Bill Mitchell — It is a syndemic not a pandemic – broader policies are needed

There was an article in The Lancet from its editor (September 26, 2020) – Offline: COVID-19 is not a pandemic – which questioned the “narrow approach” that governments were taking to the coronavirus pandemic based on the assumption that “the cause of this crisis … [is] … an infectious disease”. His argument is a whole of medical professionals have become prominent in daily press briefings and the like as they trot out the results of epidemic models and news agencies interview “infectious disease specialists” every other day. But the reality is that “(t)wo categories of disease are interacting within specific populations” – COVID-19 and “an array of non-communicable diseases” which are “clustering within social groups according to patterns of inequality deeply embedded in our societies”. He thus used the term ‘syndemic’ rather than pandemic to highlight the socio-economic distribution of the pandemic and focus attention on inequality and other forms of socio-economic disadvantage which interact with biological dimensions to determine health outcomes. He focuses on co-morbidities but I would focus on poor working conditions, poor housing, inadequate nutrition, the stress of poverty and poor urban planning that segments populations into leafy, low-density suburbs and suburban hell-holes where people are crammed in like whatever due to social inequalities and deficient government policy interventions.…

Systems approach vs. analytic approach. Synthesis supervenes but doesn't replace  analysis. Analysis conducted without sufficient attention to wholes and embeddedness risks missing relevant factors.

These issues pertain to the world system, so they are especially knotty and extend far beyond the pandemic to global society, including the global economy, and in the widest extent planetary ecology. The symptoms suggest a constellation of emerging challenges that are existential.

Bill Mitchell – billy blog
It is a syndemic not a pandemic – broader policies are needed
Bill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia

See also

Article by Jomo Kwame Sundaram, a former economics professor, who was United Nations Assistant Secretary-General for Economic Development, and received the Wassily Leontief Prize for Advancing the Frontiers of Economic Thought. Originally published at his website

Naked Capitalism
Poor Lives Matter, But Less
Yves Smith

Major Chinese cities plan large-scale tests of digital currency in 2021 — Global Times

Industry observers said that these plans by China's first-tier cities send a clear signal that DCEP will be subject to large-scale testing this year against the backdrop of a global race, which will lay a solid foundation for its launch in the near future.

"The pilot testing is only the first step of a 'long march.' Once launched, the digital yuan will reshape China's financial industry and unleash a promising digital finance service sector worth billions of yuan," a Shenzhen-based veteran industry insider told the Global Times on Sunday.

In 2020, the trial operation of DCEP expanded from small-scale closed-loop testing to large-scale open testing.

The tests were carried out in a handful of cities including Shenzhen, Shanghai, Suzhou in East China's Jiangsu Province, Chengdu, capital of Southwest China's Sichuan Province, and Xiongan New Area, North China's Hebei Province.

In addition to offline payments, the digital yuan wallet also supported online payments in e-commerce platforms in trial runs....

ECNS
Major Chinese cities plan large-scale tests of digital currency in 2021

Global Times

Also

China has allocated 104 billion yuan (about 16 billion U.S. dollars) from its central budget to fund basic living allowances for needy people ahead of the upcoming Spring Festival, an official said on Monday.

Temporary assistance and subsidies will be provided directly by local authorities to those who face dire situations due to COVID-19, said Zhang Zaigang, deputy director of the social assistance department of the Ministry of Civil Affairs, at a press conference.

Zhang urged local authorities to ensure the timely distribution of subsistence funds to people ahead of the Spring Festival, the most important traditional Chinese festival, which falls on Feb. 12 this year.

Assistance should also be offered to low-income residents in the country's northern areas to help them withstand the freezing winter temperatures, Zhang said.

Over 1.8 billion yuan in heating subsidies has been distributed in northern provincial-level regions including Heilongjiang and Liaoning, figures from the ministry show.

ECNS

China allocates billions for needy people ahead of major festival

Xinhua

UN agency reports China surpassed US in foreign direct investments in 2020 — Justine Coleman

The U.N. Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) concluded that China became the largest FDI receiver last year over the U.S., with flows increasing by 4 percent to $163 billion, Bloomberg News reported.

Most countries saw decreases due to the coronavirus pandemic, including the U.S., which saw its flow drop by 49 percent to $134 billion, according to UNCTAD’s Investment Trends Monitor. The U.S.’s decrease was seen in wholesale trade, financial services and manufacturing....

The Hill
UN agency reports China surpassed US in foreign direct investments in 2020
Justine Coleman

Also

US Government officials are protecting some of the largest Russian fraudsters and bank robbers on condition they invest their ill-gotten gains in US real estate, bank accounts, and businesses paying US tax; and also publicly attack the Putin administration for “victimising” them....

Dances with Bears
BIDEN’S RUSSIA WARFIGHTERS PROTECT RUNAWAY RUSSIAN BANK FRAUDSTER VADIM BELYAEV IN NEW YORK
John Helmer

Pentagon Report Points to Two Major Risks to National Security: Consolidation and Shareholder Capitalism — Asher Schechter

A Pentagon report released earlier this month warns that concentrated supply chains, offshoring, and a “business climate that has favored short-term shareholder earnings” have all “severely damaged” America’s ability to arm itself....

ProMarket — The blog of the Stigler Center at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business
Pentagon Report Points to Two Major Risks to National Security: Consolidation and Shareholder Capitalism
Asher Schechter

Lars P. Syll — Mainstream economics — a waste of time on a staggering scale

Why models fail.

As a philosophy professor, I taught logic and critical thinking as part of the introductory course. This involved a cursory study of methodology. 

Part of the course is about methods of correct reasoning and part about incorrect. The part about incorrect reasoning is about identifying arguments that sound great but are just wrong and showing why they are wrong. 

This part seems to have been overlook in teaching introductory economics and apparently some (many?) economists never get the message.

Lars P. Syll’s Blog
Mainstream economics — a waste of time on a staggering scale
Lars P. Syll | Professor, Malmo University

Bill Mitchell — IMF actions in Ecuador expose its venal motivations

There is clearly confusion among mainstream economists as the fractures in their paradigm are being revealed on an almost daily basis. And the more venal ideological motivations are also becoming clearer, that is, if they weren’t already completely transparent. On January 21, 2021, the World Bank published a Policy Research Working Paper – Does Central Bank Independence Increase Inequality? – which demonstrated that the way central banking has been conducted in this neoliberal era has been instrumental in the increasing income inequality that has manifested. A month earlier (December 21, 2020), we read that the IMF is waging a campaign against the democratically elected Ecuadorian government to further restrict its fiscal discretion as it struggles with a terrible pandemic situation, and set in place rules that will allow further resource plunder by foreign corporations. The latter really tells you that despite claims by mainstream economists that they have shifted away from the mainstream austerity bias, the truth is different. A quite remarkable juxtaposition that just demonstrates how confused this lot must be at present. Their attempts to cover their motivations in technical authority are clearly failing....

Bill Mitchell – billy blog
IMF actions in Ecuador expose its venal motivations
Bill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia

The Kremlins Aren't Falling - But Relations with the US Are — Anatoly Karlin

Update on the "color revolution" in Russia. (Not.)

The Unz Review
The Kremlins Aren't Falling - But Relations with the US Are

Anatoly Karlin

Four Ways Biden Can Boost the Global Economy — Jayati Ghosh

The US is nowhere near as economically dominant as it was even a decade ago. Yet President-elect Joe Biden can take several relatively simple steps that would have far-reaching benefits for the US economy, the American people, and the rest of the world....

Project Syndicate
Four Ways Biden Can Boost the Global Economy

Jayati Ghosh | Professor of Economics at the Centre for Economic Studies and Planning, School of Social Sciences, at the Jawaharlal Nehru University, in New Delhi

Slouching Toward Post-Journalism — Martin Gurri

The New York Times and other elite media outlets have openly embraced advocacy over reporting....

The opposite of censorship, which amounts to silencing opposition, is advocacy, which amounts to propaganda. It used to be called "yellow press" although that term seems to have lapsed into history.

While this is chiefly about politics, advocacy and censorship affect not only politics but also economics. 

As always, follow the money and power.

City-Journal

Slouching Toward Post-Journalism
Martin Gurri

Related

Zero Hedge
"You're Forgetting Who You Are As A Journalist": Rand Paul Slams Stephanopoulos In Sunday Spat Over Election Integrity
Tyler Durden

Sputnik — CFR Says Trump Was Right to Press China on Trade, Urges Biden to Do the Same in Concert With Allies

Confronting China is easier said than done. That vessel has already put to sea.

The problem is that no one knows just what to do that could possibly work to achieve specified objectives, you know, like drawing up a feasible plan that can get agreement. 

Why? For one thing, because of different and often competing interests. There are costs as well as benefits, and they are not evenly distributed. 

As I keep saying, without a systems approach, there will be unintended consequences, and dealing with the world system, in which global trade is deeply embedded, is no simple task when a complex adaptive system of planetary scale is involved. The Trump administration just demonstrated that.

Sputnik International
CFR Says Trump Was Right to Press China on Trade, Urges Biden to Do the Same in Concert With Allies

Sputnik — Russian Space Chief Banned on Facebook Over Online Spat With Former US Envoy

Censorship watch.

Facebook has banned Dmitry Rogozin's account after the head of Russia's Roscosmos space agency wrote a post criticising the former US envoy to Russia, Michael McFaul.

In his post, Rogozin warned McFaul against meddling in Russian affairs after the former ambassador gave his two cents on the state of the Russian democracy and the protests supporting Alexei Navalny that swept across the country on Saturday. McFaul said the Russian blogger should be free after his arrest last week for breaching the probation terms in an embezzlement case.

Rogozin mocked Facebook's decision on his Telegram channel, questioning the platform's integrity regarding freedom of speech....

Sputnik International
Russian Space Chief Banned on Facebook Over Online Spat With Former US Envoy

Related

The Twitter account @khamenei_site was never Ayatollah Khamenei's Twitter account or associated with him.

Those 886.605 people who follow Khamenei on English Twitter know that his real (English language) account is @khamenei_ir. He has also accounts that post in other languages but those are listed as official ones. @khamenei_site is not one of them...

Moon of Alabama
Was This Fakenews An Attempt To Get Khamenei Banned From Twitter?

The One Big Problem With A Central Asian Energy Corridor — Alan Mammoser

Update on Pipelinestan, here largely natural gas.

It's all about controlling territory and both stocks and flows of resources with some big players (China, Russia, Turkey) involved along with the little players, the "stans." Turkey, especially, is an emergent power in the region.

Oilprice
The One Big Problem With A Central Asian Energy Corridor
Alan Mammoser for Oilprice.com

I Wouldn't Even Post About It. — Andrei Martyanov

 The color revolution in Russia and maidan in Moscow that wasn't.

Reminiscence of the Future
I Wouldn't Even Post About It.
Andrei Martyanov

Zero Hedge — Taiwan Reports 13 Incursions By Chinese Air Force In One Day

Upping the ante.

Zero Hedge
Taiwan Reports 13 Incursions By Chinese Air Force In One Day
Tyler Durden

Corporate Media’s Leaked Chinese Documents Confirm China Didn’t Hide Covid-19 — Joshua Cho

Weekend reading. Longish and detailed.

FAIR — Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting
Corporate Media’s Leaked Chinese Documents Confirm China Didn’t Hide Covid-19

Joshua Cho

World Economic Forum — Who’s who at Davos Agenda Week 2021

• More than 2,000 leaders will join the virtual Davos Agenda under the theme of "A Crucial Year to Rebuild Trust” from 25 - 29 January.
• Twenty-five heads of state and government will join to address urgent need for global cooperation.
• Six-hundred global CEOs to represent the private sector in 140 sessions live-streamed to the public.
• Civil society leaders, academia, arts and culture, as well as youth, will be represented....

“Rebuilding trust and increasing global cooperation are crucial to fostering innovative and bold solutions to stem the pandemic and drive a robust recovery,” said Klaus Schwab, Founder and Executive Chairman of the Forum.

“This unique meeting will be an opportunity for leaders to outline their vision and address the most important issues of our time, such as the need to accelerate job creation and to protect the environment,” he added.... 

World Economic Forum
Who’s who at Davos Agenda Week 2021
Georg Schmitt

Zero Hedge — A Large US Military Convoy Rolled Into Syria On 1st Day Of Biden Presidency

That didn't take long.

Zero Hedge
A Large US Military Convoy Rolled Into Syria On 1st Day Of Biden Presidency
Tyler Durden

Ray McGovern — Daniel Lazare and I Go Hot and Heavy on Biden-Russia

Are there straws in the wind that Biden my be able to create a more decent relationship with Russia? I say Yes; Dan says No. A wager of $.25 is at stake.

I think Ray is going to be a quarter poorer with Biden up against the MICIMATT (Military-Industrial-Congressional-Intelligence-MEDIA-Academia-Think-Tank) complex, where there are trillions of dollars and world domination the table. His initial appointments don't bode well. The first order of business after Biden taking control was mounting a color revolution attempt in Russia, which is taking place now, with US interference prominent enough for the Russian government to call the US embassy out over it (and again here).

The US-UK strategy has remained essentially the same as when surfaced by Halford Mackinder in 1904 and elaborated by Nicholas Spykman. It was updated by Zbigniew Brzezinski in The Grand Chessboard.

Ray McGovern
Daniel Lazare and I Go Hot and Heavy on Biden-Russia
Ray McGovern, co-founder of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity, and retired 27-year career CIA whose tasks included preparing and briefing The President’s Daily Brief and leading the Soviet Foreign Policy Branch

See also

TASS
Putin offers condolences over death of Larry King - Kremlin

With Kamala Harris, Americans Yet Again Have Trouble Understanding What Multiracial Means — Jennifer Ho

There are some key terms in demographics that apply to the current US in particular, but also the UK through the British Empire and to some degree France with the French Empire. It is also the case with Russia and China, which are multi-ethnic countries.

These terms are "multicultural," "multiracial," and "intersectional." and also "gender" and "sexual orientation."

Culture has to do with tradition. Race has to do with a genetic grouping. They are both included in ethnicity. 

Gender and sexual preference involve physical characteristics and behavior.

Intersectionality is the combination of the above in individuals and groups. This is a big issue now and growing as the global population becomes more diverse in a "shrinking" world.

But being the melting pot and world leader, the US is at the forefront of demographic development and impact the population and world socially, politically and economically.

Tiger Woods was the former poster child. Now it is Kamala Harris.

This is a trend to watch. The post is of interest in this regard. And it goes hand in hand with the clash between liberalism and traditionalism, in which the US is now front and center.

It is not going to be smooth sailing, if Mike Pompeo's departing words that America is not a multicultural nation are any indication.

econintersect
With Kamala Harris, Americans Yet Again Have Trouble Understanding What Multiracial Means
Jennifer Ho, Professor. Asian American Studies, University of Colorado Boulder

Paris-gate

 

Here we go again.... This is just like when recently the Art degree left literally thought Trump meant that illegals were riding across the border on the backs of literal coyotes...  major cognitive impairment in these people no ability to discern the figurative from the literal...  and no ability to discern the abstraction from the real...  they are all unqualified...  SCARY!!!!

AOC lays into Ted Cruz after misleading tweet on Paris Climate Agreement https://t.co/E9IwC50CVM

— The Independent (@Independent) January 21, 2021

Now Even the QAnon Shaman Disowns Trump: I Was Duped

 Trump didn't pardon him. He must feel very let down because he probably felt a lot of loyalty for Trump. And the protestors were probably expecting a coup which didn't happen. 

The legal representative of Jacob Chansley—better known as the “QAnon Shaman,” who burst into the U.S. Capitol wearing furs and Viking horns—has said his client feels cheated by Trump. Referring to his client as “the guy with the horns and the fur,” attorney Al Watkins told the St. Louis NBC News affiliate KSDK: “[Chansley] regrets very, very much having not just been duped by the president, but by being in a position where he allowed that duping to put him in a position to make decisions he should not have made.”

The Daily Beast

Now Even the QAnon Shaman Disowns Trump: I Was Duped

Facebook purges left-wing pages and individuals

The accounts broke no rules and no reason was given for deleting the them. 

 On Friday, Facebook carried out a purge of left-wing, antiwar and progressive pages and accounts, including leading members of the Socialist Equality Party. Facebook gave no explanation why the accounts were disabled or even a public acknowledgement that the deletions had occurred.

Since the 2016 election, the US intelligence agencies have advocated internet censorship in the name of fighting “fake news.” While these actions have been presented as targeting far-right conspiracy theories, they have in fact disproportionately affected left-wing, antiwar and socialist organizations.

WSW

Facebook purges left-wing pages and individuals

MMT Is Already Helping — Pavlina R. Tcherneva

I was looking forward to reading Doug Henwood’s piece and the chance to respond to what I was sure to be a hard-hitting analytical critique. I was disappointed. There is no there there and thus my reply will be short.…

Smackdown.

Jacobin
MMT Is Already Helping

Pavlina R. Tcherneva | Assistant Professor of Economics at Bard College, Research Scholar at The Levy Economics Institute, and Senior Research Associate at the Center for Full Employment and Price Stability

The crisis of American power: How Europeans see Biden’s America — Ivan Krastev and Mark Leonard

Our survey showed that Europeans’ attitudes towards the United States have undergone a massive change. Majorities in key member states now think the US political system is broken, that China will be more powerful than the US within a decade, and that Europeans cannot rely on the US to defend them. They are drawing radical consequences from these lessons. Large numbers think Europeans should invest in their own defence and look to Berlin rather than Washington as their most important partner. They want to be tougher with the US on economic issues. And, rather than aligning with Washington, they want their countries to stay neutral in a conflict between the US and Russia or China....

European Council on Foreign Relations
The crisis of American power: How Europeans see Biden’s America The crisis of American power: How Europeans see Biden’s America
Ivan Krastev, Chairman of the Centre for Liberal Strategies, and Mark Leonard, Director

New Covid-19 strain may be more lethal, Robert Peston learns

Alarming news! 

The worrying news is that although treatments for Covid-19 have improved, the new strain does seem to be more lethal.

"Four groups - Imperial, LSHTM, PHE and Exeter - have looked at the relationship between people testing positive for the variant vs old strains and the risk of death - that suggests a 1.3-fold increased risk of death.

ITV

New Covid-19 strain may be more lethal, Robert Peston learns

Newly declassified documents, the British saw Trump as their "main opponent"

Donald Trump’s presidency would do unmitigated damage to the U.S./U.K 'special relationship,' would be absolutely hostile to British interests, and had to be defeated through Steele’s participation in the Russiagate disinformation campaign."

PDF

https://t.co/6pygLfADDE 

Heisenberger Report — Here’s An Idea: Put People To Work & Print Money To Pay Them

Job guarantee, but no mention of sources.

Heisenberger Report

Here’s An Idea: Put People To Work & Print Money To Pay Them 

Fauci says it's 'liberating' working under Biden — Jonathan Easley

I can tell you I take no pleasure at all in being in a situation of contradicting the president, so it was really something that you didn’t feel you could actually say something and there wouldn’t be any repercussions about it,” he said. “The idea that you can get up here and talk about what you know, what the evidence and science is, and know that’s it — let the science speak — it is somewhat of a liberating feeling.”...

The Hill
Fauci says it's 'liberating' working under Biden
Jonathan Easley

McConnell, Heavily Funded by Wall Street, Is Blocking Seating of Democrats as Senate Committee Chairs — Pam and Russ Martens

Finance capital rules!

Wall Street On Parade
McConnell, Heavily Funded by Wall Street, Is Blocking Seating of Democrats as Senate Committee Chairs
Pam Martens and Russ Martens

Australians could soon be deprived of Google’s ubiquitous search engine, with the web behemoth threatening to cut off service should lawmakers pass a hot-button measure forcing tech firms to cough up revenue to media outlets.

As Australian legislators continue to debate the controversial law – which would compel internet platforms to hand over a cut of revenues to press agencies for sharing their content – Google stepped into the fray on Friday, insisting the move would make its operations unfeasible in the country.

Internet growing pains.

RT
Google threatens to REMOVE search engine in Australia if legislators force it to share profits with news content creators