India’s Leader Is Accused of Hiding Unemployment Data Before Vote – By Jeffrey Gettleman and Hari Kumar – The New York Times

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By Jeffrey Gettleman and Hari Kumar

NEW DELHI — When voters swept Prime Minister Narendra Modi into power five years ago, it was in no small part because of his vows to create millions of jobs and vault India into an era of prosperity.

But now, just months before the next general election, Mr. Modi is facing a potentially troublesome challenge on the jobs promises that may be partly of his own making.

His government was accused on Thursday of suppressing an official report on the national unemployment rate that apparently showed it had reached a 45-year high in 2017.

The Business Standard, a respected Indian financial newspaper, published leaked findings from the unemployment report, which is based on a survey and produced by the National Sample Survey Office, a government agency.

Officials in Mr. Modi’s government scrambled on Thursday to blunt the impact of what amounted to withholding information that discredits the core of his economic record. The chairman of NITI Aayog, a government research organization, said the unemployment report was still in draft form, was not ready for dissemination and would be released in March. The response raised the possibility that the data could be revised.

But economists said the findings, if verified, were problematic for Mr. Modi, the dynamic prime minister whose popularity has always rested on his Hindu nationalism and promises to make India an economic powerhouse rivaling China.

Source: India’s Leader Is Accused of Hiding Unemployment Data Before Vote – The New York Times

Yes, thank you Jeffrey Gettleman and Hari Kumar. So much to learn. Here are two popular comments I endorsed:

Steve Davies
Tampa, Fl.

I lived in Southern India (Kerala) and traveled throughout India. The country is a great example of the sad dystopia of overpopulation, fierce/ancient religious rivalries, income inequality, lack of infrastructure, Hindu nationalism, corruption at every level, and environmental destruction. Modi is a dangerous man. He’s a Hindu nationalist. He’s also a globalist who is selling off Indians and their ecology to the global corporate elite. He is in bed with Trump and Trump’s children in several development projects. His scandalous government smears indigenous people as “Maoist rebels” as a ploy to steal their land from them to hand it over to plunderers such as international logging, damming and mining companies. Climate change is coming in hard on India. Of note, Kamala Harris is also a Hindu nationalist and has endorsed Modi. Read the non-fiction book “Maximum City” and the fictional book “Shantaram” for a vivid depiction of modern India.

Sam Sengupta commented January 31

Sam Sengupta
Utica, NY
Times Pick

Thanks for a very illuminating article on India and how it has been ravaged by the incompetency of BJP party during its last 5 year stint. That the job growth rate would be dismal regardless of how we slice it was expected. The current ruling party has had no specific economic plan in mind to transform economically disadvantaged India; it simply basked in its own propaganda magic while young educated people began rushing in to join the behemoth of the unemployed ones. The party thought that foreign investment would lift India up, but potential investors stayed away at a comfortable distance. Modi can blame almost everybody for India’s lackluster performance except himself and his party. His party finds it difficult to understand how no foreign investor is willing enough to pump resources in a country beset with a steady stream of open communal threats from party top-braces, with frequent lynching, raping, burning and destruction of properties orchestrated by its rank and file. How could the country get out of such a mess? It cannot as long as it ignores the compelling physical reality in favor of its dream of transforming India to a Hindu nation.

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Posted in: India, Politics and Economics

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Can China Turn the Middle of Nowhere Into the Center of the World Economy? – The New York Times

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“The Eurasian Pole of Inaccessibility is a striking name for an absence. It is the point farthest from a sea or ocean on the planet. Located in China just east of the border with Kazakhstan, the pole gets you a good distance from harbors and coastlines — at least 1,550 miles in any direction — into an expanse of white steppe and blue-beige mountain that is among the least populated places on earth. Here, among some of the last surviving pastoral nomads in Central Asia, nestled between two branches of the Tian Shan range on the edge of Kazakhstan, the largest infrastructure project in the history of the world is growing.

About 80 miles from the Pole of Inaccessibility, just across the border in Kazakhstan, is a village called Khorgos. It has spent most of its existence on the obscure periphery of international affairs, and its official population is just 908. But over the last few years, it has become an important node of the global economy. It is part of an initiative known informally as the new Silk Road, a China-led effort to build a vast cephalopodic network of highways, railroads and overseas shipping routes, supported by hundreds of new plants, pipelines and company towns in dozens of countries. Ultimately, the Belt and Road Initiative, or B.R.I., as the project is more formally known, will link China’s coastal factories and rising consumer class with Central, Southeast and South Asia; with the Gulf States and the Middle East; with Africa; and with Russia and all of Europe, all by way of a lattice of land and sea routes whose collective ambition boggles the mind.

Khorgos is a flagship project of this work in progress, an international shipping hub and free-trade zone that its promoters say is poised to become the next Dubai. Thanks to its location at the junction of the world’s soon-to-be-largest national economy and its largest landlocked country, Khorgos has become an unlikely harbinger of the interconnected planet: a zone fully enclosed by the logic of globalization, where goods flow freely across sovereign borders, following corridors designed to locate every human being on the planet within a totalizing network of producers and consumers, buyers and sellers.”

Source: Can China Turn the Middle of Nowhere Into the Center of the World Economy? – The New York Times

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Posted in: China, kazakhstan

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A Tiny Screw Shows Why iPhones Won’t Be ‘Assembled in U.S.A.’ – The New York Times

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By Jack Nicas

  •  ,  

“SAN FRANCISCO — Despite a trade war between the United States and China and past admonishments from President Trump “to start building their damn computers and things in this country,” Apple is unlikely to bring its manufacturing closer to home.

A tiny screw illustrates why.

In 2012, Apple’s chief executive, Timothy D. Cook, went on prime-time television to announce that Apple would make a Mac computer in the United States. It would be the first Apple product in years to be manufactured by American workers, and the top-of-the-line Mac Pro would come with an unusual inscription: “Assembled in USA.”

But when Apple began making the $3,000 computer in Austin, Tex., it struggled to find enough screws, according to three people who worked on the project and spoke on the condition of anonymity because of confidentiality agreements.

In China, Apple relied on factories that can produce vast quantities of custom screws on short notice. In Texas, where they say everything is bigger, it turned out the screw suppliers were not.”

Source: A Tiny Screw Shows Why iPhones Won’t Be ‘Assembled in U.S.A.’ – The New York Times

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Posted in: Business and Finance, China, United States

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Opinion | The Malign Incompetence of the British Ruling Class – By Pankaj Mishra – The New York Times

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By Pankaj Mishra

Mr. Mishra is the author, most recently, of “Age of Anger: A History of the Present.”

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Earl and Countess Mountbatten, behind naval and military members of the governor-general’s staff, walk down the steps of Government House in New Delhi, India, June 21, 1948.CreditCreditAssociated Press

“Describing Britain’s calamitous exit from its Indian empire in 1947, the novelist Paul Scott wrote that in India the British “came to the end of themselves as they were” — that is, to the end of their exalted idea about themselves. Scott was among those shocked by how hastily and ruthlessly the British, who had ruled India for more than a century, condemned it to fragmentation and anarchy; how Louis Mountbatten, accurately described by the right-wing historian Andrew Roberts as a “mendacious, intellectually limited hustler,” came to preside, as the last British viceroy of India, over the destiny of some 400 million people.

Britain’s rupture with the European Union is proving to be another act of moral dereliction by the country’s rulers. The Brexiteers, pursuing a fantasy of imperial-era strength and self-sufficiency, have repeatedly revealed their hubris, mulishness and ineptitude over the past two years. Though originally a “Remainer,” Prime Minister Theresa May has matched their arrogant obduracy, imposing a patently unworkable timetable of two years on Brexit and laying down red lines that undermined negotiations with Brussels and doomed her deal to resoundingly bipartisan rejection this week in Parliament.

Such a pattern of egotistic and destructive behavior by the British elite flabbergasts many people today. But it was already manifest seven decades ago during Britain’s rash exit from India.”

Source: Opinion | The Malign Incompetence of the British Ruling Class – The New York Times

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Posted in: India, Western Countires

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Glaciers Are Retreating. Millions Rely on Their Water. – The New York Times

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Millions Rely on Their Water.

Henry Fountain, a New York Times reporter, and Ben C. Solomon, a Times multimedia reporter, traveled to Kazakhstan to see the effects of climate change on mountain glaciers. Maps by Jeremy White.

“On a summer day in the mountains high above Almaty, Kazakhstan’s largest city, the Tuyuksu glacier is melting like mad. Rivulets of water stream down the glacier’s thin leading edge.

As she has for nearly two decades, Maria Shahgedanova, a glaciologist at the University of Reading in England, has come here to check on the Tuyuksu. As one of the longest-studied glaciers anywhere, the Tuyuksu helps gauge the impact of climate change on the world’s ice.”

Source: Glaciers Are Retreating. Millions Rely on Their Water. – The New York Times

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Posted in: Climate Change, East Asia

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Carlos Ghosn- Emerging in Public- Lays Out His Defense – By Motoko Rich – The New York Times

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By Motoko Rich

“TOKYO — Carlos Ghosn and his lawyers are laying out the most comprehensive case yet for his innocence, nearly two months after his arrest shook the auto business and tarnished the reputation of an industry titan.

Still, it may not be enough to free him from jail for months, as prosecutors try to build a case against the ousted Nissan Motor chairman and onetime leader of an automaking juggernaut that builds more than 10 million cars annually.

Mr. Ghosn’s chief defense lawyer in Japan said on Tuesday that prosecutors had no basis for holding him in jail on allegations that he improperly transferred personal losses to Nissan’s books, saying that board members had approved the transactions.

Late Tuesday, that lawyer, Motonari Otsuru, submitted a request to the court to release Mr. Ghosn from detention on the grounds that Nissan did not ultimately bear any losses and that he was not a flight risk.”

Source: Carlos Ghosn, Emerging in Public, Lays Out His Defense – The New York Times

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Posted in: Business and Finance, Japan

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 The Rise and Fall of Carlos Ghosn – by Amy Chozick and Motoko Rich – New York Times

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By Amy Chozick and Motoko Rich

“Carlos Ghosn was tired. At 64 years old, the chairman of an auto empire that spanned several continents and included Nissan, Renault and Mitsubishi wasn’t bouncing back from jet lag the way he used to. Melatonin wasn’t working anymore, and he had bouts of insomnia, phoning his children in the middle of the night or going on long walks around his Tokyo or Paris neighborhood. He planned to retire soon, stepping back from spending his life on an airplane, albeit a luxurious one paid for by Nissan.

Last month, just before Thanksgiving weekend, Mr. Ghosn headed to Tokyo to meet his youngest daughter and her boyfriend and attend a board meeting. He was scheduled to land at Haneda Airport at 4 p.m.

The daughter, Maya Ghosn, 26, had spent most of her childhood in Japan and wanted to introduce her boyfriend, Patrick, to her favorite places. Bringing a boyfriend home is a common rite of passage, but a particularly intimidating prospect when growing up Ghosn — a child of one of the most romanticized and ruthless chief executives the global business community has ever seen.

Ms. Ghosn had made a 7:30 dinner reservation at Jiro, the Michelin-starred sushi counter hidden in a basement in the city’s Ginza district.

On the tarmac in Beirut, Lebanon, Mr. Ghosn opened WhatsApp and texted his four children on a group chain labeled “Game of Ghosns,” for his favorite TV show, “Game of Thrones,” the bloody HBO drama about dynasties under siege. “On my way to Tokyo! Love you guys!” Mr. Ghosn texted as his jet lifted off.

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Police officers outside the Tokyo jail where Carlos Ghosn, the former head of Nissan, has been detained since his arrest in November.CreditCarl Court/Getty Images

He never made it to dinner.

On Nov. 19, Japanese prosecutors surrounded Mr. Ghosn’s Gulfstream after its arrival and arrested him on allegations that for years he had withheld millions of dollars in income from Nissan’s financial filings.”

Source: The Rise and Fall of Carlos Ghosn – The New York Times

David Lindsay:  This is a fascinating tragedy for Carlos Ghosn.  I have just scratched the surface. It appears, he never understood Japanese culture or values, and insulted both. He also did a great job turning around Nissan, when it needed a dose of change.

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Posted in: Business and Finance, Japan

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Opinion | Don’t Fall for Facebook’s ‘China Argument’ – by Tim Wu – The New York Times

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America’s global dominance in technology requires fierce competition at home, not the coddling of monopolies.

Tim Wu

By Tim Wu

Mr. Wu is a law professor who specializes in antitrust.

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CreditCreditAlex Merto

“Over the last year or so, Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook and other American tech leaders have issued a stark warning to those who want to see more competition in the industry. It goes something like this: “We understand that we’ve made mistakes. But don’t you realize that if you damage us, you’ll just be handing over the future to China? Unlike America, the Chinese government is standing behind its tech firms, because it knows that the competition is global, and it wants to win.”

This — Big Tech’s version of the “too big to fail” argument — has a superficial nationalistic appeal. It’s certainly true that the Chinese technology sector is growing and aggressively competitive, and that many of its companies are embraced and promoted by the Chinese state. By one count, eight of the world’s 20 largest tech firms are Chinese. That would seem to suggest a contest for global dominance, one in which the United States ought not be considering breakups or regulation, but instead be doing everything it can to protect and subsidize the home team.

But to accept this argument would be a mistake, for it betrays and ignores hard-won lessons about the folly of an industrial policy centered on “national champions,” especially in the tech sector. What Facebook is really asking for is to be embraced and protected as America’s very own social media monopolist, bravely doing battle overseas. But both history and basic economics suggest we do much better trusting that fierce competition at home yields stronger industries overall.

That’s the lesson from the history of Japanese-American tech competition. During the 1970s and into the ’80s, it was widely believed that Japan was threatening the United States for supremacy in technology markets. The Japanese giant NEC was a serious challenger to IBM in the mainframe market; Sony was running over consumer electronics, joined by powerful firms like Panasonic and Toshiba. These companies enjoyed the support of the Japanese state, through the Ministry of International Trade and Industry, which pursued a nationalistic industrial policy thought to be infallible.”

Source: Opinion | Don’t Fall for Facebook’s ‘China Argument’ – The New York Times

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Posted in: Japan, Monopoly or Monopsony

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Opinion | The Real China Challenge: Managing Its Decline – The New York Times

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Bret Stephens

By Bret Stephens

Opinion Columnist

Sculptures on the campus of the Alibaba Group in Hangzhou, China.CreditCreditBryan Denton for The New York Times

“In 2009, The Economist wrote about an up-and-coming global power: Brazil. Its economy, the magazine suggested, would soon overtake that of France or the U.K. as the world’s fifth largest. São Paulo would be the world’s fifth-richest city. Vast new reserves of offshore oil would provide an added boost, complemented by the country’s robust and sophisticated manufacturing sector.

To illustrate the point, the magazine’s cover featured a picture of Rio de Janeiro’s “Christ the Redeemer” statue taking off from its mountaintop as if it were a rocket.

The rocket never reached orbit. Brazil’s economy is now limping its way out of the worst recession in its history. The murder rate — 175 people per day in 2017 — is at a record high. One former president is in jail, another was impeached. The incoming president is an admirer of the country’s old military dictatorship, only he thinks it should have killed the people it tortured.

Those whom the gods wish to destroy, they first tout as countries of the future.

I thought about The Economist story while reading a deeply reported and thought-provoking series in The Times about another country of the future: China. The phrase “rise of China” has now become so commonplace that we treat it more as a fact of nature than as a prediction of a very familiar sort — one made erroneously about the Soviet Union in the 1950s and ’60s; about Japan in the ’70s and ’80s; and about the European Union in the ’90s and ’00s.”

Source: Opinion | The Real China Challenge: Managing Its Decline – The New York Times

David Lindsay:

Bret Stephens, as my father liked to say, you’re not as dumb as you look.  Thank you for another terrific, mind-bending piece.

I hope your are right, but fear you are wrong. The Chinese appear to be preparing for the future, fighting for our lives and the lives of our grand children against climate change, better than the United States, which is deeply troubling. You do not appear to understand that climate change is rapidly becoming a crisis. Humans are putting 110 million metric tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere every What.

Take a guess. Every year, month, week, day or hour. Take a guess.

Unfortunately the answer is daily. No wonder the coral and the shellfish are dying all over the oceans. Scientist who study the sixth extinction predict gloomily, that not only are we humans the cause of the sixth extinction, but we will be one of the myriad species that fails during it.

David Lindsay Jr. has written and performs a folk music concert and sing-a-long about Climate Change and the Sixth Extinction.

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Posted in: China, David Lindsay, Decline and Renaissanace, The Sixth Extinction of Species

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After a Hiatus- China Accelerates Cyberspying Efforts to Obtain U.S. Technology – The New York Times

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By David E. Sanger and Steven Lee Myers

“WASHINGTON — Three years ago, President Barack Obama struck a deal with China that few thought was possible: President Xi Jinping agreed to end his nation’s yearslong practice of breaking into the computer systems of American companies, military contractors and government agencies to obtain designs, technology and corporate secrets, usually on behalf of China’s state-owned firms.

The pact was celebrated by the Obama administration as one of the first arms-control agreements for cyberspace — and for 18 months or so, the number of Chinese attacks plummeted. But the victory was fleeting.

Soon after President Trump took office, China’s cyberespionage picked up again and, according to intelligence officials and analysts, accelerated in the last year as trade conflicts and other tensions began to poison relations between the world’s two largest economies.

Source: After a Hiatus, China Accelerates Cyberspying Efforts to Obtain U.S. Technology – The New York Times

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Posted in: China, Espionage & Soft Power, Military Affairs and Espionage

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