Chugalkhor Times issue 4

HOW YOUR MONEY CAN BE

TO

A two-part article published on the World Bank’s website gives us a picture of the road ahead for how digital money could be controlled in the decades to come. The article tells us about the coming New World Order of money control and the future of how we will handle our finances. Read this thought-provoking special story about how your money could be programmed to behave in certain ways.

25% Americans Know Someone Who Died Due To Covid Jab, Finds Survey

Read on Page 04

Highest Ever Trade Despite Cold War: Who Are US And China Trying To Fool?

Read on Page 08

Credit: Pixabay

Chief Editor: Dr. Biswaroop Roy Chowdhury How Smart Will India’s Smart Cities Really Be?

Your Digital Money Can Be Programmed. Here’s How

A thought-provoking article on the World Bank’s website gives us a peek into the New World Order of money control and the future of how we will handle our finances.

Ratna and Nadim Siraj

March 15, 2023:

Do you know that the money in your bank account or in your e-wallet could someday behave like a time-bomb? That it could literally implode and simply vanish? That your money could be ‘programmed’ to drastically start falling in value if you don’t follow certain orders?

Sounds scary and impossible, right? Well, if you thought keeping hackers away was just about enough to keep your money safe and secure, then that’s likely to change someday – if one is to go by a chilling report published by the World Bank on its website.

Biagio Bossone, a top financial adviser, and Ahmed Faragallah, a senior financial sector specialist, wrote a two-part article in the widely followed blog section of the World Bank’s website in November last year. Titled ‘Expiring Money: Part I and Part II’, the two-part write-up gives us a heads-up of how the money in your possession could actually be ‘programmed’ by the authorities to ‘behave’ in a certain way over which you wouldn’t have any control.

ORWELLIAN FUTURE?

Astounding and even Orwellian as it may sound, the two experts speculated on a future in which

the public would no longer have any incentive to save money in their bank accounts or in their digital wallets if the country they’re living in suddenly decides they should spend their money, and not save it.

In the world we live in now, we have complete control over the money we possess, which includes currency notes and coins, the deposits in our bank accounts, and the money we keep in e-wallets. As long as stray hackers don’t get to break in and siphon your money out, your money is in safe hands. Most importantly, you get to decide what you should do with your money.

But Bossone and Faragallah are suggesting, while citing vivid scenarios, that there could soon be a day when your digital money would be labelled ‘expiring money’ or ‘programmable money’.

So, what’s this concept of ‘expiring’ and ‘programmable’ money? The detailed report from the expert duo demystifies the jargon while also saying that this new form of money management could someday become the norm.

In a nutshell, what they are saying is that governments, central banks, and other authorities around the world would be in a position one day to make digital money technically programmed to perform in certain ways. For example, if the authorities in a certain country feel the need to jump-start the economy through increased

spending and business activities, then they can ‘program’ an individual’s money in the bank and e-wallet to ‘expire’ or diminish in value or simply get wiped out if that person decides not to spend the money for personal reasons.

Basically, by making it possible for your money to die out in such a scenario, authorities can incentivise spending the money on transactions and disincentivise saving it up – for the sake of boosting the country’s economy.

WHAT IS ‘EXPIRING’ MONEY?

Here’s how the article on the World Bank’s site introduces the concept: “Expiring money, one whose value falls to zero after a specific date, is a potential monetary policy tool. Programmability, a technical feature made possible by digitalisation, can accelerate decisions to spend it, making it a very effective means for stimulating consumption. This could be very useful for central banks and governments distributing aid to people during severe recessions or events like pandemics or calamities, when higher uncertainty makes people spend less.”

Citing some examples of what the new style of money control could be used for, the authors wrote: “Programmability could be applied to digital cash for all kinds of purposes, including to pay a positive interest rate or charge a negative interest rate on cash; to set conditions for the transfer of

money to specific types of users or types of goods and services; to automate the transfer of specific values, such as tax payments for each purchase from a merchant, or to ban certain users from access to cash in a way similar to blacklisting.”

Among many other scenarios that Bossone and Faragallah spelt out, they elaborated that ‘programmable’ money would handle IoT (Internetof-Things) payments, such as smart machines can place orders on their own. Say, for example, the internet-enabled fridge at your home can order milk on its own from a grocer when running low on stock, “or a printer tracking toner usage could buy it via Amazon once it reaches a certain level”.

The concept of programming the money is only the naïve part. What’s actually worrisome for many people around the world who prefer dealing with their own money privately and with their own full freedom is the idea of making that money expirable.

As the report articulates in this disturbing paragraph: “In the case of expiring money, the penalty for holding it would be even more radical: the money would keep its full value for a predetermined interval after issuance, and would decline in value from then onwards. This form of programmable money would set in motion a sequence of spending decisions – since no holder would have reasons to hold it beyond expiration – and would thus raise aggregate demand permanently (all else being equal).”

In their article that’s bound to spark more buzz in the years to come, Bossone and Faragallah labelled ‘expiring money’ as what is increasingly being also called ‘helicopter money’.

Here’s how the two writers explained this concept of helicopter money to their bewildered readers: “Expiring money conflates monetary and fiscal policies into one single instrument — as helicopter money does — making it possible to create purchasing power and transfer it to particular people as and when needed. It would push all people to spend it, including those with higher propensities to save and whose hoarding behaviour weakens the effect of expansionary policies, explaining why some empirical studies found helicopter money stimulus might not be as effective as might be anticipated.

“As expiring money would offset the incentive to hoard, it would be a form of hyperbolic helicopter

money, which, once injected into the economy, would support a permanently higher velocity of money. It would likely represent the most powerful tool of monetary policy imaginable.”

THE AUSTRIA EXPERIMENT

Interestingly, the idea of programming money had been tried out way back during the 1930s in Austria. At that time, money was abruptly depreciated by the authorities in the Austrian city of Wörgl to tackle a deepening economic depression. As a result of the sudden intervention – or programming, as we can now call it – people were incentivised or rather pushed to get rid of the fast-depreciating money by quickly spending it in buying goods and services.

There are multiple criticisms of the debatable concept of ‘programming’ digital money. One of them is that it would simply take away your personal freedom and your basic rights to decide on what you want to do with your own money. The other major criticism is that while money is essentially treated as a store of value, the permanent feature of ‘expiring’ it – through interventions – would take that essence away from it. Under this new economic system, money would only be seen as essential for carrying out immediate transactions, and no longer as a long-term store of value.

Of course, it’s unlikely as of now on whether money would indeed be made programmable in the days to come, even though various countries are rolling out CBDCs and educating people about switching to national digital currencies instead of traditional currencies (such as money parked in commercial banks) and cryptocurrencies (such as Bitcoin, Ethereum, Tether, etc.).

India, for example, rolled out pilot versions of wholesale and retail CBDCs last year, called e₹-W and e₹-R, respectively. Reliance Retail, which is the country’s biggest retail chain, has volunteered to accept retail payments in digital rupees. But the Indian government hasn’t aired any intentions of turning its CBDCs into programmable or expiring money. So, Indians don’t need to worry much as far as the near future is concerned.

Coming back to the report published by the World Bank, the international financial institution was tactful enough to run a disclaimer along with the exhaustive article, stating that the views expressed were only those of the authors.

However, when such enormously influential financial organisations host write-ups on intriguing ideas and concepts, they sometimes do serve as a sneak peek to what is to come. Sweden, Germany, the Bahamas, the US, Japan, Denmark –these are just a few of several countries that have either rolled out CBDCs or are seriously exploring the idea. Which of these places will someday turn

the public’s wealth into programmable money? Only time will tell us.

(For more details, you can check out the twopart articles in the ‘World Bank Blogs’ section of the international organisation’s website under the titles: ‘Expiring Money Part I’ and ‘Expiring Money Part II’).

25% Americans Know Someone Who Died Due To Covid Jab, Finds Survey

A survey of 1,000 Americans was conducted on December 28-30, 2022 by Rasmussen Reports. Field work for the survey was done by Pulse Opinion Research

—Compiled from Rasmussen Reports

March 15, 2023:

Nearly half of Americans think Covid-19 vaccines may be to blame for many unexplained deaths, and more than a quarter say someone they know could be among the victims.

The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone and online survey finds that 49% of American adults believe it is likely that side effects of Covid-19 vaccines have caused a significant number of unexplained deaths, including 28% who think it’s ‘Very Likely’. About 37% don’t say a significant number of deaths have been caused by vaccine side effects,

including 17% who believe it’s ‘Not At All Likely’. Another 14% are not sure.

About 28% of adults say they personally know someone whose death they think may have been caused by side effects of Covid-19 vaccines, while 61% don’t and another 10% are not sure.

The documentary ‘Died Suddenly’ has been criticised as promoting “debunked” anti-vaccine conspiracy theories but has been seen by some 15 million people.

About 48% of Americans believe there are legitimate reasons to be concerned about the safety of Covid-19 vaccines, while 37% think people who worry about vaccine safety are

spreading conspiracy theories. Another 15% are not sure.

NATIONWIDE SAMPLING

The survey of 1,000 American adults was conducted on December 28-30, 2022 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Field work was conducted by Pulse Opinion Research.

About 71% say they have received a Covid19 vaccination, while 26% have not. Concerns about vaccine safety are much higher among the unvaccinated.

About 77% of adults who have not gotten

Covid-19 vaccinations believe it’s at least somewhat likely that side effects of Covid-19 vaccines have caused a significant number of unexplained deaths. Among those who have gotten the vaccine, just 38% consider unexplained deaths from the vaccine at least somewhat likely.

Similarly, while 45% of those who have not been vaccinated against Covid-19 think someone they know personally might have died from vaccine side effects, only 22% of vaccinated adults think so.

About 46% of adults who have gotten vaccinated against Covid-19 believe people who worry about

Pension Protestsः Why France Shouldn’t Lecture Others On Human Rights

The G7 country’s unemployment rate is double that of the Indian state of Karnataka. But instead of fixing its domestic labour problems, the French government is busy talking about other countries’ problems.

—A Special Report

March 15, 2023:

France has been rocked by massive, disruptive street protests, including nationwide strikes and marches, during the past several weeks over the government’s anti-labour reform plans, bringing out the deep fault lines in its muchvaunted societal and democratic system.

Depending on whether you believe the government or the trade unions, either 10 lakh or 20 lakh people took part in the recently held rallies. It’s a huge number, considering the western European nation’s population of 6.56 crore is a shade less than India’s eighth most populated state of Karnataka (6.95 crore).

The smug G7 nation, which loses no opportunity to pat itself on the back for its rich culture and iconic structures, and lectures other countries such as China, Russia, and India on human rights and democracy, now stands exposed as

an undeclared failed state as the domestic mess escalates.

At the centre of the conflict is the French government’s decision to push up the retirement age from 62 to 64, and make people who’ve been in service for at least 43 years eligible for state pension, a benefit extended to all retirees until now.

Only those who joined the workforce at a younger age or are engaged in a hazardous profession are exempt from the proposed rules, which need parliament clearance before being turned into law.

The January 10 government announcement of the controversial move triggered an immediate backlash, with eight leading trade unions calling a series of strikes from January to February, vowing to force the government to roll back the plan.

“Traditionally, relations between the government, employers and trade unions have been more antagonistic in France than in most

other European countries,” said Douglas Webber, an emeritus professor of political science at the INSEAD business school.

However, policy propositions that don’t go down well with the working class come as no surprise from western governments, which are loyal-asdog worshippers of market forces, and for whom granting relief to senior citizens is a bitter pill to swallow.

WHAT ABOUT US, UK?

The UK, for example, has under its various Acts increased the state pensionable age of its citizens in phases based on their gender and date of birth. While under a previous legislation, a 1950-born woman would get her pension after attaining 60 years of age, under the latest law, a person born between March 6, 1961 and April 5, 1977 would be eligible for pension only on reaching the age of 67. Similarly, in the US, the official retirement age is 67.

Coming back to the turbulent developments in France, on January 19, nine days after the government unveiled its pension plans, students and retirees walked shoulder to shoulder, disregarding freezing rains, in nationwide rallies. Also marching with them were trade unionists, health workers, and energy agency employees as a general strike put the brakes on most of the trains, including the premium Eurostar that had to cancel a number of services between Paris and London.

One-fifth of the flights originating from Paris’s Orly Airport were grounded, while more than a third of France’s teachers joined the strike. Businesses, refinery delivery, and power supplies suffered as a result of the domestic turmoil.

Seats of French pride and global tourist destinations, such as Versailles Palace and Eiffel Tower, were closed, while the Louvre Museum shut some exhibition rooms.

(Turn to Page 09)

Credit: Pixabay

How Smart Will India’s Smart Cities Really Be?

public-private partnerships, convergence with other government missions, loans, and other avenues.

Shaguna Kanwar, project coordinator for national programmes with the NGO and monitor YUVA (Youth for Unity and Voluntary Action), pointed out the flaws. “The SCM fails to address a primary concern of the country – the critical need for access to housing and basic amenities (like electricity, water, schools and public hospitals) for millions in the country… the SCM may be just a garb to promote the interests of a few,” Kanwar wrote.

—A Special Report

March 15, 2023:

Did the Indian government come up with the sudden declaration – that 22 of the 100 cities chosen for a so-called ‘Smart City’ project would be ready by March – with an eye on the G20 leaders’ summit that the nation will host later this year?

The question arises because the information apparently leaked to a news agency by an unnamed official speaks of a time frame for the completion of a major chunk of the project, tailored to showcase before the visiting G20 world leaders that much of India’s urban population resides in “better planned” areas with “improved livability” conditions. It’s immaterial that these “better planned” areas would actually continue to be hubs of poor quality of life and unlivable slums.

According to the anonymous official, while work in the 22 Smart Cities would be completed next month, the other 78 would be ready in May-June. That’s in time for the 18th G20 leaders’ summit to be held at New Delhi’s Pragati Maidan with aplomb on September 9-10.

The government aims to promote Smart Cities

as advanced urban waterholes giving a decent quality of life to its residents besides a clean and sustainable environment. But activists and critical-thinkers question whether the so-called Smart City Mission, or SCM, actually promotes the interests of only the elites and leaves out the masses living in chaos and dereliction.

Launched on June 25, 2015, the SCM selected 100 cities for redevelopment through four rounds of competition from January 2016 to June 2018.

The implementation of the SCM at the city level is carried out by an SPV (special purpose vehicle) – a 50:50 joint venture between the state government and the urban local body – that plans, implements, and evaluates the projects.

The central government is providing financial support of Rs 48,000 crore over five years for the entire project, which comes to about Rs 100 crore per city per year. The state government or the urban local body, too, is expected to pitch in with a grant, with the rest of the project’s costs to be funded from various sources, such as

While the government booklet ‘Smart City Mission (SCM) Statement and Guidelines’ speaks of applying ‘smart’ solutions to various issues through a robust IT network and digitisation, analysts call the project “inherently unsmart”.

There are fears that the exorbitant cost of the “high-end infrastructure and superlative quality of life”, as the Smart City mission emphasises, would jack up the cost of so-called development, raising the cost of living, and making the cities out of bounds for those struggling on the margins.

SHIMLA, A CASE IN POINT

Small shopkeepers in Shimla, which is on the list of Smart Cities, are tense about whether they can continue to survive there after the reset. “We are Indians, we are not from another country. We are not different, and we live here. Please let us stay,” a shop owner told Empire Diaries in an earlier article.

Indian cities, including those that are part of the hallowed SCM, are paying the price of an irresponsible urbanisation drive. Shimla, the capital of the state of Himachal Pradesh, is just one of them. Once a refreshing getaway in northern India’s mountains and known for its serenity, Shimla now has all the ugly characteristics of a

Many of India’s designated Smart Cities are actually teeming with slums that are growing in size and numbers. It’s a sign of a civilisational failure.

Big Tech, mass

and crocodile tears

March 15, 2023:

Software giant Microsoft’s employees in recent times received an email with the subject line - “Focusing on our short- and long-term opportunity”. It came from the company’s Chief Executive, Satya Nadella. A subject line like that would make any employee think it’s a mail from the boss probably about company strategy, right? It was actually a sacking letter that was shot off to 10,000 Microsoft employees who’ve been serving the Big Tech firm for months or years.

In hindsight, the subject line of Nadella’s shocking email seems like a cruel joke. But it wouldn’t come as a surprise to those following the ways of Big Tech, sans the tinted glasses with which these US-headquartered MNCs are revered and idolised by the mainstream media.

Through the years, these behemoths have been cherry-picking the world’s most talented youths with the lure of hefty packages to expand their business, and eventually booting them out without batting an eyelid whenever they feel like cutting costs.

Take for instance, Microsoft, which was founded by Bill Gates and Paul Allen on April 4, 1975. Apart from the 10,000 employees it has decided to fire by March 31, it had laid off thousands of employees in 2017 in a move it called a “broad reorganisation” of its sales unit. Three years before that, the American company sacked 18.000 people right after acquiring mobile phone manufacturer Nokia’s devices and services business.

The ongoing season of firings is not limited to Microsoft. It spans the gamut of tech giants (or tech monsters?) that are ruthlessly scaling back.

Google’s parent Alphabet recently declared it has decided to wipe out about 12,000 jobs, or 6% of its global workforce. Jeff Bezos-led Amazon announced it was showing the door to over 18,000 workers in the US and Canada. Social media behemoth Meta, which owns Facebook, last year issued the pink slip to 11,000 employees, or 13% of its workforce. Microblogging platform Twitter, now owned by Tesla CEO Elon Musk, terminated

50% of its workforce and is planning to make more heads roll. Snap, the parent company of the social media platform Snapchat, threw out 20% of its staff.

HP also said it is planning to axe 4,000-6,000 jobs over the next two years. IBM has joined the firing party, announcing 3,900 sackings, and so has software giant SAP, which is planning to fire 3,000 people.

The list is getting longer by the week. The season of sackings just isn’t ending.

The companies have given various reasons to shrink their staff strength. Reduced earnings, economic downturn, sluggish demand, rising spending after the pandemic are pitched as reasons to justify the sackings. But experts say the tech giants were not in very bad shape, after all. They say the companies were sitting on a pile of cash less than a year ago. An analysis done by the Investor’s Business Daily in February last year said 13 nonfinancial companies in the S&P 500 were sitting on cash and investments worth one trillion

dollars. The 13 companies included Alphabet and Microsoft.

Also, some companies such as Amazon India have actually been doing decent business. The smartphone business of leading online store Amazon India jumped 30% year over year in 2022,

notwithstanding a drop in the total number of smartphone shipments. There is a positive outlook for the smartphone shipment business this year, with data analysis firm Counterpoint Research expecting smartphone shipments to go up 10% at 175 million units.

However, that hasn’t saved the jobs of Amazon India employees, an unspecified number of whom – so long working from home – were recently summoned to in-person meetings and fired.

SACK AND INVEST

The dark episode has exposed the double standards practised by some of the tech firms. While kicking their employees out, many of them were simultaneously pumping in huge money to expand their business empires.

Two days before announcing the layoffs, Microsoft outlined plans of investing in OpenAI,

Highest Ever Trade Despite Cold War: Who Are US And China Trying To Fool?

—Nadim

March 15, 2023:

There’s an old saying whose origin is contested.

It is often inconclusively credited to Abraham Lincoln. It goes like this: you can fool all the people some of the time, you can fool some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.

Recently, the governments in charge of servicing the two biggest autocratic empires of our times, China and America, emphatically proved the adage wrong.

With the release of the latest data of the two hegemonic countries’ bilateral trade, it emerges that they can actually fool all the people all the time.

How? Well, international politics is the only field under the sun in which you can fight a nuclear war with your opponent under the portico and exchange a big wet kiss in the backyard that same evening –and yet, nobody will notice the double standards. That’s precisely what Beijing and Washington, DC are pulling off, right before our eyes.

Thanks to the latest trade data dished out to us by the US, the world was stunned to learn that America’s bilateral trade with China skyrocketed to an all-time high during 2022. The world was stunned because these two countries have literally been at war – or so it seems.

THE CONTRADICTIONS

On one hand, there’s a intense Cold War raging between the two geopolitical giants over the past few years. Hong Kong, Taiwan, tariffs, South China Sea, Russia ties, silicon chips, North Korea, Wuhan

biolab, 5G, and now surveillance balloons – there’s hardly any field left in which the two governments have yet to come to blows.

But when it comes to bilateral trade, it’s the opposite story. For all the fiery talk from motormouth American presidents in recent years, the two empires are passionately locked in an eternal embrace, dancing merrily under the sparkling chandelier of global geopolitics.

Official data shows that imports and exports between the two nations were an eye-popping $690.6 billion in 2022. According to the latest figures, US imports from China shot up to a gigantic $536.8 billion in 2022, which was made possible by American buyers who’re happy to purchase Chinese goods, especially tonnes and tonnes of smartphones, other electronic gadgets, and toys. During the same year, China imported goods from the US worth $153.8 billion, thanks to many Chinese shoppers’ love for buying anything and everything American.

Here’s a simple question. If these two hawks are indeed at war with each other, how on earth are they helping each other’s exports boom – right at the time of their greatest enmity?

Are the two governments out of sync with the current equations running the world of big business? Are powerful business families and giant corporations from China and America defying

geopolitical tensions and sealing backdoor deals they shouldn’t be sealing?

Are diplomacy and business completely detached from each other, but which the public aren’t supposed to figure out due to some hidden agenda? If so, what’s the hidden agenda and who does it serve?

Or is it something that’s far more complex than what we’re allowed to see? Are there multiple Americas and multiple Chinas, where businesses sleep tight together, while diplomats and military bosses take the attention away with hollow talk of rivalry?

Whatever the truth is, there’s a gaping hole in this big, fat story of US-China bittersweet relations. Take a pause and think back about what the mainstream media has been spoon-feeding you for the past few days, keeping you engaged, engrossed, and entertained.

A clumsy Chinese surveillance balloon gets caught out like a sitting duck (a flying one, actually) as Pentagon spots it stupidly sailing over Montana, a state that otherwise never makes it to the headlines. The US valiantly shoots down the silly little balloon, and the poker-faced US secretary of state’s lavish trip to China gets jacked.

Seeing this geopolitical soap opera bursting out

of television sets, people around the world wonder –this is it, the line has been crossed, the Cold War will now break out into a military fight.

Just as this drama balloons to a climax, the two friendly foes reveal that they are driving up each other’s exports at a pace never seen before.

WHAT’S THEIR HIDDEN AGENDA?

Who are they trying to fool, really? What’s the missing piece of the puzzle?

On second thoughts, are we actually staring at ‘Chimerica’ – which it now appears is no longer an imagined concept. The term Chimerica is a portmanteau that US-based historian Niall Ferguson and German economist Moritz Schularick created to define China and America’s shapechanging relationship.

Now, here’s the thing about the origin of the word Chimerica, which sounds quite like Chimera. Greek mythology teaches us that Chimera was a hybrid monster that breathed fire. The creature’s shape comprised various animal parts. While Chimera resembled a lion’s body, it had a goat’s head popping up from its back, and its tail had an ominous-looking snake’s head at the end.

Tongue in cheek, add the proverbial Chinese dragon to this deceptive monster’s portfolio, and Chimera becomes Chimerica – a hybrid beast we’re currently unable to make sense of! A hybrid beast that’s fooling all the people, all the time.

On one hand, the two governments are constantly threatening each other, while on the other hand, the two countries are freely buying more and more of each other’s products as if there is plenty of friendship. What’s really cooking?

Siraj

typically modern city – a road network choked with traffic, escalating growth of slums in nooks and corners resulting from surrounding rural distress, poor sanitation for low-income neighbourhoods, exploding population, overdose of consumerist lifestyles through an infectious spread of giant shopping malls, and worsening hyperlocal climate conditions impacting snowfall cycles.

Compared to the look-and-feel of cities in richer countries, most Indian cities are in a state of complete civilisational mess as a result of unplanned urbanisation, with the fast-escalating slum problem gripping urban habitations in almost every state.

HUMAN RIGHTS

In fact, the springing up of new slums across Indian cities accelerated after the Covid-19 lockdowns, which hit the financial well-being of many of the city folks as well as the rural population. It is an escalating urban distress that’s hardly reported by the mainstream media in holistic terms and beyond the narrow, agenda-driven lens of politics.

Many of the urban centres are part of the 100 Smart Cities Project are now hubs of massive, putrid-smelling slums, where residing is an

(from page 05)

Similar strikes and marches took place on January 31, February 7, 11, and 16, with a huge number of people participating, making the current anti-government protests the most intense in France in recent years.

Trade unions trashed the proposed reforms, calling them a threat to the French working class’s hard-fought rights, and suggested the government tax the rich or ask employers to increase their contributions to fund the pension system.

Nathan Arsac, a 19-year-old student and member of the UNEF union, said, “I’m afraid of what’s going to happen next. Losing our social achievements could happen so fast. I’m scared of the future when I’ll be older and have to retire.”

MACRON UNMOVED

Opinion polls show a substantial majority of the French people were opposed to the government’s pension plans. However, neither the countrywide protests nor the negative opinion polls could make the government rethink the new plan, with President Emmanuel Macron saying, “People know that yes, on average, you have to work a

unacknowledged human rights violation in terms of a lack of basic facilities and attention.

Research done by the news outlet Down to Earth focuses on this point. The study revealed that 27 smart cities have proposed 41 slum redevelopment projects. The research brought out chilling statistics about urban living in India.

• Slums are so common that they’re found in 65% of Indian towns.

• Every sixth urban Indian resides in slums unfit for human habitation.

• 1.2 million slum households in India drink untreated tap water

• 63% slum households in India are either without a drainage connection or are connected to open drains

A major reason behind the ballooning slums and shanties, both in numbers and size, lies in a freefall that has gripped the farming sector and villages, forcing the rural population to escape (read: migrate) to the cities, where the central and state governments don’t give them a life beyond temporary relief.

CHERRY-PICKED DEVELOPMENT

There is a fear that the area-based development model provisions for funds to be spent mainly on

little longer, all of them, because otherwise we won’t be able to finance our pensions properly.”

“The proposed changes would create more wealth for the country because we will have more hours worked,” said Macron, who is often seen as one of the faces of 21st-century neoliberalism. In his first term, Macron reduced corporate taxes, made hiring-and-firing easier, and claiming benefits became harder for the unemployed class. The new pension plan was central to his campaign promise ahead of the second term.

In an audacious show of his servility to the neoliberal cause, the 45-year-old president is even ready to cosy up to the conservative Republican Party to push the Bill through in parliament as his centrist alliance lost its parliamentary majority last year, though it is still the largest group.

Critics point out that the proposed changes deny the people a vital social security instrument, while the two extra working years would make life tougher for the aging generation who deserve to rest after spending decades slogging for a living.

It has also been pointed out that the measures curtail employment opportunities for

developing only small parcels of land in upmarket cities, thereby sparking deeper inequality in the country.

According to the government, “Area-based development will transform existing areas (retrofit and redevelop), including slums, into better planned ones, thereby improving livability of the whole city. New areas (greenfield) will be developed around cities in order to accommodate the expanding population in urban areas.”

Though on an average, the area-based development proposals and projects corner up to 80% of the funds, they’re concentrated only on 5-10% of the city area, eventually turning the initiative into a project only for the elites.

For example, in West Bengal, the selected area under the mission is New Town, a breathy, wellplanned township in the northeast fringes of Kolkata and inhabited by the upper-middle and upper classes. Instead, it would’ve been more worthwhile had the national project focused on addressing the chaos, congestion, and traffic woes in the heart of Kolkata.

An analysis of the SCM by Delhi-based NGO HLRN (Housing and Land Rights Network) noted that there’s no emphasis on inclusion and social justice when it comes to planning Smart Cities.

(from page 04)

vaccine safety are spreading conspiracy theories, but just 15% of the unvaccinated share that belief. About 69% of those who haven’t gotten the Covid19 vaccine think there are legitimate reasons to be concerned about the safety of Covid-19 vaccines, as do 40% of those who have gotten vaccinated against the virus.

DEMOCRATS VS REPUBLICANS

More Democrats (85%) than Republicans (63%) or those not affiliated with either major party (64%) have been vaccinated against Covid-19. More Republicans (60%) than Democrats (44%) or the unaffiliated (43%) think there are legitimate reasons to be concerned about the safety of Covid-19 vaccines. However, there is less political difference in the number who suspect someone they know might have died from vaccine side effects – 33% of Democrats and 26% of both Republicans and the unaffiliated.

About 46% of whites, 48% of blacks and 57% of other minorities believe it is at least somewhat likely that side effects of Covid-19 vaccines have caused a significant number of unexplained deaths.

the youth, with France’s unemployed population rising up to around 22 lakh at the end of last year, according to the latest figures released by the French National Institute for Statistics and Economic Studies. Also, the unemployment rate stands at 7.2% of the active population – which is more than double that of Karnataka (3.4%).

FRENCH ECONOMY ON EDGE

While there’s no data on the losses suffered due to the disruptions, such serial strikes and unrest can have a bearing on the French economy, which is still recovering from the ill-effects of Covid-19 and especially lockdowns at a time of soaring inflation.

“The mission is being advertised as a strong investment opportunity for foreign governments, MNCs, and the Indian corporate sector. However, the slow rate of investment and inability of cities to mobilise the required funds reveal the limits of overly relying on the private sector,” the HLRN wrote in the report titled: ‘India’s Smart Cities Mission: Smart for Whom? Cities for Whom?’

“Moreover, the undemocratic powers conferred on SPVs and the predominant role of the corporate sector bring to light dangerous trends of privatisation of governance and corporatisation of Indian cities,” the report said.

According to another HLRN report, an estimated 22,630 people had been evicted due to infrastructure development under the SCM between 2017 and 2019.

India’s ‘Smart Cities’ are dwarfed by slums and perpetual urban mismanagement. To make the project indeed come true, a meaningful involvement of ground-level activists and citizens’ representatives from different strata of life is required. Instead, there’s an over-reliance on experts, technical persons, and marketing stunts that are snuffing out chances of an inclusive and utilitarian approach in making India’s cities more livable.

Younger Americans are less likely to be vaccinated against Covid-19, and 35% of adults under 40 believe someone they know personally might have died from vaccine side effects, compared to 28% of those 40-64 and just 14% of Americans 65 and older.

Slightly more men (52%) than women (47%) think it is at least somewhat likely that a significant number of unexplained deaths may have been caused by side effects of Covid-19 vaccines.

Married adults are more likely to be vaccinated against Covid-19 than their unmarried peers, but more married (33%) than unmarried (23%) Americans think someone they know personally might have died from vaccine side effects.

Voters with annual incomes below $30,000 are most likely to think there are legitimate reasons to be concerned about the safety of Covid-19 vaccines, while those with incomes above $200,000 are most likely to believe people who worry about vaccine safety are spreading conspiracy theories. A majority of Americans think Covid-19 vaccines are effective, but have concerns about side effects.

Webber agrees, saying, “The strikes or protests are highly disruptive because they are heavily concentrated in the public services, especially public transport, but they are normally fairly brief.”

The situation in France is volatile, but it sounds incredible because the mainstream media isn’t covering the protests as a societal failure. Influential media outlets and international news agencies have been portraying these protests as routine demonstrations, trying hard not to let the world know that France – for all its big talk about values and democracy – isn’t a big fan of workers’ rights.

However, with the confrontation set to intensify in the weeks and months to come, things may spiral out of control any day, further compromising France’s grandstanding on human rights and freedom.

Credit: Pixabay

Decoding The Biggest Deal In Aviation History

GREAT GAME 2.0: A close look at the economic implications of Air India’s recent mega-agreements with Boeing and Airbus that the mainstream press didn’t tell you about

Column

Nadim Siraj

Whenevera major transnational business deal is struck, notice how popular media outlets cover the event. Like robots programmed to parrot each other, they cover it from a very narrow and shallow perspective that’s typical of mainstream business journalism.

Take, for example, Air India’s historic twin deals with western defence and aerospace giants, Boeing and Airbus. What did the popular press tell us about the two deals? They fed us surface-level details, such as: how much the deals are worth; what’s in it for the three companies; what’s in it for their immediate workforce; what’s in it in terms of additional services to be offered; and what’s in it for the companies’ customers.

The whole episode was essentially reported as a couple of important but isolated corporatelevel transactions that don’t have much to do with the domestic economies of India, the US, and France, and with the general public in these three countries.

But the real story of what these deals actually mean starts where the bland mainstream business

journalism ends. Contrary to popular belief, the Air India-Boeing and Air India-Airbus agreements are of enormous significance for each of the three economies.

Before we deep-dive into it, let’s run a quick recap of the value of the twin deals.

Air India will pay Virginia-based Boeing Company a total amount of Rs 2.81 trillion ($34 billion) for the promised delivery of 220 civilian aeroplanes in the months to come. The set of 220 planes includes 190 737 MAX jets, 20 787 Dreamliners, and 10 minijumbo 777X airplanes.

In the other deal inked simultaneously, Air India will pay Toulouse-based Airbus a combined amount of Rs 3.82 trillion ($46 billion) for the promised delivery of 250 civilian aeroplanes. The purchase order comprises 210 A320neo narrowbody aircraft, and 40 A350 airplanes.

Together, the two deals are worth Rs 6.64 trillion or $80 billion for the delivery of 470 airplanes. In terms of the number of aircraft ordered, it’s the biggest ever combined deal in aviation history. At the corporate level, while Boeing and Airbus

are over the moon, there are other winners as well, such as Boston-based conglomerate General Electric and Paris-based manufacturing company Safran, which together bagged the lucrative engine deals. British aero-engine maker Rolls-Royce, too, is set to make a windfall from Air India’s purchase of 40 Airbus A350s.

The megabucks deals were preceded by multiple rounds of secret talks that reportedly took place near Britain’s Buckingham Palace. The deals’ epicentre was St. James’ Court – a high-end hotel near the palace in London.

WHAT IT ACTUALLY MEANS

The most realistic way of looking at this episode is to understand that Rs 6.64 trillion, which is an absolutely phenomenal amount of money, will effectively leave India’s financial ecosystem and get airdropped into the financial ecosystems of the US, where Boeing is headquartered, and France, from where Airbus operates.

In a nutshell, the entire sum of money belongs to Tata Group-owned Air India, but after all, it’s part of India’s financial resources. So, the outflow of the

money westwards will be a direct financial loss for the Indian economy. Correspondingly, although the money that Boeing and Airbus will receive from Air India will technically belong to them, the inflow of that money into the US and France will be a direct financial gain for the two domestic economies.

Let’s simplify this even further, so that you can get a granular picture of who actually wins and who actually loses – something the corporate press and mainstream economists won’t or can’t tell you.

A total amount of Rs 6.64 trillion ($80 billion) will leave Indian shores forever – India will become poorer by that sum of money. After that, Rs 2.81 trillion ($34 billion) will get parked into Boeing’s bank account in the US. Over there, it would eventually get reinvested into America’s domestic economy, helping the US develop and become richer. Similarly, Rs 3.82 trillion ($46 billion) will get deposited into Airbus’s bank account in France, where it will eventually get reinvested into the French economy, resulting in France becoming richer.

Credit: Pixabay

The bottom-line is this – India will become poorer by Rs 6.64 trillion, and the US and France together will grow richer by that amount, as a result of the deals.

If this sounds like an exaggeration, or if it seems like this is an overreaction to a one-off business dealing, then you’re mistaken. To get a sense of how significant this gigantic wealth transfer is, pay attention to the words of Joe Biden, the current CEO of the American empire.

ONE MILLION NEW JOBS!

The US president welcomed the Boeing deal by proclaiming it will generate a million jobs across 44 states in his country. Try to understand this – the financial wealth transfer from India, via Air India, to the US, via Boeing, will be so enormous that it can create 1,000,000 jobs out of thin air. “I am proud to announce today the purchase of over

Emmanuel Macron, the CEO of the French empire, also hailed the moment, excitedly saying India and France should explore further to deepen their ties. Unlike Biden, Macron stopped short of openly telling the world how his country’s economy and the job market will benefit from the Airbus deal.

Well, it’s only natural for the CEOs of these two powerful governments to get a kick out of the Air India deals. After all, the massive wealth injection into their countries’ economies all the way from India will eventually help uplift their own politically dented images.

The point here is not to look down upon the dealings of corporate juggernauts; neither is it to belittle the three stalwart companies of the aviation industry. Large companies that straddle multiple countries know no boundaries. They have

facing as a consequence of the country or the society not being equipped to manufacture those 470 airplanes domestically.

PRODUCE VS. IMPORT

Imagine a parallel world where India-based aircraft makers are producing those 470 planes locally, and Air India is buying them up at cheaper rates. Now try to imagine the win-win scenario. Air India gets what it wants, and at the same time, the entire payment that Air India makes for the aircraft doesn’t leave the country at all. It just gets transferred to the India-based airplane manufacturers, and thus, gets reinvested back into the Indian economy, helping the country’s precious financial wealth remain intact.

Alas! If only India had its own fleet of plane makers!

In fact, the historic Air India deals have gone

Empire Diaries recently reported that in July last year, India’s overall trade deficit had skyrocketed to a record-high $30 billion, according to data released by the commerce ministry.

We also came out with another disturbing report in which we disclosed that India’s trade deficit with China ballooned to a record-high Rs 8.23 trillion ($101.02 billion) during 2022. It’s the first time ever that India’s trade deficit with its neighbour shot past the $100 billion mark.

To call a spade a spade, it can be said that the Indian economy has in recent times been leaking financial wealth outwards like a sieve, with incalculable sums of money flowing out to various countries via regular trade, high-profile corporate deals, and FDI. Unless India starts producing enormously costly stuff such as planes right at home, it will unsuspectingly continue to

Credit: Pixabay

Credit: Pixabay

an artificial intelligence (AI) research lab in the US that owns the ChatGPT app. Microsoft has refused to divulge details of the deal, but reports have claimed that the company was eyeing a $10 billion investment by roping in some other venture firms.

Meta, which owns Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, has also been on a spending spree, including on CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s pet project Metaverse, a futuristic app. However, the efforts have had a rocky start. Meta’s expenses ballooned by over 24% to nearly $62 billion through the first three quarters of 2022, when its capital expenses shot up by 68%, resulting in lower profits.

While critics blamed Zuckerberg for squandering money, he responded by doing what many businesses have been doing over the ages - sack 11,000 employees who had no role in decisions related to overspending and rising costs.

Also, many Big Tech giants have been bleeding from cut-throat competition among them. Meta is up against a strong challenge from ByteDance, which owns TikTok, while many Apple device users

have been opting out of various Meta platforms after the mobile maker improved its user-privacy protocols that prevented apps such as Facebook and Instagram from tracking users’ online activity.

Similarly, Google is locked in a battle with Microsoft for supremacy over the generative AI space. But that doesn’t mean the tech companies should squarely blame their employees for losing out to business rivals. Policies are set at the management level. The employees just do what they’re told to do. They can’t be held responsible for top-level policies and strategies that go wrong.

GOOGLE’S STATEMENT

That the employees are being made to suffer for the wrong decisions taken by the management of technology giants becomes clear from the sacking letter that Sundar Pichai, CEO of Alphabet and its subsidiary Google, shot off to the employees.

“The fact that these changes will impact the lives of Googlers weighs heavily on me, and I take full responsibility for the decisions that led us here,” wrote Pichai. The full version of Pichai’s

message to his staff appears under the heading: “A difficult decision to set us up for the future.”

The CEO’s statement might appear slightly confusing. While the poster-boy of the corporate world and the mainstream media admits that his decisions have brought the company to such a pass, his future at Alphabet doesn’t seem to be under the scanner. Yet, 12,000 employees, who only carried out the top management’s instructions, were thrown under the bus. Such are the ways of the Big Tech world, or for that matter, some multinational corporations that have become so influential in modern times that they dictate governments, powerful institutions and media outlets, and even control our spending and eating habits, as well as our thought processes.

Coming back to Pichai’s sacking letter, did the firings happen because the staff were incompetent or shirking work? Well, the email says the opposite. According to him, the employees were “incredibly talented people we worked hard to hire and have loved working with.”

“To the Googlers who are leaving us: Thank you for working so hard to help people and businesses

everywhere. Your contributions have been invaluable and we are grateful for them,” Pichai wrote.

In other words, the company sacked “incredibly talented people” who were hardworking, helpful, and made “invaluable” contributions. Are these not the qualities that every organisation looks for and desires among its workforce?

The season of sackings has begun to expose the deeply corporate face of the Big Tech industry, dampening some of the feverish fanfare surrounding technology companies. For all the smooth talk of connecting people and taking freedom of speech and communication to new heights, and breaking down borders, the tech industry is eventually resorting to what other industries have been doing historically, showing no mercy for their employees.

The problem is that we live in a world where technology has become a religion. In the wake of these shocking mass sackings, it’s time people look at the Big Tech industry with scrutiny and not with awe.

Credit: Pixabay