1 South Korea launches stimulus package (Straits
Times) South Korea's new government has announced a 11.2 trillion won fiscal
stimulus package, increasing social welfare subsidies and taking the first
steps to deliver on President Moon Jae-in's key election promise - to create
810,000 public sector jobs.
The stimulus package allocates 5.4 trillion won to
create public sector and social services jobs, including places for fire
fighters, teachers and postal workers, the finance ministry said. Another 2.3
trillion won will be used to provide subsidies for maternity leave and for
elderly people needing medical care.
The government estimates the extra spending will
boost economic growth by 0.2 percentage point this year, which may raise its
2017 outlook from the current 2.6 per cent. It expects to the extra budget to
add 71,000 jobs to the public sector workforce and 15,000 jobs to the private
sector.
Unemployment among those aged 15-29 soared to 11.2
per cent in April, even though the economy posted the fastest growth in six
quarters in the January-March period. Addressing a widening income gap and
sluggish domestic demand is a major challenge for policymakers, especially as
exports have only just begun to turn around after falling for almost two years.
Calls for government subsidies will only increase as
more than 35,000 workers are expected to be laid off by the end of this year
from the shipbuilding industry alone. From December 2015 to February this year,
about 41,000 workers lost their jobs at shipbuilders as a broad global downturn
in demand and plunging commodity prices sapped the industry.
2 A world of crypto anarchists (Jamie Bartlett in
The Guardian) Crypto-anarchists are mostly computer-hacking, anti-state
libertarians who have been kicking around the political fringes for two
decades, trying to warn a mostly uninterested public about the dangers of a
world where everything is connected and online.
They also believe that digital technology, provided
citizens are able to use encryption themselves, is the route to a stateless
paradise, since it undermines government’s ability to monitor, control and tax
its people. Crypto-anarchists build software – think of it as political
computer code – that can protect us online.
Julian Assange is a crypto-anarchist, and so perhaps
is Edward Snowden. Once the obsessive and nerdy kids in school, they are now
the ones who fix your ransomware blunder or start up unicorn tech firms. They
are the sort of people who run the technology that runs the world.
Crypto-anarchy is taking over the world, since
millions now unwittingly rely on it for online security, and more are
scrambling after blockchain and bitcoin ideas, desperate not to be left behind.
That governments, businesses and friendly liberal types are falling over
themselves to import exciting new tech that has been explicitly designed to
undermine them is a bit of an inside joke.
At some point, and probably sooner than we think,
the current left and right offerings of the major parties, including the
populist, will start to appear ludicrous and unworkable. New political
movements and ideas will arrive before long for this industrial revolution,
especially once the majority of the population will soon have grown up online.
Perhaps there will be some back-to-the-earth,
off-grid thinking reminiscent of the 1970s. More likely is that groups who will
embrace the changes and experiment with entirely new forms of governance and
society, will emerge. After all, they were right about digital technology,
about surveillance and bitcoin and most of us ignored them. And for better or
worse, I think they’re probably right about this too.
3 Global beer sales drying up (BBC) People are
drinking fewer alcoholic drinks, according to a new industry report tracking
consumption worldwide. Beer sales continued to slide last year and the trend
towards cider sipping stalled.
The global market for all alcoholic drinks
contracted 1.3% in 2016, driven by a 1.8% fall in beer sales, the International
Wine and Spirits Record found. Cider sales went in reverse, down 1.5% after
several years of growth. The overall contraction of international alcohol sales
is far greater than the average dip of 0.3% in the previous five years.
The IWSR market report for 2016 found global wine
sales to be relatively flat, down 0.1% and spirits consumption grew 0.3%. UK
gin makers could be boosted as the so-called gin revival continued, with sales
of the iconic British tipple up 3.7% globally.
Although global GDP increased 3.5% in 2016,
according to the IMF, and economic growth usually correlates with increased
alcohol consumption several major economies, China, Russia and Brazil all faced
an economic slowdown or recession. Beer sales in China fell 4.2%, were down
5.3% in Brazil and dipped 7.8% in Russia.
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