- 1) ICN Informed Citizen News 10/18/09
- 2) Cities get a break on pensions but critics aren't so sure it's a good idea
"Steep declines on Wall Street and the sluggish national economy pummeled the pension funds of the Lehigh Valley's three cities last year, resulting in a combined loss of more than $85 million.
The massive dip -- familiar to those with 401(k) retirement funds -- threatened to dramatically increase the annual contributions the cities must pay to pension plans, and possibly, increase taxes.
But state lawmakers, prompted by warnings of a financial collapse in Philadelphia, bailed out municipalities across the state with a pension bill passed last month that establishes new financial standards and provides short-term budgetary relief for municipalities facing declining revenues.
The bill, known as Act 44, allows municipalities to pay less annually to account for investment losses and spreads the payments needed to cover those losses over a longer period.
In addition, municipalities may artificially increase the value of their pension funds by 30 percent -- up from 20 percent -- to account for the volatility of the market and to reduce the impact of the 2008 losses.
Critics of the bill say it bails out politicians, not the state's taxpayers, and does nothing to address the underlying financial problems of a pension system they describe as unsustainable."
"It's happening. The long-awaited bankruptcy of big-time commercial real estate lender Capmark is just about here.
WSJ: In 2006, a group led by KKR & Co., Goldman Sachs Capital Partners and Five Mile Capital Partners acquired the lender GMAC LLC's commercial-real estate business and renamed it Capmark. As of March 31, the investor group owned about 75% of the company, with GMAC and its employees owning the balance."
" Forget a jobless recovery. The economy may be entering a recovery with job losses."
"Employment mystery
Economists are puzzled as to why job growth has slowed, citing everything from higher health care costs, to higher productivity, to Chinese currency manipulation.
"The answer is, we don't know," said Tim Bartik, a liberal economist with the Upjohn Institute for Employment Research in Michigan who is proposing a tax credit for employers who hire new workers."
"Oct. 25 (Bloomberg) -- The Philippines, which sold dollar- denominated debt three times this year, may turn to the domestic market to raise funds to help temper currency gains, Finance Secretary Gary Teves said."
"The Philippines sold $1 billion of dollar-denominated bonds on Oct. 17, bringing total overseas sales this year to $3.25 billion to cover a record budget deficit."
- 6) Balli Steel reports China dominating global steel market
"Balli Steel, one of the world’s largest privately owned independent commodity traders, reports that China is expanding into the iron ore market and increasing its steel production capacity, against a backdrop of declining worldwide production.
Figures from the World Steel Association demonstrate that global steel production declined by 18.1% year-on-year in August 2009 to 758 million tonnes. In contrast, crude steel production in China increased by 5.4% over the same period. China now accounts for almost 49% of world steel production as well as approximately 50% of global consumption which equates to 1.5 million tonnes per day."
"The director of the Western Hemisphere Department at the IMF, Nicolas Eyzaguirre told reporters, in a press conference in São Paulo, southeastern Brazil, that the growth of Brazil in 2010 should be higher than previously forecasted by the institution, 3.5%.
Eyzaguirre also pointed out that one of the ways to avoid a new recession would be the establishment of a global insurance to avoid the world economy remaining dependant on the production of dollars by the United States.
"If everyone accumulates reserves in dollars, the United States have an enormous subsidy and we do not use this money for other things, like education and infrastructure. We need a multilateral organization that is not the Federal Reserve (Fed) to do this regulation.""
- 8) From the Tehran Times (quoted from Mohammad-Ali Khatibi)
"Iran replaced the dollar with other currencies such as euro and yen in oil trading about three years ago, Khatibi said.
“We took the decision in a bid to diversify the oil income currency basket. Since the dollar is becoming weaker this move has led to greater benefit for our country,” he explained.
“Some other countries have also replaced dollar with a currency basket but due to the political issues they are not willing to publicize their move,” he added"
.......Interesting statistic on some bad news on homelessness is in the 4th paragraph
......Hundreds more employees of Pennsylvania's state government are expected to get pink slips,
(but look at the other news items under the first story. What have they added to the water in Pennsylvania?)
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