How can we take it back? | Page 21 | INFJ Forum

How can we take it back?

Elizabeth Warren Blasts FHFA's Mel Watt:
"You Haven't Helped a Single Family"

[video=youtube;fovuSVd5s4Q]https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=fovuSVd5s4Q[/video]


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Sen. Elizabeth Warren asks Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Mel Watt about principal reduction for homeowners at a Senate Banking Committee hearing on November 19, 2014.


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Elizabeth Warren tore into FHFA director Mel Watt over his failure to develop a program for Fannie and Freddie to provide principal modifications to underwater borrowers at risk of foreclosure.

She also got in a dig for his failure to stop the agencies from pursuing deficiency judgments.
That means going after former homeowners when the sale of the house they lost didn’t recoup enough to cover the mortgage balance.

In the stone ages, when banks kept the mortgage loans they made, they never pursued deficiency judgements.
They knew there was no point in trying to get blood from a turnip.

Not surprisingly, the sadistic Fannie/Freddie policy has also proven to be spectacularly unproductive in financial terms.
An FHFA inspector general study found that recoveries were less than 1/4 of 1% of the amount sought.

Moreover, since those mortgage balances were often inflated by junk fees and other dubious costs, and mortgage servicers have done a poor job of maintain properties (they are too often stripped of copper and appliances, or get mold), any deficiency might be significantly or entirely the servicer’s fault.

Like most Warren performances, this one is worth watching, particularly when Mel Watt offers utterly unconvincing responses and Warren will have none of them.
Here is a key part of the exchange:

Warren: The Treasury Department has found that principal reductions could save Fannie and Freddie nearly $4 billion and help half a million homeowners stay in their home. It has been six years since Congress created FHFA and in all that time your agency has never, not once permitted a family to reduce its principal mortgage through Fannie or Freddie.

I’ve asked about this repeatedly and you’ve said you’d look into allowing Fannie and Freddie to engage in principal reduction; you said it again today,. You’ve been in office for nearly a year now and you haven’t helped a single family, not even one, by agreeing to a principal reduction. So I want to know why this hasn’t been a priority for you. The data are there.

Watt: It’s probably an overstatement to say it’s not been a priority,” Watt stammered. “It’s just a very difficult issue. The reason it is difficult is because we are looking for exactly what you said — a win-win situation. We have to do this in a way that is responsible, otherwise we just reduce principal for everybody across the board…is not what anybody I think is advocating for, so then we have to decide what is a responsible way to do that…

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Warren interrupted, and for good reason. “Responsible” is a dog-whistle word in mortgage policy debates.
The phrase “responsible borrower” is the virtuous counterpoint of “deadbeat borrowers.”

If you listened to Obama’s statements about assisting struggling homeowners, you’d regularly hear him talking about “responsible borrowers”.
In practice, this turns out to be a Catch 22: if you are in trouble through no fault of your own, say because a major employer failed and tanked the local economy, which hurt your income and the market value of your home, you are nevertheless irresponsible, as clearly proven by the fact that you are in financial duress.

When bank are hit by what they depicted as black swan events but they actually helped create, they get bailed out.
But regular people who played no role in setting in motion the tractor trailer that ran over them?

Fuggedaboutit.

The “responsible way” is code for the Administration’s extreme reluctance about having the appearance of giving individuals a break in a country that is awash in welfare for the rich.

But what is telling here is that the reason that Ed DeMarco, the former head of the FHFA, was pilloried for years by Democrats before he was finally replaced was for the very issue that has put Mel Watt in Warren’s crosshairs: not offering principal modifications to borrowers.

The very fact that Warren can cite CBO and Treasury studies on probable impact says there are already models out there for how to pick and choose among financially stressed homeowners; she referred to even more private studies.

There’s no excuse for the FHFA not to have at least a pilot program underway, save it has no real intention of doing much.
This outcome should hardly be a surprise for the Obama Administration.

We were against the Watt nomination and pointed out, as representative from Bank of America Charlotte, he was a notably bank-friendly Democrat, and had opposed Audit the Fed, been missing in action during the London Whale hearings, and hosted soirees well populated by bank lobbyists.

DeMarco was a convenient scapegoat.
As we wrote in 2012:

But all of this noise about GSE principal mods is really a smokescreen.
DeMarco has become the Administration’s favorite scapegoat as a way to divert attention from its refusal to get tough the banks in order to fix the housing market.

Among the obstacles to a real estate recovery: a broken servicing model, in which servicers find it more profitable to foreclose than modify loans; second liens on bank books at inflated values; rampant chain of title issues; a huge overhang of foreclosures in progress.

If the Administration wanted serious principal reductions, they could have used the hundreds of billions of dollars available to them under TARP to do so.

That was under its power and required no Congressional action.
Instead of owning up to disasters like HAMP and FHA-Short Refi, they whine about DeMarco, Republicans in Congress, reckless homeowners, and once in a while, for show, they’ll say a few bad words about the banks that they continue to coddle.

Just look at the conflicting messages: the banks are in such bad shape that they can’t be asked to write off second liens in full in the Administration’s mortgage settlement, yet they are deemed to be healthy by the Fed and are allowed to pay dividends rather than rebuild their balance sheets.

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Dave Dayen similarly saw the demonization of DeMarco and the touting of Mel Watt as some sort of savior as a headfake:


Watt, a longtime friend of the financial industry, might make a terrible FHFA director, and he might make a fine one….
The real story here is how the Obama administration has used the FHFA director position as a convenient distraction from their disastrous housing policies….

Too many liberals, in no small part egged on by the White House, have built up this single FHFA position as the sole impediment to justice and relief for millions of troubled homeowners.

For years, Ed DeMarco has been a cartoon villain in this rendering, a former Bush appointee fiendishly destroying the American dream all by himself. (I’m hardly being hyperbolic; one site terms him the biggest roadblock to our economic recovery.)…

So why the liberal crusade against DeMarco?….
By offloading the entire responsibility for the nation’s housing woes to one regulator, the White House has used DeMarco as a foil, averting their own shameful responsibility in designing the failed HAMP program and letting banks off with sweetheart settlement deals for systematic crimes committed against homeowners.

DeMarco turns out to be very useful to the White House, absorbing all the scorn of liberal housing groups while the Administration floats along without blame.

The Administration has slow-walked replacing DeMarco in a manner that can only suggest they’re not all that perturbed with having him remain in place.

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In fact, the trigger for the Administration to rouse itself and finally push DeMarco out the door may well have been his filing of 17 putback lawsuits against mortgage servicers seeking a total of $200 billion in damages.

And the Administration looks to have managed to have its cake and eat it.
The recent spate of bank settlements were largely mortgage securitization settlements with a series of misbehaviors all bundled into one big deal to make the headline numbers seem better.

And the biggest item in these deals, far and away, were the DeMarco putback suits, which suddenly became Administration accomplishments.
For instance, of the $9 billion in cash (the number to watch) in the recent JP Morgan mortgage settlement, $4 billion came from the FHFA component.

Let’s look at the long list of prominent Vichy Left types that sung from the “Fire DeMarco” hymnal and either implicitly or explicitly backed Mel Watt:

Paul Krugman
New York attorney general and mortgage fraud task force co-chairman Eric Schneiderman, who had eight state attorneys generals as allies:

“Kamala Harris, Martha Coakley, Beau Biden,
In addition to New York, Massachusetts, California and Delaware, other attorneys general participating in the effort are Lisa Madigan of Illinois, Douglas F. Gansler of Maryland, Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada, Ellen Rosenblum of Oregon and Bob Ferguson of Washington”

Moveon
Coalition for a Fair Settlement:
Americans for Financial Reform:
New Bottom Line, PICO National Network, Alliance for a Just Society, National People’s Action, and Right to the City
Mike Konczal

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As much as Warren also supported the Mel Watt nomination, she deserves credit for calling him out when he’s proven, as we anticipated, to be as loath to provide tangible relief to homeowners as his much-pilloried predecessor.

But will we see anyone on the list above to start demanding that the Administration fire Watt if, say in another six months, Watt is again on the hot seat before Warren with another round of “this is really hard” lame responses?

The answer is no, because these soi-disant progressives can’t say in public that the Administration is the real reason borrowers continue to be used to foam the runway for banks.
 
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Kgal said:
This is what's coming to the US. We are going to start cleaning house. Hell - I wish I could be there in congress with my broom and dustpan.... :lol:

"Zhou Yongkang's arrest shows that not even high-ranking elites are exempt from Beijing's efforts to clean house"

http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2014/12/5/zhou-china-expelled.html
Click to expand...

Oh how my fingers are crossed!!!

Someday I hope we get to the point where we are kicking in the penthouse doors all across Manhattan as the hedge fund managers awaken to find a cold pair of handcuffs slapped on their wrists.

That would be so wonderful!!
 
  • Like
Reactions: Kgal
Wall Street Moves to Put Taxpayers on the Hook for Derivatives Trades

Michael Krieger | Posted Friday Dec 5, 2014 at 3:43 pm
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Wall Street has for some time attempted to put taxpayers on the hook for its derivatives trades.
I highlighted this a year ago in the post: Citigroup Written Legislation Moves Through the House of Representatives.

Here’s an excerpt:

Five years after the Wall Street coup of 2008, it appears the U.S. House of Representatives is as bought and paid for as ever.
We heard about the Citigroup crafted legislation currently being pushed through Congress back in May when Mother Jones reported on it.

Fortunately, they included the following image in their article:
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Unsurprisingly, the main backer of the bill is notorious Wall Street lackey Jim Himes (D-Conn.), a former Goldman Sachs employee who has discovered lobbyist payoffs can be just as lucrative as a career in financial services.

The last time Mr. Himes made an appearance on these pages was in March 2013 in my piece: Congress Moves to DEREGULATE Wall Street.


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Fortunately, that bill never made it to a vote on the Senate floor, but now Wall Street is trying to sneak it into a bill needed to keep the government running.
You can’t make this stuff up. From the Huffington Post:

WASHINGTON – Wall Street lobbyists are trying to secure taxpayer backing for many derivatives trades as part of budget talks to avert a government shutdown.
According to multiple Democratic sources, banks are pushing hard to include the controversial provision in funding legislation that would keep the government operating after Dec. 11.

Top negotiators in the House are taking the derivatives provision seriously, and may include it in the final bill, the sources said.
The bank perks are not a traditional budget item.

They would allow financial institutions to trade certain financial derivatives from subsidiaries that are insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. – potentially putting taxpayers on the hook for losses caused by the risky contracts.

Big Wall Street banks had typically traded derivatives from these FDIC-backed units, but the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial reform law required them to move many of the transactions to other subsidiaries that are not insured by taxpayers.

Last year, Rep. Jim Himes (D-Conn.) introduced the same provision under debate in the current budget talks.
The legislative text was written by a Citigroup lobbyist, according to The New York Times.

The bill passed the House by a vote of 292 to 122 in October 2013, 122 Democrats opposed, and 70 in favor.
All but three House Republicans supported the bill.

It wasn’t clear whether the derivatives perk will survive negotiations in the House, or if the Senate will include it in its version of the bill.
With Democrats voting nearly 2-to-1 against the bill in the House, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) never brought the bill up for a vote in the Senate.


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Remember what Wall Street wants, Wall Street gets.

 
Sick, disgusting fucks.


The New “Water Barons”:
Wall Street Mega-Banks are Buying up the World’s Water

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A disturbing trend in the water sector is accelerating worldwide.
The new “water barons” – the Wall Street banks and elitist multibillionaires – are buying up water all over the world at unprecedented pace.

Familiar mega-banks and investing powerhouses such as Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan Chase, Citigroup, UBS, Deutsche Bank, Credit Suisse, Macquarie Bank, Barclays Bank, the Blackstone Group, Allianz, and HSBC Bank, among others, are consolidating their control over water.

Wealthy tycoons such as T. Boone Pickens, former President George H.W. Bush and his family, Hong Kong’s Li Ka-shing, Philippines’ Manuel V. Pangilinan and other Filipino billionaires, and others are also buying thousands of acres of land with aquifers, lakes, water rights, water utilities, and shares in water engineering and technology companies all over the world.

The second disturbing trend is that while the new water barons are buying up water all over the world, governments are moving fast to limit citizens’ ability to become water self-sufficient (as evidenced by the well-publicized Gary Harrington’s case in Oregon, in which the state criminalized the collection of rainwater in three ponds located on his private land, by convicting him on nine counts and sentencing him for 30 days in jail).

Let’s put this criminalization in perspective: Billionaire T. Boone Pickens owned more water rights than any other individuals in America, with rights over enough of the Ogallala Aquifer to drain approximately 200,000 acre-feet (or 65 billion gallons of water) a year.

But ordinary citizen Gary Harrington cannot collect rainwater runoff on 170 acres of his private land.
It’s a strange New World Order in which multibillionaires and elitist banks can own aquifers and lakes, but ordinary citizens cannot even collect rainwater and snow runoff in their own backyards and private lands.

“Water is the oil of the 21st century.” Andrew Liveris, CEO of DOW Chemical Company (quoted in The Economist magazine, August 21, 2008)


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In 2008, I wrote an article,

“Why Big Banks May Be Buying up Your Public Water System,” in which I detailed how both mainstream and alternative media coverage on water has tended to focus on individual corporations and super-investors seeking to control water by buying up water rights and water utilities. But paradoxically the hidden story is a far more complicated one. I argued that the real story of the global water sector is a convoluted one involving “interlocking globalized capital”: Wall Street and global investment firms, banks, and other elite private-equity firms – often transcending national boundaries to partner with each other, with banks and hedge funds, with technology corporations and insurance giants, with regional public-sector pension funds, and with sovereign wealth funds – are moving rapidly into the water sector to buy up not only water rights and water-treatment technologies, but also to privatize public water utilities and infrastructure.


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Now, in 2012, we are seeing this trend of global consolidation of water by elite banks and tycoons accelerating.
In a JP Morgan equity research document, it states clearly that “Wall Street appears well aware of the investment opportunities in water supply infrastructure, wastewater treatment, and demand management technologies.”

Indeed, Wall Street is preparing to cash in on the global water grab in the coming decades.
For example, Goldman Sachs has amassed more than $10 billion since 2006 for infrastructure investments, which include water.

A 2008 New York Times article mentioned Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Credit Suisse, Kohlberg Kravis Roberts, and the Carlyle Group, to have “amassed an estimated an estimated $250 billion war chest – must of it raised in the last two years – to finance a tidal wave of infrastructure projects in the United States and overseas.”

By “water,” I mean that it includes water rights (i.e., the right to tap groundwater, aquifers, and rivers), land with bodies of water on it or under it (i.e., lakes, ponds, and natural springs on the surface, or groundwater underneath), desalination projects, water-purification and treatment technologies (e.g., desalination, treatment chemicals and equipment), irrigation and well-drilling technologies, water and sanitation services and utilities, water infrastructure maintenance and construction (from pipes and distribution to all scales of treatment plants for residential, commercial, industrial, and municipal uses), water engineering services (e.g., those involved in the design and construction of water-related facilities), and retail water sector (such as those involved in the production, operation, and sales of bottled water, water vending machines, bottled water subscription and delivery services, water trucks, and water tankers).

Update of My 2008 Article: Mega-Banks See Water as a Critical Commodity

Since 2008, many giant banks and super-investors are capturing more market share in the water sector and identifying water as a critical commodity, much hotter than petroleum.

Goldman Sachs: Water Is Still the Next Petroleum

In 2008, Goldman Sachs called water “the petroleum for the next century” and those investors who know how to play the infrastructure boom will reap huge rewards, during its annual “Top Five Risks” conference.

Water is a U.S.$425 billion industry, and a calamitous water shortage could be a more serious threat to humanity in the 21st century than food and energy shortages, according to Goldman Sachs’s conference panel.

Goldman Sachs has convened numerous conferences and also published lengthy, insightful analyses of water and other critical sectors (food, energy).
Goldman Sachs is positioning itself to gobble up water utilities, water engineering companies, and water resources worldwide.

Since 2006, Goldman Sachs has become one of the largest infrastructure investment fund managers and has amassed a $10 billion capital for infrastructure, including water.

In March 2012, Goldman Sachs was eyeing Veolia’s UK water utility business, estimated at £1.2 billion, and in July it successfully bought Veolia Water, which serves 3.5 million people in southeastern England.

Previously, in September 2003, Goldman Sachs partnered with one of the world’s largest private-equity firm Blackstone Group and Apollo Management to acquire Ondeo Nalco (a leading company in providing water-treatment and process chemicals and services, with more than 10,000 employees and operations in 130 countries) from French water corporation Suez S.A. for U.S.$4.2 billion.

In October 2007, Goldman Sachs teamed up with Deutsche Bank and several partners to bid, unsuccessfully, for U.K.’s Southern Water.
In November 2007, Goldman Sachs was also unsuccessful in bidding for U.K. water utility Kelda.

But Goldman Sachs is still looking to buy other water utilities.In January 2008, Goldman Sachs led a team of funds (including Liberty Harbor Master Fund and the Pinnacle Fund) to buy U.S. $50 million of convertible notes in China Water and Drinks Inc., which supplies purified water to name-brand vendors like Coca-Cola and Taiwan’s top beverage company Uni-President. China Water and Drinks is also a leading producer and distributor of bottled water in China and also makes private-labeled bottled water (e.g., for Sands Casino, Macau).

Since China has one of the worse water problems in Asia and a large emerging middle class, its bottled-water sector is the fastest-growing in the world and it’s seeing enormous profits.

Additionally, China’s acute water shortages and serious pollution could “buoy demand for clean water for years to come, with China’s $14.2 billion water industry a long-term investment destination” (Reuters, January 28, 2008).

The City of Reno, Nevada, was approached by Goldman Sachs for “a long-term asset leasing that could potentially generate significant cash for the three TMWA [Truckee Meadows Water Authority] entities.

The program would allow TMWA to lease its assets for 50 years and receive an up-front cash payment” (Reno News & Review, August 28, 2008).
Essentially, Goldman Sachs wants to privatize Reno’s water utility for 50 years.

Given Reno’s revenue shortfall, this proposal was financially attractive.
But the water board eventually rejected the proposal due to strong public opposition and outcry.

Citigroup: The Water Market Will Soon Eclipse Oil, Agriculture, and Precious Metals

Citigroup’s top economist Willem Buitler said in 2011 that the water market will soon be hotter the oil market (for example, see this and this):

“Water as an asset class will, in my view, become eventually the single most important physical-commodity based asset class, dwarfing oil, copper, agricultural commodities and precious metals.”


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In its recent 2012 Water Investment Conference, Citigroup has identified top 10 trends in the water sector, as follows:

1. Desalination systems
2. Water reuse technologies
3. Produced water / water utilities
4. Membranes for filtration
5. Ultraviolet (UV) disinfection
6. Ballast-water treatment technologies
7. Forward osmosis used in desalination
8. Water-efficiency technologies and products
9. Point-of-use treatment systems
10. Chinese competitors in water

Specifically, a lucrative opportunity in water is in hydraulic fracturing (or fracking), as it generates massive demand for water and water services.
Each oil well developed requires 3 to 5 million gallons of water, and 80% of this water cannot be reused because it’s three to 10 times saltier than seawater.

Citigroup recommends water-rights owners sell water to fracking companies instead of to farmers because water for fracking can be sold for as much as $3,000 per acre-foot instead of only $50 per acre/foot to farmers.

The ballast-water treatment sector, currently at $1.35 billion annually, is estimated to reach $30 to $50 billion soon.
The water-filtration market is expected to outgrow the water-equipment market: Dow estimates it to be a $5 billion market annually instead of only $1 billion now.

Citigroup is aggressively raising funds for its war chest to participate in the coming tidal wave of infrastructure privatization: in 2007 it established a new unit called Citi Infrastructure Investors through its Citi Alternative Investments unit.

According to Reuters, Citigroup “assembled some of the biggest names in the infrastructure business at the same time it is building a $3 billion fund, including $500 million of its own capital.

The fund, according to a person familiar with the situation, will have only a handful of outside investors and will be focused on assets in developed markets” (May 16, 2007).

Citigroup initially sought only U.S.$3 billion for its first infrastructure fund but was seeking U.S.$5 billion in April 2008 (Bloomberg, April 7, 2008).
Citigroup partnered with HSBC Bank, Prudential, and other minor partners to acquire U.K.’s water utility Kelda (Yorkshire Water) in November 2007.

This week, Citigroup signed a 99-year lease with the City of Chicago for Chicago’s Midway Airport (it partnered with John Hancock Life Insurance Company and a Canadian private airport operator).

Insiders said that Citigroup is among those bidding for the state-owned company Letiste Praha which operates the Prague Airport in the Czech Republic (Bloomberg, February 7, 2008).

As the five U.K. water utility deals illustrate, typically no one single investment bank or private-equity fund owns the entire infrastructure project – they partner with many others.

The Citigroup is now entering India’s massive infrastructure market by partnering the Blackstone Group and two Indian private finance companies; they have launched a U.S. $5 billion fund in February 2007, with three entities (Citi, Blackstone, and IDFC) jointly investing U.S.$250 million.

India requires about U.S.$320 billion in infrastructure investments in the next five years (The Financial Express, February 16, 2007).

UBS: Water Scarcity Is the Defining Crisis of the 21st Century

In 2006, UBS Investment Research, a division of Switzerland-based UBS AG, Europe’s largest bank by assets, entitled its 40-page research report, “Q-Series®:Water”–“Water scarcity: The defining crisis of the 21st century?” (October 10, 2006)

In 2007, UBS, along with JP Morgan and Australia’s Challenger Fund, bought UK’s Southern Water for £4.2biillion.

Credit Suisse: Water Is the “Paramount Megatrend of Our Time”

Credit Suisse published its report about Credit Suisse Water Index (January 21, 2008) urged investors that “One way to take advantage of this trend is to invest in companies geared to water generation, preservation, infrastructure treatment and desalination.

The Index enables investors to participate in the performance of the most attractive companies….”
The trend in question, according to Credit Suisse, is the “depletion of freshwater reserves” attributable to “pollution, disappearance of glaciers (the main source of freshwater reserves), and population growth, water is likely to become a scarce resource.”

Credit Suisse recognizes water to be the “paramount megatrend of our time” because of a water-supply crisis might cause “severe societal risk” in the next 10 years and that two-thirds of the world’s population are likely to live under water-stressed conditions by 2025.

To address water shortages, it has identified desalination and wastewater treatment as the two most important technologies.
Three sectors for good investments include the following:

§ Membranes for desalination and wastewater treatment

§ Water infrastructure – corrosion resistance, pipes, valves, and pumps

§ Chemicals for water treatmentIt also created the Credit Suisse Water Index which has the equally weighed index of 30 stocks out of 128 global water stocks.

For investors, it offered “Credit Suisse PL100 World Water Trust (PL100 World Water),” launched in June 2007, with $112.9 million.
Credit Suisse partnered with General Electric (GE Infrastructure) in May 2006 to establish a U.S.$1 billion joint venture to profit from privatization and investments in global infrastructure assets.

Each partner will commit U.S.$500 million to target electricity generation and transmission, gas storage and pipelines, water facilities, airports, air traffic control, ports, railroads, and toll roads worldwide.

This joint venture has estimated that the developed market’s infrastructure opportunities are at U.S.$500 billion, and emerging world’s infrastructure market is U.S. $1 trillion in the next five years (Credit Suisse’s press release, May 31, 2006).

In October 2007, Credit Suisse partnered with Cleantech Group (a Michigan-based market-research, consulting, media, and executive-search firm that operates cleantech forums) and Consensus Business Group (a London-based equity firm owned by U.K. billionaire Vincent Tchenguiz) to invest in clean technologies worldwide.

The technologies will also clean water technologies.During its Asian Investment Conference, it said that “Water is a focus for those in the know about global strategic commodities.

As with oil, the supply is finite but demand is growing by leaps and unlike oil there is no alternative.” (Credit Suisse, February 4, 2008).

Credit Suisse sees the global water market with U.S.$190 billion in revenue in 2005 and was expected to grow to U.S.$342 billion by 2010.
It sees most significant growth opportunities in China.

JPMorgan Chase: Build Infrastructure War Chests to Buy Water, Utilities, and Public Infrastructure Worldwide

One of the world’s largest banks, JPMorgan Chase has aggressively pursued water and infrastructure worldwide.
In October 2007, it beat out rivals Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs to buy U.K.’s water utility Southern Water with partners Swiss-based UBS and Australia’s Challenger Infrastructure Fund.

This banking empire is controlled by the Rockefeller family; the family patriarch David Rockefeller is a member of the elite and secretive Bilderberg Group, Council on Foreign Relations, and Trilateral Commission.JPMorgan sees infrastructure finance as a global phenomenon, and it is joined by its global peers in investment and banking institution in their rush to cash in on water and infrastructure.

JPMorgan’s own analysts estimate that the emerging markets’ infrastructure is approximately U.S.$21.7 trillion over the next decade.
JPMorgan created a U.S.$2 billion infrastructure fund to go after India’s infrastructure projects in October 2007.

The targeted projects are transportation (roads, bridges, railroads) and utilities (gas, electricity, water).
India’s finance minister has been estimated that India requires about U.S. $500 billion in infrastructure investments by 2012.

In this regard, JPMorgan is joined by Citigroup, the Blackstone Group, 3i Group (Europe’s second-largest private-equity firm), and ICICI Bank (India’s second-largest bank) (International Herald Tribune, October 31, 2007).

Its JPMorgan Asset Management has also established an Asian Infrastructure & Related Resources Opportunity Fund which held a first close on U.S.$500 million (€333 million) and will focus on China, India, and other Southern Asian countries, with the first two investments in China and India (Private Equity Online, August 11, 2008).

The fund’s target is U.S.$1.5 billion.
JPMorgan’s Global Equity Research division also published a 60-page report called “Watch water: A guide to evaluating corporate risks in a thirsty world” (April 1, 2008).

In 2010, J.P. Morgan Asset Management and Water Asset Management led a $275 million buyout bid for SouthWest Water.

Allianz Group: Water Is Underpriced and Undervalued

Founded in 1890, Germany’s Allianz Group is one of the leading global services providers in insurance, banking, and asset management in about 70 countries.
In April 2008, Allianz SE launched the Allianz RCM Global Water Fund which invests in equity securities of water-related companies worldwide, emphasizing long-term capital appreciation.

Alliance launched its Global EcoTrends Fund in February 2007 (Business Wire, February 7, 2007).
Allianz SE’s Dresdner Bank AG told its investors that “Investments in water offer opportunities: Rising oil prices obscure our view of an even more serious scarcity: water.

The global water economy is faced with a multi-billion dollar need for capital expenditure and modernization.
Dresdner Bank sees this as offering attractive opportunities for returns for investors with a long-term investment horizon.” (Frankfurt, August 14, 2008)

Like Goldman Sachs, Allianz has the philosophy that water is underpriced.
A co-manager of the Water Fund in Frankfurt, said, “A key issue of water is that the true value of water is not recognized. …Water tends to be undervalued around the world. …Perhaps that is one of the reasons why there are so many places with a lack of supply due to a lack of investment. With that in mind, it makes sense to invest in companies that are engaged in improving water quality and infrastructure.”

Allianz sees two key investment drivers in water:
(1) upgrading the aging infrastructure in the developed world; and
(2) new urbanization and industrialization in developing countries such as China and India.

Barclays PLC: Water Index Funds and Exchange-Traded Funds

Barclays PLC is a U.K.-based major global financial services provider operating in all over the world with roots in London since 1690; it operates through its subsidiary Barclays Bank PLC and its investment bank called Barclays Capital.Barclays Bank’s unit Barclays Global Investors manages an exchange-traded fund (ETF) called iShares S&P Global Water, which is listed on the London Stock Exchanges and can be purchased like any ordinary share through a broker.

Touting the iShares S&P Global Water as offering “a broad based exposure to shares of the world’s largest water companies, including water utilities and water equipment stocks” of water companies around the world, this fund as of March 31, 2007 was valued at U.S.$33.8 million.

Barclays also have a climate index fund: launched on January 16, 2008, SAM Indexes GmbH licensed its Dow Jones Sustainability Index to Barclays Capital for investors in Germany and Switzerland.

Many other banks also have a climate index or sustainability index.In October 2007, Barclays Capital also partnered with Protected Distribution Limited (PDL) to launch a new water investment fund (with expected annual returns of 9% to 11%) called Protected Water Fund.

This new fund, listed in the Isle of Man, requires a minimum of £10,000 and is structured as a 10-year investment with Barclays Bank providing 100% of capital protection until maturity on October 11, 2017.

The Protected Water Fund will be invested in some of the world’s largest water companies; its investment decisions will be made based on an index created by Barclays Capital, the Barclays World Water Strategy, which charts the performance of some of the world’s largest water-related stocks (Investment Week and Reuters, October 11, 2007; Business Week, October 15, 2007).

Deutsche Bank’s €2 Billion Investment in European Infrastructure:
“Megatrend” in Water, Climate, Infrastructure, and Agribusiness Investments

Deutsche Bank is one of the major players in the water sector worldwide.
Its Deutsche Bank Advisors have identified water as a part of the climate investment strategies. In its presentation, “Global Warming: Implications for Investors,” they have identified the four following major areas for water investment:
§ Distribution and management:
(1) Supply and recycling,
(2) water distribution and sewage,
(3) water management and engineering.

§ Water purification:
(1) Sewage purification,
(2) disinfection,
(3) desalination,
(4) monitoring.

§ Water efficiency (demand):
(1) Home installation,
(2) gray-water recycling,
(3) water meters.

§ Water and nutrition:
(1) Irrigation,
(2) bottled water.

In addition to water, the other two new resources identified were agribusiness (e.g., pesticides, genetically modified seeds, mineral fertilizers, agricultural machinery) and renewable energies (e.g., solar, wind, hydrothermal, biomass, hydroelectricity).

The Deutsche Bank has established an investment fund of up to €2 billion in European infrastructure assets using its Structured Capital Markets Group (SCM), part of the bank’s Global Markets division.

The bank already has several “highly attractive infrastructure assets,” including East Surrey Holdings, the owner of U.K.’s water utility Sutton & East Surrey Water (Deutsche Bank press release, September 22, 2006).Moreover, Deutsche Bank has channeled €6 billion (U.S.$8.55 billion) into climate change funds, which will target companies with products that cut greenhouse gases or help people adapt to a warmer world, in sectors from agriculture to power and construction (Reuters, October 18, 2007).

In addition to SCM, Deutsche Bank also has the RREEF Infrastructure, part of RREEF Alternative Investments, headquartered in New York with main hubs in Sydney, Singapore, and London. RREEF Infrastructure has more than €6.7 billion in assets under management.

One of its main targets is utilities, including electricity networks, water-treatment or distribution operations, and natural-gas networks.
In October 2007, RREEF partnered with Goldman Sachs, GE, Prudential, and Babcok & Brown Ltd. to bid unsuccessfully for U.K.’s water utility Southern Water.

§ Crediting the boom in European infrastructure investment, the RREEF fund by August 2007 had raised €2 billion (U.S.$2.8 billion); Europe’s infrastructure market is valued at between U.S.$4 trillion to U.S.$6 trillion (DowJones Financial News Online, August 7, 2007).

§ Bulgaria – Deutsche Bank Bulgaria is planning to participate in large infrastructure projects, including public-private partnership projects in water and sewage worth up to €1 billion (Sofia Echo Media, February 26, 2008).

§ Middle East – Along with Ithmaar Bank B.S.C. (an private-equity investment bank in Bahrain), Deutsche Bank co-managed a U.S.$2 billion Shari’a-compliant Infrastructure and Growth Capital Fund and plans to target U.S.$630 billion in regional infrastructure.

Deutsche Bank AG is co-owner of Aqueduct Capital (UK) Limited which in 2006 offered to buy U.K.’s sixth-largest water utility Sutton and East Surrey Water plc from British tycoon Guy Hand.

According to an OFWAT consultation paper (May 2007), Deutsche Bank formed this new entity, Aqueduct Capital (short for ACUK), in October 2005, with two public pension funds in Canada, Singapore’s life insurance giant, and a Canadian province’s investment fund, among others.

This case, again, is an illustration of the complex nature of ownership of water utilities today, with various types of institutions crossing national boundaries to partner with each other to hold a stake in the water sector.

With its impressive war chest dedicated to water, food, and infrastructure, Deutsche Bank is expected to become a major player in the global water sector.

Other Mega-Banks Eyeing Water as Hot Investment

Merrill Lynch (before being bought by Bank of America) issued a 24-page research report titled “Water scarcity; a bigger problem than assumed” (December 6, 2007).

ML said that water scarcity is “not limited to arid climates.”Morgan Stanley in its publication, “Emerging Markets Infrastructure: Just Getting Started” (April 2008) recommends three areas of investment opportunities in water: water utilities, global operators (such as Veolia Environment), and technology companies (such as those that manufacture membranes and chemicals used in water treatment to the water industry).

Mutual Funds and Hedge Funds Join the Action in Water

Water investment funds are on the rise, such as these four well-known water-focused mutual funds:
1. Calvert Global Water Fund (CFWAX) – $42 million in assets as of 2010, which holds 30% of its assets in water utilities, 40% in infrastructure companies, and 30% in water technologies. Also between 65% to 70% of the water stocks derived more than 50% of their revenue from water-related activities.

2. Allianz RCM Global Water Fund (AWTAX) – $54 million assets as of 2010, most of it invested in water utilities.

3. PFW Water Fund (PFWAX) – $17 million in assets as of 2010, with a minimum investment of $2,500, with 80% invested in water-related companies….

4. Kinetics Water Infrastructure Advantaged Fund (KWIAX) – $26 million in assets as of 2010, with a minimum investment of $2,500.

This is a brief list of water-centered hedge funds:

§ Master Water Equity Fund – Summit Global AM (United States)
§ Water Partners Fund – Aqua Terra AM (United States)
§ The Water Fund – Terrapin AM (United States)
§ The Reservoir Fund – Water AM (United States)
§ The Oasis Fund – Perella Weinberg AM (United States)
§ Signina Water Fund – Signina Capital AG (Switzerland)
§ MFS Water Fund of Funds – MFS Aqua AM (Australia)
§ Triton Water Fund of Funds – FourWinds CM (United States)
§ Water Edge Fund of Funds – Parker Global Strategies LLC (United States)

Other banks have launched water-targeted investment funds.
Several well-known specialized water funds include Pictet Water Fund, SAM Sustainable Water Fund, Sarasin Sustainable Water Fund, Swisscanto Equity Fund Water, and Tareno Waterfund.

Several structured water products offered by major investment banks include ABN Amro Water Stocks Index Certificate, BKB Water Basket, ZKB Sustainable Basket Water, Wagelin Water Shares Certificate, UBS Water Strategy Certificate, and Certificate on Vontobel Water Index.

There are also several water indexes and index funds, as follows:

Credit Suisse Water Index
HSBC Water, Waste, and Pollution Control Index
Merrill Lynch China Water Index
S&P Global Water Index
First Trust ISE Water Index Fund (FIW)
International Securities Exchange’s ISE-B&S Water Index

The following is a small sample of other water funds and certificates (not exhaustive of the current range of diverse water products available):

Allianz RCM Global EcoTrends Fund
Allianz RCM Global Water Fund
UBS Water Strategy Certificate–it has a managed basket of 25 international stocks
Summit Water Equity Fund
Maxxwater Global Water Fund
Claymore S&P Global Water ETF (CGW)
Barclays Global Investors’ iShares S&P Global Water
Barclays and PDL’s Protected Water Fund based on Barclays World Water Strategy
Invesco’s PowerShares Water Resources Portfolio ETF (PHO)
Invesco’s PowerShares Global Water (PIO)
Pictet Asset Management’s Pictet Water Fund and Pictet Water Opportunities Fund
Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce’s Water Growth Deposit Notes
Criterion Investments Limited’s Criterion Water Infrastructure Fund

One often-heard reason for the investment banks’ rush to control of water is that “Utilities are viewed as relatively safe assets in an economic downturn so [they] are more isolated than most from the global credit crunch, initially sparked by concerns over U.S. subprime mortgages” (Reuters, October 9, 2007).

A London-based analyst at HSBC Securities told Bloomberg News that water is a good investment because “You’re buying something that’s inflation proof and there’s no threat to earnings really.
It’s very stable and you can sell it any time you want” (Bloomberg, October 8, 2007).

More Pension Funds Investing in Water

Many pension funds have entered the water sector as a relatively safe sector for investment.
For example, BT Pension Scheme (of British Telecom plc) has bought stakes in Thames Water in 2012, while Canadian pension funds CDPQ (Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec, which manages public pension funds in Québec) and CPPIB (Canada Pension Plan Investment Board) have acquired England’s South East Water and Anglian Water, respectively, as reported by Reuters this year.

Sovereign Wealth Investment Funds Jumping into Water

In January 2012, China Investment Corporation has bought 8.68% stakes in Thames Water, the largest water utility in England, which serves parts of the Greater London area, Thames Valley, and Surrey, among other areas.

In November 2012, One of the world’s largest sovereign wealth funds, the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA), also purchased 9.9% stake in Thames Water.Billionaires Sucking up Water Globally:
George H.W. Bush and Family, Li Ka-shing, the Filipino Billionaires, and Others.

Not only are the mega-banks investing heavily in water, the multibillionaire tycoons are also buying water.

Update on Hong Kong Multibillionaire Li Ka-shing’s Water Acquisition

In summer 2011, the Hong Kong multibillionaire tycoon Li Ka-shing who owns Cheung Kong Infrastructure (CKI), bought Northumbrian Water, which serves 2.6 million people in northeastern England, for $3.9 billion (see this and this).

CKI also sold Cambridge Water for £74 million to HSBC in 2011.
Not satisfied with controlling the water sector, in 2010, CKI with a consortium bought EDF’s power networks in UK for £5.8 billion.

Li is now also collaborating with Samsung on investing in water treatment.

Warren Buffet Buys Nalco, a Chemical Maker and Water Process Technology Company

Through his Berkshire Hathaway, Warren Buffet is the largest institutional investor of Nalco Holding Co. (NLC), a subsidiary of Ecolab, with 9 million shares. Nalco was named 2012 Water Technology Company of the Year.

Nalco manufactures treatment chemicals and water treatment process technologies.
But the company Nalco is not just a membrane manufacturer; it also produced the infamous toxic chemical dispersant Corexit which was used to disperse crude oil in the aftermath of BP’s oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010.

Before being sold to Ecolab, Nalco’s parent company was Blackstone……

Former President George H.W. Bush’s Family Bought 300,000 Acres on South America’s and World’s Largest Aquifer, Acuifero Guaraní

In my 2008 article, I overlooked the astonishingly large land purchases (298,840 acres, to be exact) by the Bush family in 2005 and 2006.
In 2006, while on a trip to Paraguay for the United Nation’s children’s group UNICEF, Jenna Bush (daughter of former President George W. Bush and granddaughter of former President George H.W. Bush) reportedly bought 98,840 acres of land in Chaco, Paraguay, near the Triple Frontier (Bolivia, Brazil, and Paraguay).

This land is said to be near the 200,000 acres purchased by her grandfather, George H.W. Bush, in 2005.
The lands purchased by the Bush family sit over not only South America’s largest aquifer – but the world’s as well – Acuifero Guaraní, which runs beneath Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, and Uruguay.

This aquifer is larger than Texas and California combined.Online political magazine Counterpunch quoted Argentinean pacifist Adolfo Perez Esquivel, the winner of 1981 Nobel Peace Prize, who “warned that the real war will be fought not for oil, but for water, and recalled that Acuifero Guaraní is one of the largest underground water reserves in South America….”

According to Wikipedia, this aquifer covers 1,200,000 km², with a volume of about 40,000 km³, a thickness of between 50 m and 800 m and a maximum depth of about 1,800 m.

It is estimated to contain about 37,000 km³ of water (arguably the largest single body of groundwater in the world, although the overall volume of the constituent parts of the Great Artesian Basin is much larger), with a total recharge rate of about 166 km³/year from precipitation.

It is said that this vast underground reservoir could supply fresh drinking water to the world for 200 years.

Filipino Tycoon Manuel V. Pangilinan and Others Buy Water Services in Vietnam

In October 2012, Filipino businessman Manuel V. Pangilinan went to Vietnam to scout for investment opportunities, particularly on toll road and water services. Mr. Pangilinan and other Filipino billionaires, such as the owners of the Ayala Corp. and subsidiary Manila Water Co. earlier announced a deal to buy a 10-per cent stake in Ho Chi Minh City Infrastructure Investment Joint Stock Co. (CII) and a 49-per cent stake in Kenh Dong Water Supply Joint Stock Co. (Kenh Dong).

The Ayala group has also entered the Vietnamese market by buying significant minority interest in a leading infrastructure company and a bulk water supply company both based in Ho Chi Minh City.

Water Grabbing Is Unstoppable

Unfortunately, the global water and infrastructure-privatization fever is unstoppable: many local and state governments are suffering from revenue shortfalls and are under financial and budgetary strains.

These local and state governments can longer shoulder the responsibilities of maintaining and upgrading their own utilities.
Facing offers of millions of cash from Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup, UBS, and other elite banks for their utilities and other infrastructure and municipal services, cities and states will find it extremely difficult to refuse these privatization offers.

The elite multinational and Wall Street banks and investment banks have been preparing and waiting for this golden moment for years.
Over the past few years, they have amassed war chests of infrastructure funds to privatize water, municipal services, and utilities all over the world.

It will be extremely difficult to reverse this privatization trend in water.

References for Several Articles Mentioned“Goldman Sachs eyes bid for Veolia Water,” by Anousha Sakoui and Daniel Schäfer, Financial Times, March 13, 2012.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/183cfae4-6d21-11e1-a7c7-00144feab49a.html#axzz2CM8OLnFQ
“Hong Kong tycoon to buy Northumbrian Water,” by Mark Wembridge, Financial Times, August 2, 2011.
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/3df07960-bcdb-11e0-bdb1-00144feabdc0.html#axzz2CM8OLnFQ
“Why Big Banks May Be Buying up Your Public Water System: In uncertain economic and environmental times, big banks and financial groups are buying up public water systems as safe investments,” by Jo-Shing Yang, AlterNet, October 31, 2008.
http://www.alternet.org/zstory/105083/why_big_banks_may_be_trying_to_buy_up_your_public_water_system
“Barclays Capital Backs Water Fund,” by Dylan Lobo, October 11, 2007. Reuters.
http://uk.reuters.com/article/2007/10/11/citywire-barclays-water-idUKNOA13736320071011
“Investors Gush Over SouthWest Water Buyout,” March 3, 2010, Forbes.
http://www.forbes.com/2010/03/03/southwest-water-novell-markets-equities-deals-marketnewsvideo.html
“Hideout or Water Raid? Bush’s Paraguay Land Grab,” by CP News Wire, Counterpunch, October 22-26, 2006.
http://www.counterpunch.org/2006/10/20/bush-s-paraguay-land-grab/
“Paraguay in a spin about Bush’s alleged 100,000 acre hideaway,” by Tom Phillips, The Guardian, October 22, 2006.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2006/oct/23/mainsection.tomphillips
“Cities Debate Privatizing Public Infrastructure,” by Jenny Anderson, August 26, 2008, The New York Times.
http://w.nytimes.com/2008/08/27/business/27fund.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0
“Philippine tycoon eyes investments in Vietnam,” by Doris C. Dunlao in Manila, Philippine Daily Inquirer, October 18, 2012.
http://my.news.yahoo.com/philippine-tycoon-eyes-investments-vietnam-060002777.html

Jo-Shing Yang is an independent researcher and author of “Ecological Planning, Design, & Engineering. Solving Global Water Crises: New Paradigms in Wastewater and Water Treatment. Small and On-Site Systems for Water Self-Sufficiency and Sustainability.”
 
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Another story that has been buried!


Reports:
Fast Food Companies Outsource $7 Billion In Annual Labor Costs To Taxpayers

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McDonald's: leading the pack in outsourcing labor costs.

​
Two new reports released this week have shed light on how America’s fast food companies have quietly outsourced a significant chunk of their labor costs to the taxpayer, with more than half of the industry’s 3.65 million low-wage workers on public assistance at a cost of $7 billion each year.

Researchers at the University of California, Berkeley released a study on Tuesday showing that front-line fast food workers earning a median wage of $8.69 an hour are more than twice as likely to rely on public benefits programs as the rest of the workforce – 52% compared to 25%.

Of that $7 billion, well over half – $3.9 billion – is spent on Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) for fast food workers and their families.

UC Berkeley’s researchers found that 68% of these low-wage earners are the main breadwinners in their households, with over a quarter raising children.

A companion report released by the National Employment Law Project found that the 10 biggest fast food corporations in the country are responsible for nearly 60%, or $3.8 billion, of the annual $7 billion outlaid by the taxpayer for low-wage workers.

These same 10 companies made a cumulative $7.4 billion in profits in 2012, paying out an additional $7.7 billion in dividends and buybacks to shareholders.

The NELP compared just how much the public purse subsidizes labor costs at each of these ten restaurant chains.
McDonald's MCD -3.61% topped the list, costing the taxpayer $1.2 billion annually in public assistance programs for their low-paid workers.

Yum Brands comes in at a distant number two, with its Pizza Hut, Taco Bell and KFC subsidiaries costing $648 million in benefits programs for workers each year.


fastfoodcost1.jpg

Chart courtesy NELP

​
The chair of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) reacted to the two reports in a statement to the press, describing the figures as “stark.”

“Anyone concerned about the federal deficit only needs to look at this report to understand a major source of the problem: multi-billion dollar companies that pay poverty wages and then rely on taxpayers to pick up the slack, to the tune of a quarter of a trillion dollars every year in the form of public assistance to working families,” said Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa).

“Seven billion of this is just for fast food workers, more than half of whom, even working full time, still must rely on programs like food stamps and Medicaid just to make ends meet.”

“In a nation as wealthy as the United States, no one who works hard for a living should live in poverty,” Harkin added.

“Underpaying workers affects us all. These highly-profitable companies paying poverty wages should raise wages and listen to their workers’ demands to form a union. We should also increase the minimum wage, as I have proposed. These steps are not only the right thing to do for low-wage workers, but also the smart thing to do for the economy and fortaxpayers.”
 
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Welcome To The Recovery: 40% of Americans Live Paycheck To Paycheck
(Up From 30% In 2012)
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-...y-40-americans-live-paycheck-paycheck-30-2012


​
Nothing screams economic recovery like 2 out of every 5 Americans living paycheck to paycheck.
Especially when that number has reportedly increased by 33% since 2012.

Perhaps someone should inform these destitute plebs that the stock market is up nearly 45% over the past two years, and after all, nothing says economic success like the 0.01% enriching themselves via fraud and financial engineering.

Here are two of the most sobering findings from the survery:


  • 40 percent of the consumers we surveyed said they are coping with the challenge of living paycheck to paycheck, up from 31 percent in 2012.
  • Today just 23 percent say they are optimistic about the economy, down from 27 percent at the beginning of the recession in 2009.

If that’s not enough for you, check out these additional excerpts from the summary:

The slow start to the holiday shopping season underlines the findings of McKinsey’s latest Consumer Sentiment Survey. Every six to twelve months since August 2008, we have asked a representative sample of at least 1,000 Americans about their views on the economy and their own financial future, and how these opinions are shaping their buying decisions. The result is a unique data set that tracks how attitudes and behaviors have changed over the past six years. In addition, we have completed nine surveys outside the U.S., giving our data a global perspective.

Here are the salient findings from this year’s survey:

Our report in September 2012 showed that things were looking up for most Americans.
Many aspects of consumer sentiment indicated marked improvement.

Yet from there, things have either plateaued or gotten worse.
Consumers are still worried about losing their jobs (39 percent in 2014), and 40 percent of the consumers we surveyed said they are coping with the challenge of living paycheck to paycheck, up from 31 percent in 2012.

The significant economic pressure that families earning less than $75,000 a year feel has caused many of them to make spending adjustments in order to make ends meet.

Roughly 40 percent of these households say they are making changes, including cutting back and delaying purchases, as compared to 22 percent of those in households earning at least $150,000 a year.

Americans at all income levels have yet to return to their pre-recession positive feelings about the country’s economy.
Today just 23 percent say they are optimistic about the economy, down from 27 percent at the beginning of the recession in 2009.

While the number of consumers cutting back on spending has stabilized, Americans are still pinching pennies.
Decreasing purchases of high-end brands and doing more one-stop shopping to reduce the number of trips are just as popular as they were last year, with 40 percent of consumers saying they have cut their spending over the past 12 months.

An even bigger proportion of Americans (55 percent) say they continue to look for ways to save money, including paying more attention to prices, using coupons more often, shopping around to get the best deals, and buying more items in bulk.

Multiple years of austerity have left consumers with altered views about spending.
Almost 40 percent say they will probably never go back to their pre-recession approach to buying.

Twenty-nine percent say they now have new attitudes and values about spending, a figure that’s up from 17 percent in 2010.
Another 24 percent claim that their opposition to increased spending is due to a change in their economic situation.


​
With recoveries like these, who needs recessions.

For more recent articles documenting the so-called “recovery,” which in reality has been little more than theft by a handful of families and connected players, read:

Welcome to the Recovery – U.S. Child Homelessness Hits Record as Poverty in Mass. is Highest Since 1960

Welcome to the Recovery Part 2 – Washington D.C.’s Homeless Population Expected to Rise 16% in 2014



 
Top 2014 Hypocrites When It Comes to Capitalist Me-First Entitlements


ahypo.jpg


There were countless candidates, from individuals to corporations to government officials, all of whom combine the capitalist sense of me-first entitlement with a disdain for the needs of others.

Individuals: The Public is Blocking My Freedom To Take from the Public​

AIG's Hank Greenberg, who saved about $300 million when his high-risk insurance company was bailed out by our tax money, sued the federal government because he felt cheated by the bailout, even though without the bailout his stock would have dropped to zero.

Next is Cliven Bundy, who refused to pay grazing fees for the use of our public land, then turned around and blamed government for not maintaining the fences on the land when one of his cattle strayed onto the highway and caused an accident.

Finally we have Exxon CEO Rex Tillerson, who criticized fracking regulations for "holding back the American economic recovery," and then protested when a fracking water tower was to be built near his home.

Corporations: Sure We Don't Pay Our Taxes, But We Want Tax Relief Anyway​

Tax avoidance is reaching new levels of hypocrisy.
Caterpillar, which complained that government failure to spend on infrastructure impedes its business, is recognized as a leading avoider of the federal taxes that could pay for infrastructure.

Pfizer had 40% of its 2013 sales in the U.S., but claimed all of its profits overseas.

Medtronic is one of the biggest names in the so-called inversions that allow companies to desert the country that provided decades of publicly funded research in technology and medicine.

As a further insult to the American taxpayer, much of the untaxed corporate foreign income is actually held in U.S. banks and stocks and other assets.
Microsoft, for example, at one point held 93 percent of its offshore profits in U.S. assets.

Charter Schools: We're Public Schools. No, We're Not Public Schools​

In her quest for public space for her Success Academy charter schools, Eva Moskowitz argued:
"We want educational justice. We want access to educational excellence and opportunity."

But when the State of New York wanted to audit the school's finances, Success Academy objected on the grounds that the State lacked the authority to do so, even though the state constitution authorizes audits of all public schools, including charters.

It's easy to understand the charter school's reluctance to open its books.
The Wall Street Journal reported:
"Lease documents show the city is paying almost $18,000 in rent for every student at the Success Academy that opened last month in Washington Heights, in the former Mother Cabrini High School...The rental fees come on top of $13,777 for every student that taxpayers provide to charters, which are publicly funded and independently operated."

Eva Moskowitz makes $72 per student as CEO of the private Success Academy in New York City, while Carmen Farina makes 19 cents per student as Chancellor of New York City Public Schools.

Politicians: Of Course We're Guided by Public Opinion -- We Always Do the Opposite​

Despite the fact that Medicaid has slashed medical expenses among the poor, and despite the fact that Americans are strongly in favor of Medicaid expansion, and despite the fact that opting out of Medicaid leaves 5.7 million Americans without vital health insurance coverage...

...Despite all that, 24 states opted out of Medicaid this year.

A comprehensive political study found that "economic elites...have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy, while average citizens...have little or no independent influence."

In other words, Congress passes laws that are desired by the rich, and skips on laws that are desired by the middle class.

Laughable If Not Sad: Suing Climate Change, and Beautifying Pollution​

In response to flooding claims, Farmers Insurance filed suit on behalf of its customers against Chicago-area communities for not recognizing the threat of global warming and fortifying local sewers.

Worse yet, with a note of irony, any success by Farmers to collect on the lawsuit (which was later dropped) would have meant that the insurance company's own customers would be paying damages through their tax money.

And finally, the Susan G. Komen Foundation, the leading proponent of breast cancer awareness and thus presumably health conscious, accepted $100,000 from oil giant Baker Hughes, which will paint their fracking drill bits pink in honor of the foundation's pink-ribbon logo.

Hypocrisy on both sides.

And the year isn't over yet.

Paul Buchheit is a writer for progressive publications, and the founder and developer of social justice and educational websites (UsAgainstGreed.org, PayUpNow.org, RappingHistory.org).


 
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Jim Hightower:
Frightening SWAT Team Raid Called in on Business for
'Barbering Without a License'

Armament giants have discovered a new market: the militarization of our local and state police agencies.
​


It can be tough policing the mean streets in these days of desperation, when drug cartels and other hardened criminals are out there ... somewhere ... you really can't know where, until they strike, and another civilian is marked with a V -- for Victim.

But the good people of Orange Country, Florida, are lucky, because they've got the astonishing team of the Department of Business and Professional Regulation and the Orange County Sheriffs Office keeping watch, ready and able to preempt any criminal gang before it can strike locals with the dreaded V. I
n fact, a recent ruling by a U.S. Court of Appeals documents the truly incredible vigilance of this dynamic policing duo.

The DBPR/OCSO target in this case was a suspicious enterprise calling itself Strictly Skillz, and the agents spent a month carefully planning a joint sweep operation including a fully armed SWAT team in full battle dress.

On the day of the raid, the team first sealed off the parking lot; next, two plainclothes cops entered to size up the danger; and then -- BAM! -- the SWAT team hit the unsuspecting subjects.

Wearing riot gear and brandishing their guns, the team seized half a dozen of the enterprise's kingpins, cuffed them, and then laid them out on the floor, while officers searched the premises for more than an hour.
Alas, nothing criminal was found.

You might assume that this was a narcotics operation, but no.
In fact, Strictly Skillz is just a barbershop.

What possible criminal activity led to this militaristic show of brute force?
"Barbering without a license." That's a mere second-degree misdemeanor, but there was no violation, for all licenses at the shop were valid.

DBPR could've determined that by a routine inspection, but instead the OCSO got involved to muscle the barbers, because ... well, because it has a SWAT team and a military mentality, so it thinks it's above the law.

In this case, the court not only yanked this abusive duo's constitutional chain, but also ridiculed its Keystone Kops routine of SWATing at barbers.
But it's not funny -- for police now run thousands of these farcical SWAT raids a year, and they're rarely held accountable.

They justify their over-the-top response to routine police work with the idea that since they have the equipment, they might as well put it to use.
Multibillion-dollar armament giants have long profited from the constant wars and repressive tactics of police states around the globe, but they've now discovered a hot new growth market here at home: The militarization of our local and state police agencies.

The people of Ferguson, Missouri, learned about the domestic proliferation of battlefield firepower the hard way when their own police department came after them with a Bearcat tank, two armored Humvees, stun grenades, M-16 rifles and other weapons of war.

It's been widely reported that this push into combat gear (and the militant mentality that accompanies it) has largely come from a 1990 congressional act authorizing the Pentagon to disperse surplus war equipment around the country.

Less known, however, is that our corporate arms peddlers have lately leapt into direct sales of their deadly goodies, holding field demonstrations and trade shows to titillate the fancy of police chiefs and other officials.

Long Range Acoustic Device Corporation, for example, makes the long-range sound cannon that was used in Ferguson, literally blasting away demonstrators with ear-shattering pain.

Also, such tear gas makers as Combined Tactical Systems are having a field day supplying and re-supplying police agencies.
Then there's Taser International, whose electrocution gun -- which can stop a heart -- is now on the hip of nearly everyone with a badge.

In September, corporate militarizers paraded their stuff in -- of all places -- Missouri at a shebang called Military Police Expo.
LRAD, CTS and Taser were there, along with a horde of other venders, to meet and greet, schmooze with and sell to a crowd of "civilian law enforcement and chiefs of police" who were invited to enjoy a shopping spree.

A coalition of citizen groups are organizing to stop this pernicious sale of arms to be used against ... well, us citizens.
For information, go to www.FacingTearGas.org.


Jim Hightower is a national radio commentator, writer, public speaker, and author of the new book, "Swim Against the Current: Even a Dead Fish Can Go With the Flow." (Wiley, March 2008) He publishes the monthly "Hightower Lowdown," co-edited by Phillip Frazer.




 
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