Archive for the 'Economy' Category
Is College Still Worth It? The New Calculus of Falling Returns
December 27th, 2019We explore a variety of explanations and conclude that falling college wealth premiums may be due to the luck of when you were born, financial liberalization and the rising cost of higher education. Maybe, but it’s incredible how the authors avoided the elephant in the room. The number of times the word technology appears in […]
Turkey Unveils First Fully Homemade Car in $3.7 Billion Bet on Electric
December 27th, 2019Via: Reuters: Turkey unveiled its first fully domestically-produced car on Friday, saying it aimed to eventually produce up to 175,000 a year of the electric vehicle in a project expected to cost 22 billion lira ($3.7 billion) over 13 years.
Russia Raids Offices of Kremlin Critic Over Refusal to Take Down Video About Medvedev
December 27th, 2019Don’t Call Him “Dimon” Via: AFP: Russian security officials searched the offices of leading Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny’s anti-corruption foundation on Thursday, with his team calling the raid a new bid to disrupt their work. Navalny linked the searches to his refusal to take down a 2017 video report that accused Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev […]
Japan’s Births Decline To Lowest Number On Record
December 25th, 2019Japan has been trying to increase its birth rate for years, hoping that a youthful boost could offset an otherwise rapidly aging population. It’s not working. The country’s health ministry announced Tuesday that the number of babies born in 2019 fell by an estimated 5.9% this year, to 864,000. It’s the first time since 1899, […]
Rivian Scores $1.3 Billion Investment
December 24th, 2019Via: Reuters: Electric vehicle startup Rivian said on Monday it closed a $1.3 billion investment round led by T. Rowe Price and including existing investors Amazon.com and Ford Motor Co. The investment round, which also included BlackRock Inc, is the fourth this year for Rivian and positions the Plymouth, Michigan-based company as one of the […]
Pig Ebola: Chinese Banks Offer Pork to Reward Customers for Opening New Accounts
December 19th, 2019Via: South China Morning Post: Handing out servings of expensive pork as a reward for opening an account is the latest gimmick being used by a growing number of small local banks across China to lure new depositors. Banks are being forced to go to greater lengths to attract new deposits, since they generally earn […]
Warrant Not Always Needed for ‘Inadvertent’ NSA Surveillance of Americans
December 19th, 2019This sort of fluff is nothing compared to: “It’s just like laundering money – you work it backwards to make it clean.” Enjoy your 4th Amendment. Via: Reuters: The U.S. government may collect information about U.S. citizens without obtaining a warrant if the information is gathered inadvertently while legally carrying out surveillance of non-nationals abroad, […]
Vampire Squid May Admit Guilt, Pay $2 Billion Fine in Corruption Scandal
December 19th, 2019Via: Reuters: Goldman Sachs Group Inc is in talks with the U.S. government and a state regulator to possibly pay up to $2 billion and admit guilt to resolve investigations into its role in the 1MDB Malaysian corruption scandal, according to a source familiar with the matter. The bank and U.S. officials have discussed a […]
Robot Can Make 300 Pizzas an Hour
December 19th, 2019Via: Fox 5 NY: A robot will be serving food to thousands of guests at next month’s Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas. Seattle-based Picnic says its automated food assembly system will produce up to 300 12-inch customized pizzas an hour on the CES show floor. … The company ran a test pilot with […]
Open Thread: Donald Trump Impeached on Two Charges
December 18th, 2019My guess: This is noise, which I’ve mostly ignored. The people involved with this, on all sides, are so corrupt that I physically can’t stand trying to pretend to be interested one way or the other. As the public facing bipartisan goon squad tries to out ratfuck each other, the Military Industrial Complex quietly swallows […]
