There was talk about renaming the Krugman thread for this purpose, but that seems to be going nowhere. Besides which, I feel the Krugman thread should be left to discuss Krugman while this thread can be used for more general economic discussion.
Discuss:
- The merits of competing theories.
- The role of the government in managing the economy.
- The causes of and solutions to our current economic woes.
- Comparisons between the economic systems of different countries.
- Theoretical and existing alternatives to our current market system.
edited 17th Dec '12 10:58:52 AM by Topazan
Uber is currently facing 70 lawsuits in federal court
My important take from the numbers list at the bottom of the article is this: The biggest lawsuit they face is $100 million. Their valuation is $60 billion.
Kind of tells me that the way to get ahead in business is not to hide your crimes, but to simply commit so many crimes that you end up billions of dollars ahead of your fines when the dust settles.
Blowout soon fellow Stalker
What was that old sorta urban legend or whatever about how Ford found it cheaper to pay out injury and death settlements than to fix the Pinto?
Oh really when?
Causing freakouts over sourcing since 2018
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
The myth says the document was regarding the cost of the shielding that would have to be retrofitted to every Pinto to reduce the likelihood of a fuel tank fire vs the likely payouts from civil suits resulting from such fires, with the cost of shielding being significantly higher than the total expected payout. (See page 9 onwards) Apparently the $200K cost figure that resulted in the outrage was actually based on the cost of a human life estimated by the NTHSA at the time. The NTHSA did in fact scrap a proposal for truck rear under-ride bumpers due to the proposal in question failing such a test.
Of course, the Pinto wouldn't have passed muster in a modern crash test.
Or you scrape together enough money to lobby your local representative to strike down laws you would find inconvenient...
edited 9th Jul '16 6:12:14 AM by Krieger22
I have disagreed with her a lot, but comparing her to republicans and propagandists of dictatorships is really low. - An idiot
Visiting from the Hoag Galaxy
Keep in mind, valuation is not the same as money on hand. Tumblr had a high valuation, but no one's been able to get a consistent profit out of it. Uber might have some of that money, but a company very rarely has access to the money the valuation implies.
Not Three Laws compliant.
Fuck you, Fascist sympathizers
They could always cash out some of their valuation, but that cedes some control to an outside party and the very act of having to do so lowers the valuation anyway.
The thing with lawsuits though is that any corporation of that size has that all covered by insurance, right? Or do the lawsuits come out of general operating expenses?
V
Any payouts will come out on the Balance Sheet as a one-off expense.
Professional Forum Ninja
Not sure if all of those Uber suits are actual wrongdoing, though the one I'm thinking of is at the state level. Upstate NY cab drivers are trying to push regulations that would force rideshare services to adhere to the same regulations that currently exist for taxi service (as a condition for Uber to be able to operate upstate.).
edited 10th Jul '16 9:04:12 PM by Elle
One Winged Egret
I haven't read the article, but the point is that Uber avoids being regulated in the way taxis are simply by not calling themselves a taxi service. At best they're exploiting a loophole in the law.
edited 10th Jul '16 9:26:57 PM by Clarste
The law itself, though, is designed in many places to preserve the monopoly on transportation services that taxi companies enjoy.
V
So, what would you want a deregulated Taxi market to look like?
IMF warns Italy of two-decade-long recession
Italian banks suffered fresh heavy losses on Monday as the European Union insisted that Matteo Renzi’s centre-left government abide by state-aid rules that limit Rome’s scope to provide help to banks burdened by the non-performing loans (NPLs) caused by economic stagnation.
The IMF said Italy was “recovering gradually from a deep and protracted recession”, but said the healing process was likely to be “prolonged and subject to risks”. It used its article IV consultation – an annual economic and financial health check – to stress that Italy was vulnerable to a cocktail of threats that could have knock-on effects for the rest of Europe and the world.
The IMF’s forecast says it will be the mid-2020s before Italy’s economy returns to its pre-2007 levels. During this period of slow recuperation, the country would grow relatively poorer compared with other eurozone countries, while its banks would continue to be heavily exposed to economic shocks.
“Downside risks arise from delays in addressing bank asset quality, intensified global financial market volatility – including from Brexit, the global trade slowdown weighing on exports, and the refugee influx and security threats that could further complicate policymaking,” said the IMF.
“If downside risks were to materialise, regional and global spillovers could be significant, given Italy’s systemic weight.”
Britain’s vote to leave the European Union has led to investors focusing on the problems of the Italian banking sector, fearing that renewed turmoil in the eurozone will lead to lower growth, a fresh wave of bankruptcies, and an increase in NPLs. Unicredit, Italy’s biggest bank, has lost a third of its value since 23 June, and its shares fell by almost 4% on Monday.
The IMF said: “With the economy turning around, non-performing loans appear to be stabilising at about 18% of loans, one of the highest in the eurozone.” These bad debts, it added, meant that profit margins in Italian banks were among the lowest in Europe and were also affecting their ability to lend.
The IMF said Italian banks had raised more money during 2015 to boost their financial resilience, but still had capital ratios that were below the eurozone average. It noted that despite further measures imposed on a few specific banks, concerns about NP Ls and weak profitability in a period of low interest rates, Italian banks had “come under intense market pressure, losing over 40% of their market value this year”.
The report highlighted other weaknesses, including low productivity and investment growth, an 11% unemployment rate, and a national debt that had risen to 133% of GDP, limiting the scope for Renzi’s government to use tax cuts or higher public spending in an attempt to boost growth.
Italy is in talks with the European commission to allow public support for its weakest lenders, including Monte dei Paschi di Siena. State aid to banks is allowed by European Union rules only in exceptional circumstances, when “a serious disturbance” emerges in the economy.
Amid signs that Italy might be prepared to have a confrontation with the EU, the country’s finance minister, Pier Carlo Padoan, said Rome would safeguard the interests of savers. The government faces a close-fought referendum on constitutional reforms later this year, on which Renzi’s political fate hinges, and is wary of angering small investors.
Theresa May looks to Germany for board reform
Under German rules enacted 40 years ago last month, labour representatives hold half of the seats on the supervisory boards of any company with 2,000 or more workers. Mitbestimmung was a British invention. It was introduced on a large scale by British occupying authorities in the postwar German coal and steel industry, to “prevent it remilitarising”, says Markus Roth, an authority on comparative corporate governance at the Philipps-Universität Marburg.
Experts say it played a critical role in the German Wirtschaftswunder, or economic miracle, creating a model of labour relations based on consensus rather than confrontation. It was also one of the reasons Germany was able to avoid the industrial strife that paralysed Britain’s economy in the 1970s.
Mitbestimmung is supposed to make big companies more democratic by allowing information to pass more quickly from the shop floor to the C-suite, and ensuring a wider range of views are heard in the boardroom.
Its virtues were manifested during the 2008-9 financial crisis, when companies placed thousands of employees in short-time work schemes. “It allowed them to hang on to their workers rather than fire them,” says Anke Hassel, professor of public policy at the Hertie School of Governance. “That happened because of co-operative trade unions and works councils.”
But it has not been without its critics. Some experts say labour representatives can sometimes become too closely aligned with corporate interests and end up conniving with management at the expense of the workers.
Works councils and labour reps at Volkswagen, for example, did not help to uncover the carmaker’s diesel emissions scandal last year.
There have also been concerted efforts by some companies to evade the rules, either through outsourcing jobs or putting employees on temporary contracts, thereby bringing their workforce below the 2,000 threshold.
United Earth
Taxis don't need "deregulation", they need "reregulation". Allow free competition, and add new rules forcing the taxis to keep up a certain standard of quality in the rides and a universal tariff with every case scenario spelled out to the passenger, which they may consult at any point of the ride.
Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.
(Equiblog) Technological change and the future demand for labor
Basically there's going to be more demand for even more highly well trained labor as Robots become common place, I believe it's saying.
V
That's exactly what Taxis are like in the UK, even down to the tariff displayed in the cab that covers the Licencing Area (usually a Local Council).
Mind you, we also have "Private Hire" cars (aka. minicabs), which is a lot like Uber is doing, except these work by telephone (or online) and the fare is worked out in advance (which also applies for Taxis "Hackney Cabs" out of area).
edited 12th Jul '16 8:44:55 AM by Greenmantle
Keep Rolling On
Fuck you, Fascist sympathizers
May doesn't seem as bad as some of the alternatives, her frightful views on mass surveillance notwithstanding.
I feel like worker representation on corporate boards should be mandatory for any institution that uses a board as its governance structure. And not just one token worker, either, unless it's only a 5-person board or something. If it's a big 12-person board, probably have three workers, and then two community representatives too.
I can't really say I'd be in favor of handing over the governance of something made of my money to citizens at large.
Well, I'd rather have several viewpoints represented than only the shareholders'. A company doesn't operate in a vacuum and its actions have consequences on the community it's operating in.
Fuck you, Fascist sympathizers
The idea is that you have an obligation to more than just yourself and your shareholders, but also to your employees and to the community in which you are centered. That's the German model of corporate governance. Giving the latter two a voice in the board (but not a controlling voice, even combined) helps stem the ability of the company to roll on "profit at any cost" plans.
V
The term you may be looking for is Stakeholder.
Lost in Space
Equiblog: How other nations handle student debt and what the United States could learn from them
- The repayment term for U.S. student loans is typically 10 years, while many other nations use 20-30 year periods. This reduces principal payments and as such increases aggregate demand.
- The Australian system handles loan repayment through automatic withholding, pausing payments if the individual's income drops below ~$40K. This means that in downturns people don't suddenly go into default, meaning they have more money to spend in the economy.
V
Or if they're in a job that doesn't earn about the threshold...
Keep Rolling On
So it's official that the UK is leaving the European Single Market.
This should be interesting. Especially in the Chinese sense.
"Yup. That tasted purple."
What is the Single Market, if I may ask in my eternal ignorance?
