It is not another debate. Nor is it a hedge fund. What could it be?

It may look like it but, no, it's not another presidential debate.

Nor is it a hedge fund taking a position in a company.

Instead, a bigger shark eats a smaller shark in an aquarium in Korea. 

When the big one is done it will regurgitate the 'meal.'   It will be interesting to see what that looks like.  Maybe it's just politics, or business, and we simply have another way of looking at life.   PB

New Stagflation: more evidence of less startups, less job growth - but certainly More Government 16 Years into George W. Obama World

Where is the dynamism?

Same Old, Same Old rumbles down the line, 
but new company formation lags far, far behind.

Far from a visible leap ahead, new jobs from startups creep behind.

This is the New Stagflation.  Courtesy of George W. Obama.

Little Guys keep getting hurt and left behind.  And the Big Guys - including Big Gov, Big Biz, Big Labor, Big Media, Big Tech, Big Deals, Big Parties - make the rounds at the banquet tables.  Hmmm....

Where's Gerald Ford when you need him?

Maybe he and Jimmy C have been with us for sixteen years.  How does that possibly change with the presidential options before us?  P
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From the Real Time Economics Blog at WSJ.com:

America’s entrepreneurs still hadn’t regained their footing six years after the recession ended, a troubling sign for an economy that once counted on fast-growing startups for employment and ideas.

A new report by the Labor Department shows 232,000 establishment “births” [Start Up companies] in the second quarter of 2015, a slight decline from the prior quarter. Those accounted for 831,000 jobs.

As a share of the overall labor market, the number of jobs attributed to such births has fallen noticeably since before the recession, from about 12.5% of the total to a little more than 11%.

Commerce Department data, which isn’t as current but reaches back to the 1970s, shows the trend stretching back decades...

But the apparent loss of dynamism—the decline of startups—has been a puzzle for economists and a potential roadblock for economic growth.

The creation and destruction of companies and jobs should, at least in theory, make way for new technology and innovation, allow people to better match their skills to openings and boost productivity...
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Link: http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2016/01/27/the-missing-startup-recovery/

Shooting Back Can Save Innocent Lives

Throw me a pistol...so I can arm myself and shoot back at these terrorists.

That's what some teachers said in Pakistan when evil terrorists went on a murderous rampage of hate inside their school building filled with innocent students.

Shooting back?  Lives were saved because of that.   PB
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From Reuters.com:

Stuck with 15 of his students on a third floor balcony of a campus building as gunmen came up the stairs, university director Mohammad Shakil urged Pakistani police arriving at the scene to toss him up a gun so he could shoot back.

"We were hiding ... but were unarmed," Shakil told Reuters, speaking after four Islamist militants attacked Bacha Khan University in Pakistan's troubled northwest on Wednesday, killing more than 20 people.

"I was worried about the students, and then one of the militants came after us," Shakil added. "After repeated requests, the police threw me a pistol and I fired some shots at the terrorists."

As more details of Wednesday's assault emerged, attention focused on at least two members of staff who took up arms to resist attackers bent on killing them and their students.

Some hailed them as heroes, as the country digested an attack which bore similarities to the massacre, in late 2014, of 134 pupils at an army-run school in Peshawar, about 30 km (19 miles) from where this week's violence occurred.

Others questioned whether teachers should be armed, as many are, because it goes against the ideals of the profession.

Such a dilemma may have been far from the mind of chemistry professor Hamid Hussain, as he locked himself inside a room with colleagues after gunmen stormed an accommodation block on the university campus.

When the assailants broke down the door, Hussain fired several rounds from his pistol, according to Shabir Ahmad Khan, an English department lecturer taking cover in an adjacent washroom.

"They carried on heavy shooting and I was preparing myself for death, but then they did not enter the washroom and left," Khan recalled.

Later on in the same building, Hussain fired again at the militants to allow some of his students to get away, surviving pupils told local media.

Hussain was subsequently shot and later died from his wounds.

"Kudos to professor Dr Hamid Hussain. Our hero fought bravely n saved many," Asma Shirazi, a popular talk show host, said on Twitter.

Others, too, have credited the actions of Hussain and Shakil with helping to prevent the gunmen, armed with assault rifles and hand grenades, from spilling more blood.

Bacha Khan University also employed around 50 of its own guards who, witnesses said, fought for close to an hour to keep the gunmen isolated and prevent them from entering the girl's hostel as the police and army arrived.

Pakistan army spokesman General Asim Bajwa said the security guards responded "very well" to the attack before reinforcements reached them...
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Link: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-pakistan-attacks-idUSKCN0UZ232

Code Red: Wall Street Hemorrhages

More to come.  More to drop.    PB
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From Reuters.com:


Wall Street bled on Friday, with the S&P 500 sinking to its lowest since October 2014 as oil prices sank below $30 per barrel and fears grew about economic trouble in China.

Pain was dealt widely, with the day's trading volume unusually high and more than a fifth of S&P 500 stocks touching 52-week lows.

The major S&P sectors all ended sharply lower. The Russell 2000 small-cap index dropped as much as 3.5 percent to its lowest since July 2013.

The energy sector dropped 2.87 percent as oil prices fell 6.5 percent, in part due to fears of slow economic growth in China, where major stock indexes also slumped overnight.

The energy sector has lost nearly half its value after hitting record highs in late 2014...
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Link: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-stocks-idUSKCN0UT1DA

Global Stocks Plunge: Made in China!

From the Wall Street Journal online:

Steep falls in Chinese equities pummeled global markets on Thursday, as widening concerns over the world’s No. 2 economy pushed investors out of shares, oil and metals.

The selloff came after the People’s Bank of China made its largest downward adjustment to the yuan since August, a move that sent the country’s stock market down over 7% amid concerns about capital flight from the Asian giant...

China’s stock markets stopped trading after only 30 minutes, ending the shortest trading day in their history after a newly installed mechanism to limit volatility was triggered for the second time this week...
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Link: http://www.wsj.com/articles/global-stocks-fall-on-china-volatility-1452156855

North Korea said it successfully tested a miniaturized hydrogen nuclear bomb

And Happy New Year to you, too!

Acting crazy, being unpredictable, and claiming great capacity to inflict great harm seems to work for North Korea.  The world has dangerous neighborhoods as much as big cities do.  PB
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From Reuters.com:

North Korea says it successfully conducts H-bomb test

North Korea said it successfully tested a miniaturized hydrogen nuclear bomb on Wednesday, claiming a significant advance in its strike capability and setting off alarm bells in Japan and South Korea.

The test, the fourth time the isolated state has exploded a nuclear device, was ordered by young leader Kim Jong Un and successfully conducted at 10:00 a.m. local time (0130 GMT), North Korea's official KCNA news agency said.

"Let the world look up to the strong, self-reliant nuclear-armed state," Kim wrote in what North Korean state TV displayed as a handwritten note.

South Korean intelligence officials and several analysts questioned whether Wednesday's explosion was indeed a full-fledged test of a hydrogen device.

But the reported nuclear test drew condemnation abroad, including from China and Russia, North Korea's two main allies.

China expressed "resolute opposition" and said it would lodge a protest with Pyongyang.

No countries were given advance warning of a nuclear test, South Korea's intelligence service said, according to lawmakers briefed by intelligence officials...
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Link: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-northkorea-nuclear-idUSKBN0UK0G420160106

Job Growth to get Worse for Men Without College Degrees - What Colorful Words Come to Mind?

Poor men.

Another study suggests that men without college degrees face the worst job prospects.

These men are the first to worry about their jobs: not the next job they wish they had, but the current one they have and would like to hold onto.

As their slog continues and their ceilings lower, working class men talk often about their jobs.  Those conversations typically use impolite words that describe what affects their paychecks. It's not hard to interpret what they mean by the words they use.

In the meantime, establishment types get upset over the public use of modestly rough language that is widely used by working men in their private conversations from shop floors to where they drink coffee, which is likely at the same place you could quickly get a hamburger.

Jobs are important to men.  So they laugh when they hear familiar words spoken in more proper settings.

But as they laugh they also know America is ignoring what men, especially working class men, need most.

Establishment types who act offended about the use of colorful language don't know the people who use that kind of language the most.  2016 is an important year.

Ding Dong!  Happy New Year.   PB

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See the Wall Street Journal: Why Job Growth Could Get Even Worse for Men Without College Degrees
Link: http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2015/12/31/why-job-growth-could-get-even-worse-for-men-without-college-degrees/

The New Stagflation: less jobs from less Startups, but more Government

Things ain't what they seem to be, or used to be.

New business formation has slowed in the last decade.  At the same time, the size of government has exploded.  Americans are poorly served by that combination.

New successful businesses create new jobs.  Yet our economy suffers from stagnation of job growth.  As Robert Samuelson, quoted below, writes: "there's a double whammy: fewer startups and slower growth at the survivors." 

So, what do we have that might best describe this?

Let's use a word from the Nixon-Carter 1970s and apply it to the current George W. Obama decade and a half:

Stagflation. Today it means: stagnation of job growth; inflation of government growth.

Speaking of the 1970s, that's when Miller Lite beer was introduced through an advertising campaign: Tastes Great, Less Filling.  Not so much anymore.

Today's Stagflation certainly doesn't taste great, but clearly it is less filling when it comes to creating jobs.  PB
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From economist Robert Samuelson writing at Investors.com:


There's more discouraging news about American business — specifically about entrepreneurship.

We confidently assume that we have the world's most entrepreneurial nation, and the proof seems overwhelming.

Google, Facebook and Twitter are but three (relatively) recent startups that have become corporate titans.

Before them, there were others: Microsoft, Intel and FedEx. We seem to excel at nurturing new firms.

Or do we?

Previous studies have shown that, despite the success of firms like Facebook, the number of startups has dropped sharply, from about 13% of all firms in the late 1980s to about 8% in 2011.

Now a new study from the National Bureau of Economic Research reports that the expansion of the remaining startups — which traditionally has been much faster than the growth of existing companies — has slowed considerably.

By some measures, it now barely exceeds the average of older companies.

So there's a double whammy: fewer startups and slower growth at the survivors.

This could be one reason the recovery from the Great Recession has been so sluggish, with the economy's growth averaging about 2% annually from 2010 to 2014, much slower than earlier post-World War II recoveries...

The upshot: "Startups and high-growth young firms (under five years) contributed less to U.S. job creation in the post-2000 period than in earlier periods," said the report.

The startup slump may also help explain the slowdown in productivity — a measure of efficiency that ultimately raises living standards.

From 2010 to 2014, productivity grew a meager 0.3% annually, also well below the post-World War II average of about 2%, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics...

Just what has caused the startup slump isn't clear, the study admits...

What's clear is the startup slump is consistent with other business behavior, specifically weak investment spending on new plants and machinery.

Compared with the past, companies seem more reluctant to invest in the future.

"There is now robust evidence, from multiple data sources ... of a pervasive decline in U.S. business dynamism over the last several decades," says the study, which was released earlier this month.
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http://news.investors.com/ibd-editorials-perspective/121715-785867-robert-j-samuelson-says-us-in-a-serious-startup-slump.htm

Junk Bonds Are Tanking -- Icahn Says Meltdown `Just Beginning'

From Bloomberg.com:

A day after a prominent Wall Street firm shocked investors by freezing withdrawals from a credit mutual fund, things only got nastier in the junk-bond market.

Prices on the high-risk securities sank to levels not seen in six years and, to add to the growing sense of alarm, billionaire investor Carl Icahn said the sell off is only starting.

“The meltdown in High Yield is just beginning," Icahn, who’s been betting against the high-yield market, wrote on his verified Twitter account Friday.

Icahn’s comments come as junk-bond investors, already stung by the worst losses since 2008, are the most nervous they’ve been in three years after Third Avenue Management took the rare step of freezing withdrawals from a $788 million credit mutual fund...

The move by Third Avenue, announced on Dec. 9, is the latest omen of stress in a market already beaten down by a prolonged slump in oil prices that has battered the energy sector.

The news came as appetite for risk globally is souring as the countdown to the Federal Reserve’s probable interest-rate increase sparked a sell off in equities and other risk assets...


The weakness in the market comes as credit quality in speculative-grade debt is falling.

For every junk-bond issuer that had its rating boosted this year, two have been downgraded, a ratio not seen since 2009, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

And companies are increasingly defaulting on their debt.

Swift Energy Co.’s failure to make an $8.9 million interest payment last week raised the global tally of defaults to 102 issuers, a figure last exceeded in 2009, according to Standard & Poor’s...
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Link: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-12-11/junk-bond-fear-gauge-nears-3-year-high-after-third-avenue-freeze

Hillary: Al Gore in a Pantsuit

Uh oh.   Does this mean what I think it means?   PB
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From TheHill.com:

HILLARY CLINTON'S LIKABILITY  PROBLEM

Allies of Hillary Clinton ... are worried about one big thing: her likability problem in the general election...

Presidential elections are often decided on personality instead of specific policies.

Along those lines, people in Clinton’s orbit are worried she doesn’t pass the would-you-like-to-have-a-beer-with-her test.

It’s a test she failed against then-Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) in 2008...

Head-to-head 2016 matchups suggest vulnerabilities for Clinton, particularly against Sen. Marco Rubio, the Florida Republican who often talks about his love of professional football.

Team Clinton spent a good part of 2015 highlighting the former first lady’s personality, which they call warm and effusive.

Clinton aides, longtime confidants and friends have always maintained she is charming and funny, at least behind the scenes and out of the public spotlight...

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STOP THE CLOCK!  ROLL BACK THE CALENDAR!!
GO BACK 15 YEARS!!!  YES, THAT MEANS AL GORE!!!!


AL GORE'S A LOSER IF IT'S LIKABILITY THAT VOTERS WANT

BY Cokie Roberts, Steven V., Roberts
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Wednesday, August 16, 2000

This election should be a slam dunk for Vice President Gore. National moods and markets are soaring. From Wal-Mart to Wall Street, the future looks healthy.

History says the incumbent party will sail to victory on this tide of optimism.

But that is not happening, and Democrats gathered here to nominate Gore are feeling frazzled and frustrated. One party baron pronounced the vice president's campaign "moribund," and President Clinton is grumbling to friends that his old running mate can't seem to get his act together.

Much of Gore's problem comes down to two words: leadership and likability.

In the latest Los Angeles Times survey, voters prefer Texas Gov. George W. Bush by wide margins on both questions - a major reason why the Republican nominee holds a 9-point lead overall.

This drives Democrats nuts...
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Links:
http://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/261741-hillary-clintons-likability-problem
http://www.nydailynews.com/archives/opinions/al-gore-loser-likability-voters-article-1.877229

Amazon: Soon to Conquer Home Delivery? Or Become a Terrorist's BFF?

A drone delivers a package to your home.

Do you tip the drone?

Or will the drone trip you into unforeseen dangers?

Will terrorists learn how to exploit Amazon Prime to deliver explosives, nuclear waste, toxic poisons or baby parts to your backyard?

What kind of security will there be at the Amazon warehouses when bad guys take over and send Amazon Prime delivery drones to your home?

You might receive something you never ordered and would never want in a million years.

What if the Bad Guys work with Google and Facebook - using their deep data profiles that means you will never have privacy ever again - and start eliminating people?

Someone doesn't like Christians, or immigrants, or Republicans, or what? 

You have no privacy anymore.

Now that drones can deliver packages to your home, there is little security and nowhere to hide, certainly no way to remain private.

There is no Jack Bauer coming to rescue you.

Let's imagine - this is not hard to do - that Seattle, Silicon Valley and Washington D.C. Power People decide to profile you, vilify you, and target you.   Why not deliver a bit of nasty to your backyard or doorstep?

Right now, only Seattle Billionaires know for sure!

The Seattle Billionaire who owns Amazon also owns the Washington Post newspaper.

Google and Facebook can and do control the content and type of news that is delivered to your device. 

What happens when bad things happen and the news never gets delivered?

George Orwell somewhere is whistling a tune you will start hearing very soon.  PB

Why Fewer Jobs? Fewer New Small Businesses

Fewer Jobs = Phew!  We need more jobs!

A report highlights why the U.S. needs new small businesses, especially as the economy remains stagnant for tens of millions of Americans. 

Too many people are underemployed, or stuck with part time work hoping for more hours, or simply stopped looking because they can't get hired.

Yet, those people are not counted and get ignored when selected official unemployment figures are widely reported by the media.

A report about small businesses emphasizes the direct impact new small businesses have on creating new jobs.

More new businesses = more new jobs.  This should be common sense.  But, we all know it is not common sense in Washington D.C., no matter what slogans get repeated.    PB
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From the Wall Street Journal online:

Newly formed businesses are adding jobs at a much slower pace than a decade ago, a factor that’s containing employment gains even six years into the expansion.

The number of jobs created by new businesses fell 7% in the first quarter from the fourth quarter of 2014...

From a decade ago, the figure is down 18%.

“Look at the rate of new-business formation, that’s fallen for a couple decades in a row,” Jason Furman, chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, said Tuesday at The Wall Street Journal CEO Council annual meeting...

The latest data comes from Labor Department’s Business Employment Dynamics report.

That report showed private-sector employers added a fairly paltry 226,000 jobs in the first quarter [three months, not just one month], a starkly different picture than reported by the monthly jobs report...
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http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2015/11/19/why-it-matters-that-new-businesses-are-creating-jobs-more-slowly-than-a-decade-ago/