neoliberalismo e recessão econômica mundial,

Por: Bruno Santos de Moraes
 O termo “tempestade perfeita” é usado por alguns analistas para identificar diversos fatores negativos na economia que, juntos, culminam em uma recessão. Dentre os fatores que estão sendo identificados nesta quase inevitável recessão, prevista para o ano de 2020, temos:

• a insustentabilidade das políticas de estímulo fiscal feitas nos EUA no pós-crash de 2008;
• superaquecimento da economia norte americana com a inflação subindo acima da meta; 
• perigo de inflação também em outras economias do mundo, forçando os Bancos Centrais a também fazer ajustes monetários; 
• disputa comercial entre EUA e China, com medidas protecionistas do governo estadunidense, devem impactar crescimento econômico mundial; 
• analistas indicam também que, assim como no período pré-2008, a taxa de alavancagem dos EUA está muito alta, provando que Wall Street não aprendeu (ou não quer aprender) com o crash de 2008,

 já que os motivos desta próxima recessão são similares às daquele ano; há ainda uma crise política nos EUA, com um forte indicativo de abertura de processo de impeachment contra o atual presidente Donald Trump. Contudo, o fator mais preocupante desta nova recessão prevista é que os governos no mundo não serão capazes de fornecer ajuda financeira como feito em 2008, dado o alto nível da dívida pública dos países – o que pode tornar esta nova recessão muito mais intensa e duradoura.

Os efeitos sociais negativos do neoliberalismo em países subdesenvolvidos são conhecidos, e a “tempestade perfeita” seguida de recessão econômica mundial está sendo fundamentada na mídia internacional por analistas importantes. O que desejo expor aqui, então, é que não estou vendo nenhum alarde no Brasil sobre a relação catastrófica para a população das duas coisas acontecendo simultaneamente – neoliberalismo e recessão. No atual estágio de globalização que as nações compartilham, nosso país não pode se prender a uma “expectativa sem lastro” baseada em uma onda populista, restringindo os olhares somente aos problemas internos do nosso país sem verificar as questões externas que nos influenciam. É direito do cidadão brasileiro saber os riscos que corre.

Por: Bruno Santos de Moraes
 https://esquerdaonline.com.br/2019/01/14/neoliberalismo-interno-com-recessao-externa-a-cilada-bolsonarista/

 “Record 60 Cargo Ships Wait to Unload at Los Angeles, Long Beach” [Maritime Logistic Professional]. “A record 60 container vessels are at anchor or adrift in the San Pedro Bay, waiting to be unloaded at the Port of Los Angeles/Long Beach seaports and another 20 are due to arrive in coming days, a port executive said on Wednesday. With the pandemic still raging around the world, U.S. consumers have not fully resumed previous spending on restaurants and travel, yet they continue to splurge on goods ranging from appliances and home exercise equipment to sweatpants and toys. Volume at the Port of Los Angeles – the busiest U.S. gateway for trade with Asia – is up 30.3% so far this calendar year. 

"The global supply chain has been reeling due to
- overwhelming demand for cargo;
- temporary COVID-19 closures of ports and factories in Asia;
- shortages of
shipping containers and
key products like resin and computer chips;
- and severe weather.
Transportation costs have spiked, exacerbating delays and fueling product shortages. ‘Disruptions continue at every node in the supply chain,’ said Gene Seroka, executive director at the Port of Los Angeles.

Containers are waiting on Port of Los Angeles docks a peak of six days for truck pickup, Seroka said. Containers on chassis are waiting 8.5 days ‘on the street’ for warehouse space or to be returned empty to the port. There are nearly 8,000 containers ready to be whisked away by train, with the wait clocking in at 11.7 days, Seroka said.”

 “Tech industry braces for skyrocketing rare earth prices” [Nikkei Asia]. “Electronic hardware manufacturers are sweating as prices for rare-earth metals surge amid soaring demand and simmering tensions between the U.S. and China, the world’s most important source of these vital materials…. Demand for rare earths has risen sharply due to their increasing use in cutting-edge technologies, including the booming electric vehicle industry, while the economic recovery from the coronavirus pandemic has fueled demand for electronics. Geopolitics are only making matters worse. China is the only country that has a complete supply chain for rare earths from mining, to refining, to processing. As of last year, it controlled 55% of global production capacity and 85% of refining output for rare-earth elements, according to commodity research specialist Roskill. … Rare earths such as neodymium oxide — a key input for motors and wind turbines — have jumped 21.1% since the beginning of the year, while holmium, which is also used in magnets and magnetostrictive alloys for sensors and actuators, have surged nearly 50% so far this year, according to Shanghai Metals Markets.”

 “Biden sets sights on the meat processing industry while lobbying soars” [Open Secrets]. “The White House took aim last week at meat processing companies for the prices of poultry, beef and pork increasing. The meat processing and products industry has already spent nearly $2.1 million on lobbying in 2021 and is on pace to match or beat its 2020 lobbying spend of $4.1 million. Director of the National Economic Council Brian Deese and other White House officials said just four firms control the majority of the meat processing market, allowing them to push higher prices on consumers while reaping record profits. Since December 2020, the price of beef rose by 14%, pork by 12.1%, and poultry by 6.6%, contributing to over half of the higher costs consumers see at the grocery store, according to the White House. The largest meat processing firms also spend the most on lobbying, according to data compiled by OpenSecrets. A study by the Open Market Institute found that JBS SA, Tyson Foods, Cargill and Smithfield Foods collectively control 53% of the meat processing market. ”

Study of convicted extremists shows open social media platforms play an increasing role in radicalisation

by Nottingham Trent University

 

 

Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain

... those who had radicalized mainly or solely online were the 

least likely to be engaged with an extremist group, cause or ideology, and 

least willing and able to perpetrate violent extremist acts. They were also 

less likely to be socially connected to other extremists offline in the context of the offense and 

more likely to display strong signs of mental illness or personality disorder.

The internet is playing an increasingly prominent role in radicalisation, with a particular rise in the use of open social media platforms, according to a comprehensive analysis of the online activity of convicted extremists in England and Wales.

The research by Nottingham Trent University (NTU) and Her Majesty's Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS) was the first to use closed source data and has been published in a parliamentary report by the Ministry of Justice.

Researchers were given access to more than 230 detailed post-conviction assessments to investigate online and offline activities in the build-up to the offense, together with ratings of risk levels and further characteristics of each individual and case.

The study explored the relationship between online activity and the type of offenses committed among three groups: those who primarily radicalized online; those who primarily radicalized offline; and those radicalized through both online and offline influences.

Findings show that since 2005 the proportion of offenders radicalized online has increased, while at the same time those who were subject primarily to offline influences were found to have decreased.

The types of websites, platforms and applications used by those who are convicted of extremist offenses were found to have changed over time, moving away from specific extremist websites towards the use of open social media platforms.

The research, which included reports containing assessments of overall levels of engagement, intent and capability, also reveals that those who had radicalized mainly or solely online were the least likely to be engaged with an extremist group, cause or ideology, and least willing and able to perpetrate violent extremist acts. They were also less likely to be socially connected to other extremists offline in the context of the offense and more likely to display strong signs of mental illness or personality disorder.

Conversely, those who had radicalized primarily offline were more likely to take on the role of attacker compared against the other two groups and were less likely to follow an Islamist extremist ideology as opposed to another ideological cause.

When analyzing the perceived risk of committing future violent extremist offenses, the 'hybrid' group, which included those who were subject to both online and offline influences, were found to have the highest levels of engagement and intent to commit future extremist offenses, compared to the other pathway groups.

The group primarily radicalized offline were found to have the highest levels of capability to commit future extremist offenses likely to cause serious or significant harm, again compared to the other pathway groups.

Dr. Jonathan Kenyon, HMPPS National Specialist Lead for Extremism, carried out the research as part of a Doctorate in Forensic Psychology. He said: "This current study, using a large and unique dataset, provides a number of interesting and novel insights into the way convicted extremists in England and Wales have used the internet and engaged in online activities in the context of their offending. As such, it makes an important contribution to the literature which up until now has been largely reliant on open-source data or small numbers of case studies drawing from primary data."

Co-researcher, Dr. Jens Binder, senior lecturer in Psychology at NTU's School of Social Sciences, said: "Online radicalisation as a route towards extremist offending is on the rise, and the pace of development is in line with the expansion of the Internet into all domains of everyday life. We can see from our findings that the pathway to radicalisation individuals take can make a crucial difference in terms of the risks they pose—this highlights the need for a more systematic investigation of online dynamics in the context of radicalisation.

"Sustained efforts in the profiling of online and offline pathways into radicalisation can contribute to counter-terrorism measures and more effective offender assessment and treatment with the prison system."

 

Study: As a population gets older, automation accelerates

 

"

In Germany, robots have entered the workplace more to compensate for the absence of workers; 

in the U.S., relatively more robot adoption has displaced a slightly younger workforce."

"companies’ adoption of robots is partly due to shortages in middle-aged labor."

"We provide a lot of evidence to bolster the case that this is a causal relationship, and it is driven by precisely the industries that are most affected by aging and have opportunities for automating work," Acemoglu adds.

 

Peter Dizikes | MIT News Office

Publication Date:

September 15, 2021

 PRESS INQUIRIES

Caption:

MIT economist Daron Acemoglu is co-author of a new study showing that aging populations lead to greater implementation of robots in workplace settings.

Credits:

Image: Digital collage by Jose-Luis Olivares, MIT, with images from iStockphoto

 

SEPTEMBER 15, 2021

Companies' adoption of robots is partly due to shortages in middle-aged labor

by Peter Dizikes, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Credit: CC0 Public Domain

You might think robots and other forms of workplace automation gain traction due to intrinsic advances in technology—that innovations naturally find their way into the economy. But a study co-authored by an MIT professor tells a different story: Robots are more widely adopted where populations become notably older, filling the gaps in an aging industrial work force.

"Demographic change—aging—is one of the most important factors leading to the adoption of robotics and other automation technologies," says Daron Acemoglu, an MIT economist and co-author of a new paper detailing the results of the study.

The study finds that when it comes to the adoption of robots, aging alone accounts for 35 percent of the variation among countries. Within the U.S., the research shows the same pattern: Metro areas where the population is getting older at a faster rate are the places where industry invests more in robots.

[Why not invest more on immigrants training and qualification?]

"We provide a lot of evidence to bolster the case that this is a causal relationship, and it is driven by precisely the industries that are most affected by aging and have opportunities for automating work," Acemoglu adds.

The paper, "Demographics and Automation," has been published online by The Review of Economic Studies, and will be appearing in a forthcoming print edition of the journal. The authors are Acemoglu, an Institute Professor at MIT, and Pascual Restrepo Ph.D. '16, an assistant professor of economics at Boston University.

An 'amazing frontier,' but driven by labor shortages

The current study is the latest in a series of papers Acemoglu and Restrepo have published about
automation,
robots, and the
workforce.

They have previously 

    quantified job displacement in the U.S. due to robots, 

    looked at the firm-level effects of robot use, and 

    identified the late 1980s as a key moment when automation started replacing more jobs than it was creating.

This study involves multiple layers of demographic, technological, and industry-level data, largely from the early 1990s through the mid-2010s. First, Acemoglu and Restrepo found a strong relationship between 

    an aging work force—defined by the ratio of workers 56 and older to those ages 21 to 55—and 

    robot deployment in 60 countries. 

Aging alone accounted for not only 35 percent of the variation in robot use among countries, but also 20 percent of the variation in imports of robots, the researchers found.

Other data points involving particular countries also stand out. South Korea has been the country both aging most rapidly and implementing robotics most extensively. And Germany's relatively older population accounts for 80 percent of the difference in robot implementation between that country and the U.S.

Overall, Acemoglu says, "Our findings suggest that quite a bit of investment in robotics is not driven by the fact that this is the next 'amazing frontier," but because
 

some countries have shortages of labor, especially middle-aged labor that would be necessary for blue-collar work."

Digging into a wide variety of industry-level data across 129 countries, Acemoglu and Restrepo concluded that what holds for robots also applies to other, nonrobotic types of automation.

"We find the same thing when we look at other automation technologies, such as numerically controlled machinery or automated machine tools," Acemoglu says. Significantly, at the same time, he observes, "We do not find similar relationships when we look at nonautomated machinery, for example nonautomated machine tools or things such as computers."

The research likely sheds light on larger-scale trends as well. In recent decades, workers have fared better economically in Germany than in the U.S. The current research suggests there is a difference between 

- adopting automation in response to labor shortages, as opposed to 

- adopting automation as a cost-cutting, worker-replacing strategy. 

In Germany, robots have entered the workplace more to compensate for the absence of workers; in the U.S., relatively more robot adoption has displaced a slightly younger workforce.

"This is a potential explanation for why South Korea, Japan, and Germany—the leaders in robot investment and the most rapidly aging countries in the world—have not seen labor market outcomes [as bad] as those in the U.S.," Acemoglu notes.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/227005/unemployment-rate-in-germany/

 

Back in the U.S.

Having examined demographics and robot usage globally, Acemoglu and Restrepo applied the same techniques to studying automation in the roughly 700 "commuting zones" (essentially, metro areas) in the U.S. from 1990 to 2015, while controlling for factors like the industrial composition of the local economy and labor trends.

Overall, the same global trend also applied within the U.S.: Older workforce populations saw greater adoption of robots after 1990. Specifically, the study found that a 10-percentage-point increase in local population aging led to a 6.45 -percentage-point increase in presence of robot "integrators" in the area—firms specializing in installing and maintaining industrial robots.

The study's data sources included population and economic statistics from multiple United Nations sources, including the UN Comtrade data on international economic activity; technology and industry data from the International Federation of Robotics; and U.S. demographic and economic statistics from multiple government sources. On top of their other layers of analysis, Acemoglu and Restrepo also studied patent data and found a "strong association" between aging and patents in automation, as Acemoglu puts it. "Which makes sense," he adds.

For their part, Acemoglu and Restrepo are continuing to look at the effects of artificial intelligence on the workforce, and to research the relationship between workplace automation and economic inequality.