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Haydn W

Scrap the licence fee and privatise the BBC - The Commentator - 0 views

www.thecommentator.com/...ence_fee_and_privatise_the_bbc

BBC Public Good The Commentator UK government

shared by Haydn W on 01 Dec 13 - No Cached
  • The next two years will see a lively debate over the future of the British Broadcasting Corporation, with the current Royal Charter due to run out at the end of 2016.
  • According to an ICM poll in the Sunday Telegraph last month, 70 per cent of voters believe that the licence fee should be abolished or cut.
  • With the licence fee scrapped, should the BBC remain in public ownership? Or should the BBC be privatised, so that it can compete on a level playing field with the global media giants that are now emerging? 
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  • Paul Samuelson, the Nobel-prize-winning American economist, advanced the concept of "public goods" in his classic 1954 paper "The Pure Theory of Public Expenditure", demonstrating that such goods had to be financed by taxation and could not be left to the free market. The hostility to advertising meant that broadcasting was the textbook paradigm of a "public good".
  • Still benefiting from the halo conferred by its wartime role, the BBC was by far the most influential broadcasting service in the world. Further, with the UK accounting for almost 10 per cent of world output in the late 1940s, its state-owned monopoly was a vast broadcasting business by international standards. The BBC may not have been part of the British constitution, but it was undoubtedly a "national champion".
  • Advertising is sometimes demonised by left-wing commentators as capitalism without taste or shame, and as free enterprise at its selfish worst.
  • The actual position is far more even-handed and complex. As the growing unpopularity of the licence fee has constrained the BBC's revenues, TV advertising spend is now about the same size as the total money collected by the licence fee and well above the portion of this money devoted to television.
  • But the truly spectacular development of the last few years is that both total advertising spend and the licence fee money have been surpassed by BSkyB's subscription revenue. As BSkyB also picks up advertising revenue on its channels, its annual income is well above the BBC's.
  • Haydn W on 01 Dec 13
     
    This article talks about the logistics of scraping the license fee that finances one of the worlds most famous examples of a public good, the BBC. Economic stagnation and falling wages have left many consumers disgruntled at the license fee and with the BBC failing to keep up with it's competitors in terms of revenue, costs have had to be cut at the world renowned corporation. The article explores the concept of the public good and how politicians have began to propose alternatives to the license fee.
Haydn W

France's Fiscal Policy Targets Very Challenging Says IMF - NASDAQ.com - 0 views

www.nasdaq.com/...enging-says-imf-20140515-00278

Nasdaq France Fiscal Policy IMF

shared by Haydn W on 20 May 14 - No Cached
  • PARIS--French President Francois Hollande has chosen the right path to repair the country's economy and finances, but its fiscal targets are very challenging, the International Monetary Fund said Thursday.
  • At the start of the year, the socialist leader switched from a policy of tax increases to spending cuts to bring down the budget deficit.
  • The planned reduction in taxes mean that the cutbacks to spending relative to trend will need to be very large if public finances are to be brought back to balance
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  • If the government delivers the EUR50 billion ($68.5 billion) of savings over 2015 to 2017 that would be "remarkable by historical standards," the IMF said.
  • data on Thursday showed the French economy remained weak at the start of this year, while Germany posted better-than-expected growth. France escaped the wider euro-zone recession that followed the bloc's debt crisis, but it has failed to post strong growth for the last two years and the government has repeatedly missed its targets for bringing down the deficit.
  • Mr. Hollande launched a Responsibility Pact, under which payroll taxes on businesses would be cut in an effort to boost investment and recruitment
  • The IMF said the measures in the Responsibility Pact would only slowly boost growth to around 1% this year and 1.5% in 2015. It also warned there are risks of a weaker rebound and that inflation would remain around 1% with the economy operating well below capacity.
  • The IMF said the European Central Bank--which indicated last week it may launch stimulus measures in June--could do more to help France meet its targets.
  • "More accommodative monetary conditions would help with the implementation of the fiscal program and bring forward the benefits of structural reforms," the fund said.
  • Haydn W on 20 May 14
     
    This article details France's success in it's road to recovery following the Eurozone sovereign debt crisis. This week the IMF has hailed president François Hollande's cutback path to repair the countries economy but commented that his targets may be 'very challenging.' This comes after the French government has delivered vast savings through austerity measures whilst retaining general stability despite the rise of far-right groups like The Front National. In my opinion for a country in the eurozone Hollande's France seems to be doing well for itself on the road to recovery and could set an example for other Eurozone countries, like Greece and Portugal.
Haydn W

Falling oil prices offer the west a great chance to refashion itself. Let's seize it | ... - 1 views

www.theguardian.com/...west-chance-refashion-policies

The Guardian USA Russia Oil Prices Balance of Payments

shared by Haydn W on 05 Dec 14 - No Cached
  • Falling oil prices offer the west a great chance to refashion itself. Let’s seize it
  • For the past 18 months, the world’s biggest oil producer has been the US.
  • One first good result of this oil price shift, however, was witnessed at Opec’s meeting in Vienna last week. The once feared cartel of oil-exporting countries, with Saudi Arabia at its core, a cartel that at one time commanded more than half of global production, is now a shadow of its former self.
  • ...9 more annotations...
  • the US will maintain this new standing for the foreseeable future, according to official projections.
  • It should be no surprise, then, that in the past rising oil prices were associated with recessions and falling oil prices with booms. If the oil price carries on falling back towards $50 a barrel, and if history is any guide, the western economy should respond – to the good.
  • But although particular companies may lose out, the first-round effect of this fall should provide good news. High oil prices depress economic activity. They suck money from consumer spending and redirect it to oil-exporting countries, which typically hoard it in elephantine foreign exchange reserves or unspent  bank deposits. It is a tax by the few on the many.
  • With the US needing to buy less oil on international markets and China’s growth sinking to its lowest mark for 40 years, there is now, amazingly, the prospect of an oil glut. The oil price instantly nosedived to its lowest level for four years, around $70 a barrel – down more than a third in three months.
  • Suddenly, the balance of economic advantage with Russia, no less dependent on oil and gas exports, will flip. Russia’s 2014 budget was based on an oil price of $100 a barrel. At $70 a barrel, the economy will contract by at least 3% in 2015, the country will run a balance of payments deficit and the government’s finances will spin out of control.
  • The chances of Russia sustaining a surrogate war in Ukraine have suddenly been reduced. All good news.
  • But western governments cannot hope that economic benefits will arrive automatically. These are new times.
  • Uncertainty and fear abound. Interest rates in Britain alone have been pegged at 0.5% for more than five years. But still business is reluctant to invest, not knowing what technologies to back or not knowing how much demand there will be for new products and services. We live in an era of stagnation, “secular stagnation”
  • So falling oil prices offer the world economy a great opportunity. But if it is not leapt upon purposefully by aggressively expansionary economic policy, secular stagnation might worsen.
  • Haydn W on 05 Dec 14
     
    The recent fall in oil prices, largely due to America's newfound dominance in the market, will cause Russia to experience a balance of payments deficit, according to this article from the Guardian. This is based on Russia's overestimate of the forecast for the global oil price and can be said to be an example of how global prices often influence balance of payments for countries, especially when it concerns national resources.
Haydn W

The Motorship - Shipbuilding competition promotes efficient working - 0 views

www.motorship.com/...ion-promotes-efficient-working

Competition Efficiency Shipbuilding Energy

shared by Haydn W on 08 Feb 14 - No Cached
  • In order to compete in a crowded market, efficiency is the key to success in shipbuilding
  • We spoke to Malaysian offshore specialist shipyard Shin Yang Shipbuilding to see how the company was faring in difficult times.
  • Our recent orders over the past few years have come from returning customers in UAE and Malaysia.
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  • We are looking at downsizing our present build capacity and to keep a lean workforce.
  • The speculative market is not looking positive right now due to Chinese yards churning out huge numbers of OSVs, with brokers trying to capitalise on the competitive vessel price and flexible payment and finance terms offered by these Chinese yards.
  • I don’t have a strong view at this stage as market prices are predominantly controlled by brokers and the bigger shipyards which monopolise the global market, and affected by growing regulatory pressures on safety and energy efficiency.
  • Haydn W on 08 Feb 14
     
    This article details how competition in the shipbuilding market is promoting firms to strive to be both market and energy efficient. The article relates to the economic concepts of market efficiency and theories of competition and monopoly. It also briefly relates to the concepts of externalities of production too, discussing measures imposed by governments like fuel sulphur limits.
Daniel B

Internet supplier monopoly - 2 views

www.newyorker.com/...n-cable-internet-monopoly.html

monopoly

shared by Daniel B on 16 Feb 14 - No Cached
  • Clemente F on 16 Feb 14
     
    This article discusses how monopolies are not efficient and real competition would be more efficient.
  • Daniel B on 18 Feb 14
     
    The greatest supplier of the Internet behaves in the anti-competitive way as a result that they want to swall up second biggest company on this market in the US. We have here typical situation of inefficiency on monopolistic market. The supplier provide services for high price as well as the provided services are well below the standards in comparison with other advanced countries.
Marenne M

Youth unemployment: Generation Jobless at risk of becoming reality - 3 views

www.smh.com.au/...ng-reality-20140414-zquf3.html

unemployment

shared by Marenne M on 14 Apr 14 - No Cached
  • Marenne M on 14 Apr 14
     
    This article describes the unemployment among youths in Australia. It describes how no matter whether you have a degree or not, it is barely possible to find a job. This is due to a lack in demand for labor, which generally results from a lack of aggregate demand, meaning that the economy isn't operating at its full potential. Therefore there is a surplus of supply for a minimal demand of labor, leading to a decrease in wage cost and a decrease in chances of finding a job. This is why many people are recommending doing internships for free, because firms are no longer paying as much for the employees, but even these internships are hard to get.
Sungmin Lee

China to again levy coal import tariffs after nearly a decade - 1 views

www.reuters.com/...ina-coal-idUSL3N0S41QP20141009

tariff China Coal

shared by Sungmin Lee on 23 Oct 14 - No Cached
  • Sungmin Lee on 23 Oct 14
     
    Australia, Russia exports seen hit; Indonesia to be exempt * China thermal coal futures, China shares of top coal firms rise (Adds analyst's comments, coal futures and coal firms' shares) By Fayen Wong SHANGHAI, Oct 9 (Reuters) - China, the world's top coal importer, will levy import tariffs on the commodity after nearly a decade, in its latest bid to prop up ailing domestic miners who have been buffeted by rising costs and tumbling prices. China will levy import tariffs between 3-6 percent.
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