Social and political consequence of high oil price.

joybetluck · Joined: 25 Aug 2007 Posts: 147

So in the long-term future Americans will become more like Europeans - a description for which I am indebted to William Hogan of Harvard University’s John F Kennedy School of Government, a long-time observer of energy markets. We will continue the shift that has left dealers with lots crammed with unsold 4x4s, and unable to meet the demand for more fuel-efficient vehicles. We will set thermostats higher in summer and lower in winter. Insulation levels will increase, and lighting levels decrease. All because we have refused to tax petrol so as to get the money into the US Treasury rather than let producing nations snatch it for themselves.

In short, economics works - if consumers are left free to adjust to higher prices in ways they find most agreeable and efficient. However, politicians prefer “solutions” that not unsurprisingly confer more power on them and less on markets. One such now being debated in Congress is the cap-and-trade system for reducing carbon emissions. Carbon taxes would be more efficient, and allow individuals and businesses to decide how to adjust their energy use to cut emissions, but cap-and-trade lets politicians decide which lobbyists get permits for their clients, and which are so ungrateful that they do not. Best of all, politicians get to decide how to employ the trillions that will be paid for permits. This undercover raid on energy consumers and plan to enhance government power has the approval of both presidential candidates. John McCain and Barack Obama have drunk deeply of Al Gore’s global-warming potion while zooming around the country in private jets and racing to meetings in the large Chelsea tractors favoured by them and their entourages. No light carbon footprint for them.
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/columnists/article40873 99.ece

joybetluck · Joined: 25 Aug 2007 Posts: 147

So political leaders say we are worried that these sovereign wealth fund would seek political control over their country and we the citizen would not be happy. In other words these political leaders who debase the world monetary system wants to stay in power despite their mismanagement and continue to dictate to us their political idealism, draw on their expense account and ensure the safety of their pension. I notice that they also leave out the world social. Social and political power goes hand in hand. So leaders wants handout from these funds on social project, and to claim the benefit as their own.

joybetluck · Joined: 25 Aug 2007 Posts: 147

So the French President want to pull a fast one on the rest of the world that a french design house invented the trouser suit.
No it was London Transport who invented it and the French merely popularize it.
No say a reader of the Times. The Chinese invented it as it was already an everyday wear in China.
I would go further the French copied the Chinese and claim it as their own in the days when travel was difficult.
I could still remember the day when I heard it is high fashion to wear trouser suit.
As a youngster I thought wealthy people are mad as I saw trouser suit being worn by work women everywhere in Hong Kong and as far as I was concerned looks as good, more comfortable, and more practical than Yves St Laurent!
In the cowboys days in HK I felt a lot of patent ware was no more that a copied of what people ware doing in their everyday life.

chunxueping · Joined: 24 Jun 2007 Posts: 474 Location: Surrey, UK

Chinese women invent trouser suit for sure without doubt. I rarely saw a woman in a skirt until 1995 when finally get to HK. China invent flying machine (kite and fireworks), TV (shadow puppet show), Medicines, compass, writing, everything.

According to life of Lily Wong the only thing the west invented was Smallpox, Lite-beer and AIDS.

joybetluck · Joined: 25 Aug 2007 Posts: 147

Those with a heart and soul instinctively knows what to do.
Proud to be prudent: Meet the new army of frugalistas

Allotments, clothes swaps, make do and mend: Britain is learning to cut costs again – and saving has never been so fashionable.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/this-britain/proud-to-be-prudent- meet-the-new-army-of-frugalistas-847463.html

chunxueping · Joined: 24 Jun 2007 Posts: 474 Location: Surrey, UK

Pah! Good Chinese families been doing this for years thats why we save so much money.

Wake up time for the west!

joybetluck · Joined: 25 Aug 2007 Posts: 147

Maybe but the British managed to put it in print first, and to reach a broader audience more rapidly! The length of time taken to be proficient at Chinese remains the greatest if not insurmountable problem for the Chinese. Wink

The cost of having an education is shocking but a noble form of contraceptive! Shocked

Hong Kong - Hundreds of expatriate and Chinese parents have signed a petition protesting fee rises of more than 1,000 US dollars a month at English schools, a news report said Monday. Fees at the English School Foundation, which runs 20 government-subsidized, English-curriculum schools in the former British colony, have risen sharply in the past three years, the Hong Kong Standard reported.
Annual tuition fees for primary school pupils have risen from 47,300 Hong Kong dollars (6,053 US dollars) to 58,100 Hong Kong dollars since the 2005-2006 school year.
Meanwhile, secondary school fees have gone from 78,600 to 89,250 Hong Kong dollars a year, the newspaper said.
Expatriate children make up around 50 per cent of all students, and parents complain they have no option but to send their children to the schools because local schools teach only in Chinese.
The schools are also increasingly popular with parents of local Chinese children who see English as the key to international universities and better job prospects.
When Hong Kong reverted to Chinese sovereignty in 1997, the administration introduced a controversial "mother tongue" teaching policy in local schools, phasing out English in favor of Cantonese.
http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/212605,expat-hong-kong-parents -protest-hikes-in-english-school-fees.html

Edwina Lee · Joined: 06 Oct 2006 Posts: 634 Location: High Wycombe, UK

Looks to me that earthtimes.com is another site dedicated to smearing China by political lies.

Quote: "The schools are also increasingly popular with parents of local Chinese children who see English as the key to international universities and better job prospects.
When Hong Kong reverted to Chinese sovereignty in 1997, the administration introduced a controversial "mother tongue" teaching policy in local schools, phasing out English in favor of Cantonese. "

This is just rubbish. China recognises english as the International business language, and their government place great emphasis for chinese to learn english as a second language.

If China is to emphasise the chinese language to displace english, then it would certainly be pushing Putunwah (i.e. spoken Mandarin) and not Cantonese.

For example, here is the language teaching policy of my former school which is a local school and expatriate pupils are welcome:-

http://ssp.proj.hkedcity.net/eng/detail_subject.php?sch_id=1025

Secondary years 1,2,3 teach in chinese except English Language lessons. But year 4,5,6 teach in english except chinese subjects.

Edwina Lee · Joined: 06 Oct 2006 Posts: 634 Location: High Wycombe, UK

Post colonial language policy in Hong Kong (i.e. post 1997):-

http://www.cbs.polyu.edu.hk/ctdso/paper/lang%20in%20ed%20hk%20.pdf

joybetluck · Joined: 25 Aug 2007 Posts: 147

Thanks for detailed exposition edwina but I only wanted to point out that parents spend good money to educate their children.

joybetluck · Joined: 25 Aug 2007 Posts: 147

Everyday record is being broken. It gets harder and harder to stand out from the crowd. Crying or Very sad

Hong Kong - A Hong Kong mother was arrested Saturday after her 6-year-old son and 8-year-old daughter climbed out of their 34th floor apartment and tried to shin down drainpipes to the ground. Horrified residents saw the children on the outside of the high- rise block, having apparently decided to climb down because they were locked indoors while their mother slept.
Neighbours pulled the girl inside to safety when she reached the 28th floor while the boy was three floors lower down when he was pulled into an apartment, police said.
Both children were taken to hospital suffering only minor scratches after the incident in Hong Kong's low-income Tin Shui Wai district which has high levels of crime and social problems.
http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/213979,children-aged-six-eight -climb-down-34th-floor-of-hong.html

The daring duo shimmied down the drainpipe from their 34th-floor public housing estate home to get breakfast as their mother was asleep and their father at work.
The court yesterday decided to put them under the Po Leung Kuk's care until a custody hearing on July 14.
http://www.thestandard.com.hk/news_detail.asp?pp_cat=11&art_id=67634&s id=19491573&con_type=1

joybetluck · Joined: 25 Aug 2007 Posts: 147

Getting The French To Work will be broadcast on Monday 23 June at 1100BST on Radio 4
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/7466348.stm

This should be a good program. There is always money talking about getting people into work. Wink

The French are just so lucky, whether it is they who invented entrepreneurship it would always remind us of them, because it sound simplement Francais. You can sympathize with their concern about language dilution by the Anglo Saxon's Kingdom.

joybetluck · Joined: 25 Aug 2007 Posts: 147

It is no longer compulsory for secondary pupils to study a language after the age of 14.

The new figures - from the National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER) show that traditional languages dominate, with French being most popular (89% of primary schools which teach languages) followed by Spanish (23%) and German (9%)

A small number (under 3%) offer Italian, Chinese, Japanese or Urdu.

The survey suggests that 84% of schools are offering pupils in KS2 (ages seven to 11) the opportunity to learn a language within class time – a rise of 14 percentage points from 2006.

And 54% of schools are fully meeting the entitlement for all year groups – a rise of 20 percentage points from 2006.

Last year the government accepted the findings of Lord Dearing in his review of languages when he said language learning should be compulsory in primary school.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/7475422.stm

joybetluck · Joined: 25 Aug 2007 Posts: 147

Train your mind so to keep cost down!
Under the knife with hypnosis
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/7494262.stm

joybetluck · Joined: 25 Aug 2007 Posts: 147

TOKYO —

Labor authorities have found that a contract-based manager at an outlet of restaurant chain operator Skylark Co died from overwork, the man’s family said Thursday. The recognition indicates not only regular employees but also non-permanent ones are forced to work long hours, according to the National Union of General Workers Tokyo Tobu, a supporter of the family of Takayuki Maezawa, who died of brain bleeding last October at the age of 32.

General OT Observations
I think the big problem is there is a huge stigma about being unemployed. Just look at the stories that are posted here. The fact that someone is employed or not is one of the first things listed in the story. I think people are under big pressure to stay employed.
Overall, I have to agree with some of the observations about efficiently. There are a lot of service jobs in Japan that are done by 2-3 people that in the west would be done by one person and a computer in the west. I personally think the Japanese economy is a giant "Jobs program" in some respect. Companies are encouraged to hire a lot of people in low level jobs.
At the same time, when a companies are in competitive markets and want to be lean and efficient, they have no problem doing it.
http://www.japantoday.com/category/national/view/skylark-outlet-manage r-dies-from-overwork

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