Dec. 24 (Bloomberg) -- Missouri's plan to spend $750 million in federal money on highways and nothing on mass transit in St. Louis doesn't square with President-elect Barack Obama's vision for a revolutionary re-engineering of the nation's infrastructure. Utah would pour 87 percent of the funds it may receive in a new economic stimulus bill into new road capacity. Arizona would spend $869 million of its $1.2 billion wish list on highways. While many states are keeping their project lists secret, plans that have surfaced show why environmentalists and some development experts say much of the stimulus spending may promote urban sprawl while scrimping on more green-friendly rail and mass transit. "It's a lot of more of the same," said Robert Puentes, a metropolitan growth and development expert at the Brookings Institution in Washington who is tracking the legislation. "You build a lot of new highways, continue to decentralize" urban and suburban communities and "pull resources away from transit."
Dec. 24 (Bloomberg) -- Missouri's plan to spend $750 million in federal money on highways and nothing on mass transit in St. Louis doesn't square with President-elect Barack Obama's vision for a revolutionary re-engineering of the nation's infrastructure.
Utah would pour 87 percent of the funds it may receive in a new economic stimulus bill into new road capacity. Arizona would spend $869 million of its $1.2 billion wish list on highways.
While many states are keeping their project lists secret, plans that have surfaced show why environmentalists and some development experts say much of the stimulus spending may promote urban sprawl while scrimping on more green-friendly rail and mass transit.
"It's a lot of more of the same," said Robert Puentes, a metropolitan growth and development expert at the Brookings Institution in Washington who is tracking the legislation. "You build a lot of new highways, continue to decentralize" urban and suburban communities and "pull resources away from transit."
The article notes near the end:
In Europe and Southeast Asia, governments are investing tens of billions of dollars in high-speed rail projects that include systems designed for the rapid transport of merchandise. Proponents of a new approach to transportation in the U.S. are pushing for the stimulus package to fund similar projects.
Rail and mass-transit advocates propose to "direct funds to metropolitan planning authorities and to create a national oversight group to help coordinate the spending." They want long range planning for national infrastructure. Maybe the Obama administration will get on board. However, if the U.S. continues to ignore rail, then I think it will become a very backwards nation. How much longer can America try to keep the 20th century going?
Further, many states reproduce that same problem within their borders - the state government is largely controlled by rural interests, and thus urban areas are routinely shafted. This is especially true in places like Michigan and Missouri, where you have a big urban area with a high percentage of African Americans, and the rest of the state being generally white.
Wall Street bankers and London fund managers have little in common with Mongolian craftsmen and Philippine tuk-tuk drivers. But the world of high finance is beginning to take an interest in the lives of those at the bottom of the economic heap. Microfinance - making tiny loans to the very poor - is increasingly viewed as an investment opportunity and not just a way to fight poverty. "Its potential as an asset class is colossal," says Jack Lowe, a former businessman, who now works for Blue Orchard, a Geneva-based company that manages microfinance investments.
Wall Street bankers and London fund managers have little in common with Mongolian craftsmen and Philippine tuk-tuk drivers.
But the world of high finance is beginning to take an interest in the lives of those at the bottom of the economic heap.
Microfinance - making tiny loans to the very poor - is increasingly viewed as an investment opportunity and not just a way to fight poverty.
"Its potential as an asset class is colossal," says Jack Lowe, a former businessman, who now works for Blue Orchard, a Geneva-based company that manages microfinance investments.
"Its potential as an asset class is colossal,"
Gobble, chew, gobble, chomp, creak, collapse.
[FT Letters:] Microfinance's `iron law' - local economies reduced to poverty ... in nearly 25 years of academic and consulting work in local economic development, my experience is that microfinance programmes most often spell the death of the local economy. Put simply, to the extent that local savings are intermediated through microfinance institutions, the more that country or region or locality will be left behind in a state of poverty and under-development. This is an "iron law of microfinance". Focusing on isolated cases of microenterprise success simply does not add up to economic development. The reason microfinance is supported is overwhelmingly political/ideological - the economic rationale is simply not there ...
... in nearly 25 years of academic and consulting work in local economic development, my experience is that microfinance programmes most often spell the death of the local economy. Put simply, to the extent that local savings are intermediated through microfinance institutions, the more that country or region or locality will be left behind in a state of poverty and under-development. This is an "iron law of microfinance". Focusing on isolated cases of microenterprise success simply does not add up to economic development. The reason microfinance is supported is overwhelmingly political/ideological - the economic rationale is simply not there ...
That is why his focus is now upon "Social Business" carried out on a "Not for Loss" basis, as he puts it, to address the problem identified in the letter. But he's scratching his head to find an enterprise model that works..... "Any economic unit can emit money. The serious problem is to get it accepted" Hyman Minsky
The formation of Afghan militias comes on the heels of a similar undertaking in Iraq, where 100,000 Sunni gunmen, many of them former insurgents, have been placed on the government payroll. The Awakening Councils, as they are known, are credited by American officials as one of the main catalysts behind the steep reduction in violence there. But the plan is causing deep unease among many Afghans, who fear that Pashtun-dominated militias could get out of control, terrorize local populations and turn against the government. The Afghan government, aided by the Americans, has carried out several ambitious campaigns since 2001 to disarm militants and gather up their guns. A proposal to field local militias was defeated in the Afghan Senate in the fall. "There will be fighting between Pashtuns and non-Pashtuns," said Salih Mohammad Registani, a member of the Afghan Parliament and an ethnic Tajik. Mr. Registani raised the specter of the Arbaki, a Pashtun-dominated militia turned loose on other Afghans early in the 20th century. "A civil war will start very soon," he said.
But the plan is causing deep unease among many Afghans, who fear that Pashtun-dominated militias could get out of control, terrorize local populations and turn against the government. The Afghan government, aided by the Americans, has carried out several ambitious campaigns since 2001 to disarm militants and gather up their guns. A proposal to field local militias was defeated in the Afghan Senate in the fall.
"There will be fighting between Pashtuns and non-Pashtuns," said Salih Mohammad Registani, a member of the Afghan Parliament and an ethnic Tajik. Mr. Registani raised the specter of the Arbaki, a Pashtun-dominated militia turned loose on other Afghans early in the 20th century.
"A civil war will start very soon," he said.
The number of people filing for unemployment benefits hit a 26-year high last week, as the deepening recession forced more employers to cut jobs. First-time claims for unemployment rose 5.4 percent, to 586,000 for the week ending Dec. 20, the Labor Department reported this morning. The last time claims were that high was Nov. 27, 1982. The four-week moving average, which is a less volatile indicator, rose to 558,000 from 544,250, also a 26-year high. Orders for durable goods, such as appliances and televisions, dropped 1 percent to $186.9 billion, the U.S. Census Bureau said today. It was the fourth consecutive monthly drop but a much smaller decline than the 8.4 percent drop in October, thanks largely to orders for defense-related goods.
First-time claims for unemployment rose 5.4 percent, to 586,000 for the week ending Dec. 20, the Labor Department reported this morning. The last time claims were that high was Nov. 27, 1982. The four-week moving average, which is a less volatile indicator, rose to 558,000 from 544,250, also a 26-year high.
Orders for durable goods, such as appliances and televisions, dropped 1 percent to $186.9 billion, the U.S. Census Bureau said today. It was the fourth consecutive monthly drop but a much smaller decline than the 8.4 percent drop in October, thanks largely to orders for defense-related goods.
Really good to see that America's Military-Industrial-Complex is still trundling along.
By a vote of 180 in favour to 1 against (United States) and no abstentions, the Committee also approved a resolution on the right to food, by which the Assembly would "consider it intolerable" that more than 6 million children still died every year from hunger-related illness before their fifth birthday, and that the number of undernourished people had grown to about 923 million worldwide, at the same time that the planet could produce enough food to feed 12 billion people, or twice the world's present population. (See Annex III.)
On Dec. 23 President Bush pardoned Isaac Toussie, who had defrauded low-income home buyers, then on Dec. 24 he revoked the pardon. It is a bit early to tell how this will play out, but suppose Toussie goes to federal court to claimed "once a pardonee, always a pardonee" and loses. In other words, supposes the courts rule that if President's have to power to pardon, they also have the power to revoke a pardon. That could have implications if President Bush pardons members of his administration on his last day in office and then incoming President Barack Obama revokes the pardons. This is definitely uncharted territory.
