugman
William Black: This Economic Disaster
Bill Moyers with Kevin Drum and David Corn
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[font color=red]Partial List of Financial Sector Officials Convicted since 1/20/09 [/font][font color=red]
2/2/12 David Higgs and Salmaan Siddiqui, Credit Suisse, plead guilty to conspiracy involving valuation of MBS
3/6/12 Allen Stanford, former Caribbean billionaire and general schmuck, convicted on 13 of 14 counts in $2.2B Ponzi scheme, faces 20+ years in prison
6/4/12 Matthew Kluger, lawyer, sentenced to 12 years in prison, along with co-conspirator stock trader Garrett Bauer (9 years) and co-conspirator Kenneth Robinson (not yet sentenced) for 17 year insider trading scheme.
6/14/12 Allen Stanford sentenced to 110 years without parole.
6/15/12 Rajat Gupta, former Goldman Sachs director, found guilty of insider trading. Could face a decade in prison when sentenced later this year.
6/22/12 Timothy S. Durham, 49, former CEO of Fair Financial Company, convicted of one count conspiracy to commit wire and securities fraud, 10 counts of wire fraud, and one count of securities fraud.
6/22/12 James F. Cochran, 56, former chairman of the board of Fair, convicted of one count of conspiracy to commit wire and securities fraud, one count of securities fraud, and six counts of wire fraud.
6/22/12 Rick D. Snow, 48, former CFO of Fair, convicted of one count of conspiracy to commit wire and securities fraud, one count of securities fraud, and three counts of wire fraud.
7/13/12 Russell Wassendorf Sr., CEO of collapsed brokerage firm Peregrine Financial Group Inc. arrested and charged with lying to regulators after admitting to authorities he embezzled "millions of dollars" and forged bank statements for "nearly twenty years."
8/22/12 Doug Whitman, Whitman Capital LLC hedge fund founder, convicted of insider trading following a trial in which he spent more than two days on the stand telling jurors he was innocent
10/26/12 UPDATE: Former Goldman Sachs director Rajat Gupta sentenced to two years in federal prison. He will, of course, appeal. . .
11/20/12 Hedge fund manager Matthew Martoma charged with insider trading at SAC Capital Advisors, and prosecutors are looking at Martoma's boss, Steven Cohen, for possible involvement.
02/14/13 Gilbert Lopez, former chief accounting officer of Stanford Financial Group, and former controller Mark Kuhrt sentenced to 20 yrs in prison for their roles in Allen Sanford's $7.2 billion Ponzi scheme.
03/29/13 Michael Sternberg, portfolio mgr at SAC Capital, arrested in NYC, charged with conspiracy and securities fraud. Pled not guilty and freed on $3m bail.
04/04/13 Matthew Marshall Taylor,fmr Goldman Sachs trader arrested, charged by CFTC w/defrauding his employer on $8BN futures bet "by intentionally concealing the true huge size, as well as the risk and potential profits or losses associated."
04/04/13 Matthew Taylor admits guilt, makes plea bargain. Sentencing set for 26 June; faces up to 20 years in prison but will likely only see 3-4 years. Says, "I am truly sorry."
04/11/13 Ex-KPMG LLP partner Scott London charged by federal prosecutors w/passing inside tips to a friend in exchange for cash, jewelry, and concert tickets; expected to plead guilty in May.
08/01/13 Fabrice Tourré convicted on six counts of security fraud, including "aiding and abetting" his former employer, Goldman Sachs
08/14/13 Javier Martin-Artajo and Julien Grout charged with wire fraud, falsifying records, and conspiracy in connection with JP Morgan's "London Whale" trade.
08/19/13 Phillip A. Falcone, manager of hedge fund Harbinger Capital Partners, agrees to admit to "wrongdoing" in market manipulation. Will banned from securities industry for 5 years and pay $18MM in disgorgement and fines.








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[font size=3][font color=red]This thread contains opinions and observations. Individuals may post their experiences, inferences and opinions on this thread. However, it should not be construed as advice. It is unethical (and probably illegal) for financial recommendations to be given here.[/font][/font][/font color=red][font color=black]

[Demeter]

1. It looks like it's cooling off

Both the weather here, and the Syrian insanity. The Japanese and Eurozone markets seem happy....maybe we won't start WW3 this month. Just the next economic collapse when Congress balks on the debt limit.

[Ghost Dog]

29. I suspect that's an illusion.

Re-adjust positions... trim and reduce sails... Expect wild weather...

Edit: Grim Cartoon.

[Demeter]

2. An Easy Way to Squeeze a Lot of Taxes from Corporations That Try to Hide Their Profits Offshore

http://www.alternet.org/economy/easy-way-squeeze-lot-taxes-corporations-try-hide-their-profits-offshore?akid=10871.227380.YXhAMQ&rd=1&src=newsletter890528&t=18


... Congress should modify the “deferral” tax loophole that lets companies dodge their taxes by moving and keeping profits “out of the country.” The top corporate tax rate is currently 35%. But corporations are allowed to “defer” paying taxes on profits earned outside of the country until they “repatriate” those profits, which means bringing the money back into the country. (Any taxes paid elsewhere are deducted from the amount owed.) There are solid reasons to allow corporations to do this. Simply put, they might need to put that money to good use, which will benefit the company, which in theory will later benefit our country. But this tax deferral has turned into a huge loophole that is draining our country of jobs, tax revenue, investment, manufacturing infrastructure and other good things We the People are supposed to receive in return for allowing these corporations to operate. Companies not only are keeping profits out of the country, the loophole gives them an incentive to engage in schemes that shift more and more jobs, production and profit centers out of the country. (One well-known example: Apple transferred ownership of it’s “crown jewels” — “intellectual property” — to Ireland.)

A Ton Of Cash That We The People Could Really Put To Use

The amount now being held outside of the country is astounding. Some estimates say that it is as much as $1.5 to 2 trillion, or even more. If the full amount were brought back and the tax rate applied that would bring a $525-700 billion windfall that the government could use to hire people to get things done that really, really need to get done like modernizing our infrastructure, hiring teachers, building high-speed rail, retrofitting homes and buildings to be energy-efficient … so many things… (Of course it would be less because of taxes paid elsewhere, etc., but we’re still talking hundreds of billions.) And, of course, after that $1.5-2 trillion is brought back and the appropriate taxes are paid the rest would either be invested or distributed to shareholders — another nice boost to the economy. Beyond the one-time windfall from bringing that cash back there would be two other major effects of changing this deferral loophole. The first, of course, is that tens of billions of revenue now withheld each year would be coming in to be taxed, thereby reducing the budget deficit. But perhaps more important, the incentive to move jobs, factories and profit centers (“crown jewels”) out of the country would be eliminated, so companies would keep factories and jobs here.

Why They Do It

The reason so much $$ is being kept away is that companies have good reason to believe that eventually they will be allowed to bring it back without paying the taxes they owe. Congress made a huge mistake in 2004 and gave corporations a “tax repatriation holiday.” They allowed companies that were holding profits outside of the country to bring those profits back without paying all of the taxes due. This created the expectation that Congress will of course do this again (and again). So, not looking a gift horse in the mouth, companies started to find ways to increase their outside-the-country profits and reduce their inside-the-country profits. Jobs, factories, production, profit centers (desks, chairs, carpets…) and everything else that could be moved out of the country started to be … moved out of the country. And it gets worse every year.

Solution: Put A Surtax On Money Held Outside The Country

Some people say we should just repeal the rule that lets companies defer taxes due on profits earned outside of the country until they bring it home. But that undoes the benefits that were the original reason to allow deferral. Here is a simple idea that could go a long way toward solving this problem. Don’t eliminate the deferral, tax it. As I said, there are good reasons to allow it in certain instances. Instead, put a surtax on profits held outside of the country. Just for illustration, suppose this surtax was 5%. This means that if a company decides to keep $1 billion of profits outside of the country, they would pay 5% of that, $50 million, each year they do this. This is not later used to reduce the amount of taxes due when they eventually bring the money home; when they finally “repatriate” the profits they would be still taxed at the same rate as now (up to 35% minus taxes paid elsewhere, etc.) But instead of gaining from keeping the money out of the country, it instead costs them 5% each year they keep it out. Of course, this must be coupled with the end of any hope that Congress will eventually give in to hostage-taking and let companies bring profits back at some reduced rate. That was a mistake that has cost the country dearly in lost revenue, jobs, factories, profit centers, (desks, chairs, carpets…) and also cost the country money that should be either invested or distributed to shareholders. If the companies decide to continue to hold that $1.5-2 trillion outside of the country this surtax would bring the government between $75 and $100 billion per year of additional tax revenue, and these companies would also eventually have to bring it back and pay the up-to-$700 billion due in taxes as well. I’d be happy with that, and so would the country.

Dave Johnson is a fellow at Campaign for America's Future and a senior fellow at Renew California.


I DON'T KNOW, BUT IT'S WORTH A TRY....

[Demeter]

3. Bill Black: Zero Prosecutions of Elite Banksters is Too Many for the Wall Street Journal

http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2013/08/bill-black-zero-prosecutions-of-elite-banksters-is-too-many-for-the-wall-street-journal.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+NakedCapitalism+%28naked+capitalism%29

By Bill Black, the author of The Best Way to Rob a Bank is to Own One and an associate professor of economics and law at the University of Missouri-Kansas City. Cross posed from New Economic Perspectives

Unintentional self-parody was the result to a coordinated effort by the systemically dangerous institutions’ (SDIs) press flacks to gin up outrage that the Department of Justice (DOJ) would have the audacity to sue the SDIs’ for their manifold violations of the law. The Wall Street Journal recalled one of its former opinion page pundits to active duty as a shill for the Street. George Melloan’s August 25 column warned:

If dubious prosecutions continue to mount, they could backfire on the regulatory agencies and further diminish sinking public confidence in government. Ask the folks at the IRS.

Given the fact that there are zero prosecutions of any of the elite bankers whose frauds drove the crisis the phrase “if dubious prosecutions continue to mount” is surreal. Melloan’s IRS reference is a threat aimed at the banking regulators. If they ever emerge from their torpor and begin make criminal referrals and demand that DOJ prosecute the banksters Melloan is threatening to reprise the kneecapping that that Republicans members of Congress inflicted on the IRS at Senate hearings in 1989. Senator Roth (R. Del.) staged the hearing quite brilliantly as a series of alleged “horror stories” often told by alleged IRS “whistleblowers”......There were only two problems with the Republican’s self-described “horror stories” – they weren’t true and they provided the pretext for the Republicans to gut the effective enforcement of the tax laws and the wealthiest tax cheats. But that description leaves out much of the story, for the Clinton and Gore administration under the rubric of “Reinventing Government” endorsed the Republican slanders of the IRS and partnered eagerly with the Republicans and wealthy business interests to gut the IRS’ effectiveness. The two administration officials that designed the 200 specific measures that gutted the IRS were Treasury Secretary Rubin and his deputy, Larry Summers.

The Charges against the IRS Were Baseless, Partisan Slanders

............

The Clinton Gore Administration Threw the IRS to the Wolves

The Republicans were, of course, using the Senate hearings on the demon IRS to attack the Clinton administration, the IRS and its employees, and the legitimacy of government. Fortunately, the Clinton administration was dedicated to “Reinventing Government” (ReGo) as their central domestic initiative. One of ReGo’s mantras was that the administration would support government workers and emphasize that they were not the problem. On April 7, 1997, Vice President Al Gore gave one of many talks stating this mantra.

What company ever succeeded in working better and smarter by pointing at its own employees and saying, ‘They are the problem.’ None. For obvious reasons.

I was convinced that you, the federal employees, were not the problem but that you were the solution, and that you are the solution

.

Naturally, therefore, the Democratic administration rallied immediately to defend the IRS employees who were the subject of this baseless, partisan demonization by the Republicans.
(Just kidding; we are talking about Clinton and Gore. They threw the IRS employees who were being smeared by the Republicans to the wolves. They were “the problem” rather than “the solution.” Gore’s promises were inoperative within four months.)

On October 10, 1997, a few months after Gore’s ode to federal workers, Clinton (supported by Bob Rubin and Larry Summers) assumed that the slandered IRS officials were guilty as charged by the Republicans.

I took particular interest in the recent congressional hearings into the problems of IRS policy and some specific examples of taxpayer abuse. Like most Americans, I was genuinely angered by the stories of our citizens harassed and humiliated by what seemed to them to be an all-powerful, unaccountable, and often down right tone-deaf agency.

It is clear that we have more to do. The IRS should be above reproach. Americans who work hard and pay their taxes deserve to be treated fairly, and no one should ever have a home, a car, a livelihood threatened by unaccountable actions of government. Abuse or bullying or callousness by officials of our government are unacceptable whenever and wherever they occur. If they occur once, it’s once too many. But especially in connection with the IRS, it is important that they be rooted out.

Let me say that it’s important, too, for the American people to know that the IRS is made up overwhelmingly of hard-working and dedicated people who put in long hours in public service. The vast majority of them do their jobs well, and the vast majority of them were just as outraged by the case studies profiled in the congressional hearings as other Americans were.

It is clear that in spite of our best efforts in the past, there remain significant problems and challenges at the IRS. That’s why last May the Vice President and the Secretary of the Treasury initiated their effort to deal with problems, many of which have been a long time in the making, but which have to be addressed and addressed now.

Their initiatives will take significant steps toward ending abuses, protecting taxpayers and making the IRS more customer- friendly.

Let me say, I can’t go over all 200 recommendations, although I hope that most of them will be widely reported to the American people. But let me give you just a few. The package of reforms says to every taxpayer, first, you will have a tax collection agency that is reinvented so that it serves its customers and taxpayers every bit as well as the best private companies serve their customers. As the Vice President said, reinvention begins with a ban on the use of dollar goals to evaluate IRS employee performance — goals that can give some IRS agents the wrong incentives — just as parking ticket quotas can give police officers the wrong incentives.

Fourth, we will strengthen the government and oversight of the IRS. The steps I have taken today are building on the reforms already put in place and described by Secretary Rubin. In order to strengthen public accountability, I am seeking legislation to establish a new IRS board of trustees with the majority of members from the private sector. This board will review IRS performance on customer service, strategic plans, performance measures, and citizen advisory panel recommendations to ensure that taxpayers do, in fact, receive the treatment we say they deserve. The board would report independently, and at least annually, to the Secretary, the President, and the Congress. It will provide the private sector input we need.

I will not discuss the logical inconsistencies in these passages in this column. The Democratic Party’s leaders (Clinton and Gore) accepted baseless, partisan slanders against their own officials as revealed truth without even hearing their own officials’ side of the story. Clinton and Gore accepted the lies of the people that hated them (and would soon impeach Clinton) as revealed truth without even allowing the IRS officials to respond to the charges. That is simultaneously politically, ethically, and substantively disastrous. But Clinton descended even lower. He shamelessly praised the slanders of the Republican show trial in the Senate that trashed his administration.

MORE

[Demeter]

4. JPMorgan Bribe Probe Said to Expand in Asia as Spreadsheet Is Found

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-08-29/jpmorgan-bribe-probe-said-to-expand-in-asia-as-spreadsheet-found.html




A probe of JPMorgan Chase & Co.’s (JPM) hiring practices in China has uncovered red flags across Asia, including an internal spreadsheet that linked appointments to specific deals pursued by the bank, people with knowledge of the matter said.

The Justice Department has joined the Securities and Exchange Commission in examining whether JPMorgan hired people so that their family members in government and elsewhere would steer business to the firm, possibly violating bribery laws, said one of the people, all of whom asked to not be named because the inquiry isn’t public. The bank has opened an internal investigation that has flagged more than 200 hires for review, said two people with knowledge of the examination, results of which JPMorgan is sharing with regulators.

The scrutiny began in Hong Kong and has now expanded to countries across Asia, looking at interns as well as full-time workers, two people said. The employees include influential politicians’ family members who worked in JPMorgan’s investment bank, as well as relatives of asset-management clients, the people said. Wall Street firms have long enlisted people whose pedigree and connections can win business, a practice that doesn’t necessarily violate the law.
‘Real Jobs’

The SEC will hunt for evidence showing “these weren’t real jobs, that they were only there because their father or mother were important public officials,” said Dan Hurson, a former U.S. prosecutor and SEC lawyer who runs his own Washington practice. “If the public official requested the job for the child, that would be a strong indication to the company that the official was seeking and receiving something of value.”

MORE

[Demeter]

5. The Big Confidence Gap Splitting the U.S. Middle Class

http://go.bloomberg.com/market-now/2013/08/30/the-great-yawning-confidence-gap-in-a-little-chart/

It’s always been true that those who are better off have a more sanguine view of the economy. In the last year, though, that gap has become especially glaring. For households with income of more than $50,000 a year, confidence is up to the levels of 2007. For those below that, it’s not even close. Take a look at the chart below, which charts the Conference Board’s Consumer Confidence Index by income group since 2006.



Three things are worth pointing out here. One is that median household income in the U.S. has hovered a little above $50,000 ($52,100 now) for several years, so just about half of households end up below the $50,000 mark. The second is the surge in confidence among those in the upper half in the last year. For that group, the index now stands at 110.7, above where it was in 2007.*

The third point to notice is that those who have recovered least are not those at the bottom. It’s those in the lower part of the middle class. Look carefully at the green line, marking households that earn $35,000 to $50,000 a year. They’ve actually beome more pessimistic since 2011.

This is where the political battles of the next few years are likely to be fought. There’s plentiful evidence that the recession has been especially hard on the poor. Yesterday alone Bloomberg published stories about subsidized housing in Atlanta and striking fast food workers. What’s more surprising is that the confidence gap is actually more severe a little way up the ladder. For a long time it was a cliché that much of the U.S. working class felt ”middle class.” Now it appears that a big part of the middle class — those households in the $35,000 to $50,000 a year bracket — feels poor.

[DemReadingDU]

6. Mark Fiore: Glenn Grenwald Killed the Internet

lol

8/27/13 Glenn Grenwald Killed the Internet

You know the Internet is in trouble when people start taking plane flights to deliver messages. After Glenn Greenwald's partner was detained for nine hours and stripped of all his computer gear, it's clearly time to look at new ways of communicating.

[Demeter]

7. Obama Has Decided That It Is Safer To Buy Congress Than To Go It Alone By Paul Craig Roberts

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article36069.htm

While still claiming dictatorial powers to start a war on his own authority, Obama put his unilateral attack on Syria on hold when he received a letter from more than 160 members of the House of Representatives reminding him that to take the country to war without congressional approval is an impeachable offense and when he saw that no country that could serve as cover for a war crime, not even the puppet British government and the NATO puppet states, would support America’s announced military aggression against Syria.

Obama got away with attacking Libya without an OK from Congress, because he used Washington’s NATO puppets and not US military forces. That ploy let Obama claim that the US was not directly involved. Now that the lack of cover and the challenge from Congress has caused the would-be tyrant Obama to put on hold his attack on Syria, what can we expect?

If Obama were intelligent, and clearly anyone who would appoint Susan Rice as his national security adviser is not intelligent, he would simply let the attack on Syria fade into the background and die as Congress returns on September 9 to face the insoluble problems of the budget deficit and debt ceiling. A competent administration would realize that a government that is unable to pay its bills without heavy use of the printing press is in far too much trouble to be worrying about what is going on in Syria. No competent administration would risk a military strike that could result in a Middle East conflagration and a rise in oil prices, thus worsening the economic situation that Washington faces. But Obama and his collection of incompetents have demonstrated that they have no competence. The regime is also corrupt, and the entire edifice rests on nothing but lies.

Now that the White House realizes that Obama cannot commit a war crime without cover, here is what we can likely expect. The argument will move away from whether or not Assad used chemical weapons and become an argument that Congress must not undermine US prestige and credibility by failing to support President Obama, the latest front man for American wars of aggression. The White House will bribe, cajole, and intimidate the Congress. The regime’s argument will be that with America’s prestige and credibility on the line, Congress must support the President. The President and Secretary of State have made unequivocal statements of Assad’s guilt and their determination to punish Assad. Given Washington’s insanity, the way Washington punishes Assad for (allegedly) killing Syrians with chemical weapons is for Washington to kill more Syrians with cruise missiles.

If this doesn’t make sense to you, you don’t belong in Obama’s government or in the American media, and you could never be a neoconservative...

MORE VITRIOL AT LINK

[Demeter]

9. Obama's Carte Blanche War Resolution

http://www.moonofalabama.org/2013/09/obamas-carte-blanche-war-resolution.html/

Any war resolution Congress would pass would likely be interpreted by the administration as a license for all out war on Syria and beyond. But the first draft the executive is putting to Congress is even worse:

The President is authorized to use the Armed Forces of the United States as he determines to be necessary and appropriate in connection with the use of chemical weapons and other weapons of mass destruction in the conflict in Syria in order to -

1. prevent or deter the use or proliferation (including the transfer to terrorist groups or other state or non-state actors), within, to or from Syria, of any weapon of mass destruction, including chemical or biological weapons or components of or materials used in such weapons; or
   
2. protect the United States or its allies and partners against the threats posed by such weapons.

This draft is nearly as wide as the Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Terrorists that Congress passed on September 14 2001 and which has been (ab-)used by the Bush and Obama administrations as an undiscriminating, unlimited license to incarcerate, torture or kill anyone at the free discretion of the executive.

The key words in Obama's draft and their meaning are:

"as he determines to be necessary and appropriate" ==> no limits apply
"in connection with" ==> as everything is connected ...
"or deter the use or proliferation" ==> by whatever means
"to .. other state .. actors" ==> target Iran
"or components of or materials used" ==> from corrugated steel to petroleum products
"protect ... or its allies and partners" ==> the Zionists
"against the threats posed" ==> includes non-use but assumed existence of such weapons

It is clear from this wording that such a resolution would allow nearly everything far beyond the "punitive" few cruise missile strikes against Syrian forces the administration marketed so far. It could easily be used for an outright blockade of Iran or even a "preemptive" strike against Iran's industries in the name of "deterrence" and "protecting" Israel.

It is all or nothing, peace or unlimited war. Anyone with peace on her mind should hope and work to prevent any war resolution from passing Congress. The abuse of any war resolution by this and the next executive is practically guaranteed. And even with a Congress approved war resolution any attack by the United States against Syria would still be a illegal war of aggression under international law...MORE

[bread_and_roses]

11. We must kill the Syrians to save them!

Here we are again, and everything old is new again ... or is it "this time is different?"

How anyone can pretend there is anything either rational or ethical about such an act is beyond me.

[Demeter]

12. Or even necessary, for that matter

[Ghost Dog]

33. "unable to pay its bills without heavy use of the printing press"

Hence, the guns.

[Demeter]

8. The Last Chance to Stop the NDAA By Chris Hedges

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/the_last_chance_to_stop_the_ndaa_20130902/

I and my fellow plaintiffs have begun the third and final round of our battle to get the courts to strike down a section of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) that permits the military to seize U.S. citizens, strip them of due process and hold them indefinitely in military facilities. Carl Mayer and Bruce Afran, the lawyers who with me in January 2012 brought a lawsuit against President Barack Obama (Hedges v. Obama), are about to file papers asking the U.S. Supreme Court to hear our appeal of a 2013 ruling on the act’s Section 1021.

“First the terrorism-industrial complex assured Americans that they were only spying on foreigners, not U.S. citizens,” Mayer said to me recently. “Then they assured us that they were only spying on phone calls, not electronic communications. Then they assured us that they were not spying on American journalists. And now both [major political] parties and the Obama administration have assured us that they will not detain journalists, citizens and activists. Well, they detained journalist Chris Hedges without a lawyer, they detained journalist Laura Poitras without due process and if allowed to stand this law will permit the military to target activists, journalists and citizens in an unprecedented assault on freedom in America.”

Last year we won round one: U.S. District Judge Katherine B. Forrest of the Southern District of New York declared Section 1021 unconstitutional. The Obama administration immediately appealed her ruling and asked a higher court to put the law back into effect until Obama’s petition was heard. The appellate court agreed. The law went back on the books. I suspect it went back on the books because the administration is already using it, most likely holding U.S. citizens who are dual nationals in black sites in Afghanistan and the Middle East. If Judge Forrest’s ruling were allowed to stand, the administration, if it is indeed holding U.S. citizens in military detention centers, would be in contempt of court.

In July 2013 the appellate court, in round two, overturned Forrest’s ruling. All we have left is the Supreme Court, which may not take the case. If the Supreme Court does not take our case, the law will remain in place unless Congress strikes it down, something that federal legislators have so far refused to consider. The three branches of government may want to retain the ability to use the military to maintain control if widespread civil unrest should occur in the United States. I suspect the corporate state knows that amid the mounting effects of climate change and economic decline the military may be all that is left between the elite and an enraged population. And I suspect the corporate masters do not trust the police to protect them.

If Section 1021 stands it will mean that more than 150 years of case law in which the Supreme Court repeatedly held the military has no jurisdiction over civilians will be abolished. It will mean citizens who are charged by the government with “substantially supporting” al-Qaida, the Taliban or the nebulous category of “associated forces” will be lawfully subject to extraordinary rendition. It will mean citizens seized by the military will languish in military jails indefinitely, or in the language of Section 1021 until “the end of hostilities”—in an age of permanent war, for the rest of their lives. It will mean, in short, obliteration of our last remaining legal protections, especially now that we have lost the right to privacy, and the ascent of a crude, militarized state that serves the leviathan of corporate totalitarianism. It will mean, as Forrest pointed out in her 112-page opinion, that whole categories of Americans—and here you can assume dissidents and activists—will be subject to seizure by the military and indefinite and secret detention.

“As Justice [Robert] Jackson said in his dissent in the Korematsu case, involving the indiscriminate detention of Japanese-American citizens during World War II, once an unconstitutional military power is sanctioned by the courts it ‘lies about like a loaded weapon, ready for the hand of any authority,’ ” Mayer said.

MORE CATCH-22 AT LINK

Chris Hedges, whose column is published Mondays on Truthdig, spent nearly two decades as a foreign correspondent in Central America, the Middle East, Africa and the Balkans. He has reported from more than 50 countries and has worked for The Christian Science Monitor, National Public Radio, The Dallas Morning News and The New York Times, for which he was a foreign correspondent for 15 years.

[Demeter]

10. Labor Economics 101: Few Jobs Means Bad Jobs

http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/beat-the-press/labor-economics-101-few-jobs-means-bad-jobs

Everyone knows the story about the two old men in a retirement home. The first one complains that, "the food here is poison." His friend agrees with him then adds, "and the portions are so small."

We have been getting this story the last several years in assessments of the labor market. The economy remains far below full employment by every measure. The employment to population ratio is still more than 4 percentage points below its pre-recession level. We are almost 9 million jobs below trend levels. In addition, many have pointed out that a disproportionate number of the jobs that have been created have been low-paying jobs in sectors like hotels and restaurants.

Some analysts have picked up on the latter point to argue there has been a fundamental change in the economy. They claim we are moving to an economy that produces high-paying jobs for highly skilled people (e.g. doctors, lawyers, financial engineers) and bad jobs for everyone else. I have beaten up on this one elsewhere. (The trick for doctors and lawyers is protectionism not skills.)

However there is no dispute that bad jobs seem to be growing rapidly as a share of employment at present. The question is why. An alternative explanation to the "it just happens" view is that the weak economy itself is responsible for the proliferation of bad jobs. In other words, because the economy is not generating decent jobs in any reasonable number, workers are forced to take bad jobs. In that story the proliferation of bad jobs is the direct result of a weak economy....

MORE

[Demeter]

13. U.S. Bank Legal Bills Exceed $100 Billion

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-08-28/u-s-bank-legal-bills-exceed-100-billion.html

The six biggest U.S. banks, led by JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM) and Bank of America Corp., have piled up $103 billion in legal costs since the financial crisis, more than all dividends paid to shareholders in the past five years. That’s the amount allotted to lawyers and litigation, as well as for settling claims about shoddy mortgages and foreclosures, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The sum, equivalent to spending $51 million a day, is enough to erase everything the banks earned for 2012.

The mounting bills have vexed bankers who are counting on expense cuts to make up for slow revenue growth and make room for higher payouts. About 40 percent of the legal and litigation outlays arose since January 2012, and banks are warning the tally may surge as regulators, prosecutors and investors press new claims. The prospect is clouding outlooks for stock prices, and by some estimates the damage could last another decade.

“They’ve crossed the point of no return when it comes to the effects that these expenses are going to have on earnings,” said Jeffrey Sica, who helps oversee more than $1 billion as head of Sica Wealth Management LLC in Morristown, New Jersey, and doesn’t recommend bank stocks. “This is going to keep on hurting them, and people will start paying more attention.”

JPMorgan and Bank of America bore about 75 percent of the total costs, according to the figures compiled from company reports. JPMorgan devoted $21.3 billion to legal fees and litigation since the start of 2008, more than any other lender, and added $8.1 billion to reserves for mortgage buybacks, filings show.

.......................

Investigators may be stepping up efforts now that the economy has recovered and the solvency of the nation’s banks is no longer in doubt, according to Daniel Hurson, a former U.S. prosecutor and Securities and Exchange Commission lawyer who runs his own Washington practice.

“There may be a sense that financial institutions have gotten away with a lot and maybe now is the time to catch up,” Hurson said.

MUCH SCANDALOUS DETAIL AT LINK

[Demeter]

15. Top Litigator Set to Leave J.P. Morgan

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323407104579036952397683862.html

J.P. Morgan Chase & Co.'s co-head of litigation is leaving the nation's largest bank as J.P. Morgan faces a mounting pile of regulatory headaches, lawsuits and investigations. Michael Coyne, who is responsible for all of J.P. Morgan's litigation and government investigations, will become general counsel of UnionBanCal Corp., a smaller San Francisco lender with $102.23 billion in assets and 422 branches. New York-based J.P. Morgan has $2.4 trillion in assets and 5,657 branches. Mr. Coyne's departure after 21 years at the bank leaves J.P. Morgan without one of its top litigators as it tries to work its way through a litany of legal problems and a heightened period of scrutiny in Washington, D.C.

Another reminder of J.P. Morgan's exposure came Monday when a decision by a New York state judge was made public that awards a fund controlled by investor Leonard Blavatnik $42.5 million. Mr. Blavatnik alleged an investment unit of J.P. Morgan violated an agreement by putting too much of his fund's money in risky mortgage securities. A J.P. Morgan spokesman said "we respectfully disagree with the court's interpretation of our agreement" and "we are considering our options regarding that finding."

The bank disclosed recently that its future legal losses could be as much as $6.8 billion above its existing reserves, more than any other U.S. bank. The Department of Justice has at least seven separate probes of the bank under way, from the circumstances surrounding a giant 2012 trading loss to alleged manipulation of U.S. energy markets. Several other agencies, including the Securities and Exchange Commission and the U.K.'s Financial Conduct Authority, are also conducting investigations of how J.P. Morgan handled a series of bad bets engineered by a trader nicknamed the "London whale." Earlier this month, U.S. prosecutors filed charges against two other former J.P. Morgan traders for allegedly hiding some losses.

The exit of one of J.P. Morgan's top legal executives is also the latest in a string of high-profile departures or reassignments as the bank works to improve its internal controls and satisfy regulators. In April co-Chief Operating Officer Frank Bisignano, a longtime lieutenant of Chief Executive Officer James Dimon, left to become chief executive of Atlanta processing firm First Data Corp. He was the ninth executive since early 2012 to leave Mr. Dimon's operating committee, a group that represents all of the firm's key decision makers. Mr. Bisignano recruited two other J.P. Morgan executives to follow him, including Chief Information Officer Guy Chiarello. In May, J.P. Morgan's consumer-banking head Ryan McInerney left to become president of Visa Inc., and in June John Hogan dropped his role as chief risk officer after a four-month leave. Ashley Bacon now is chief risk officer, while Mr. Hogan, who has a new title as chairman of risk, will eventually take another senior role at the bank or leave altogether...

LOOKS LIKE RATS ARE LEAVING THE SINKING SHIP

[Demeter]

17. JPMorgan woes deepen as US demands $6bn penalty

http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/423ba922-0f27-11e3-ae66-00144feabdc0.html

US authorities are demanding JPMorgan Chase pay more than $6bn to settle allegations it mis-sold securities to government-backed mortgage companies (FANNIE AND FREDDIE) in the run-up to the financial crisis, according to people familiar with the discussions. The bank is resisting the payment, which would be its single biggest penalty in a catalogue of expensive run-ins with US authorities and one of the largest post-crisis settlements by any bank, these people said. It dwarfs the amount that JPMorgan is expected to pay to settle regulatory action over its “London whale” trading scandal and exceeds the penalties for its alleged manipulation of commodities markets.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency, a government regulator, sued JPMorgan and 17 other banks in 2011. It said the bank falsely claimed that loans backing $33bn of mortgage-backed securities complied with underwriting guidelines and that it “significantly overstated the ability of the borrowers to repay their mortgage loans”. The securities were sold to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which guarantee US home loans and also buy securities for their own investment portfolio. As borrowers began to default in 2007, the value of the securities fell sharply. The FHFA is suing the banks in its role as regulator of Fannie and Freddie.

Although JPMorgan is refusing to pay the amount requested by the government, it expects to settle for billions of dollars, according to people familiar with the situation. The mounting potential price tag was partly responsible for a warning by the bank this month that its total legal bill could exceed cash put aside to cover it by $6.8bn. It is still possible that JPMorgan could reach a lower settlement than $6bn or even win its case outright in court. But cases settled so far have seen banks pay out a high percentage of losses and banks are complaining that they have not had any significant rulings in their favour by the judge overseeing the case in the New York district court.

Last month UBS settled for $885m compared with original losses that were estimated at about $1.15bn. As the market recovered due to the improving economy, these were reduced to about $900m, said people familiar with the case, making the Swiss bank’s payment equal more than 90 per cent of the estimated losses. The notional value of securities sold by JPMorgan are five times bigger than those sold by UBS. Unlike the UBS lawsuit, the case against JPMorgan and some of the other banks alleges fraud, which the government says makes the offence more serious and strengthens its claims for substantial damages. One point of contention is that a large proportion of the securities were sold by Washington Mutual and Bear Stearns, which JPMorgan bought with the support of the government as they teetered during the crisis. Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan chief executive, has previously complained that the bank should not be punished for the alleged past misdeeds of those companies.

Also heavily exposed to the government’s lawsuits are Bank of America and the UK’s Royal Bank of Scotland...

[Demeter]

19. Former JPMorgan banker Javier Martin-Artajo arrested in Spain

http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/a0bbb1f0-0f17-11e3-8e58-00144feabdc0.html?siteedition=intl

Spanish police on LAST Tuesday arrested Javier Martin-Artajo, the former JPMorgan Chase banker accused of hiding hundreds of millions of dollars in losses from the “London whale” trade, Spain’s interior ministry said. The arrest comes just 10 days after US authorities charged Mr Martin-Artajo and Julien Grout, a junior bank employee, with falsifying bank records by artificially inflating the value of derivative trades to avoid losses. Mr Martin-Artajo, a Spanish national living in London, was vacationing in Spain at the time the charges were announced. Mr Martin-Artajo’s lawyer was not immediately available for comment. The lawyer previously said his client was not hiding from the case. The interior ministry said in a statement that the suspect had presented himself at a local police station in Madrid after being notified by the police. Mr Martin-Artajo was then taken to Spain’s Audiencia Nacional for an extradition hearing, and later released under conditions.

Spanish media reported that the former banker is officially barred from leaving the country and must present himself to a judge every 15 days. Crucially, he is also reported to have told the judge that he would not agree to extradition – a declaration that may make it difficult for the US to prosecute Mr Martin-Artajo. Spain, like most countries, is usually reluctant to extradite its own citizens against their wishes.

Bruno Iksil, the trader dubbed the “London whale”, was given an immunity deal by prosecutors and is co-operating in the case.

Mr Grout has been living in his native France since he left the bank following the 2012 trading position that ultimately resulted in $6bn in losses. It is not clear if Mr Grout intends voluntarily to come to the US or remain in France. France rarely extradites its own citizens. Edward Little, a lawyer for Mr Grout, said: “We are in serious discussions with prosecutors on how to proceed but no decision has been made.”

Both men face years in prison if convicted.

[Ghost Dog]

30. Spanish law does not permit extradition of Spanish nationals.

He'll be tried in Spain, where... No, I won't say that. But certain judges have been, um, lightly chastised for commiting the crime of "prevaricación" - not quite the same meaning as the English language term


Edit:

... High quality global journalism requires investment. Please share this article with others using the link below, do not cut & paste the article. See our Ts&Cs and Copyright Policy for more detail. Email [e-mail] to buy additional rights. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/a0bbb1f0-0f17-11e3-8e58-00144feabdc0.html#ixzz2dpfdMoeB

Mr Martin-Artajo, a Spanish national living in London, was vacationing in Spain at the time the charges were announced. Mr Martin-Artajo’s lawyer was not immediately available for comment. The lawyer previously said his client was not hiding from the case.

The interior ministry said in a statement that the suspect had presented himself at a local police station in Madrid after being notified by the police. Mr Martin-Artajo was then taken to Spain’s Audiencia Nacional for an extradition hearing, and later released under conditions.

Spanish media reported that the former banker is officially barred from leaving the country and must present himself to a judge every 15 days. Crucially, he is also reported to have told the judge that he would not agree to extradition – a declaration that may make it difficult for the US to prosecute Mr Martin-Artajo. Spain, like most countries, is usually reluctant to extradite its own citizens against their wishes...

/... http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/a0bbb1f0-0f17-11e3-8e58-00144feabdc0.html#axzz2dpfUo0Jt

[Demeter]

14. The Syrian angle Obama and the media don't mention

http://prorevnews.blogspot.com/2013/09/the-syrian-angle-obama-and-media-dont.html


In the summer of 2011, just weeks after civil war broke out in Syria, the Tehran Times released a report entitled: Iran, Iraq, Syria Sign Major Gas Pipeline Deal. The report provided details on how Iran planned to export its vast natural gas reserves to Europe through a pipeline that traversed both Iraq and Syria. This Iran-Iraq-Syria pipeline would be the largest gas pipeline in the Middle East and would span from Iran’s gas-rich South Pars field to the Mediterranean coastline in Lebanon, via Iraq and Syria. But the pipeline won’t stop there. The agreement calls for the construction of an underwater pipeline under the Mediterranean Sea stretching from Lebanon to Greece to deliver Iranian gas to energy-hungry European nations.

The 6,000 kilometer pipeline, which has a massive price tag of $10 billion, will have an estimated capacity of 100-120 million cubic feet of gas per day, with a projected completion date sometime near 2018. As of this writing, the construction of this proposed pipeline has not begun and the question of who will finance the project has not been addressed. However, in July 2013, leaders from Syria, Iran, and Iraq met to sign a preliminary agreement on the pipeline with the hopes of finalizing the deal by the end of the year.

Like its Turkish neighbor, Syria’s geographic location on the Mediterranean Sea makes it an obvious export center for landlocked oil producers within the greater Middle East seeking to export their oil and gas reserves to European markets. For this reason, Syria’s strategic location, and its warm water port on the Mediterranean, have placed it near the center of a major effort by Western nations to pump cheap Middle East gas supplies to Europe and beyond. Syria is already part of a Western-ordained gas pipeline that spans from Egypt to Homs. This pipeline, known as the Arab Gas Pipeline, was originally planned to continue traveling north of Homs up into Turkey. From there, it can be piped into Europe. The major players of this Western approved pipeline include Saudi Arabia and Qatar, among other Gulf nations.

Syrian President Assad has since rejected the Arab Gas Pipeline and has instead begun working closely with Iran on Iran’s proposed gas pipeline, dubbed the Islamic Pipeline. This proposed pipeline would obviously compete directly with the Arab Gas Pipeline and its goal of delivering Mideast natural gas to Europe.

[xchrom]

16. OECD sees Europe joining U.S. recovery, emerging markets sluggish

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/09/03/us-oecd-economy-idUSBRE9820AG20130903


(Reuters) - Led by firm U.S. growth, the outlook is gradually improving for advanced economies while even crisis-weary Europe is at last joining the recovery, the OECD said on Tuesday.

Nonetheless, a slowdown in many emerging economies meant that global growth would remain sluggish, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development said.

"The bottom line is that advanced economies are growing more and emerging economies are growing less," OECD chief economist Pier Carlo Padoan told Reuters.

Among major economies, the United States would lead the recovery with growth this year of 1.7 percent, the think tank said, trimming its estimate from a May forecast of 1.9 percent.

[xchrom]

18. S&P rating warning, Middle East fears heap more pressure on sliding India rupee

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/09/03/us-india-markets-idUSBRE9820GB20130903

(Reuters) - The Indian rupee fell below 68 to the dollar to near record lows on Tuesday after Standard & Poor's said there was a more than one-in-three chance of a ratings downgrade for the country and as fears of war in the Middle East roiled global markets.

The currency later extended its losses on the day to more than 3 percent after Russian news agencies quoted the Defence Ministry as saying radar had detected the launch of two ballistic "objects" towards the eastern Mediterranean.

Israel later said it had carried out a joint missile test with the United States in the area, as President Barack Obama pushed lawmakers to back his plan to attack Syria.

The S&P warning was largely a repeat of comments made to Reuters in late August, and no missiles were reported to have landed in Syria, but Indian investors were so unnerved that the reports exacerbated a sell-off in the rupee and local stocks.

[xchrom]

20. Nokia to sell handset business to Microsoft for $7.2 billion

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/09/03/us-microsoft-nokia-idUSBRE98202V20130903

(Reuters) - Two years after hitching its fate to Microsoft's Windows Phone software, Nokia collapsed into the arms of the U.S. software giant on Tuesday, agreeing to sell its main handset business for 5.44 billion euros ($7.2 billion).

Nokia, which will continue to make networking equipment and hold patents, was once the world's dominant handset maker but was long since overtaken by Apple and Samsung in the highly competitive market for more powerful smartphones.

Nokia's Canadian boss Stephen Elop, who ran Microsoft's business software division before jumping to Nokia in 2010, will return to the U.S. firm as head of its mobile devices business - a Trojan horse, according to disgruntled Finnish media.

He is being discussed as a possible replacement for Microsoft's retiring CEO Steve Ballmer, who is trying to remake the U.S. firm into a gadget and services company like Apple before he departs, though it has fallen short so far in its attempts to compete in mobile devices.

[Demeter]

21. Lew: Obama not negotiating over debt limit (AND YOU KNOW WHAT THAT MEANS)

HE'S JUST GONNA LIE DOWN AND PLAY DEAD, THAT'S ALL....

http://www.cnbc.com/id/100990014

Treasury Secretary Jack Lew challenged Congress on Tuesday to raise the debt limit—telling CNBC that President Barack Obama will not negotiate over the issue.

"What we need in our economy is some certainty. We don't need another self-inflicted wound," Lew said in a "Squawk Box" interview. "Congress should come back and they should act."

He added, "We don't need another crisis at the last minute" because it causes uncertainty in the financial markets.

On Monday, the Obama administration warned Congress that the U.S. could run out of money to pay its bills around mid-October. In a letter to House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, Lew urged lawmakers to swiftly raise the limit on federal government borrowing. The government has been bumping up against its $16.7 trillion debt ceiling since May.

The president is "not going to be negotiating over the debt limit," Lew told CNBC. "Congress has already authorized funding, committed us to make expenditures. We're now in a place where the only question is, will we pay the bills that the United States has incurred?" Answering his own question, Lew stressed there can be no question about that.

As part their budget-reduction strategy, Republicans have been trying to repeal and defund the president's health-care law. But Lew said the White House won't accept any delay or defunding of Obamacare. Last week, Boehner took one of the fall budget fights with Democrats off the table—saying he plans to avoid a government shutdown at the end of September. He has urged lawmakers to pass a "short-term" bill that maintains sharp automatic spending cuts, known as the sequester, to keep the government funded for two months past the Oct. 1 deadline. The president has tried to reach across the aisle in every way on budget issues, Lew asserted, saying the sequester must be replaced with balanced policies to deficit reduction.

As Treasury secretary, Lew said he looks at what will help the core economy, which he observed is growing "in the 2 percent range ... with substantial headwinds from federal policy."

"As we get to the end of the year, we think that without the headwinds of additional federal cuts, the economy should pickup a notch again," he said.

The president is "prepared to do tough things on entitlement programs," Lew said. "But those tough actions ... require balance in terms of revenue, both for fairness and because for economic results."
Lew made it clear the White House wants tax increases as part of the discussion. "We've pressed very hard for the kinds of agreements that would do both spending reform, entitlement reform and tax reform."

On the issue of corporate tax reform, Lew said he sees ideas from Democrats and Republicans that indicate progress can be made.

"[But] on the individual side, it's a little more complicated because it is intrinsically connected to the larger fiscal policy conversation," Lew said. "Without additional revenues, I don't see a path toward comprehensive tax reform."

[xchrom]

22. South Africa's Zuma appeals to gold firms, unions to avoid strike

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/09/03/us-safrica-strikes-idUSBRE9820F220130903

(Reuters) - South African President Jacob Zuma on Tuesday appealed to unions and companies in the gold industry to avoid an imminent strike that could seriously damage Africa's largest economy, force mine closures and cost thousands of jobs.

Gold miners were set to strike for higher pay from Tuesday, after talks between unions and companies broke down last week.

Labor unrest since last year has left more than 50 people dead and put renewed pressure on Zuma ahead of elections next year. The rand last week slid to a four-year low.

With stoppages in auto and building sectors already hitting an economy suffering from slow growth and unemployment at 25 percent, strikes could cripple an industry that has produced a third of the world's bullion but is now in rapid decline.

[Demeter]

23. Duty calls...have a good start to September, everyone!

[xchrom]

25. have a good day!

[xchrom]

24. Norway's centre-right on course for election win

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/09/03/us-norway-election-idUSBRE9820GR20130903

(Reuters) - Conservative Erna Solberg seems likely to emerge as prime minister from Monday's Norwegian elections on promises to cut taxes, improve health care and sell off some oil assets, but may be forced into a tricky alliance with a populist anti-immigration party.

Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg guided Norway through a global downturn with little more than a scratch. But growth is slowing, his record on health care is mixed and critics accuse him of squandering the oil revenues that have shielded Norway.

Opinion polls suggest Conservative leader Erna Solberg, an admirer of German Chancellor Angela Merkel, would need the support of smaller parties, raising the prospect that the populist Progress Party, which wants to restrict immigration, could hold the balance of power.

While Progress may get fewer votes than four years ago, it will likely enter government for the first time, marking another big step for populist anti-immigration parties after gains in Sweden, Finland and Denmark. Progress itself however has moderated its tone and could make more concessions to enter government.

[xchrom]

26. How America's Minimum Wage Really Stacks Up Globally

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2013/09/how-americas-minimum-wage-em-really-em-stacks-up-globally/279258/

By the standards of other rich nations, the U.S. minimum wage, at $7.25 an hour, can look pretty measly. Australia's minimum for full-time adult employees works out to almost $15, these days. France's is around $12. For almost a year now, American fast food workers have been going on strike to demand that kind of pay.

But in some senses, those high wages abroad aren't quite as high as they sound. The reason: cost of living. Melbourne, where about a fifth of all Australians live, is the fourth most expensive city in the world according to The Economist's Intelligence Unit—about 36 percent pricier than New York. Making rent and putting food on the table in Paris, meanwhile, is about 28 percent costlier than in NYC. When it comes to everyday living in these countries, money doesn't stretch as far as in the states.

Thankfully for us, economists have come up with a concept that lets us adjust exchange rates to account for the differences local prices. It's called "purchasing power parity," or PPP. When applied to minimum wages around the world, it tends to even out the differences, a bit. As shown in the chart below, based on 2012 data from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, Australia's minimum wage is actually closer to $10 once purchasing power is taken into account. France's also drops to around $10. Both are still higher than America's, but not quite as eye-popping. (Scroll to the bottom for the table version of this chart).

[xchrom]

27. Where Wages Have Grown the Most (and Least) Since the Recovery

http://www.theatlanticcities.com/jobs-and-economy/2013/09/best-cities-raise-americas-post-recession-economy/6668/



Just in time for Labor Day, a recent Gallup poll has given some promising employment news. More than half of American workers say that their income has grown over the last five years, telling Gallup that they are making either a lot (28 percent) or a little (30 percent) more money since the onslaught of the economic crisis.

However, workers' wage growth has been uneven across the country's metros. To chart where wages have grown the most during America's recovery, my Martin Prosperity Institute colleague Charlotta Mellander ran the numbers on average change in wages and salaries for all 350-plus U.S. metros between 2009 and 2012 (the latest year available) based on data from the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Average wages have increased in most metros over the course of the recovery, as the map above shows. Workers in more than half of all metros saw their wages rise by more than $2,000. And in 16 percent of them, workers saw their average wages rise by more than $3,000 between 2009 and 2012. Conversely, workers in only 15 metro areas saw their average wages decline over this period, and just 63 metros saw average wages grow less than $1,000. Across the nation, workers saw their average wages increase by $2,330, as mean wages rose from $43,460 in 2009 to $45,790 in 2012.

Many of the largest green dots (the metros with the greatest wage growth) are in the economically vibrant, coastal metros that you'd expect -- San Francisco, Seattle, and New York -- as well as cities in the Energy Belt like Houston. But some metro areas in hard-hit industrial areas of the Rustbelt and a number of Sunbelt metros that were wracked by the housing crisis also saw substantial wage increases, which suggests that the economic recovery may finally be registering in workers' paychecks nationwide.

The table below lists the large metro areas (those with populations of one million or more people) that saw the largest "raises" in the post-recession era.

Large Metros with the Biggest Average Increases in Wages and Salaries, 2009-2012
Rank Metro Total Raise 2009 Wages 2012 Wages
1 Washington-Arlington-Alexandria, DC-VA-MD-WV $4,600 $60,090 $64,690
2 Seattle-Bellevue-Everett, WA $4,320 $53,240 $57,560
3 San Francisco-San Mateo-Redwood City, CA $4,130 $61,940 $66,070
4 Houston-Sugar Land-Baytown, TX $3,970 $44,880 $48,850
5 Providence-Fall River-Warwick RI $3,740 $43,600 $47,340
6 Oklahoma City, OK $3,460 $38,090 $41,550
7 Cleveland-Elyria-Mentor, OH $3,380 $41,930 $45,310
8 Phoenix-Mesa-Scottsdale, AZ $3,310 $41,930 $45,240
9 New York-White Plains-Wayne NY-NJ $3,300 $56,250 $59,550
10 New Orleans-Metairie-Kenner, LA $3,230 $39,210 $42,440
Data from U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

[xchrom]

28. The Next Lesson From Holland: Why Local Money Matters

http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2013/09/the-next-lesson-from-holland-why-local-money-matters/279251/



There is a category of things you "learn" from travel or other experience that you simply weren't aware of before. Example: it is obvious once you travel around in the Dakotas that they really should have been two states -- but East and West Dakota, not North and South. And that the political dividing line should have been what is also the natural and geological and climate-zone divider, the Missouri River, which in that part of the country runs largely north-south. Obvious once you see it, but something I had not thought about before.


A different kind of learning involves things you already "knew" but whose implications and importance you had not really absorbed. One more of these reminders from Holland, Michigan is the crucial impact on civic culture of locally based wealth.

To sum up that impact: a lot of what is successful, resilient, and attractive about this town seems directly connected to the fact that many of its significant companies are locally owned or locally headquartered, rather than sub-units of big global corporations.

Of course everybody knows that family- and personally owned businesses can behave differently from publicly traded firms. For the big corporations, it is a compliment rather than a criticism to say that ultimately they care most about dividend growth and "maximizing shareholder value." Toward that end layoffs, outsourcing, cost-cutting, cheese-paring, union-busting -- you name it, and if it can arguably lead to greater long-run corporate profitability, then by definition it is what management should do.

[Tansy_Gold]

36. I think the same could be said of Whidbey Island, Washington

Would make an interesting study, I think, for someone perhaps doing a dissertation on what "local economy" means in the US any more.

[xchrom]

31. Israel Rattles Markets With Missile Test as Obama Works Congress

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-09-03/israel-rattles-markets-with-missile-test-as-obama-works-congress.html

Israel tested its missile-defense system, provoking war jitters in the Middle East as President Barack Obama sought to galvanize support in Congress for what he calls a “limited” U.S. intervention in Syria.

Stock and oil markets were briefly rattled by Russian news reports of the launch of two missiles in the Mediterranean Sea. The Israeli Defense Ministry said it will release more details later. RIA Novosti reported that the missiles landed in the water. A spokesman for Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declined to comment.

The demonstration of Israeli preparedness was a possible signal to Iran, Syria’s main regional ally. It came as key pro-intervention senators urged Obama to work harder to make his case to a war-weary American public.

“Mr. President, clear the air,” Republican Senator Lindsey Graham said at the White House yesterday after meeting Obama. “Be decisive. Be firm about why it matters to us as a nation to get Syria right.”

[xchrom]

32. Tankers Worst Since 1997 on Africa Oil Slowdown to China

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-09-02/tankers-worst-since-1997-as-africa-oil-to-china-slows-freight.html

China’s smallest oil imports from West Africa in at least two years are curbing demand for tankers on the second-longest trade route, prolonging the worst rates in more than a decade for Frontline Ltd. and other owners.

Chinese refiners will buy 28 percent less West African crude this month than a year earlier, the least in data starting in August 2011, according to loading plans and a Bloomberg News survey of eight traders. Shares of Frontline, which operates 32 very large crude carriers, will drop 35 percent in 12 months, the average of 13 analyst estimates compiled by Bloomberg shows. Those of Euronav SA, with 13 supertankers in its fleet, will retreat 24 percent, the forecasts show.

Tanker owners are enduring a fifth year of declining rates as fleet growth outpaces demand. China’s preference for cheaper Middle East oil over West African supplies shortens voyages by 42 percent, effectively increasing the capacity of the fleet, says ICAP Shipping International Ltd., a shipbroker in London. That’s adding to changes in trade flows as the U.S., the only country that buys more oil than China, meets the highest proportion of its energy needs since 1986.

“Falling shipments point to potentially one more bad month of earnings, which tanker owners could really do without,” Simon Newman, the London-based head of tanker research at ICAP Shipping, said by telephone on Aug. 28. “To avoid an even weaker market, owners will need significant support from shipments out of other areas.”

[xchrom]

34. Why Can’t You Wear White After Labor Day? {fashion tickets will be issued}

http://mentalfloss.com/article/12424/why-can’t-you-wear-white-after-labor-day



Wearing white in the summer makes sense. Desert peoples have known for thousands of years that white clothing seems to keep you a little bit cooler than other colors. But wearing white only during the summer? While no one is completely sure exactly when or why this fashion rule came into effect, our best guess is that it had to do with snobbery in the late 1800s and early 1900s.

The wives of the super-rich ruled high society with an iron fist after the Civil War. As more and more people became millionaires, though, it was difficult to tell the difference between old money, respectable families, and those who only had vulgar new money. By the 1880s, in order to tell who was acceptable and who wasn’t, the women who were already “in” felt it necessary to create dozens of fashion rules that everyone in the know had to follow. That way, if a woman showed up at the opera in a dress that cost more than most Americans made in a year, but it had the wrong sleeve length, other women would know not to give her the time of day.

Not wearing white outside the summer months was another one of these silly rules. White was for weddings and resort wear, not dinner parties in the fall. Of course it could get extremely hot in September, and wearing white might make the most sense, but if you wanted to be appropriately attired you just did not do it. Labor Day became a federal holiday in 1894, and society eventually adopted it as the natural endpoint for summer fashion.

Not everyone followed this rule. Even some socialites continued to buck the trend, most famously Coco Chanel, who wore white year-round. But even though the rule was originally enforced by only a few hundred women, over the decades it trickled down to everyone else. By the 1950s, women’s magazines made it clear to middle class America: white clothing came out on Memorial Day and went away on Labor Day.



Read the full text here: http://mentalfloss.com/article/12424/why-can%E2%80%99t-you-wear-white-after-labor-day#ixzz2dpnbmNM7
--brought to you by mental_floss!

[AnneD]

40. It helps to wear white in the hospital....

So you can tell what you have been hit with and when to wipe everything down. I have some black crocs this time around and they look cleaner longer.

But I did put up my white Sperry topsiders for the year yesterday.

[xchrom]

41. I'm going to have to find the 'rules' for

Winter white.

And good for putting up the white sperry's - I LOVE sperry's they're so comfy and stylish.

[AnneD]

42. I unpacked my....

tan Sperry topsiders.

I like the traction on the soles. When it rains, the tile floors get a bit slippery. The last thing I need is a broken hip.

[xchrom]

43. i've reached the age where i HATE falling. it's always more than just a spill. nt

[xchrom]

35. old roots, new branches: jewish spiritual communities and the rise of alt-labor

http://www.nationofchange.org/old-roots-new-branches-jewish-spiritual-communities-and-rise-alt-labor-1378131678

Even as many lament the withering of three movements in the United States—Conservative Judaism, Reform Judaism, and the labor movement—something is happening in proximity to them that just might give them new life.

Similarly, traditional labor unions have been hemorrhaging members since the 1960s. A host of factors has hastened this process, including an aging workforce, loopholes in labor law that prevent the formation of unions in certain industries, the offshoring of jobs via globalized trade, and decades of state-level assaults on workers’ rights to collectively bargain. Yet, as formalized unions wane, new independent labor organizations are emerging to champion the rights of low-wage workers in the health care, food service, food production, and retail industries, among others.

A growing number of independent, unaffiliated Jewish spiritual communities are sprouting against a backdrop of declining membership in the Conservative and Reform Jewish movements. Just as the Reform, Conservative, and Renewal movements each placed themselves somewhat in contrast to older traditions so as to attract young adults back into Jewish life, the new unaffiliated outlets for the expression of Jewish faith draw nourishment from traditional values and rituals while eschewing old norms and taboos that seem less relevant for today’s realities.

How—and to what degree—are these two parallel uprisings achieving prosperity outside of the constraints of tradition, and what does their growth portend for the continued existence of the old institutions?

[Demeter]

37. Toles on Economy

http://assets.amuniversal.com/4e45a3d0f3cf01301143001dd8b71c47?width=750

[Tansy_Gold]

38. It's not like 2008 was a big "thrill"

At least not for most of us..........

[Demeter]

44. Well, some people LIKE to shit in their pants...they get a thrill out of it

[DemReadingDU]

39. Political Cartoonist David Horsey: Americans are hostages of the 'terrorists' of Wall Street

Since this Horsey cartoon appeared in 2009, not much has changed in the way Wall Street's high rollers do business. (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times / August 29, 2013)
http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/topoftheticket/la-tot-cartoons-pg,0,1019230.photogallery?index=la-tot-cartoons-pg-americans-are-hostages-of-the-terrorists-of-wall-street&gallery=large



8/29/13 David Horsey: Americans are hostages of the 'terrorists' of Wall Street
When are America’s leaders going to step up and protect us from the most threatening terrorists, hedge fund managers?

Sure, some Islamist nutcase might be able to set off a bomb on a bus or in a building, but, horrific as that may be, the damage to our society is not nearly as great as the wrecking ball that can hit us all when one of the greedy schemes of aggressive and unscrupulous financiers goes awry. Yes, Islamic terrorists took down the World Trade Center in 2001, but the financial terrorists took down the world economy in 2008.

Vast new wealth is being manufactured from thin air by the financial sector, and almost all of that wealth goes to the very few hedge fund managers, derivatives traders and other money manipulators who operate in a world of their own creation with scant regulation and no sense of obligation to society. The rest of us only get hooked into this bigger game when the guys in high finance screw up, drive the economy over a cliff and drag everyone down with them.

more...
http://www.latimes.com/opinion/topoftheticket/la-na-tt-terrorists-of-wall-street-20130829,0,2187850.story