Subjects Archives: Financialization

Reminiscent of Imperial Japan’s “Comfort Women,” the organized sex trade near U.S. bases in Korea involved horrendous human rights violations.

The ongoing plunder of Africa’s natural resources drained by capital flight is holding it back yet again. More African nations face protracted recessions amid mounting debt distress, rubbing salt into deep wounds from the past.

In the current calendar year an estimated $200 billion has already flown out of India which amounts to a third of India’s exchange reserves.

The demise of FTX, the fifth-biggest cryptocurrency exchange by trade volume in 2022, and the second-largest by holdings, has sent a wave of chaos through global financial markets.

FTX had some eye-opening connections to powerful entities and individuals around the world before it all came crashing down.

Increased consumption of ultraprocessed foods (UPFs) was associated with more than 10% of all-cause premature, preventable deaths in Brazil in 2019. That is the finding of a new peer-reviewed study in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.

Developing countries have long been told to avoid borrowing from central banks (CBs) to finance government spending. Many have even legislated against CB financing of fiscal expenditure.

Seneca Lake’s picturesque setting belies its long history of conquest and extraction.

During the Second World War, the Canadian government appealed for Canadians to buy war bonds to fight fascism in Europe.

The story currently being peddle by the folks at Bloomberg [ht: ja] is that the American middle-class is currently suffering, as the enormous wealth they managed to accumulate during the past few years is now dwindling. And that crisis—the end of their “once-in-a-generation wealth boom”—is what they will take into the midterm elections.

Inflation, Imperialism & Worker Resistance

EU foreign-policy chief Josep Borrell confessed the West’s neoliberal economic model was “based on cheap energy coming from Russia,” “access to the big China market,” and low-paid Chinese workers. Europe has now lost that, and is thus in crisis.

Big Oil stands to pocket billions in taxpayer dollars by way of carbon capture, their latest climate scam. Here’s how they’ll do it.

Preoccupied with enhancing their own ‘credibility’ and reputations, central banks (CBs) are again driving the world economy into recession, financial turmoil and debt crises.

WHAT is called OPEC+, that is the 13 members of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) together with 11 other petroleum exporting countries led by Russia, decided on October 5 to cut their oil production by 2 million barrels per day, starting from November. The U.S. had been pressing OPEC not to take this decision.

The dogmatic obsession with and focus on fighting inflation in rich countries are pushing the world economy into recession, with many dire consequences, especially for poorer countries. This phobia is due to myths shared by most central bankers.

FOR the first time ever, the annual rate of inflation in the Eurozone, measured by the Consumer Price Index, has reached double digits: it exceeded 10 per cent in September 2022, up from 9.1 per cent in August.

Conor: Germany’s swift demise reminds me of the German intelligence agent Bachmann in “A Most Wanted Man.” He’s led to believe he’s operating on an equal level with CIA and British intelligence only to realize too late he was being played the whole time.

The Secretary-General of the UNCTAD is warning that “the current course of action is hurting the most vulnerable, especially in developing countries, and risks tipping the world into a global recession.”

“Record heat and droughts are exposing millions to growing water and food scarcity issues across all continents,” the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) warned in a February 2022 report. “About half of the world’s population already experiences severe water scarcity for some part of the year.”