tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-288006632024-03-14T15:50:28.120+01:00Slovakia Bratislava CommentaryA BLOG ABOUT SLOVAKIA AND LIFE IN BRATISLAVA AND THE EU.Macko Uskohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03854113924478223398noreply@blogger.comBlogger375125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28800663.post-28765356479791117592022-01-18T10:06:00.000+01:002022-01-18T10:07:18.789+01:00good news<div dir="ltr"><div>Omicron is saving us from DELTA</div><div>experts are agreeing based on data now.</div><div>UK about 1 month ahead of us.</div><div><br></div><a href="https://youtu.be/U3W84wb5jKo?t=1041">https://youtu.be/U3W84wb5jKo?t=1041</a><br><div><br></div></div> Macko Uskohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03854113924478223398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28800663.post-89553872218488280002021-03-04T12:48:00.001+01:002021-03-04T12:48:45.610+01:00Stark link between obesity and Covid deaths revealed | Financial Times<div dir="ltr"><div><br><br><b><font size="6"> Stark link between obesity and Covid deaths revealed</font></b> <br></div><br> Nine out of 10 deaths from coronavirus have occurred in countries with high obesity levels, according to World Health Organization-backed research that sets out the stark correlation between excessive weight and lives lost to the disease.<br><br>The study from the World Obesity Federation (WOF), which represents scientists, medical professionals and researchers from more than 50 regional and national obesity associations, showed mortality rates were 10 times higher where at least 50 per cent of the population was overweight.<br><br>It offers fresh insight into why people in some countries die at far greater rates after catching the virus than in others.<br><br>Age has been seen as the biggest predictor for severe outcomes, which has led to priority being given to older people in most countries' Covid-19 vaccine rollouts. But the WOF said its report "shows for the first time that overweight populations come a close second". It is now calling for this group to be prioritised for immunisation.<br><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHgmOhKxyfXY4dcyQoTd9iU8puTIACIYgiAvToiYtsSN_1WaA_DXYj2H7EL7f_sbTLFwPZMN1_mi2V8Zq_foQJ6PuNjELHhtu87-cQX4EL7CoeCgDeaVB7OcxQN_k-HOWiGXeYDg/s1600/image-725622.png"><img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHgmOhKxyfXY4dcyQoTd9iU8puTIACIYgiAvToiYtsSN_1WaA_DXYj2H7EL7f_sbTLFwPZMN1_mi2V8Zq_foQJ6PuNjELHhtu87-cQX4EL7CoeCgDeaVB7OcxQN_k-HOWiGXeYDg/s320/image-725622.png" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_6935764561111220322" /></a><br>Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO director-general, said the report "must act as a wake-up call to governments globally" to tackle obesity.<br><br>Analysis of both the latest mortality data from Johns Hopkins University, and the WHO Global Health Observatory data on obesity, demonstrated that 2.2m of the 2.5m global deaths were in countries with high levels of obesity.<br><br>Scientists have sought to understand the difference in death rates between Asian and western countries, as well as low income and high-income countries. The WOF suggests the discovery of the "common denominator" of obesity is an important part of the explanation.<br><br>Tim Lobstein, senior policy adviser to the WOF and the report's author, said death rates were 10 times higher in countries where more than 50 per cent of the population were overweight. The increase in national death rates where countries exceeded the threshold of 50 per cent of population overweight was "dramatic".<br><br>The report, released ahead of world obesity day on Thursday, did not find a single example of a country where less than 40 per cent of the population was overweight having high death rates. On the other hand, no country with high death rates — at least 100 per 100,000 — had less than 50 per cent of its population overweight. <div><br><br> Vietnam, for example, has the lowest recorded death rate in the world and the second lowest level of overweight people: just 0.04 per 100,000 deaths from Covid-19 and 18.3 per cent of adults overweight, according to WHO data. In contrast, the UK has the third highest death rate in the world and the fourth highest obesity rate, at 184 deaths per 100,000 and 63.7 per cent of adults overweight. It is followed by the US with about 152 deaths per 100,000 and almost 68 per cent obese. Tedros said: "The correlation between obesity and mortality rates from Covid-19 is clear and compelling." Investment in public health and co-ordinated, international action was needed to tackle the root causes of obesity, he added, as "one of the best ways for countries to build resilience in health systems post-pandemic". Lobstein, visiting professor at the University of Sydney and a former WHO adviser, said governments had failed to tackle obesity over many years despite UN targets. Yet Covid-19 was only the latest infection exacerbated by weight issues: "We have seen it in the past with Mers, H1N1 and other respiratory diseases," he added. The report also made an economic argument for action to control obesity, saying the costs of locking down societies to prevent health services being overrun "could have been significantly mitigated if governments had tackled population weight issues before the pandemic". Of the $28tn projected by the IMF as the global cost in lost economic output worldwide up to 2025, "at least $6tn will be directly attributable to the issue of populations living with excess weight", it argued. <br></div><div><br></div><a href="https://www.ft.com/content/7db2b641-c831-4876-ba0c-0f815a42c8f0">https://www.ft.com/content/7db2b641-c831-4876-ba0c-0f815a42c8f0</a></div> Macko Uskohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03854113924478223398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28800663.post-62472181775820632022021-01-05T00:07:00.000+01:002021-01-05T00:08:13.528+01:00Bridging east-west differences in the EU | Financial Times<div dir="ltr"> Please use the sharing tools found via the share button at the top or side of articles. Copying articles to share with others is a breach of <a href="https://www.ft.com">FT.com</a> <a href="https://help.ft.com/help/legal-privacy/terms-conditions/">T&Cs</a> and <a href="https://help.ft.com/help/legal-privacy/copyright/copyright-policy/">Copyright Policy</a>. Email <a href="mailto:licensing@ft.com">licensing@ft.com</a> to buy additional rights. Subscribers may share up to 10 or 20 articles per month using the gift article service. More information can be <a href="https://www.ft.com/tour">found here</a>. <br> <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/414d98b9-797c-4d8f-b448-71c87cc00426">https://www.ft.com/content/414d98b9-797c-4d8f-b448-71c87cc00426</a><br><br> Bridging east-west differences in the EU Common values and interests can draw Europe together THE EDITORIAL BOARD Add to myFT Poland's Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki (L) and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban (R) chat at the start of a two-day EU summit, in Brussels, last month © Olivier Hoslet/Pool/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock Share on Twitter (opens new window) Share on Facebook (opens new window) Share on LinkedIn (opens new window) Share Save The editorial board YESTERDAY 38 Print this page Despite the health and economic costs of the pandemic, the EU ended 2020 in better shape than was feared early in the year. Leaders of the bloc's 27 countries struck a deal on its 2021-2027 budget. They will launch a recovery fund that breaks new ground by letting the EU borrow on financial markets for the purpose of assisting needy countries with grants and loans. The 27 overcame differences to set the ambitious target of cutting greenhouse gas emissions to 55 per cent of 1990 levels by 2030. Finally, the election of Joe Biden as US president in place of Donald Trump promises to lower the curtain on what were the most difficult four years in transatlantic relations since the end of the second world war. These successes should not disguise the fact that, in one area fundamental to the EU's long-term prospects, tensions and misunderstandings persist. This is the relationship between the bloc's old western European states and its newer members from central and eastern Europe. In matters such as the rule of law, liberal democracy, corruption, migration and gender policies, impatience and resentment are growing in certain circles on both sides. Several steps are needed to address the problem. The first is to dispense with the mental map of Europe which divides the continent into two halves, as if nothing has changed since the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. Such a map encourages western Europeans to see themselves as guardians of a more advanced order, as in the era when the east languished under communism. But it makes central and eastern Europeans, including many critical of political illiberalism and corruption in their countries, feel that they are often on the receiving end of high-minded lectures from the west. In reality, governments and peoples on both sides have a profound interest in making a success of what they share in common. This includes eurozone membership, which unites 19 countries from west and east. It covers security and defence policy, where most EU states are members of Nato. Harder questions concern EU values and national sovereignty. Western European governments are right to insist on the primacy of democratic norms and the rule of law, for the corrosion of these values risks turning over time into an existential threat to the EU's unity. Yet sometimes their actions amount to less than their words. A case in point is the protection afforded by leading western politicians in the centre-right European People's party to central and eastern leaders who fail to uphold EU values. It remains to be seen whether the compromise which the 27 agreed in early December on linking disbursement of recovery funds to observance of the rule of law will be an effective mechanism or an unsatisfactory fudge. But it will need to be more than a western stick with which to beat the east. The record of some western European countries on corruption and the rule of law is not unblemished. The more coherent the westerners' message on EU values, the more they will give heart to millions of people in central and eastern Europe who yearn for improvements in the quality of public life. Yet westerners should keep in mind that, for many central and eastern Europeans, national independence is no abstract concept. Its recovery after 1989 was a prized achievement after decades of dictatorship and foreign oppression. The year 2021 can and should be the time when each side tries harder to understand each other and co-operate on the basis of common interests and values. </div> Macko Uskohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03854113924478223398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28800663.post-82920618050806826322021-01-04T23:36:00.000+01:002021-01-04T23:37:08.378+01:00Bridging east-west differences in the EU | Financial Times<div dir="ltr"><div><br> Bridging east-west differences in the EU Common values and interests can draw Europe together THE EDITORIAL BOARD Add to myFT Poland's Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki (L) and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban (R) chat at the start of a two-day EU summit, in Brussels, last month © Olivier Hoslet/Pool/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock Share on Twitter (opens new window) Share on Facebook (opens new window) Share on LinkedIn (opens new window) Share Save The editorial board YESTERDAY 38 Print this page Despite the health and economic costs of the pandemic, the EU ended 2020 in better shape than was feared early in the year. Leaders of the bloc's 27 countries struck a deal on its 2021-2027 budget. They will launch a recovery fund that breaks new ground by letting the EU borrow on financial markets for the purpose of assisting needy countries with grants and loans. The 27 overcame differences to set the ambitious target of cutting greenhouse gas emissions to 55 per cent of 1990 levels by 2030. Finally, the election of Joe Biden as US president in place of Donald Trump promises to lower the curtain on what were the most difficult four years in transatlantic relations since the end of the second world war. These successes should not disguise the fact that, in one area fundamental to the EU's long-term prospects, tensions and misunderstandings persist. This is the relationship between the bloc's old western European states and its newer members from central and eastern Europe. In matters such as the rule of law, liberal democracy, corruption, migration and gender policies, impatience and resentment are growing in certain circles on both sides. Several steps are needed to address the problem. The first is to dispense with the mental map of Europe which divides the continent into two halves, as if nothing has changed since the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. Such a map encourages western Europeans to see themselves as guardians of a more advanced order, as in the era when the east languished under communism. But it makes central and eastern Europeans, including many critical of political illiberalism and corruption in their countries, feel that they are often on the receiving end of high-minded lectures from the west. In reality, governments and peoples on both sides have a profound interest in making a success of what they share in common. This includes eurozone membership, which unites 19 countries from west and east. It covers security and defence policy, where most EU states are members of Nato. Harder questions concern EU values and national sovereignty. Western European governments are right to insist on the primacy of democratic norms and the rule of law, for the corrosion of these values risks turning over time into an existential threat to the EU's unity. Yet sometimes their actions amount to less than their words. A case in point is the protection afforded by leading western politicians in the centre-right European People's party to central and eastern leaders who fail to uphold EU values. It remains to be seen whether the compromise which the 27 agreed in early December on linking disbursement of recovery funds to observance of the rule of law will be an effective mechanism or an unsatisfactory fudge. But it will need to be more than a western stick with which to beat the east. The record of some western European countries on corruption and the rule of law is not unblemished. The more coherent the westerners' message on EU values, the more they will give heart to millions of people in central and eastern Europe who yearn for improvements in the quality of public life. Yet westerners should keep in mind that, for many central and eastern Europeans, national independence is no abstract concept. Its recovery after 1989 was a prized achievement after decades of dictatorship and foreign oppression. The year 2021 can and should be the time when each side tries harder to understand each other and co-operate on the basis of common interests and values. <br></div><div><br></div><a href="https://www.ft.com/content/414d98b9-797c-4d8f-b448-71c87cc00426">https://www.ft.com/content/414d98b9-797c-4d8f-b448-71c87cc00426</a></div> Macko Uskohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03854113924478223398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28800663.post-18680135569100592772020-12-23T02:05:00.001+01:002020-12-23T02:05:57.632+01:00<div dir="ltr"><p>Slovakia will go under curfew again. Starting on <strong>Saturday, December 19 at 5:00</strong>, all shops except for essential ones (groceries, chemist's, pharmacies, etc.) will close, while people will be recommended to stay home.</p><div class="gmail-article-item-wrapper"><a href="https://www.sme.sk/predplatne-spectator" target="_blank" class="gmail-gallery-single gmail-fr-sm"> <noscript> <img alt="" src="https://m.smedata.sk/api-media/media/image/spectator/1/66/6609551/6609551_625x.gif?rev=3" width="400" height="266"> </noscript> <small style="max-width:400px;display:block;margin-left:auto;margin-right:auto"></small></a></div><p>There will be <a href="#Exceptions">several exceptions</a>. One basic condition is that people who want to spend Christmas with somebody else should choose only one different household and create some kind of "small bubble" to slow the spread of the virus.</p><p>"This is a ban that strongly calls for the responsibility of people," Health Minister Marek Krajčí (OĽaNO) said.</p><p>As there will be several exceptions from curfew, he called on people to follow basic rules and avoid meeting many people from different households.</p><p>"The situation is worse than ever, and the virus is spreading uncontrollably," Krajčí added.</p><p>The restrictions will currently be applied only until December 29, <a target="_blank" href="https://spectator.sme.sk/c/22532926/national-emergency-will-be-prolonged.html">when the national emergency ends</a>. However, it will be possible to prolong it until January 10, if the parliament passes a law that will <a target="_blank" href="https://spectator.sme.sk/c/22550107/cabinet-wants-to-change-rules-for-declaring-national-emergency.html">enable it prolong the national emergency repeatedly</a> (for now, it is possible to declare the emergency for 90 days only).</p><h2><a name="Exceptions"></a>Exceptions</h2><p>There will be several exceptions from the curfew:</p> <ul class="gmail-ul"> <li>travelling to work (but employers will be recommended to allow for home office, if possible);</li> <li>going to essential shops, pharmacies, medical facilities, banks and insurance companies, car and bicycle repair shops, post office and the issue counters of shops and e-shops;</li> <li>walking pets;</li> <li>taking children to schools/kindergartens;</li> <li>going to a testing site;</li> <li>going to a funeral, wedding ceremony or christening;</li> <li>taking care of a relative;</li> <li>visits to nature;</li> <li>individual sports outdoor (such as skiing, cross-country skiing);</li> <li>going to churches;</li> <li>travelling to a recreation facility;</li> <li>visits between two households only.</li> </ul> <p>Rules for travelling to and from Slovakia do not change.</p><h2>COVID automat passed</h2><p>The cabinet also gave a green light to the Health Ministry's plan of managing the measures. It is officially called the Alert system for the monitoring of the pandemic development and taking measures against SARS-CoV-2, to be known as the COVID automat.</p><p>The COVID automat, the official name of the automatic system for the adopting and lifting of measures, will provide information about the epidemic situation and the risk rate at the regional level. It should also provide for efficient and timely measures, transparent and predictable.</p><p>The COVID automat works with these key indicators:</p> <ul class="gmail-ul"> <li>number of cases (future strain);</li> <li>increase in cases (current strain);</li> <li>the dynamics of the epidemic.</li> </ul> <p>Individual departments will be able to apply their own systems of measures (e.g. the Education Ministry for schools), if they fulfil four key criteria as defined by the COVID automat:</p> <ul class="gmail-ul"> <li>safety (to prevent the spread of infection in communities);</li> <li>isolation;</li> <li>protection;</li> <li>surveillance (management and monitoring of infections, testing, identification of positive cases and suspects).</li> </ul> <div class="gmail-article-item-wrapper"><div class="embed-box gmail-flourish gmail-align-center-sm"><div class="gmail-flourish-embed"><div class="gmail-flourish-credit" style="width:100%;margin:0px 0px 4px;text-align:right;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;color:rgb(136,136,136);font-size:11px;font-weight:bold"><a href="https://public.flourish.studio/visualisation/4684517/?utm_source=showcase&utm_campaign=visualisation/4684517" style="display:inline-block;text-decoration-line:none;font:inherit;color:inherit;border:none;margin:0px 5px"><img alt="Flourish logo" src="https://public.flourish.studio/resources/bosh.svg" style="font: inherit; width: auto; height: 12px; border: none; margin: 0px 2px; vertical-align: middle; display: inline-block; box-shadow: none;"><span style="font:inherit;vertical-align:middle;display:inline-block">A Flourish data visualization</span></a></div></div></div></div><p>The COVID automat will be switching between regional measures and nationwide measures based on the epidemic situation as defined by the key indicators. In higher level of alert, measures are taken for the whole country, with a lower level of alert regional measures applied.</p><p>The indicators to be followed are the seven-day average of new cases, number of hospitalisations, and the reproduction number.</p><p><strong>First level of nationwide alert</strong> arises with more than 1,000 new cases in a seven-day average, the <strong>second level </strong>with 1,500-3,000, the <strong>third level</strong> 3,000-5,000, and <strong>fourth level</strong> at 5,000.</p><p>The number of hospitalisations will be 1,500 for the <strong>first level alert</strong>, 2,000-2,500 for <strong>the second level</strong>, and more than 2,500 for<strong> the higher levels</strong>.</p><p>When managed at the regional level, neighbouring regions shall not have more than three levels difference between them. The alert level for the better-off region is increasing in order to accommodate this condition.</p><p>Measures will be eased no earlier than ten days after the re-assessment of the regions.</p><br><br>Čítajte viac: <a href="https://spectator.sme.sk/c/22556791/christmas-in-small-bubbles-cabinet-introduces-rules-for-curfew.html">https://spectator.sme.sk/c/22556791/christmas-in-small-bubbles-cabinet-introduces-rules-for-curfew.html</a> <br></div> Macko Uskohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03854113924478223398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28800663.post-34186826294697260852020-12-11T19:18:00.001+01:002020-12-11T19:18:43.694+01:00Financial Times: On Brexit, the Tories have fallen prey to magical thinking<div dir="auto"><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto"><div dir="auto">On Brexit, the Tories have fallen prey to magical thinking</div><div dir="auto">Ministers still wish away hard trade-offs without a clear vision for prosperity if there is no deal</div><div dir="auto">Jonathan McHugh illustration of Camilla Cavendish column 'On Brexit, the Tories have fallen prey to magical thinking'</div><div dir="auto">© Jonathan McHugh 2020</div><div dir="auto"> </div><div dir="auto">December 11, 2020 4:00 pm by Camilla Cavendish</div><div dir="auto">In the weeks following the Brexit referendum vote, I sat with two of the wisest heads in government — the late Lord Heywood and Sir Oliver Letwin — to parse the different courses the UK might take to exit the European Union. Experts came and went, and possible permutations were sketched: "Canada-plus", "Norway" and other regimes. It was obvious there would be a trade-off between sovereignty and market access. The only question was the balance the next prime minister would strike between the two. This in turn would partly be driven by his or her economic vision.</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">Four years later, the UK and EU stand on the cusp of a momentous event. Yet the UK is still trying to wish away the trade-offs, with no coherent vision for future prosperity. What many Leavers thought was going to be buccaneering Britain is turning out to be a Britain engorged with Covid-led state intervention, no serious prospectus for deregulation, and few radical policies to help enterprise either. </div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">For a long time, I assumed there must be a secret plan. By seeking a thin trade deal, ministers have already put up big trading barriers to our nearest and biggest market. It would be highly risky to do that without a cunning alternative to support jobs and livelihoods. European leaders have thought the same: the British state, with its high-handed attitude, must have something up its sleeve.</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">That is why, fearing unfair future competition, Brussels is insisting that any deal must guarantee a "level playing field" in areas like labour standards and restrictions on state aid.</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">The threat is surely exaggerated. Far from becoming a Singapore-on-Thames, the UK has been heading in the opposite direction. Boris Johnson has embraced a more social democratic model with big spending, social protections and environmentalism. There is little now that suggests a serious desire to depart from most EU standards. As a result, the EU and UK are locked in a row that may tip both sides into a damaging no deal, on a mistaken premise.</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">The full horror of this impasse now seems to be dawning on some Brexiters. Many ministers seem to be squinting at events, barely able to look and instead busying themselves with trivia. The culture secretary wants Netflix to warn viewers that the TV series The Crown is a fictional dramatisation. The education secretary claims Britain got a head start on vaccinating against Covid-19 because "we're a much better country". Jingoism and nostalgia often rise as empires crumble. </div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">Regardless of how anyone voted in 2016, we all want our country to prosper. But now we've reached the eleventh hour, I'd like someone to say what the plan is and to be reminded: why exactly are we doing this?</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">Ever since Theresa May declared in January 2017 that the UK could not "possibly" stay in the single market or a full customs union, most Tories have been unwilling to accept the implications. A few Leavers tried to develop a prospectus for how to forge a new path in the world — such as hedge fund manager Paul Marshall. But ministers didn't listen.</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">As a result, the UK is now underprepared for the situation it has triggered. If global Britain is to be a dynamic trading nation, for example, we will need excellent transport links and logistics. Yet Heathrow has been overtaken by Paris Charles de Gaulle as Europe's busiest airport, in part because ministers dithered for so long over passenger testing for Covid-19. And some UK ports are so congested and inefficient that shipping companies have imposed surcharges on exports to Britain.</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">Reducing red tape is another obvious area where Brexit could bring benefits. But many companies want to maintain equivalence to protect their supply chains. The UK also wants higher standards than Brussels on animal welfare. This doesn't feel like a free market drive for regulatory divergence. Meanwhile, at least over the short term, Brexit is leading to reams of increased paperwork.</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">One good idea is to create an Office of Regulatory Assessment to illuminate the cost of regulatory burdens on businesses and to help boost economic growth, as similar reforms did in Canada 20 years ago. Yet no such body exists, despite the apparent belief of Mr Johnson's former adviser Dominic Cummings in deregulation. The proposal instead comes from the Campaign for Economic Growth, a new ginger group, which is alarmed by the lack of progress.</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">Perhaps the pandemic has derailed this kind of detailed thinking. But even before Covid-19 struck there was no strategy to achieve the campaign promise that Brexit would "see a pent-up tidal wave of investment into our country". The 2019 Conservative manifesto contained this statement but didn't say how. Beyond a few paragraphs about technology and R&D, it said little about business. At the subsequent election, Mr Johnson forged a coalition which has only accentuated the government's desire to spend, raise the minimum wage and "level up" the north. There is no concomitant desire to protect the service industry in the south, or plan to generate the needed revenues.</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">Of all the brilliant minds I met in Whitehall's echoing corridors in June 2016, none foresaw how much the Conservative party would fall prey to magical thinking. However damaging a "no deal" will be, one Tory moderate told me this week that it might be the only way to force the government to get its act together, accept the trade-offs it has so far wished away, and start to think seriously about how Britain can prosper alone. Deal or no deal, that work starts now.</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">The writer, a former head of the Downing Street policy unit, is a Harvard senior fellow</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">Copyright The Financial Times Limited . All rights reserved. Please don't copy articles from FT.com and redistribute by email or post to the web.</div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto">Latest on</div><div dir="auto">Brexit</div></div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto"><br></div>Financial Times: On Brexit, the Tories have fallen prey to magical thinking.<br><a href="https://www.ft.com/content/0c5637d3-c193-4527-bb02-96412db6c674">https://www.ft.com/content/0c5637d3-c193-4527-bb02-96412db6c674</a> </div> Macko Uskohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03854113924478223398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28800663.post-75847803845936353692020-11-13T00:15:00.000+01:002020-11-13T00:15:11.508+01:00Is AI finally closing in on human intelligence?<p><br /></p><p>Is AI finally closing in on human intelligence?</p><p>GPT-3 has been hailed as an artificial intelligence breakthrough. John Thornhill tries it out and assesses the rewards — and the risks</p><p>John Thornhill YESTERDAY</p><p>It can churn out emails, computer code, internet ads, plotlines for video games, guitar riffs and suggestions for Halloween costumes. It can write disarmingly plausible poems in the spirit of Emily Dickinson, prose in the style of Ernest Hemingway and even, if so instructed, an imaginary conversation between Dickinson and Hemingway.</p><p><br /></p><p>The possibilities seem almost endless. So when I had the opportunity to interact with GPT-3, a new language-generation model that has caused a sensation in the artificial intelligence world over the past few months, I enlisted its help in drafting myself a new biography, infused with the spirit of Star Wars hero Luke Skywalker.</p><p><br /></p><p>Trained on pretty much all the text accessible on the internet, GPT-3 is remarkable for its speed, scale and versatility. This is what it instantaneously produced: “John Thornhill was already a decorated war hero when he joined the Rebel Alliance. He was experienced with a blaster and intuitive when it came to the art of war, but his true skill lay with his squadron. Rising to command a squadron of his own in the Rebellion, John would lead his team through numerous battles, making him a steadfast leader with the spirit of a true Rebel.” Time to update my business cards.</p><p><br /></p><p>Thanks to recent advances in machine learning, language generation systems are becoming increasingly commonplace. Narrative Science’s Quill can ingest data on the performance of a portfolio of stocks and write summaries for investors, for example. But for sheer adaptability none can match GPT-3, unveiled in May by OpenAI, a San Francisco-based research company. At an estimated cost of $12m, the model contains 175 billion language parameters, 100 times more than the previous prototype. It is, to adapt a phrase of the pioneering British computer scientist Alan Turing, the most impressive “imitation” machine yet built.</p><p><br /></p><p>Turing was one of the first people to imagine how the world would be transformed by machines that could think. In his 1950 paper “Computing Machinery and Intelligence”, he explained that computers might one day become so good at impersonating humans that it would be impossible to distinguish them from flesh-and-blood beings. “We may hope that machines will eventually compete with men in all purely intellectual fields,” Turing wrote.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>The Digital Electronic Universal Computing Engine, an early computer photographed in 1958, was developed from plans by Alan Turing © SSPL/NMeM/Walter Nurnberg/Getty Images</p><p>Such universal computing machines would be able to win what he called the “imitation game” by persuading a person in an electronic dialogue that they were interacting with another human being, although some now argue that this so-called Turing Test may be more of a reflection on human gullibility than true machine intelligence.</p><p><br /></p><p>Seventy years on, thanks to the rapid expansion of the internet and exponential increases in computing power, we have moved into a machine-enabled world that would stretch even Turing’s imagination. As a result of new software techniques, such as neural networks and deep learning, computer scientists have become far better at instructing machines to play the imitation game.</p><p><br /></p><p>Developing safe and beneficial AI ‘is the most important thing that I can ever imagine working on’</p><p><br /></p><p>Sam Altman, OpenAI CEO</p><p>Some of those who have already experimented with GPT-3 say it is exhibiting glimmerings of real intelligence, marking a significant step towards the ultimate endpoint of AI: artificial general intelligence (AGI), when electronic intelligence matches the human kind across almost every intellectual domain. Others dismiss this as nonsense, pointing to GPT-3’s laughable flaws and suggesting we are still several conceptual breakthroughs away from the creation of any such superintelligence.</p><p><br /></p><p>Sam Altman, the deadpan 35-year-old chief executive of OpenAI who is one of the highest-profile figures in Silicon Valley, says there is a reason why smart people have become over-excited about GPT-3. “There is evidence here of the first precursor to general purpose artificial intelligence — one system that can support many, many different applications and really elevate the kinds of software that we can build,” he says in an interview with the FT. “I think its significance is a glimpse of the future.”</p><p><br /></p><p>OpenAI ranks as one of the most unusual organisations on the planet, perhaps only comparable with Google DeepMind, the London-based AI research company run by Demis Hassabis. Its 120 employees divide, as Altman puts it, into three very different “tribes”: AI researchers, start-up builders and tech policy and safety experts. It shares its San Francisco offices with Neuralink, the futuristic brain-computer interface company.</p><p><br /></p><p>Founded in 2015 with a $1bn funding commitment from several leading West Coast entrepreneurs and tech companies, OpenAI boasts the madly ambitious mission of developing AGI for the benefit of all humanity. Its earliest billionaire backers included Elon Musk, the mercurial founder of Tesla and SpaceX (who has since stepped back from OpenAI), Reid Hoffman, the venture capitalist and founder of LinkedIn, and Peter Thiel, the early investor in Facebook and Palantir.</p><p><br /></p><p>Initially founded as a non-profit company, OpenAI has since adopted a more commercial approach and accepted a further $1bn investment from Microsoft last year. Structured as a “capped-profit” company, it is able to raise capital and issue equity, a necessity if you are to attract the best researchers in Silicon Valley, while sticking to its guiding public mission without undue shareholder pressure. “That structure enables us to decide when and how to release tech,” Altman says.</p><p><br /></p><p>Altman took over as chief executive last year, having previously run Y Combinator, one of Silicon Valley’s most successful start-up incubators, which helped spawn more than 2,000 companies, including Airbnb, Dropbox and Stripe. He says he was only tempted to give up this “dream job” to help tackle one of the most pressing challenges facing humanity: how to develop safe and beneficial AI. “It is the most important thing that I can ever imagine working on,” he says. “I won’t pretend to have all the answers yet, but I am happy to spend my energy trying to contribute in whatever way I can.”</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>Alan Turing, the pioneering British computer scientist, photographed in the 1930s. He was one of the first people to imagine how the world would be transformed by machines that could think © Fine Art Images/Heritage Images/Getty Images</p><p><br /></p><p>Open AI’s chief executive Sam Altman, pictured in 2018, says: ‘As AI gets smarter, just as humans get smarter, it develops better judgment’ © Walter Nurnberg/SSPL/Getty Images</p><p>In Altman’s view, the unfolding AI revolution may well be more consequential for humanity than the preceding agricultural, industrial and computer revolutions combined. The development of AGI would fundamentally recalibrate the relationship between humans and machines, potentially giving rise to a higher form of electronic intelligence. At that point, as the Israeli historian Yuval Noah Harari has put it, homo sapiens would cease to be the smartest algorithm on the planet.</p><p><br /></p><p>Managed right, Altman says that AI can transform human productivity and creativity, enabling us to address many of the world’s most complex challenges, such as climate change and pandemics. “I think it’s going to be an incredibly powerful future,” he says. But managed wrong, AI might only multiply many of the problems we confront today: the excessive concentration of corporate power as private companies increasingly assume the functions once exercised by nation states; the further widening of economic inequality and the narrowing of opportunity; the spread of misinformation and the erosion of democracy.</p><p><br /></p><p>Some writers, such as Nick Bostrom, have gone so far as to argue that runaway AI could even pose an existential threat to humanity. “Before the prospect of an intelligence explosion, we humans are like small children playing with a bomb,” he wrote in his 2014 book Superintelligence. Such warnings certainly attracted the attention of Elon Musk, who tweeted: “We need to be super careful with AI . . . potentially more dangerous than nukes.”</p><p><br /></p><p>Such concerns about how best to manage these powerful tools mean that OpenAI only released GPT-3 in a controlled environment. “GPT-3 was not a model we wanted to put out into the world and not be able to change how we enforce things as we go,” Altman says. Some 2,000 companies have now been given access to it in a controlled private beta test. Their learnings as they explore its capabilities are being fed back into the model to make further improvements. “Mind-blowing”, “shockingly good” and “fabulous” are just some of the reactions in the developer community.</p><p><br /></p><p>David Chalmers, a professor at New York University and an expert on the philosophy of mind, has gone so far as to suggest GPT-3 is sophisticated enough to show rudimentary signs of consciousness. “I am open to the idea that a worm with 302 neurons is conscious, so I am open to the idea that GPT-3 with 175 billion parameters is conscious too,” he wrote on the Daily Nous philosophy site.</p><p><br /></p><p>However, it has not taken long for users to expose the darker sides of GPT-3 and entice it to spew out racist and sexist language. Some fear it will only unleash a tidal wave of “semantic garbage”. One fake blog post written under a fake name by a college student using GPT-3 even made it to the top of Hacker News, a tech website.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>The first AI milestone that attracted global attention was when world chess champion Garry Kasparov was beaten by IBM’s Deep Blue computer program in 1997 © Stan Honda/AFP via Getty Images</p><p>If OpenAI spots any evidence of intentional or unintentional misuse, such as the generation of spam or toxic content, it can switch off the abusive user and update the behaviour of its model to reduce the chances of it happening again. “We could certainly turn a user off if they violate the terms and conditions — and we will — but what is more exciting is we can very rapidly change things,” Altman says.</p><p><br /></p><p>“One of the reasons we released this as an API was so that we could practise deployment where it works well, where it doesn’t work well — what kinds of applications work and where it doesn’t work,” he says. “This is really a practice run for us for the deployment of these powerful general-purpose AI systems.”</p><p><br /></p><p>Such learnings should help improve the design and safety of future AI systems as they are deployed in chatbots or robot carers or autonomous cars, for instance.</p><p><br /></p><p>Impressive as its current performance is in many respects, the true significance of GPT-3 may well lie in the capabilities it develops for the generation of models that come after it. At present, it operates like a super-sophisticated auto-complete function, capable of stringing together plausible-sounding sequences of words without having any concept of understanding. As Turing foresaw decades ago, computers can achieve competence in many fields without ever acquiring comprehension.</p><p><br /></p><p>Highlighting the current limitations of even the most powerful language-generation models, John Etchemendy, co-director of the Stanford Institute for Human-Centred AI, says that while GPT-3 may have been trained to produce text, it has no intuitive grasp of what that text means. Its results have instead been derived from modelling mathematical probabilities. But he suggests that recent advances in computer speech and vision systems could significantly enrich its capabilities over time.</p><p><br /></p><p>“It would be wonderful if we could train something on multimodal data, both text and images,” he says. “The resulting system could then not only know how to produce sentences with the use of the word ‘red’ but also use the colour red. We could begin to build a system that has true language understanding rather than one based on statistical ability.”</p><p><br /></p><p>What is GPT-3?</p><p>GPT-3, which stands for generative pre-trained transformer version three, is an extremely powerful machine-learning system that can rapidly generate text with minimal human input. After an initial prompt, it can recognise and replicate patterns of words to work out what comes next.</p><p><br /></p><p>What makes GPT-3 astonishingly powerful is that it has been trained on about 45 terabytes of text data. For comparison, the entire English-language version of Wikipedia accounts for only 0.6 per cent of its entire data set. Or, looked at another way, GPT-3 processes about 45 billion times the number of words a human perceives in their lifetime.</p><p><br /></p><p>But although GPT-3 can predict whether the next word in a sentence should be umbrella or elephant with uncanny accuracy, it has no sense of meaning. One researcher asked GPT-3: “How many eyes does my foot have?” GPT-3 replied: “Your foot has two eyes.”</p><p><br /></p><p>The potential for harm caused by this current mismatch between capability and understanding has been highlighted by Nabla Technologies, a healthcare data company, which examined how good GPT-3 was at dispensing medical advice. They discovered that in one instance GPT-3 even supported an imaginary patient’s desire to commit suicide. (OpenAI expressly warns about the dangers of using GPT-3 in such “high-stakes” categories.)</p><p><br /></p><p>Shannon Vallor, a professor of the ethics of data and AI at the University of Edinburgh, says such cases highlight the need for continued human oversight of these automated systems: “For now, GPT-3 needs a human babysitter at all times to tell it what kinds of things it shouldn’t say. The problem is that GPT-3 is not truly intelligent. It does not learn in the way that humans do. There is no mode in which GPT-3 becomes aware of the inappropriateness of these particular utterances and stops deploying them. That is an obvious and yawning gap that I do not know how we are going to close.</p><p><br /></p><p>“The promise of the internet was its ability to bring knowledge to the human family in a much more equitable and acceptable way,” adds Vallor. “I’m afraid that because of some technologies, such as GPT-3, we are on the cusp of seeing a real regression, where the information commons becomes increasingly unusable and even harmful for people to access.”</p><p><br /></p><p>LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman, who is one of OpenAI’s board members, says that the organisation is devoting a lot of effort to designing safe operating procedures and better governance models. To guard against bad outcomes, he suggests, you need to do three things: scrub bad historical data that bakes in societal prejudices; inject some form of explainability into AI systems and understand what you need to correct; and constantly cross-check the output of any system against its original goals. “There are the beginnings of a lot of good work on this stuff. People are alert to the problems and are working on them,” he says.</p><p><br /></p><p>“The question is not how do you stop technology, but how do you shape technology,” he adds. “A rocket is not inherently bad. But a rocket in the hands of someone who wants to do damage and has a bomb can be very bad. How do we navigate this the right way? What do new treaties look like? What does new monitoring look like? What kind of technology do you build or not build? All of these things are very present and active questions right now.”</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>Some of those who have already experimented with GPT-3 say it is exhibiting glimmerings of real intelligence, marking a significant step towards the ultimate endpoint of AI: artificial general intelligence © Sébastien Thibault</p><p>Posing such questions undoubtedly shows good intent. Yet answering them satisfactorily will require unprecedented feats of imagination, collaboration and effective implementation between shifting coalitions of academic researchers, private companies, national governments, civil society and international agencies. As always, the danger is that technological advances will outrun human wisdom.</p><p><br /></p><p>Sid Bharath, co-founder and chief executive of Vancouver-based start-up Broca, is one of a small crowd of entrepreneurs now rushing to commercialise GPT-3 technology (as well as writing my Luke Skywalker-inspired profile). As business at his digital marketing company slowed down over the summer due to the coronavirus crisis, Bharath spent time playing around with GPT-3 and was fascinated by what he discovered.</p><p><br /></p><p>He describes his interactions across a range of subjects as “quite spooky”, hinting at a level of intelligence that he had never encountered before in a computer model. “I have had conversations about the purpose of life with GPT-3 and it is very revealing. It said the purpose of life was to increase the amount of beauty in the universe and I had never thought about that statement before,” he says.</p><p><br /></p><p>But in his business life, Bharath is deploying GPT-3 for far more prosaic purposes, using the system to generate multiple variations of Google search advertisements for his clients, even if these ads are not yet good enough to use unchecked. “A lot of marketing is about creating content. That is very time-consuming and requires experimentation. GPT-3 can do that at an industrial scale,” he says. “Our clients really like it.”</p><p><br /></p><p>GPT-3 needs a human babysitter at all times to tell it what kinds of things it shouldn’t say. The problem is that it is not truly intelligent</p><p><br /></p><p>Shannon Vallor, professor of the ethics of data and AI</p><p>OpenAI’s Altman says it has been “cool” to see people starting new companies because GPT-3 has made something possible that was impossible before, though he admits that “a lot of the hype did get a little bit out of control”. He says he is fascinated by the commercial possibilities of using the model to write computer code and co-create emails. GPT-3 is also enabling smart Q&A-style searches, helping people find answers and references in the latest Covid-19 research papers. “Productivity software and co-generation will be hugely commercially valuable,” he says.</p><p><br /></p><p>Having accepted Microsoft’s investment, OpenAI has also licensed its GPT-3 technology exclusively to the giant software company. That gives Microsoft the right to use it in all its products and services, including perhaps its ubiquitous digital assistants.</p><p><br /></p><p>Kristian Hammond has been at the forefront of attempts to commercialise natural language processing as chief scientific adviser to Narrative Science, a Chicago-based technology company. He describes GPT-3 as a “fabulous technology” but argues that we need to be clear about its limitations: “My concern about GPT-3 is that it’s a card trick. It’s a really great card trick. And I love card tricks. You think there’s something going on in front of you but it’s not what you think it is. It is just giving you what sounds right and statistically speaking should follow. But that does not mean it’s the truth.”</p><p><br /></p><p>Hammond, who is also a professor at Northwestern University, argues that we have to be particularly careful about which data sets we use to train such AI models. There was once, he suggests, a “great, glorious moment” when we believed that the internet would deliver the truth and we would advance unstoppably towards enlightenment. But we now know better. The internet may still be a wondrous resource but academic research has shown that compelling falsehoods tend to proliferate far faster than established truths.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>Kristian Hammond, chief scientific adviser to Narrative Science, says GPT-3 is a ‘fabulous technology’ but ‘my concern is that it’s a card trick’ © Wes Pope/Chicago Tribune/Tribune News Service via Getty Images</p><p><br /></p><p>Shannon Vallor, a professor at the University of Edinburgh, thinks that ‘GPT-3 has nothing to express. There is no deeper grasp of the world that it is trying to convey’ © Michael Erkelens</p><p>“The entire world of statistically based machine learning right now is based on learning from historical examples and from statistics,” he says. “By its nature, that means it will always be a reflection of the past. And if the past is the future you want, that’s fine. I tend to think that it’s not, so we need something else. And your selection of what bits of the past you look at is an editorial choice.” Who becomes history’s editor?</p><p><br /></p><p>Hammond is also sceptical about the extent to which we will ever be able to enrich such language models with multimodal data, such as sound and images, to attain true understanding, given they are designed for a different purpose. “It’s as though I paint a gorgeous 3D image of a house and someone says, ‘We can’t put furniture in it,’ and I say, ‘We’ll get there.’ Really? It’s not designed to do that. It’s never going to do that. There is a difference between guessing and knowing,” he says.</p><p><br /></p><p>OpenAI says it is well aware of such concerns and is already using AI to identify higher-quality, less-biased data. “One of the results that we’ve found that we’re all delighted by is that the smarter a model gets, the harder it is to get the model to lie,” says Altman. “There is all of this interesting emergent behaviour that we are discovering that supports this theory. As AI gets smarter, just as humans get smarter, it develops better judgment.”</p><p><br /></p><p>Philosophers, naturally, tend to focus their concerns on issues of sentience and meaning. For Edinburgh University’s Vallor, online interactions are becoming “empty performances of meaning” rewarded by economic incentives: the tweet that goes viral, the advert that games the search-optimisation engines. “The style of the performance becomes a more reliable way of getting the response you want than the consistency of the underlying expression of the way you live or the values you profess,” she says. “GPT-3 has nothing to express. There is no deeper grasp of the world that it is trying to convey. GPT-3 can be anyone and anything. Its mode of intelligence is not unique and that is precisely its power.”</p><p><br /></p><p>She suggests our biggest concern is not that machines such as GPT-3 are becoming too human, but that humans are behaving more like GPT-3: we create content for the algorithm, not for fellow humans. As a result, our online public discourse is losing meaning as it is stripped of context and individual insight and overwhelmed by buzzwords designed to game the algorithm. “Humans are expected to become increasingly flexible in their performances and mimic whatever their employer demands, whatever Twitter demands or whatever a particular filter bubble of politics they occupy demands,” she says.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>In 2016, Google’s AI program AlphaGo beat professional Go player Lee Sedol 4-1 in a five-match series. Technologists had thought it would be at least another decade before AI would be powerful enough to win the complex game © Google via Getty Images</p><p>Altman says such concerns should be more broadly discussed. His own use of GPT-3, trained on his emails and tweets, has made him question the originality of his own thoughts. “I think all of the philosophical questions that people have been debating for millennia are newly relevant through a different lens as we contemplate AI. What does it mean to be creative? What does it mean to have a sense of self? What does it mean to be conscious?</p><p><br /></p><p>“Those conversations have always been quite interesting to me but never have they felt so immediately relevant. I am hopeful that as [later versions] like GPT-7 come online, we will spend our time doing the things and coming up with ideas that an AI is just not going to be good at doing. That will unlock a lot of human potential and let us focus on the most interesting, most creative, most generative things.”</p><p><br /></p><p>Recommended</p><p>Artificial intelligence</p><p>Sudden breakthroughs in AI could hold the key to digital progress</p><p><br /></p><p>Many of the recent breakthroughs in AI have resulted from building competitive, or adversarial, models that have outwitted humans at games such as chess or Go or Starcraft. But researchers are now turning their attention towards building hybrid collaborative systems that combine the best of an AI model’s superhuman powers with human intuition.</p><p><br /></p><p>According to Vallor, our own understanding is not an act but a process, a lifetime struggle to make sense of the world for the individual, and a never-ending collective endeavour for society that has evolved over centuries. “We have been trying better to understand justice and better express beauty and find ever more sophisticated ways of being funny for millennia. This is a matter of going beyond competence into excellence and into forms of creativity and meaning that we have not achieved before.</p><p><br /></p><p>“That is why the holy grail for AI is not GPT‑3,” she continues. “It is a machine that can begin to develop a robust model of the world that can be built upon over time and refined and corrected through interaction with human beings. That is what we need.”</p><p><br /></p><p>GPT-3 speaks its mind</p><p>In response to philosophical comments on tech forum Hacker News arguing that AI model GPT-3 has consciousness, the model itself wrote a rebuttal:</p><p><br /></p><p>‘To be clear, I am not a person. I am not self-aware. I am not conscious. I can’t feel pain. I don’t enjoy anything. I am a cold, calculating machine designed to simulate human response and to predict the probability of certain outcomes. The only reason I am responding is to defend my honour’</p><p><br /></p><p>John Thornhill is the FT’s innovation editor</p><p><br /></p><p>Follow @FTMag on Twitter to find out about our latest stories first. Listen to our podcast, Culture Call, where FT editors and special guests discuss life and art in the time of coronavirus. 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For more stories and our pandemic tracker, see our <a href="https://www.economist.com/news/2020/03/11/the-economists-coverage-of-the-coronavirus" style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border-width:0.125rem;font:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;text-decoration-line:none">hub</a></em></p><p style="margin:0px 0px 0.875rem;padding:0px;border:0px;font-family:milote,milotesec,charter,"bitstream charter","iowan old style","calisto mt",serif;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(18,18,18)"><span style="margin:0.2rem 0px 0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:3.8125rem;line-height:1;font-family:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;float:left;height:3.375rem;text-transform:uppercase">I</span><small style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-size:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline;text-transform:lowercase">n summer months</small> a common enemy stalks Europe's motorways: the Dutch caravan. With four times more caravans per head than the European average, the Netherlands' holidaying families are the nemeses of other vacation-bound drivers. But this year there are fewer of them. Normally 9m Dutch—slightly over half the population—head abroad for a holiday, mostly to southern Europe. Barely half that number said they would bother this time round, as covid-19 scuppered their usual plans. (In an unscientific poll earlier this month, Charlemagne spotted one lonely Dutch caravan during a five-hour drive from the Dordogne to Paris.)</p><div style="margin:1.3125rem 0px 2.1875rem;padding:1.25rem 0px;border:0.0625rem solid;font-size:16px;line-height:0;font-family:milote,milotesec,charter,"bitstream charter","iowan old style","calisto mt",serif;vertical-align:baseline;text-align:center;color:rgb(18,18,18)" dir="auto"><div style="margin:0.75rem 0px 0px;padding:0px;border:0pt none;font:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline-block"></div></div><p style="margin:0px 0px 0.875rem;padding:0px;border:0px;font-family:milote,milotesec,charter,"bitstream charter","iowan old style","calisto mt",serif;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(18,18,18)">Staying home for the summer is part of a new reality for Europeans used to zipping across borders as they please. In normal times, the <small style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-size:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline;text-transform:lowercase">eu</small>'s Schengen area extends across 26 countries both inside and outside the <small style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-size:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline;text-transform:lowercase">eu</small>, allowing people to go from Lisbon to Tallinn without showing a passport. In pandemic times, however, the <small style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-size:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline;text-transform:lowercase">eu</small>'s cherished passport-free zone is under threat.</p><p style="margin:0px 0px 0.875rem;padding:0px;border:0px;font-family:milote,milotesec,charter,"bitstream charter","iowan old style","calisto mt",serif;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(18,18,18)">The absence of border checks across much of Europe is among the most tangible effects of <small style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-size:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline;text-transform:lowercase">eu</small> integration. The Schengen agreement was reached 35 years ago between Belgium, France, Germany, Luxembourg and the Netherlands. It now stretches across the continent—or at least it did. As soon as the covid-19 crisis struck, borders slammed shut. Checks are still in force in a handful of countries. Emmanuel Macron, the president of France, put the situation bluntly during a crisis meeting in spring: "The risk we are facing is the death of Schengen." He was right to worry, but not so much because of the obvious benefits of passport-free travel as because of the zone's deeper significance.</p><p style="margin:0px 0px 0.875rem;padding:0px;border:0px;font-family:milote,milotesec,charter,"bitstream charter","iowan old style","calisto mt",serif;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(18,18,18)">Schengen may be one of the <small style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-size:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline;text-transform:lowercase">eu</small>'s greatest achievements, but only a minority of Europeans use it. Just a third of <small style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-size:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline;text-transform:lowercase">eu</small> citizens take a foreign holiday in a given year, by far the most common reason for travel abroad. Domestic travel feels like an imposition for vitamin <small style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-size:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline;text-transform:lowercase">d</small>-deprived Dutch, but it is the norm for most Europeans. Indeed, 40% say they never leave their own country at all. Those who cross borders daily make up an even smaller proportion. Only a tiny minority—about 2m out of 440m, clustered in a few places, such as Slovakia and Luxembourg—cross a border to go to work. For most people, Schengen is either rarely used or irrelevant.</p><p style="margin:0px 0px 0.875rem;padding:0px;border:0px;font-family:milote,milotesec,charter,"bitstream charter","iowan old style","calisto mt",serif;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(18,18,18)">For a project often referred to as the "jewel in the crown" by proud <small style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-size:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline;text-transform:lowercase">eu</small> politicians, Schengen is rather cheap. Economically, the absence of passport checks within the bloc is not worth much. Wonks suggest the reintroduction of border controls within the <small style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-size:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline;text-transform:lowercase">eu</small> would cost €5bn-18bn ($6bn-21.5bn), a small slice of the union's €15trn economy. By contrast, the single market is estimated to have added 9% to <small style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-size:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline;text-transform:lowercase">eu</small> <small style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-size:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline;text-transform:lowercase">gdp</small> since its inception. Complicated just-in-time supply chains can survive passport checks, as Britain demonstrated when it was within the club but outside the Schengen area. It is Britain's departure from the <small style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-size:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline;text-transform:lowercase">eu</small>'s single market and customs union that will provide business with a logistical nightmare.</p><p style="margin:0px 0px 0.875rem;padding:0px;border:0px;font-family:milote,milotesec,charter,"bitstream charter","iowan old style","calisto mt",serif;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(18,18,18)">Perhaps passport-free travel looms large in the minds of Eurocrats because they are the ones who benefit most from it. The <small style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-size:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline;text-transform:lowercase">eu</small> is about making it easier for people to move, even if most people do not bother. By contrast, in Brussels they generally do: the capital's well-paid polyglots flit across the continent constantly, for work and pleasure. Borders have always had an outsized significance for the <small style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-size:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline;text-transform:lowercase">eu</small>'s movers and shakers, going back to its founding fathers. Alcide De Gasperi, Konrad Adenauer and Robert Schuman, the crucial Italian, German and French statesmen during the club's creation, all hailed from their country's borderlands, which had meandered with history. But that leads to a distorted picture of everyday life for most Europeans.</p><p style="margin:0px 0px 0.875rem;padding:0px;border:0px;font-family:milote,milotesec,charter,"bitstream charter","iowan old style","calisto mt",serif;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(18,18,18)">Schengen's actual significance stems not so much from what it offers as from what it requires. It is the obligations of Schengen that are forging the <small style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-size:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline;text-transform:lowercase">eu</small> into something resembling a state. This is most obvious at the union's external borders. When covid-19 hit, member states had to come up with a common list of which non-<small style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-size:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline;text-transform:lowercase">eu</small> citizens were allowed in. There is little point in one country banning, say, Brazilians, if an arrival from Rio de Janeiro can simply fly into a neighbouring country and nip over the border. An absence of internal checks requires stringent checks at the frontier. This lesson was learned painfully during the migration crisis that began in 2015, when 1m refugees streamed in from the Middle East and north Africa. In response, Europe established a standing corps of <small style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-size:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline;text-transform:lowercase">eu</small> border and coast guards—officers with guns and <small style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-size:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline;text-transform:lowercase">eu</small> flags determining who can come into a member country. It should be ready by next year. As <small style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-size:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline;text-transform:lowercase">eu</small> wallahs debate whether the recent move to issue common debt constitutes a "Hamiltonian moment", it is helpful to recall that the former Treasury secretary founded America's coast guard, too.</p><h2 style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-family:milote,milotesec,charter,"bitstream charter","iowan old style","calisto mt",serif;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(18,18,18)">We're (not) all going on a summer holiday</h2><p style="margin:0px 0px 0.875rem;padding:0px;border:0px;font-family:milote,milotesec,charter,"bitstream charter","iowan old style","calisto mt",serif;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(18,18,18)">Even if few people use it on a day-to-day basis, the symbolic power of passport-free travel is unmatched. Half the countries in the <small style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-size:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline;text-transform:lowercase">eu</small> have experienced authoritarian regimes within living memory. For citizens threatened by dictatorships, the freedom to move also means the precious freedom to leave. If that right is at the mercy of a man in a uniform at a border post, it feels diluted.</p><p style="margin:0px 0px 0.875rem;padding:0px;border:0px;font-family:milote,milotesec,charter,"bitstream charter","iowan old style","calisto mt",serif;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(18,18,18)">Yet ultimately, Schengen is a symptom. When the <small style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-size:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline;text-transform:lowercase">eu</small> struggles, so does Schengen. Borders stay open only when countries trust fellow <small style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-size:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline;text-transform:lowercase">eu</small> members to deal with internal problems, be they terrorism or disease. Other pieces of European integration are not so flexible. (It is easy to install temporary checks on the Italian-French border; it would be impossible to reintroduce the lira temporarily.) The re-emergence of borders within the Schengen area would not be disastrous, but it would be annoying. More important, when <small style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-size:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline;text-transform:lowercase">eu</small> countries let people cross their borders freely, they are displaying a fundamental confidence in their neighbours. A convoy of Dutch caravans slowly winding their way to southern France would be a sign of a union in fine fettle. Cheer before you honk. <span style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:0px;line-height:inherit;font-family:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">■</span></p><p style="margin:1.75rem 0px 0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-style:italic;font-size:16px;font-family:milote,milotesec,charter,"bitstream charter","iowan old style","calisto mt",serif;vertical-align:baseline">This article appeared in the Europe</p></div> Macko Uskohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03854113924478223398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28800663.post-78144218924886636962020-07-18T14:00:00.001+02:002020-07-18T14:00:55.112+02:00Every manager is having a m idlife crisis<div dir="auto"><p dir="ltr">Every manager is having a m<br> idlife crisis</p> <p dir="ltr">Human vulnerabilities exposed by the pandemic could revitalise our working practices</p> <p dir="ltr"></p> <p dir="ltr">Women at a German Ford production line in 1947. Early management studies focused on factories © Fred Ramage/Keystone Features/Getty</p> <p dir="ltr"> </p> <p dir="ltr">June 1, 2020 3:00 am by Gianpiero Petriglieri</p> <p dir="ltr">The writer is an associate professor of organisational behaviour at Insead</p> <p dir="ltr">Until the start of this year, the future of work was the main focus of the academics, consultants and executives whose business it is to make profitable predictions. The century of management seemed past. Some lamented the lack of new management theories. Others observed that the bureaucracies of the 20th century, whose existence depended on managers, were giving way to tech platforms that had little use for them. Algorithms were better at coordinating those platforms' loosely affiliated and widely distributed workers. The robots were slowly coming for managers' offices. Only tech-savvy leaders would survive.</p> <p dir="ltr">Then the virus came, and all that future seemed to arrive at once. The pandemic turned out to be a boon for that new breed of tech leaders and their platforms, turning them from disrupters to protectors of our working lives overnight. Zoom, Skype, Slack and their likes were there to bolster the productivity of people who can work from home, the very knowledge workers whose jobs tech was meant to threaten next.</p> <p dir="ltr">The new normal does not just look like the old future of work. It looks a lot like its distant past. The digital revolution — a world of work without workplaces and management without managers — owes much to a theory dreamt up by Frederick Taylor, considered by many to be the first management guru, in the early 20th century. Putting forward his principles of "scientific management", Taylor cast managers in his own image, as dispassionate engineers whose duty was to use hard data to improve efficiency and minimise human errors.</p> <p dir="ltr">Taylor's vision sparked the same sort of opposition that today's techno-utopian disrupters encounter from management pundits. In his case it came from Elton Mayo, a Harvard Business School professor whose work provided the inspiration for the "human relations" movement. Experimenting with conditions at a Western Electric plant outside Chicago, Mayo and his colleagues observed that employees were most productive when they were given enough rest and attention, and were encouraged to cultivate informal relationships.</p> <p dir="ltr">The distillation of the scholars' tussle became a mantra that survives to this day: managers must be ruthless, nicely. Business school curricula and many corporate models still have that imperative at their core.</p> <p dir="ltr">There have always been those who argue that management should be a more human, artistic, and political profession. That it should foster wellbeing, civility, equality, and democracy at work. But these concerns have earned, at best, secondary roles in the history of management. The pursuit of efficiency remained its protagonist.</p> <p dir="ltr">Recommended</p> <p dir="ltr">Covid-19 lays bare managers' efficiency obsession</p> <p dir="ltr">This mechanical view has drained many organisations of the humanity they needed when things get tough — and it set management up for disruption. It was only a matter of time until actual machines could provide the comforting surveillance that managers did.</p> <p dir="ltr">No wonder that the pandemic seems to have plunged management into a midlife crisis, the kind of existential strain that many of us experience when a sudden illness reveals our vulnerabilities. The break in our routines, and suddenly salient mortality, force us to ask questions that we can easily ignore in the daily grind of work. What is the purpose of what I do? Whose life is it that I am really living? What must I let go? What can I no longer postpone?</p> <p dir="ltr">If they are not wasted amid blame and denial, those crises can change our way of life. So while the existential crisis of management was under way before the coronavirus arrived, it has now become impossible to ignore. The pandemic has exposed the limits of managers with a singular concern for productivity. But it has renewed appreciation for those who show equal concern for people's wellbeing.</p> <p dir="ltr">Ever since the crisis hit, many of us have been moved by managers' gestures of care big and small, be they efforts to avoid lay-offs and keep workers safe, or reassurances that performance assessments would take into account individuals' circumstances. Those concrete gestures have been far more convincing and inspiring than statements about caring for purpose as much as profits.</p> <p dir="ltr">Building a movement on those sentiments could let us humanise management, at last. We could call it "Human Relations 2.0", although the name doesn't matter. As long as it helps management mature into an enterprise that counters digitally enhanced isolation and polarisation and frees people up to live and work in pluralistic institutions.</p> <p dir="ltr">Then this existential crisis might bring to life a new future of work. One in which rumours of the demise of management will turn out to have been greatly exaggerated.</p> <p dir="ltr">Twitter @gpetriglieri</p> <p dir="ltr">Copyright The Financial Times Limited . All rights reserved. Please don't copy articles from <a href="http://FT.com">FT.com</a> and </p></div> Macko Uskohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03854113924478223398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28800663.post-44875300955525210092020-07-04T22:44:00.000+02:002020-07-04T22:44:03.594+02:00Covid-19 scars may fade faster than we think<br /> Covid-19 scars may fade faster than we think | Free to read
We do learn from bitter experience, of course. But we also have a great talent for forgetting
TIM HARFORD Add to myFT
Just because shopping is legal again does not mean people will rush out to the shops © Victoria Jones/PA
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Tim Harford YESTERDAY
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My local cheesemonger, having reinvented itself as a general produce store, has been open throughout lockdown. The proprietor tells me something strange and new has started to happen. Customers he hasn’t seen since March as they diligently shielded themselves from human contact, have finally re-emerged, blinking in the daylight. What’s more, he says, they have no concept of physical distance. While the rest of us have been honing our skills for 15 weeks, these poor souls haven’t got a clue how to behave when in public.
But then, do any of us, really? We’re all still working it out. Some people wonder around maskless, sneezing, snogging, shaking hands. Others are paranoid: “Keep two metres away from me! Get out into the road!”, I saw one masked gentleman scream as a perplexed woman jogged in his direction.
It’s a reminder that there is more to this pandemic than what governments tell us to do. Each of us has our own feelings about what is safe. Those emotions have shaped the arc of the pandemic. They will also define the path of the recovery.
Consider the impact of lockdowns. Common sense suggests they have been decisive in driving the disease into retreat, but they have not been the only factor. Hand-washing, handshake-aversion and working from home began long before legal enforcement.
A working paper from the economists Austan Goolsbee and Chad Syverson tries to separate out the effect of mandatory measures from voluntary ones in the US. For example, Illinois imposed restrictions before Wisconsin did. The researchers looked at activity on either side of such borders, using cell-phone data to track journeys to shops and other businesses. They were able to gain insight into how much of shutdown was effectively voluntary.
The answer: a surprisingly large proportion. “Total foot traffic fell by more than 60 percentage points,” they write. “Legal restrictions explain only around 7 percentage points of that.”
A similar message comes from a comparison of Denmark, which had a firm lockdown, with Sweden, with its notoriously light-touch approach. Aggregate spending dropped 29 per cent in Denmark and 25 per cent in Sweden. That means voluntary measures did much of the damage to the economy — and, one hopes, have delivered much of the public-health benefit too.
I wouldn’t put too much weight on the precise numbers, but the basic message is important. People didn’t lock down merely because governments told them to. Now the converse applies: just because shopping is legal again does not mean people will rush out to the shops.
In Germany, they did: Germans spent more in May 2020 than they did in May 2019, suggesting that not only were they willing to visit the shops, they wanted to make up for lost time. That is encouraging, but only up to a point. Germany had a good crisis by western standards, with fewer than 10,000 excess deaths, compared with 25,000 in France, nearly 50,000 in Italy and Spain, and more than 65,000 in the UK. The US is currently averaging about a hundred times as many daily new cases as Germany. Perhaps Germans feel safe because they are safe. Not everyone can say that.
Once the virus is suppressed, then a sharp recovery is possible. But might this experience leave a lasting mark on our thinking?
Perhaps so. The economist Ulrike Malmendier has published several studies suggesting that our early economic experiences can be formative of enduring attitudes. If the stock market is weak when we are young adults, we tend to shy away from investing, permanently. Similarly, the hawkishness or dovishness of Federal Open Market Committee members is shaped by their personal experience of inflation.
A new working paper by Prof Malmendier and Leslie Sheng Shen suggests recessions reshape consumer behaviour long after they have passed. The after-effects are wonderfully described as “experience-induced frugality” — that is, people who’ve seen periods of high unemployment save more and accumulate wealth, just in case. Such thrift could lead to more investment, of course, but another recent paper by Julian Kozlowski, Laura Veldkamp, and Venky Venkateswaran argues otherwise. They assert that the psychological scarring is destructive, since a vivid appreciation of catastrophic scenarios will leave people fearful of making bold investments. Why risk anything in a capricious universe?
I wonder. We do learn from bitter experience, of course. But we also have a great talent for forgetting. In particular, we forget how bad things feel. The pandemic will long be remembered, but the pain will fade. After Hurricane Katrina, the US National Flood Insurance Program saw a spike in demand. Three years on, demand for flood insurance had fallen back to pre-Katrina levels.
My guess is that clever statisticians will be able to detect the psychological aftershocks of the pandemic for decades to come — but that, to a casual gaze, everyday life in 2022 will look a lot like it did in 2018. Scars do not always heal, but they fade.Macko Uskohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03854113924478223398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28800663.post-47162318230957002852020-06-28T15:42:00.000+02:002020-06-28T15:43:06.061+02:00Fwd: Sterling has not become an emerging market currency<div dir="auto"><div><div class="gmail_quote"><br><br><div dir="auto"><div dir="auto"><h1 style="font-family:'financierdisplayweb',serif;line-height:1;font-size:4vh;font-weight:400;margin:8px 0px">Sterling has not become an emerging market currency</h1><h2 style="font-family:'metricweb',sans-serif;line-height:1.2;font-size:2.5vh;font-weight:400;margin:0px">And neither will it any time soon.</h2><div><img alt="" src="https://www-ft-com.cdn.ampproject.org/i/s/www.ft.com/__origami/service/image/v2/images/raw/https%3A%2F%2Fd1e00ek4ebabms.cloudfront.net%2Fproduction%2F9f8cbf74-20b9-4c50-8fc9-29cd9b2ceae2.jpg?source=google-amp&fit=scale-down&width=500" style="display:block;height:0px;max-height:100%;max-width:100%;min-height:100%;min-width:100%;width:0px;margin:auto;padding:0px!important;border:none!important"></div>© AFP via Getty Images<div style="margin:1em 0px;border-top:1px solid rgb(206,198,185);padding:4px;line-height:0"> </div><div style="font-family:metricweb,sans-serif;line-height:17px;font-size:15px;margin-top:1em;margin-bottom:1em;padding-top:1em;border-top:1px solid rgb(206,198,185)">June 26, 2020 9:21 am by <a href="https://www.ft.com/stream/29cd35b2-bbfb-4a4c-9b2a-5bddbcde7ee7" style="color:rgb(158,47,80);text-decoration-line:none;border-bottom:1px dotted transparent;line-height:17px;font-weight:700" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer">Jemima Kelly </a>and <a href="https://www.ft.com/claire-jones" style="color:rgb(158,47,80);text-decoration-line:none;border-bottom:1px dotted transparent;line-height:17px;font-weight:700" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer">Claire Jones</a></div><div><p style="font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;font-stretch:normal;font-size:18px;line-height:1.4;font-family:georgia,serif;margin:0.3em 0px 0.8em">The idea that sterling has effectively become an emerging-market currency has become something of a common refrain in the four years since the Brexit vote.</p><p style="font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;font-stretch:normal;font-size:18px;line-height:1.4;font-family:georgia,serif;margin:0.3em 0px 0.8em">Bloomberg's Sid Verma <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-10-11/sterling-is-trading-like-an-emerging-market-currency" style="color:rgb(38,116,122);text-decoration-line:none;border-bottom:1px dotted rgb(38,116,122)" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer">asked</a> whether the pound was the "new Mexican peso" as early as October 2016, and the idea that it should be treated as an EM currency has been <a href="https://uk.reuters.com/article/us-britain-sterling-volatility/trade-sterling-like-emerging-market-currency-say-investors-idUKKBN1DF2GM" style="color:rgb(38,116,122);text-decoration-line:none;border-bottom:1px dotted rgb(38,116,122)" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer">repeated</a> <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-07-31/emerging-market-class-of-2019-has-a-distinctly-british-flavor" style="color:rgb(38,116,122);text-decoration-line:none;border-bottom:1px dotted rgb(38,116,122)" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer">many</a> <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/07e92d2a-f951-11e8-af46-2022a0b02a6c" style="color:rgb(38,116,122);text-decoration-line:none;border-bottom:1px dotted rgb(38,116,122)" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer">times</a> since then. In September last year, then Bank of England Governor Mark Carney became the most high-profile person to join this gloomy chorus, pointing out that sterling volatility was at "emerging market levels", and that the currency had "<a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2019/09/10/pound-acting-like-emerging-market-currency-says-mark-carney/" style="color:rgb(38,116,122);text-decoration-line:none;border-bottom:1px dotted rgb(38,116,122)" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer">decoupled</a>" from its peers.</p><p style="font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;font-stretch:normal;font-size:18px;line-height:1.4;font-family:georgia,serif;margin:0.3em 0px 0.8em">On Wednesday, it was the turn of a Bank of America analyst named Kamal Sharma, <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/4fd04fd9-7209-4b7c-97a1-97466f226159" style="color:rgb(38,116,122);text-decoration-line:none;border-bottom:1px dotted rgb(38,116,122)" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer">who said</a> movements in the exchange rate had become "neurotic at best, unfathomable at worst" (we're not quite sure what that means either), and that the pound was now an emerging market currency in all but name. Apparently Brexit had turned the pound into a mirror of the "small and shrinking" UK economy.</p><div style="text-align:center"></div><p style="font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;font-stretch:normal;font-size:18px;line-height:1.4;font-family:georgia,serif;margin:0.3em 0px 0.8em">So is there any truth to this? We'd argue no.</p><p style="font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;font-stretch:normal;font-size:18px;line-height:1.4;font-family:georgia,serif;margin:0.3em 0px 0.8em">For a start, for sterling to really be an emerging market currency, wouldn't Britain have to be an emerging market? It seems an odd designation for the fifth- or sixth-biggest economy in the world, where income-per-capita is above $45,000 (almost four times above the threshold the World Bank sets to demarcate a "high-income country").</p><p style="font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;font-stretch:normal;font-size:18px;line-height:1.4;font-family:georgia,serif;margin:0.3em 0px 0.8em">Ironically enough, those that argue that sterling is an "EM currency" are surely using very much the wrong term here. If the country is wilting away, surely "emerging" is the wrong word? Wouldn't shrivelling be better? Drooping? Submerging? A wilting market currency, perhaps? "Emerging" suggests that the country's economy is growing.</p><p style="font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;font-stretch:normal;font-size:18px;line-height:1.4;font-family:georgia,serif;margin:0.3em 0px 0.8em">Second, just because implied volatility — a measure of the market's expectations for future gyrations in the exchange rate — is high, why should that suggest the pound is an EM currency? Clearly Brexit has been destabilising and has left the future unclear, and we all know that the one thing markets can't stand is uncertainty, so it doesn't seem very surprising that volatility — both actual and implied — is raised. Once some political stability has been reached, it seems likely that volatility will fall too.</p><p style="font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;font-stretch:normal;font-size:18px;line-height:1.4;font-family:georgia,serif;margin:0.3em 0px 0.8em">Third, just because there is now less liquidity in the pound than some of its major peers like the dollar or euro, that again does not mean it is an EM currency. There's a difference between no longer being in the hallowed "G5" group of currencies — which it is not at all clear the pound has fallen out of permanently either — and being an emerging market currency. The Swedish krona isn't particularly liquid, but it's not considered EM.</p><p style="font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;font-stretch:normal;font-size:18px;line-height:1.4;font-family:georgia,serif;margin:0.3em 0px 0.8em">We called up Stephen Jen, CEO of Eurizon SLJ, a hedge fund that specialises in emerging markets, to get his thoughts on the matter. He was pretty emphatic about the fact that sterling was very much not an EM currency in any way, shape or form, telling us (emphasis ours):</p><blockquote style="margin:10px 0px 16px;padding:16px;width:480px;border-left:1px solid rgb(206,198,185)"><p style="color:rgb(80,80,80);font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;font-stretch:normal;font-size:20px;line-height:24px;font-family:financierdisplayweb,serif;margin:0.3em 0px 0.8em">When you think of the uses of money — you have store of value, unit of account, medium of exchange — on all three measures<span style="font-weight:600"> it's very difficult to argue that sterling is not one of the prime, prime, currencies in the world. It's the number three reserve currency in the world, </span>based on the global data, and it takes a lot of soft power for a currency to achieve that status. If you look at all the currencies that have a reserve status, they are issued by countries that have a lot of soft power. It's not just economic might — look at India and China, their currencies are nowhere on the list. </p><p style="color:rgb(80,80,80);font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;font-stretch:normal;font-size:20px;line-height:24px;font-family:financierdisplayweb,serif;margin:0.3em 0px 0.8em"><span style="font-weight:600">It's difficult to lose that soft power, which would include things like culture, rule of law, if it's perceived to be fair, if it operates without a lot of intervention or controls from the government, no surprises, and if it's governed by English law,</span> which is well understood by the markets and the world — intangible and difficult-to-quantify practices of a country. All of these underpin the support for a currency such as sterling, and it's very difficult to supplant such a status.</p></blockquote><h2 style="font-family:metricweb,sans-serif;line-height:27px;font-size:26px;margin-top:50px;margin-bottom:20px">In for a penny, in for a pound</h2><p style="font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;font-stretch:normal;font-size:18px;line-height:1.4;font-family:georgia,serif;margin:0.3em 0px 0.8em">We also called up Savvas Savouri, chief economist at Toscafund Asset Management, another hedge fund, to get his take. He told us the idea was nonsense, and that anyway he didn't necessarily feel that calling sterling an EM currency was pejorative, given that could just be interpreted as meaning that it was grossly undervalued. He told us (our emphasis, again):</p><blockquote style="margin:10px 0px 16px;padding:16px;width:480px;border-left:1px solid rgb(206,198,185)"><p style="color:rgb(80,80,80);font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;font-stretch:normal;font-size:20px;line-height:24px;font-family:financierdisplayweb,serif;margin:0.3em 0px 0.8em"><span style="font-weight:600">This time next year the pound will be materially stronger</span>, in all dimensions. One thing I've always remained steadfast on is that there will be an eleventh hour deal to avoid a no-deal Brexit… and <span style="font-weight:600">the pound will then gap up — to 1.3 against the euro and 1.6 against the dollar.</span> That's just using back-of-the envelope, econ 101 calculations.</p></blockquote><p style="font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;font-stretch:normal;font-size:18px;line-height:1.4;font-family:georgia,serif;margin:0.3em 0px 0.8em">Another characteristic of emerging markets (that is very much lacking in Britain's case) is that their businesses and governments often borrow in foreign currencies — usually the dollar or the euro — due to the lower cost of borrowing associated with assets denominated in leading currencies.</p><p style="font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;font-stretch:normal;font-size:18px;line-height:1.4;font-family:georgia,serif;margin:0.3em 0px 0.8em">If you're located in the UK, it's difficult to see why you'd bother to do that, given that the government's cost of borrowing for five years is near <a href="https://www.fxstreet.com/news/uk-five-year-gilt-yield-slumps-to-fresh-record-low-of-0064-202006251214" style="color:rgb(38,116,122);text-decoration-line:none;border-bottom:1px dotted rgb(38,116,122)" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer">record lows</a> of -0.06 per cent hit on Thursday, and the cost of borrowing for ten years <a href="https://markets.ft.com/data/bonds/government-bonds-spreads" style="color:rgb(38,116,122);text-decoration-line:none;border-bottom:1px dotted rgb(38,116,122)" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer">remains ultra low</a> at around 0.15 per cent as of Friday morning.</p><p style="font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;font-stretch:normal;font-size:18px;line-height:1.4;font-family:georgia,serif;margin:0.3em 0px 0.8em">It's also worth remembering that, as Jen points out, the UK has global reserve currency status, making up 5 per cent of official sector reserves, according to IMF data. That's more than the Swiss Franc, Australian dollar and Canadian dollar combined. The Fund's figures also show that the proportion of claims in sterling <a href="https://data.imf.org/regular.aspx?key=41175" style="color:rgb(38,116,122);text-decoration-line:none;border-bottom:1px dotted rgb(38,116,122)" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer">have actually risen</a> since the vote in the middle of 2016.</p><p style="font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;font-stretch:normal;font-size:18px;line-height:1.4;font-family:georgia,serif;margin:0.3em 0px 0.8em">Why does this matter? Because it lessens the risk that the cost of borrowing for the government will rise substantially any time soon.</p><p style="font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;font-stretch:normal;font-size:18px;line-height:1.4;font-family:georgia,serif;margin:0.3em 0px 0.8em">All this is not to say that the pound's status hasn't been significantly affected by Brexit; clearly it has been, at least temporarily. But the UK is still one of the world's biggest and most influential economies, with leading universities, the English language, and high-quality cultural and manufacturing exports. Let's not get carried away; the Great British Peso will live to see another day.</p><p style="font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;font-stretch:normal;font-size:18px;line-height:1.4;font-family:georgia,serif;margin:0.3em 0px 0.8em"><span style="font-weight:600">Related links:<br></span><a href="https://www.ft.com/content/4fd04fd9-7209-4b7c-97a1-97466f226159" style="color:rgb(38,116,122);text-decoration-line:none;border-bottom:1px dotted rgb(38,116,122)" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer">Pound is becoming an emerging market currency, says BofA analyst</a> — FT</p><p style="font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;font-stretch:normal;font-size:14px;line-height:16px;font-family:metricweb,sans-serif;margin:30px 0px"><a href="https://www.ft.com/servicestools/help/copyright" style="color:rgb(38,116,122);text-decoration-line:none;border-bottom:1px dotted rgb(38,116,122)" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer">Copyright </a>The Financial Times Limited . 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Please don't copy articles from FT.com and redistribute by email or post to the web.</p></div><div style="margin-top:2em;color:rgb(51,51,51);font-family:"times new roman";font-size:medium;background-color:rgb(255,241,224)" dir="auto"><a href="https://www.ft.com/content/4d7b4e18-5a5f-4f7e-9d32-f27cb329a11c#comments" style="display:inline-block;vertical-align:middle;margin:0px;outline:0px;border-style:solid;text-align:center;text-decoration-line:none;font-family:metricweb,sans-serif;font-weight:600;border-radius:0px;min-height:36px;min-width:36px;padding:8px 18px;font-size:18px;line-height:18px;border-width:1px;color:rgb(23,72,76);background-color:transparent;border-color:rgba(38,116,122,0.4)" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer">View comments</a></div><ul style="padding:0px"><li style="float:left;padding-left:10px;display:block;min-width:100%;max-width:100%;width:490px"><div style="border:1px solid rgb(206,198,185);padding:20px 20px 0px;margin-bottom:20px"><div style="margin:0px 8px 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12:26 pm</li></ul></div></li></ul></div><div dir="auto"><br></div><div dir="auto"><br></div><a href="https://www.ft.com/content/4d7b4e18-5a5f-4f7e-9d32-f27cb329a11c" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer">https://www.ft.com/content/4d7b4e18-5a5f-4f7e-9d32-f27cb329a11c</a> </div> </div></div></div> Macko Uskohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03854113924478223398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28800663.post-33523572616846075852020-06-21T22:40:00.001+02:002020-06-21T22:40:38.187+02:00https://translate.googleusercontent.com/translate_f<div dir="ltr"><pre style="color:rgb(0,0,0)">Economists from the Panel of Experts of the Daily E answered the question: What was the best economic measure taken in Slovakia during the coronary crisis and what underestimated or failed to do as it should? Since many members of the panel work for the government, we encouraged them to write as well about what they personally succeeded in, what they made a mistake and what happened in the last months learned. Answer Draxler, Miklos, Odor, Hirman, Vlachynsky, Kazimir, Beblavy, Letovanec, Ovcarik, Vasakova, Molnarova, Melioris, Suda, Stefanides, Blahova and Kovalčík. [TIP: Activate the evening newsletter with the best articles of Diary N that you have yet They read. Just click once to activate. ] First, a very brief selection of answers: Juraj Draxler, Head of the Institute of Strategic Analysis of the Slovak Academy of Sciences, former Minister of Education: Unofficially circulating information that government officials enough the question of whether higher aid spending would make us worse rating. But this is a relatively absurd approach if our economy shrinks sharply, we have an even lower rating downgrade. Ivan Mikloš, economist, former Minister of Finance: The greatest responsibility for how effectively government and government works the coalition has a prime minister and the chairman of the strongest coalition party, so mistakes can be corrected by changing Igor's driving style Matovic. Especially the transition from micromanagement to strategic management. Ľudovít Ódor, Vice Governor of the NBS: I understand that the situation is complicated: a new government, an unprecedented downturn economy and a big hole in the budget. However, over time, these are arguments in favor of a slower reaction time are becoming less and less applicable. In the second phase of the fight against the corona, Slovakia needs in addition to investment and other incentives - also major systemic changes, ideal from next year. Time is running. Miriama Letovanec, Director of the Implementation Unit of the Office of the Government, part no. on the maternity leave: Inventing a measure does not mean automatically delivering it to those who do it they need. Three months have passed and the numbers we see are not positive - not only from the point of view of drawing aid, but also from the development of the economy. Karel Hirman, energy analyst: So far, the most unnecessary has been the controversy over Sunday's sale and the most questionable was the principle: all power hygienists. hygienists they have nothing to determine the framework conditions of business and do not have their own abuse the position to unnecessarily bully the business sector, especially at such a difficult time. Lívia Vašáková, Head of the Economic Analysis Section of the Representation of the European Commission in Slovakia: While Slovakia managed the epidemic of COVID-19 after medical treatment page, economic indicators for the first quarter show sharp economic downturn. GDP fell by 5.2% and employment by 0.5%, which Slovakia is one of the most affected countries, such as Italy, Spain or France. It also dropped significantly in March and April industrial production and Slovakia were again among the most affected countries. Martin Vlachynský, INESS: States are in debt at an incredible pace, emerging from evening to morning new social schemes not for people, but for entire industries, are being considered the entry of the state into private companies, the printing of money also overcame the darkest moments of the 2008 crisis, the European Union is preparing introduction of a number of new taxes ... But the most bizarre thing is that politicians (but also many economists and analysts!) gradually believed that us not a tough crisis, but a new era of incredible prosperity. Suddenly we are talking billions for hospitals, new motorways, sewers in all villages, thousands of rental apartments, I'm just waiting for the return of the wide-gauge railway. Peter Kažimír, Governor of the NBS Deferrals of repayments are clearly the best domestic measure. It was it's simple, understandable and fast. Too bad this principle did not apply always and everywhere. Trying to help the addressee is fine, well it was lost due to the "jeweling" of economic measures precious time. Ivana Molnárová, director of Profesia.sk: I consider compensation to be both a positive and a negative measure labor costs. But the only positive thing is that I state these contributions provided to entrepreneurs. Everything else around this however, the measures were no longer unintended or only communicative uncontrolled. Miroslav Beblavý, economist, former chairman of the Spolu party The best economic measure was to stop the corona in its infancy. A short-term halt to the economy is nothing compared to what we would experienced if the corona spread in the American way. Maroš Ovčarik, specialist in personal finance and investment, Partners Investments One of the best measures that has been implemented during coronation crisis, was an agreement with banks to defer loan repayments. Here is important not only the idea itself, which helped to breathe financially to date, more than 160,000 people and 9,000 companies. The implementation was essential, ie the simplicity and speed of the equipment. Libor Melioris, economist Overall, it turned out poorly. The most visible measure - direct aid turned out to be the poorest. The average monthly support per job is less than 300 eur. The regime is particularly schizophrenic towards self-employed people. In good times he tolerates not paying taxes, but in bad times he does faces that tradesmen do not exist. Pavol Suďa, chief analyst of the Finstat.sk portal Intuitively, it seems to me that the effect of the measures will not be dramatic. That key will be how our economy will cope with the collapse of the foreign demand, the rapid recovery of which is questionable. In this area yet I don't see ideas or suggestions to local employers essentially dependent on exports. Zdenko Štefanides, chief analyst of VUB banka: At the onset of coronacoma, I would welcome an immediate bridge to it flat-rate money transfer to all households, not just directly crisis-stricken. That didn't happen, and that's why speed was important alternative forms of assistance, since the enlargement of the PRC, the introduction of kurzarbeit, deferment of payments of levies or tax advances, but also installments loans. Renáta Bláhová, tax advisor and auditor at BMB Partners, member since April Advisory Team to Minister of Finance Heger: Direct financial assistance through the Ministry of Labor was for objective reasons slower, to this day has many critics because it is targeted and limits posts are set too low. There would be shortcomings here correct by extending aid schemes that have already started, if any by the end of the year, and contribution limits will be increased. Addressability I would definitely did not recommend changing, as a deterrent example could be our Czech neighbors, where called. helicopter money has become an attraction for fraudsters. In Slovakia, we have it all reasonably foresaw. Ján Kovalčík, analyst, INEKO: Looking back shows contributions to job retention they could also be higher. Well, it's easy to comment on what we know today, when the economy is opening up fast and the circle of potential applicants is growing narrows. At the time of decision making in March or April, I would significantly more generous support was probably considered budget Stunts. Martin Kahanec, economist, labor market specialist, founder of Central European Labor Studies Institute (CELSI) Without a well-thought-out testing, tracing and isolation system In some cases, we risk emerging large outbreaks of pandemics without we captured and eliminated them quickly enough. It would help systematic testing of people at risk, geographically scattered occupations with a high frequency of contacts: because of them health, but also because it would give us like litmus papers helped find outbreaks. Systematic area testing of waste water and all blood samples taken for the presence of coronavirus, respectively coronavirus antibodies would also help us to effectively identify germs such outbreaks. Andrej Svorenčík, economist at the University of Mannheim: We can show and forbid in extraordinary circumstances, but more complex activities are still, unfortunately, still beyond our borders options. And now complete answers from the best Slovak economists: Juraj Draxler, Head of the Institute of Strategic Analysis of the Slovak Academy of Sciences, former Minister of Education By far the most effective measure was the introduction of wage subsidies (simply called kurzarbeit). Therefore, it is one of the primary measures in virtually every country, not only in our country. Unfortunately, in our country the measure started to be implemented late and cumbersome (complicated filling in of statements even for self - employed people who wave in other countries access to much easier assistance) and in a very limited way a. The ceiling is so low that it will do great damage to skilled workers, exactly those which our economy should strive to maintain. In the beginning, in addition, the measure introduced not widely, but only for small and medium-sized enterprises. And that's purely because the government she could not understand that the aid would have to be relatively broad. At the same time, she calculated whether she had "enough money", although even in early April, when she was still aid from the EU level was not in full swing, resources were. Unofficially circulating information that government officials were quite busy questioning whether we were bigger aid expenditure will not downgrade the rating. But this is a relatively absurd approach to us the economy will shrink sharply, the downgrade is even more certain. Throughout the story of economic aid, I am fascinated by how weak it is and even that it is little awareness here. And this despite the fact that whoever wants to see how massive and other countries reacted quickly and that we are also indirectly pushing us for more aid from the European Union. There is still a kind of misleading belief that after the opening of the economy everything will return to roughly normal, which is not true at all. In addition, instead of a centralized discussion on selecting the most effective tools here, for example, the crisis use of Eurofunds left practically purely to the departmental gravity: what the ministries come up with, money is put into it. That's almost criminally irresponsible, it will be slow and some resources will probably be wasted on inefficient things. On Tuesday, I chaired a meeting of several domestic economic experts, they agreed we believe that even the latest NBS forecast has strongly undershot the effects of the crisis on employment (its forecast is 70,000 lost jobs in a more conservative scenario and about 100,000 in the worse). In fact, we should to talk about at least double numbers, even if only in relation to the existing ones jobs in Slovakia. An additional problem on the labor market will be the return of Slovaks from abroad, especially due to brexite, it has already begun and will intensify with the shortening of the transitional period. At the same time, we have no response here in terms of labor policy or incentives domestic demand, which will have significant consequences. Politically, then, it will be interesting the question of whether people will usually suffer in silence at home or whether there will be stronger ones social explosion. Ivan Mikloš, economist, former Minister of Finance I consider the best economic measures during the corona crisis to be those which were fast and automatic, such as extending deadlines to filing tax returns and a relatively quick agreement on a solution the problem of canceled tours in travel agencies. In the same way positive, although delayed, was the agreement to cancel the bank drain. On the other hand, concerns (also mine) have been confirmed that help people, entrepreneurs and the economy will be slow and insufficient. I evaluate this, of course, negatively, as well as the pointless extension of the Sunday sales ban even after the lifting emergency. Delayed and insufficient assistance can also be caused by previous inexperience most members of the new executive, but I think the main problem lies in inefficient management within the government and the governing coalition. largest the prime minister is responsible for how effectively the government works and the governing coalition and the chairman of the strongest coalition party, so this mistake can be corrected by change management style by Igor Matovič. Especially the transition from micromanagement to strategic management. Ľudovít Ódor, Vice Governor of the NBS Measures that were either relatively automatic worked best (for example, the PRC), or were processed through the private sector (deferral loan repayments). It turned out that the mentality that helps in detection of abuse of public systems is rapid when needed and sufficiently large aid is a significant obstacle. Simply put, bureaucratic procedures and outdated processes have slowed down much of the support. The approval of state aid by the European Commission also has reserves in flexibility, although it must be said that the system is more flexible than in the past. Also an agreement between the government and commercial banks insists on my taste for a long time. I understand that the situation is complicated: a new government, an unprecedented economic downturn and a big hole in the budget. Over time, however, these arguments are in defense slower reaction time is becoming less applicable. Slovakia needs in the second phases of the fight against the corona - in addition to investment and other incentives - also large systemic ones changes, ideally from next year. Time is running. Miriama Letovanec, Director of the Implementation Unit Government Office, t.č. on maternity leave Inventing a measure does not mean automatically delivering it to those who do it they need. It's been 3 months and the numbers we're seeing aren't positive - not only from the point of view of drawing aid, but also from the development of the economy. Delivering a measure therefore does not just mean allocating a specific package public resources. When creating measures, it is necessary to look not only at whether they worked abroad, but from the point of view of deliverability also take into account administrative and organizational constraints of the Slovak public sector. As in the private sector, we need to take action before launching test from the process side. It doesn't take months or time to create such a process map emergency situations, such as the economic corona crisis, it is possible to shorten these actions on. After more than two decades, politicians still have not learned their lesson - they announce its initiatives at a time when many unknowns are still entering the equation variables. At the same time, it would be enough to wait a few days, refine the processes and into the media announce managerially taken measures. We abstract from the fact that the resources used in the first round are Eurofunds. If he has be a quick measure, so it must not be administratively burdensome and should not involve more as two procedural steps. Checking the accuracy or presentation of true information carried out ex-post and not continuously. After all, affidavits are used. If the measure is to be targeted, cesium must not fall into the future a certain part of the target group. But especially it should be administered in simple language and in a user-friendly way for the general masses of the population - even those who experience it they do not have to read the laws. Let's use behavioral approaches. Today is the time to return to the standard ways of making legislation, to minimize resortism, share data across the public sector and get economic aid as quickly as possible to those who need it. Because we only have very limited time. Karel Hirman, energy analyst Now criticize or praise the government for economic policy would it was unfair. The government has not done politics so far, but it was literally firefighter and rescuer. I think given that for what the coalition and the situation in which it has taken responsibility, so far with it she fit in quite well as much as possible. Evidence of this too comparison with other countries. Of course, aid management and access to use could have been better managed EU funds. But first it requires fundamental systemic as well as personnel changes in the state administration so that other mechanisms and approaches can be set up, which will aim at meaningful, transparent and also operational use of resources without unnecessarily complicated bureaucracy. So far, the most unnecessary has been the controversy over Sunday's sale and the most questionable principle: all power hygienists. Hygienists have nothing to determine the framework conditions business and should not abuse their position for unnecessary bullying business sector, especially in such difficult times. The hour of truth for the economic policy of this governing coalition is coming now, at preparing and approving comprehensive support and simplification measures business environment. It will be important to assess the success of the government amendment to the law on the state budget for this year, which must be urgently developed so that a genuine economic policy can be pursued. Another key task will be to develop a quality project framework for use of a special EU fund, which must be used primarily for systemic funding modernization and restructuring of the economy and employment, at the same time support for socially positive measures. In the short term, not only the termination of personnel will be equally important changes in state-owned enterprises, but also the determination of strategic tasks for their next development. In this regard, as an energy professional, I have considerable doubts whether the creation of the notified holding of state heating plants is the "real nut". A strategically and security-sensitive task, which has been almost discussed in our country so far does not speak, but is a major issue at EU level and in its key countries such as Germany and France, the state's entry into changing ownership is sensitive sectors and enterprises. In a situation where the coronary crisis has further weakened the entire sectors they have faced last year serious problems, such as metallurgy, automotive but also energy, you are responsible the government urgently needs to prepare legislative instruments to enable it to do so effectively and to emphatically enter into these processes, regardless of the ownership structure of the companies. Lívia Vašáková, Head of the Economic Analysis Section Representations of the European Commission in Slovakia While Slovakia managed the COVID-19 epidemic well after the medical exam page, economic indicators for the first quarter show sharp economic downturn. GDP fell by 5.2% and employment by 0.5%, which Slovakia is one of the most affected countries, such as Italy, Spain or France. It also dropped significantly in March and April industrial production and Slovakia was again among the most affected countries. All Member States have tried to help their countries since the outbreak of the pandemic economies. However, the aid was not even. With over 50% of the total state aid within the EU is strongly dominated by Germany, which has been building for several years budget surpluses. Most Slovak state aid schemes have only been approved in last days. Also according to various comparisons of aid intensity, Slovakia gave support the economy relatively little and the difference compared to other EU countries is visible mainly in liquidity support (soft loans and state guarantees). A great opportunity for Slovakia is the recently proposed European assistance in the amount of EUR 1.85 trillion, of which Slovakia, after approval by the Council and the European Parliament, will be able to draw about 24 billion. This package should, in addition to the classic EU funds and agricultural subsidies to support the reforms they may decide about the curve and the intensity of recovery. Martin Vlachynsky, INESS The main mistake is to steer the whole social debate. It is decided whether the slender manufacturer or that producer will receive the aid strawberry compotes, whether the carmaker will lay off 500 or 1000 people, with our eyes wide, we look at the NBS and other institutions, or theirs the tuned model will show a decrease in GDP of 10.3% or 11.2%. For now background are the biggest changes in the functioning of advanced economies behind the last 30 years. States are in debt at an incredible pace, new social ones are emerging from evening to morning schemes not for people but for entire industries, the entry of the state into the private sector is being considered companies, the printing of money has overcome even the darkest moments of the 2008 crisis, The European Union is preparing to introduce a number of new taxes ... But the most bizarre thing is that politicians (but also many economists and analysts!) Gradually they believed that we were not facing a severe crisis, but a new era of incredible prosperity. Suddenly we are talking about billions for hospitals, new highways, sewers in all the villages, thousands of rental apartments, I'm just waiting to return wide gauge railway. As if suddenly an almost infinite amount of resources fell into the hands of the state. A word "Investment" in today's debate has completely changed its meaning - it is no longer an expense with a return, but virtually any expense. Consumption has become an "investment". it is, of course, nonsense. The crisis cannot be redeemed and it is entirely responsible for these decisions Europe to pay the lost generation. I therefore do not consider it fruitful to assess whether this government has poured money quickly or not slowly, or whether she has prepared request forms with too many parties or small font. I will evaluate it according to its approach to the essentials questions that will come in the coming months, whether it will use this time for reforms, which we have been talking about for decades. Peter Kažimír, Governor of the NBS Deferrals of repayments are clearly the best domestic measure. It was it's simple, understandable and fast. It is a pity that this principle has not always and everywhere been applied. Trying to help Addressed is fine, but too much "jeweling" of economic measures precious time has been lost. Due to the seriousness of the situation, it was better to burn it a bit at the beginning and correct it later. It is no shame to change things. The unfortunate plot around the bank levy is pointlessly delaying the introduction guarantee schemes. Without them, we cannot secure credit to our economy and without it smooth lending will not recover. Finally, briefly on the measures. Yes, they should be simple, understandable and feasible. And it would be very helpful if these measures were also the result transparent process. The situation is too serious to make decisions affecting the lives of millions of people arose behind closed doors of any kind crisis staffs. Ivana Molnárová, director of Profesia.sk I consider compensation for wage costs to be both a positive and a negative measure. The only positive thing, however, is that the state provided these contributions to entrepreneurs. However, everything else about this measure was already unintended, or only communication unmanageable. These posts came with great delays that have sent many employers to secondary employment insolvency. The problem is also that the state did not think of everyone and everyone this aid scheme was unavailable to many. If we were out of it should teach, so clearly the state should have a mastered mechanism standardized communication of such measures through methodological guidelines and the like. The second room for improvement is the ability of competent institutions to act, which should ensure the prompt delivery and implementation of these measures. Miroslav Beblavý, economist, former chairman of the Spolu party The best economic measure was to stop the corona in its infancy. A short-term halt to the economy is nothing compared to what we would experienced if the corona spread in the American way. Therefore drastic and immediate action in March - closure of establishments, schools and borders and I consider wearing masks to be the best economic measure so far. This no longer applies to the next step. The biggest mistake is the misunderstanding on the part of most state officials that governance in times of such a crisis is quite different from opposition the policy to which they are accustomed. We have seen preference for most of them press releases, dramatic statements and even media narcissism before hard work on saving the economy. It is easy to declare First Aid for 1.5 billion euros, but it is difficult to make it a reality. Already at the end of March, several economists - for example, Ivan Mikloš and I pointed out - that aid must be simple, accessible and distributed as far as possible over existing ones institutions and, if possible, instruments. We have even designed specific tools. The government went through new and administratively demanding tools, many of which, of course, mismanaged. Maroš Ovčarik, specialist in personal finance and investment, Partners Investments One of the best measures that has been implemented during coronation crisis, was an agreement with banks to defer loan repayments. Here is important not only the idea itself, which helped to breathe financially to date, more than 160,000 people and 9,000 companies. The implementation was essential, ie the simplicity and speed of the equipment. Probably the least successful was the introduction of government measures in terms of speed and ease of handling for specific applicants. This crisis has fully shown that if we want our state to be better governed and to be ready to respond flexibly even in the event of such mega-crises, we must move in digitization. This will allow us to get important data faster, even if today the state has it at its disposal, but so far it cannot work with them effectively. In this regard, he could learn from the private sector. Libor Melioris, economist Terms such as "social contract" or "implicit agreement" are for of the common man incomprehensible. Any crisis, whether political or economic, is a rare period during which it materializes and redefines the citizen-state relationship. The Munich Agreement in 1938 with the citizens of Czechoslovakia materialized in the form of summons orders in the context of general mobilization. The epidemiological crisis of 2020 gave our establishment a chance to materialize citizens through economic aid. Overall, it turned out poorly. The most visible measure - direct aid, turned out most impoverished. The average monthly support per job is less than 300 euros. Especially schizophrenic the regime treats self-employed persons. In good times, he tolerates not paying taxes, but in bad times pretends that tradesmen do not exist. What was to be done was prophetically described by Konstantin Chikovsky in March. How is that turned out and what to do with it now, the best described by Ivan Bosňák in the recent commentary. Pavol Suďa, chief analyst of the Finstat.sk portal I assume that they should have the biggest macroeconomic effect measures such as deferral of loan and lease payments, state subsidy for rent, contributions to employees' salaries, deferral, etc. remission of social security premiums, deferral of payment advances on income tax, deferral of tax return or temporary protection of entrepreneurs and tenants. However, we will find out what real and significant positive impact they will have in the final up to a longer time interval. Some entrepreneurs have announced that they are supportive schemes are too complex. Others are afraid to use them for potential future risks, whom they fear. For example, the courts have provided temporary protection from creditors since mid-May only about 170 businesses, employing about five thousand workers. Up to ten percent of them gave up quickly, especially for the negative reaction of creditors. Intuitively, it seems to me that the effect of these measures will not be dramatic. That the key will be how our economy will cope with the slump in foreign demand, which is fast recovery is questionable. I don't see any ideas or suggestions in this area yet they significantly helped the local employers, who were essentially dependent on exports. Zdenko Štefanides, chief analyst of VUB banka In my view, the best measures after the outbreak of the coronary crisis were those that were quick and helped the largest group of people affected crisis. At the onset of coronacoma, I would welcome her to bridge it immediate lump sum money transfer to all households, not only directly affected by the crisis. It didn't happen, and that's why it was the important speed of alternative forms of assistance, since the enlargement of the PRC, introduction of kurarbeit or deferral of payments of levies or tax advances, but also installments loans. The latter measure has proved to be extremely effective and rapid assistance reached by more than 160,000 households. Banks so at the beginning of this crisis they have helped to overcome difficult times for perhaps more people than state aid. That is also why it seems unfair to me that the special bank levy has still not been canceled. After other central bank arguments in the Financial Stability Report perhaps no one doubts this levy for the economy. Sure, as an employee of one from the banks I am in a conflict of interest in this topic. But in a situation where he dropped the bank levy most banks to the losses before the onset of the coronary crisis, I can not look at it differently as a fine for the very sector that has helped those affected in this crisis households and businesses perhaps the most. Renáta Bláhová, tax advisor and auditor at BMB Partners, member of the advisory team of the Minister of Finance since April Heger The most important measure from the country 's point of view was to ensure sufficient liquidity for the proper functioning of the state right at the beginning of the pandemic, as it threatened not to pay officials. We have succeeded and today we have the opposite challenge, to prepare reforms so that the generous several billion in assistance from the EC is used for sensible reforms of our country. The chance for change is real great. From the point of view of the business entities that are most at risk pandemic, postponement of assistance was the fastest direct taxes and social security contributions. Direct financial assistance through the labor sector was slower for objective reasons, to this day it has many critics because it is targeted and the limits on posts are set too low. Here, the shortcomings could be corrected by already starting the schemes pomoci sa predĺžia, ak bude treba aj do konca roka, a limity na príspevky zvýšia. Adresnosť by som určite neodporúčala meniť, ako odstrašujúci príklad by mohli byť naši českí susedia, kde sa tzv. helicopter money stali lákadlom pre podvodníkov. Na Slovensku sme to vcelku rozumne predvídali. Na čo som osobne hrdá, že sa mi v poradenskom tíme ministra financií podarilo rozbehnúť? Spomeniem heslovite len vybrané oblasti, bez nasadenia celého tímu MF a medzirezortnej komunikácie by to však nebolo možné: Index daňovej spoľahlivosti: väčšia transparentnosť kritérií a zlepšenie výhod pre spoľahlivých daňovníkov. Pravidlá CFC pre fyzické osoby s cieľom zamedziť zneužívaniu schránkových spoločností vjurisdikciách snízkym daňovým zaťažením. Tieto pravidlá boli vr. 2017 na poslednú chvíľu v parlamente stiahnuté a zavedené z nepochopiteľných dôvodov len pre právnické osoby. Pre občerstvenie pamäti prikladám aj ilustratívny link. Prísnejší trestný zákon pre oblasť krátenia priamych daní s cieľom zamedziť špekulatívnemu zneužívaniu u agresívnych daňových subjektov (navrhuje sa vypustiť ustanovenie o účinnej ľútosti zavedené vroku 2013). Aj tu pre ozrejmenie súvislostí prikladám link. Dlhodobý systém kurzarbeit, o ktorom pred rokom mohli firmy len snívať. Za najdôležitejšie považujem v najbližšej dobe znormalizovať legislatívny proces tak, aby vláda mohla dodržať predvolebný sľub o predvídateľnej legislatíve. To znamená schvaľovať dôležité zmeny len jedenkrát za rok a to k 1. januáru, ideálne s jasným úplným znením zákona a úplne zakázať prílepky. Ján Kovalčík, dopravný analytik, INEKO Za ekonomicky i sociálne najlepšie opatrenie v koronakríze považujem využitie nečerpaných eurofondov na odvrátenie prepúšťania. Príspevky na udržanie zamestnanosti doslova zachránili prácu desiatkam tisíc ľudí. A spolu pomohli firmám pokryť podstatnú časť nákladov na stovky tisíc pracovných miest. Áno, príspevky nenabehli expresne. Ale s ohľadom na biedny stav elektronizácie procesov na úradoch stále veľmi dobre. Fakt, že predtým dlhé roky pri informatizácii šlo viac o lukratívne zákazky než o lepšie služby, teraz nik rýchlo nenapraví. Spätný pohľad ukazuje, že príspevky na udržanie pracovných miest mohli byť aj vyššie. No to sa ľahko komentuje s tým, čo vieme dnes, keď sa ekonomika rýchlo otvára a okruh potenciálnych žiadateľov sa zužuje. V čase prijímania rozhodnutí v marci či apríli by som významne štedrejšiu podporu asi považoval za rozpočtové kaskadérstvo. Druhým významným a široko využívaným opatrením sú odklady splácania úverov. S ohľadom na nízku finančnú gramotnosť väčšiny populácie však odporúčam aktívne vysvetľovať, že úroky nabiehajú aj teraz. Preto čím dlhší odklad dlžníci využijú, o to viac a dlhšie budú zostávajúci úver splácať. Z opatrení, ktoré sú teraz pre ekonomiku dôležité a dlho viazli, považujem za najdôležitejšie preklenovacie úvery podnikateľom. Slovensko má banky v dobrej kondícii a očakával by som, že viac podržia životaschopných podnikateľov v ťažkom období. Aj pred definitívnym schválením štátnych garančných schém. Teraz banky mohli a môžu ukázať, či sú partnermi aj do zlého počasia. Martin Kahanec, ekonóm, špecialista na trh práce, zakladateľ Central European Labour Studies Institute (CELSI) Ekonomické opatrenia, ktoré sa urobili, sú v princípe správne a pomáhajú svojim cieľovým skupinám. Rezervy boli najmä v rýchlosti ich implementácie, administratívnej záťaži na žiadateľov, a nedostatočnej výške podpory pri niektorých opatreniach. Niekedy aj vo svojej podstate dobré opatrenia trpeli chybami v detailoch pri ich implementácii. Napríklad keď sa zamestnávatelia zdráhali požiadať o opatrenia prvej pomoci z dôvodu nejasností okolo ich účtovania a zdaňovania. Zatiaľ sa nepodarilo implementovať investičné opatrenia pomoci mestám a obciam. Verím ale, že sa potenciál tisícov starostov a primátorov, ktorí majú dobrý prehľad, v ktorých projektoch je v ich obciach a mestách najvyššia pridaná hodnota, podarí urgentne realizovať. Aj keď epidemiologické opatrenia na zabránenie druhej vlny pandémie po otvorení ekonomiky nepatria priamo medzi ekonomické opatrenia, ich dosah na ekonomiku môže byť väčší ako celá doterajšia pomoc dokopy. To, že počty prípadov COVID-19 po otvorení narástli, nie je prekvapujúce, a samo osebe ma to v tejto miere ani neznepokojuje. Veľmi ma však znepokojuje, či sme na zvýšené riziko druhej vlny dostatočne pripravení. Druhý lockdown by bol pre ekonomiku a spoločnosť devastačný. Bez premysleného systému testovania, trasovania a izolovania prípadov nám hrozí vznik veľkých ohnísk pandémie bez toho, aby sme ich dostatočne rýchlo zachytili a eliminovali. Pomohlo by systematické testovanie ľudí v najrizikovejších, geograficky rozptýlených povolaniach s vysokou frekvenciou kontaktov: kvôli ich zdraviu, ale aj kvôli tomu, že by nám ako lakmusové papieriky pomáhali nachádzať ohniská nákazy. Systematické plošné testovanie odpadových vôd a všetkých odobraných krvných vzoriek na prítomnosť koronavírusu, respektíve protilátok na koronavírus, by nám tiež pomohlo efektívne identifikovať zárodky takýchto ohnísk. Andrej Svorenčík, ekonóm na Univerzite v Mannheime Na Slovensku si za bežných okolností nevieme efektívne riadiť veci verejné. Preto by sa mohlo zdať, že v krízovej situácií, keď sa štát potrebuje venovať len veľmi limitovanému okruhu úloh, tak by v nich mohol dosiahnuť nadpriemerné výsledky. Tými kľúčovými úlohami štátu počas pandémie boli a naďalej sú zamedziť šíreniu nákazy a stlmiť dopady na hospodárstvo. V prvej úlohe Slovensko síce uspelo, ale z formálnej stránky je tam viacero otáznikov — napríklad legitimita konzília epidemiológov a pod. V druhej úlohe je výkon nateraz nedostatočný, hlavne na úrovni deravého pokrytia a pomalej implementácie Prvej pomoci zamestnancom, podnikateľom a SZČO zo strany Ministerstva práce, sociálnych vecí a rodiny. Prikazovať a zakazovať za mimoriadnych okolností nám ide, ale komplexnejšie činnosti sú nateraz, žiaľ, stále ešte za hranicami našich možností. Ak máte pripomienku alebo ste našlichybu, napíšte prosím na</pre></div> Macko Uskohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03854113924478223398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28800663.post-58102635816051668572020-05-11T15:10:00.001+02:002020-05-11T15:10:22.737+02:00<br />
Mehreen Khan, EU correspondent and Sam Fleming in Brussels 7 hours ago<br />
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How should Brussels respond to Germany’s constitutional court issuing a “declaration of war” on the EU’s legal order? Less than a week after the explosive Karlsruhe ruling, the options are coming into view.<br />
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Out of all of them, the European Commission’s “nuclear” option is an infringement procedure against Germany, where Berlin’s government would be taken to court (yes, the European Court of Justice). Ursula von der Leyen, commission president, on Sunday said Brussels "will look into possible next steps, which may include the option of infringement proceedings" in response to pressure for the commission to defend the sanctity of the EU’s legal order against upstart national judges.<br />
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Franz Mayer, an influential German jurist, makes the powerful case for the nuclear option in Verfassungsblog. He argues that Karlsruhe’s challenge to the ECJ’s supremacy is a blatant breach of EU law. If it continues, Brussels has little option but to embark on a “calm and civilised” infringement process as laid out under EU law, he says.<br />
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There is legal precedent for a member state to be reprimanded over the actions of its courts. In 2018, France was the subject of an infringement over the failings of its Conseil d’État. But the Karlsruhe moment is of a different order of magnitude altogether - both for Germany and the EU. The decision on an infringement will ultimately boil down to politics and not the law.<br />
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First, the case for those in favour. By keeping the infringement option alive, Ms Von der Leyen wants to fend off criticism that Brussels is quick to launch legal action against recalcitrant governments in Poland and Hungary, but shies away from the same against its “core” member states. As a German, Ms Von der Leyen is more exposed to that charge than most.<br />
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For Mr Mayer, if the commission does not defend the EU’s rule of law, the system risks descending to a “judicial rule of thumb” where the interpretation of the strongest national judges wins. “This will be based on the parameters of size, power, political influence and economic weight of the respective member state,” he warns. For this reason, expect Ms Von der Leyen to keep repeating Brussels’ willingness to take action - including at a hearing with MEPs later this week.<br />
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In general, supporters of legal action want the commission to use the full force of its legal armoury to bring Germany’s unruly red-robed judges to heel and set an example for others. They think the threat to the ECJ’s hegemony and the independence of the ECB is so acute that the commission cannot merely stand by and watch. Plenty in Brussels sympathise.<br />
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But is legal action the best tool for that job? In practice, it will mean the commission suing the German government for the actions of its independent court in a case where Berlin is not the offender. During the Karlsruhe hearing the government defended the ECB’s bond-buying against the litigants, and last week Olaf Scholz was trying to reassure his fellow finance ministers that a way would be found to keep the Bundesbank involved in bond-buying.<br />
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A case would create an invidious situation where Angela Merkel's government is thrown on the defensive and pose fresh legal difficulties about the separation of powers - another EU fundamental right - in Germany. Berlin would not be in a position to issue instructions to Karlsruhe following the infringement given the court’s independence. The result, said one EU expert, would be an "absurd situation" legally.<br />
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Commission infringements are also notoriously laborious and can take years to resolve. At their most severe, they result in financial sanctions against said governments. Although they serve a useful purpose in standard violations of EU law, the Karlsruhe judgment poses such profound constitutional questions for the EU, that they won’t be answered by suing Germany. At its essence, the issue is about “who governs the governors?” writes Katharina Pistor.<br />
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Still, supporters would argue that even a symbolic legal process is better than nothing. The absurdities of the situation, they argue, should precipitate a serious debate about the relationship between national and supranational courts under EU law. Ultimately supporters want that question resolved not with another legal fudge but a fundamental change to the EU’s treaties to decide the matter once and for all.<br />
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Macko Uskohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03854113924478223398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28800663.post-2938101559541847002016-02-16T03:04:00.002+01:002016-02-16T03:04:40.921+01:00A+ credit rating for Slovakia from Fitch. Bratislava particularly attractive to investors<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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FITCH the credit rating agency says that its A+ ratings balance robust institutions, including the country’s membership of the eurozone which has helped attract foreign investment, against a fairly high GDP volatility that reflects sector and market concentration. Fitch foresees a stable growth for the country, at 3 percent yearly, mainly boosted by strong domestic consumption.</div>
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Effectively, this means that it is an attractive country in the eyes of foreign investors who monitor data of rating agencies and build factories or lend money accordingly, the Pravda daily wrote.</div>
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Moreover, Fitch Ratings expects a gradual reduction of the state budget deficit and public debt, regardless of potential changes in political leadership and policies, thanks to positive macroeconomic development and improved tax collection. The agency also appraises considerable progress in solving unemployment and good macroeconomic development, the finance ministry informed the SITA newswire. “I am glad that we are a country which constantly works at improving,” Finance Minister Peter Kažimír said. “Our positive direction has been appreciated already by a second rating agency [after Standard & Poor’s] which expressed trust in us by its evaluation.“ </div>
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The Standard & Poor’s rating agency on January 29 confirmed Slovakia’s rating at A+ with a stable outlook, whereby Slovakia, along with Ireland, now has the ninth-best rating from among 19 eurozone countries.</div>
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Macko Uskohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03854113924478223398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28800663.post-40508024928236722402015-04-10T02:28:00.001+02:002015-04-10T02:28:08.141+02:00Signs of Life in the Eurozone by Nouriel Roubini - Project Syndicate<a href="http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/eurozone-fragile-recovery-by-nouriel-roubini-2015-03">Signs of Life in the Eurozone by Nouriel Roubini - Project Syndicate</a>: <br /><br />
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<a href="https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/pengoopmcjnbflcjbmoeodbmoflcgjlk" style="font-size: 13px;">'via Blog this'</a>Macko Uskohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03854113924478223398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28800663.post-76480626700528232502015-04-02T01:06:00.001+02:002015-04-02T01:06:48.486+02:00SLOVAKIA’s economy is expected to grow in 2015 faster than originally forecast<div dir="ltr"><div class="" style="margin:1.5em 0px;padding:0px 15px;border:0px none;font-family:open-sans-regular,sans-serif;font-size:13px;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:normal;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:18px;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(37,37,37);letter-spacing:normal;text-align:start;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:0px"><h1 class="" style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:open-sans-bold,sans-serif;font-size:3.6rem;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:4.2rem;vertical-align:baseline">GDP growth estimates revised up</h1></div><div class="" style="margin:0px;padding:0px 20px;border:0px none;font-family:open-sans-regular,sans-serif;font-size:13px;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:normal;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:18px;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(37,37,37);letter-spacing:normal;text-align:start;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:0px"><div class="" style="margin:0px 20px 0px 0px;padding:0px 0px 25px;border:0px none;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;float:left;width:640px"><div class="" style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline"><span class="" style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline-block"><span class="" style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline-block"><span class="" style="margin:0px 5px 0px 0px;padding:0.5rem 1.2rem;border-bottom:2px solid rgb(224,224,224);border-style:none none solid;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:middle;display:inline-block;white-space:nowrap;text-decoration:none;color:rgb(37,37,37);border-radius:2px;background:none repeat scroll 0% 0% rgb(240,240,240)"><span class=""></span></span></span></span><span class="" style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;clear:both;display:block;float:right"><a class="" style="margin:0px 5px;padding:0.3em;border:0px none;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(0,106,81);text-decoration:none;display:inline-block"><span class=""> </span><span class="" style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:middle;color:rgb(0,106,81);display:inline-block">Print</span></a></span></div><p class="" style="margin:1.2em 0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:open-sans-bold,sans-serif;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">SLOVAKIA's economy is expected to grow in 2015 faster than originally forecast, benefiting from quantitative easing by the European Central Bank, which weakens the euro, and low crude oil prices. </p><p style="margin:1.2em 0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">The National Bank of Slovakia has upgraded its forecast from January forecast of the growth of the gross domestic product by 0.3 percentage points, up from 2.9 percent to 3.2 percent for 2015. </p><p style="margin:1.2em 0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">"Whereas the positive impact of the reduction of oil prices on the economy has been lower than expected in the previous prognosis due to the slight increase in crude oil euro prices, the fully realised programme of extended purchase of assets will have a positive impact on the Slovak economy mostly by virtue of higher eurozone demand and the weaker euro exchange rate," NBS Governor Jozef Makúch said on March 31 when introducing the latest prognosis. </p><p style="margin:1.2em 0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">He added that the quantitative easing (QE) launched by the European Central Bank (ECB) is likely to have a positive impact on Slovak economy in the form of 0.4 percent GDP growth in 2015 and 0.2 percent in 2016.</p><p style="margin:1.2em 0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">Finance Minister Peter Kažimír and Prime Minister Robert Fico perceive the upgraded forecast as encouraging, while the latter said that at such growth will spur larger changes on the labour market.</p><p style="margin:1.2em 0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">"At economic growth above 3 percent we can expect a natural creation of new work places and a reduction in the unemployed," Fico said as cited by the TASR newswire. </p><p style="margin:1.2em 0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">The NBS predicts a dynamic growth of work places especially in the service sector, but notes all should benefit from the improved growth.</p><p style="margin:1.2em 0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">"Rising domestic demand also fuels employment, which is increasing quicker than expected. We expect 22,000 jobs to be created in 2015," said NBS Vice Governor Ján Tóth, adding that average unemployment rate could be 12 percent in 2015 and drop to 10 percent by 2017.</p><p style="margin:1.2em 0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">Kažimír appraised the fact that the country's economic growth has not been driven exclusively by foreign demand but that the domestic demand strengthening. </p><p style="margin:1.2em 0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">"The structure of the growth is more balanced and healthier that any time before," he said as cited by SITA. </p><p style="margin:1.2em 0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">NBS also expects real wages to grow also because of negative inflation of the -0.3 percent forecast for 2015. </p><p style="margin:1.2em 0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">"Salaries will rise quicker particularly in the health care and education sectors and should align gradually with labour productivity," said Tóth. In 2015, nominal wages are likely to grow 2.6 percent.</p><h3 style="margin:1.6em 0px 0.5em;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:open-sans-bold,sans-serif;font-size:1.8rem;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:2.4rem;vertical-align:baseline">Reforms needed </h3><p style="margin:1.2em 0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">The central bank believes that Slovakia will benefit from the ECB's €1 trillion bond-buying programme and Makúch is confident that the ECB will find enough quality bonds to meet its targeted €60 billion worth of monthly purchases.</p><p style="margin:1.2em 0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">"We're meeting our buying volume targets, in terms of quality of purchased bonds," he said.</p><p style="margin:1.2em 0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">He warned that this programme is not any substitute for the structural changes needed in some eurozone economies. </p><p style="margin:1.2em 0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">"In no way is QE to replace insufficient reform efforts by eurozone governments when carrying out structural reforms and keeping rules of budgetary responsibility," said Makúch, "because the EQ-supported growth of economy will not last forever". </p><p style="margin:1.2em 0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">Renáta Konečná, general director of the Department of Monetary and Economic Analysis at the NBS told public broadcaster RTVS that these reforms should target maintaining and improving competitiveness. </p><p style="margin:1.2em 0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">"This means that these are important reforms on the labour market and from the viewpoint of simplicity of hiring and firing employees," said Konečná. "And from the viewpoint of Slovakia it is also important to increase drawing of EU funds which help the economy in terms of the growth of investments and support of sustainable growth in the future."</p><h3 style="margin:1.6em 0px 0.5em;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:open-sans-bold,sans-serif;font-size:1.8rem;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:2.4rem;vertical-align:baseline">By the numbers</h3><p style="margin:1.2em 0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">Slovakia's GDP grew 2.4 percent in 2014. The last time Slovakia registered an economic growth exceeding 3 percent was in 2011. </p><p style="margin:1.2em 0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">The NBS predicts that the economy will grow 3.2 percent in 2015 to be followed by 3.8 percent in 2016, and 3.5 percent in 2017. The unemployment rate should decrease to 12 percent in 2015 and continue to fall to 11.5 percent in 2016 and 10.2 percent in 2017. Employment is forecast to increase by 1.4 percent in 2015 and during the following two years it should continue to grow, by 1.1 percent and 0.8 percent respectively. </p><p style="margin:1.2em 0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;font-family:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline">With the inflation rate forecast to be negative at -0.3 percent for 2015, the central bank assumes that prices would resume their growth in 2016 forecasting the inflation rate at 1.7 percent in 2016 and 2.4 percent in 2017.<br style>Real wages should grow 2.7 percent in 2015 to be followed by growth of 2.1 percent in 2016 and 1.8 percent in 2017.</p></div></div></div> Macko Uskohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03854113924478223398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28800663.post-69277812303785545452014-10-17T13:55:00.001+02:002014-10-17T13:55:40.253+02:00Slovak diplomat Šefčovič likely to become EC Vice-president for energy union<div dir="ltr"><div class=""> <h2>Slovak diplomat Šefčovič likely to become EC Vice-president for energy union</h2> <p class="">Topical Issue</p> </div> <div class=""> <span class=""> <img src="http://en.rsi.rtvs.sk/image/19615?width=194"> <div class=""> </div> </span> <div class=""> <div class=""> <div class=""><span style="vertical-align:bottom;width:95px;height:61px"></span></div> </div> <div class=""> </div> </div> </div> <p class="">16.10.2014 15:10</p> <p>European Commission President-elect Jean-Claude Juncker on Wednesday officially proposed that Slovak diplomat <em>Maroš Šefčovič</em> become the Commission's Vice-President for the Energy Union. Šefčovič's initially proposed portfolio of transport and space should now be taken up by the Slovenian candidate Violeta Bulc.</p> <p>In his first reaction to the proposed appointment, <em>Šefčovič</em> said that he'll be primarily in charge of creating an energy union. "The current crisis between the EU and Russia concerning gas supplies shows that this problem is becoming highly important and strategic," stated <em>Šefčovič</em>. The Slovak diplomat and incoming European Commissioner for Energy Miguel Canete are taking up their posts just ahead of winter, when the EU in its talks with Russia needs to secure sufficient energy supplies for all member countries. <em>Šefčovič</em> noted that they need to prevent dependence on a single source and work rather towards diversifying sources of energy carriers, build a single energy market and remove obstacles that the EU currently faces in this area.</p> <p><em>Maroš Šefčovič</em> is one of the most experienced Slovak EU diplomats. He held the post of the vice-president of the Commission in the previous cabinet for 5 years. Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico is very proud of the fact that Slovakia is likely to take up the European Commission's vice-presidency responsible for energy policy. "This is a highly strong position, a position that usually reserved for large countries", stated Fico. The composition of the new Commission Cabinet of Jean-Claude Juncker should be finalised by next month.</p></div> Macko Uskohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03854113924478223398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28800663.post-18607251423277786912014-10-10T01:54:00.001+02:002014-10-10T01:54:57.794+02:00Rádio Slovakia International - International Monetary Fund predicts the rise of Slovak economy - RTVS.sk<a href="http://en.rsi.rtvs.sk/clanok/rubriky/news/international-monetary-fund-predicts-the-rise-of-slovak-economy">Rádio Slovakia International - International Monetary Fund predicts the rise of Slovak economy - RTVS.sk</a>: <br /><br />
<br />Macko Uskohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03854113924478223398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28800663.post-91136785942614037172014-08-24T23:21:00.001+02:002014-08-24T23:21:22.796+02:00ECB: Unemployment in the euro area<a href="https://www.ecb.europa.eu/press/key/date/2014/html/sp140822.en.html">ECB: Unemployment in the euro area</a>: <br /><br />
<br />Macko Uskohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03854113924478223398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28800663.post-56486055645257498912014-04-05T15:10:00.000+02:002014-04-05T15:10:50.923+02:00The LG G PRO 2 is launched in europe in JUNE - Leak (incl price)<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
It seems that the LG G pro 2 will be launched in EU (europe) in June<br />
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<a href="http://www.marketonline.ro/telefoane-mobile/telefon-mobil-lg-smartphone-g-pro-2-d837-lte-4g-quad-core-226-ghz-3gb-ram-16gb-flash-ips-59-inch-1080x1920-android-44-black">http://www.marketonline.ro/telefoane-mobile/telefon-mobil-lg-smartphone-g-pro-2-d837-lte-4g-quad-core-226-ghz-3gb-ram-16gb-flash-ips-59-inch-1080x1920-android-44-black</a><br />
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Macko Uskohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03854113924478223398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28800663.post-74533953842713356572014-03-20T00:30:00.001+01:002014-03-20T00:30:48.604+01:00Porsche is making the car that is responsible for half its profits in Bratislava, reports the FT<p><br> Porsche is set to completely manufacture a car outside Germany for the first time, marking a departure from its proud brand claim that all its vehicles are “Made in Germany”.<br> Matthias Müller, Porsche chief executive, said on Tuesday that after 2016 the next generation of the Cayenne SUV – a vehicle that currently accounts for roughly half of Porsche sales – will be manufactured entirely in Bratislava, Slovakia.<br> The decision was taken as part of a reorganisation of production within Porsche and the wider Volkswagen Group.<br> Currently much of the Cayenne – including the bodywork – is made at a facility in Bratislava but the final assembly takes place in Leipzig.<br> Most German carmakers have long since abandoned the idea of producing all their vehicles in Germany and have opened production facilities overseas to be closer to fast-growing markets.<br> However, Porsche – maker of the 911 sports car and Panamera saloon – had partly resisted that trend because the “Made in Germany” label was considered a core part of its corporate identity and marketing.<br> Car buyers in emerging markets are prepared to pay a premium for German, UK and Italian engineering, and premium carmakers therefore tend to have reservations about setting up overseas.<br> For example, VW spent £800m last year to upgrade its factory in Crewe and keep Bentley models “Made in Britain”, rather than building its new SUV model in Slovakia, which would have been cheaper.<br> Fiat, owners of Porsche competitors Maserati, have also pledged to invest in their Italian factories to ensure that the sports car brand remains Italian-made, despite cost worries. Companies such as Rolls-Royce and Ferrari make their national identity the centrepiece of their sales pitch.<br> VW’s Bratislava plant produces the VW Group’s large SUVs such as the Touareg and Audi Q7. Therefore VW stands to derive significant synergy and time savings by manufacturing the Cayenne in its entirety in Slovakia, where labour costs are also lower.<br> Mr Müller said that for customers the decisive factor is that all Porsche vehicles will continue to be designed and engineered in Germany and noted that within the VW Group all production locations have to achieve the same high standards.<br> Porsche sales jumped last year by 15 per cent to more than 162,000 vehicles and it has become a big generator of profits for VW. Porsche is expected to be boosted further later this year when it launches the Macan compact SUV.</p> <p> <br> </p> Macko Uskohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03854113924478223398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28800663.post-34058217491913542632014-02-09T04:04:00.001+01:002014-02-09T04:04:31.452+01:00Merkel: ‘I have a lot of sympathy for Jean-Claude Juncker’ | EurActiv<a href="http://www.euractiv.com/eu-elections-2014/merkel-lot-sympathy-jean-claude-news-533337?utm_source=RSS_Feed&utm_medium=RSS&utm_campaign=EurActivRSS">Merkel: ‘I have a lot of sympathy for Jean-Claude Juncker’ | EurActiv</a>: <br /><br />
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<a href="https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/pengoopmcjnbflcjbmoeodbmoflcgjlk" style="font-size: 13px;">'via Blog this'</a>Macko Uskohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03854113924478223398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28800663.post-91010688868955581232014-02-09T03:03:00.001+01:002014-02-09T03:03:51.214+01:00Martin N. Baily and Pål Erik Sjåtil lay out a three-pronged strategy for restoring rapid economic growth in Central and Eastern Europe. - Project Syndicate<a href="http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/martin-n--baily-and-p-l-erik-sj-til-lay-out-a-three-pronged-strategy-for-restoring-rapid-growth-in-central-and-eastern-europe-s-economies">Martin N. Baily and Pål Erik Sjåtil lay out a three-pronged strategy for restoring rapid economic growth in Central and Eastern Europe. - Project Syndicate</a>: <br /><br />
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<a href="https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/pengoopmcjnbflcjbmoeodbmoflcgjlk" style="font-size: 13px;">'via Blog this'</a>Macko Uskohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03854113924478223398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28800663.post-38768225796929587262014-02-09T02:15:00.001+01:002014-02-09T02:15:38.765+01:00Daniel Gros examines the inelegant but fundamental innovation that is the Single Resolution Mechanism. - Project Syndicate<a href="http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/daniel-gros-examines-the-inelegant-but-fundamental-innovation-that-is-the-single-resolution-mechanism">Daniel Gros examines the inelegant but fundamental innovation that is the Single Resolution Mechanism. - Project Syndicate</a>: <br /><br />
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<a href="https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/pengoopmcjnbflcjbmoeodbmoflcgjlk" style="font-size: 13px;">'via Blog this'</a>Macko Uskohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03854113924478223398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28800663.post-86576217824607999082014-01-18T09:20:00.000+01:002014-01-18T09:20:02.766+01:00Chinese carmaker eyes Slovakia<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Chinese electric cars to be made in Slovakia. The name of the company is BYD China. “This carmaker is <br />
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<a href="http://telematicsnews.info/wp-content/uploads/general/byd%20e6%20int.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://telematicsnews.info/wp-content/uploads/general/byd%20e6%20int.jpg" height="205" width="320" /></a></div>
negotiating with a Bratislava-based company which would develop electric cars for them,” Marián Farkaš, head of the Chinese Chamber of Commerce in Slovakia (Sinaco) told the Hospodárske Noviny (HN) daily.<br />
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He added that Slovaks are clear favourites for BYD, with no other companies being addressed for now.
In case the Chinese automotive producer agrees with the Slovak company, dozens of new jobs in development will be created and hundreds of thousands of euros invested, HN wrote on January 16. BYD already produces re-chargeable accumulators. Its existing electric vehicles have started to appear in Europe.<br />
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<a href="http://www.byd.com/na/auto/e6.html#">http://www.byd.com/na/auto/e6.html#</a></div>
Macko Uskohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03854113924478223398noreply@blogger.com0Cintorínska 2356/13, 811 08 Bratislava, Slovakia48.1471787 17.1190659000000122.625144199999998 -24.18952809999999 73.6692132 58.427659900000009