Month: July 2022
Hacking of Iranian Steel maker
cyber-attack on a steel maker in Iran two weeks ago is being seen as one of those significant and troubling moments. It’s extremely rare for hackers, who operate in the digital world, to cause damage in the physical world. Iran has been the victim of a spate of recent cyber-attacks that have had an impact
More Jobs in US
Like other countries, the cost of living in the US is soaring due to rising food and energy prices. Inflation hit a 40-year high of 8.6% in the year to April and the US Federal Reserve has been increasing borrowing costs to try to cool the rate of price growth. The US economy created 372,000
Expensive flights
Oil prices have jumped as economies recover from the Covid pandemic and due to the war in Ukraine. Oil prices were already rising as demand picked up again in economies that had started recovering from the Covid pandemic. The fallout from the war in Ukraine has pushed prices up further. It’s inevitable that ultimately the
Illegal logging, fishing and hunting threatening lives
It is estimated that one million plants and animals could go extinct in coming decades. And much of this is being driven by unsustainable fishing, hunting and logging. One in five people around the world rely on wild animals, plants and fungi for food and livelihoods. Many wild species are not being harvested sustainably, putting
Somalia drought
More than half of Somalia’s population is at serious risk of famine over the next two months unless aid is immediately increased. Deforestation, and al-Shabab’s activities depriving citizens of their livelihoods, were also key challenges facing Somalia. Somalis are dying from climate-induced drought fuelled by other nations’ consumption. It has appealed for nearly $1bn (£831m)
India’s anti-defection law
Critics argue the rule, intended to stop politicians jumping parties, hurts the country’s democracy. Defectors tend to be enticed by the promise of money and power. But in theory they should be unable to jump ship. In 1985 India’s government introduced a law designed to curb “the evil of political defections”. In june about 40
Tiktok growth and suspicion
TikTok makes creating films easy. It has done for video-editing what Instagram did for photo-editing a decade ago, allowing amateurs to turn wobbly recordings into slick-looking films. The AI discovery algorithm dangles the prospect of viral success before unknown creators, who struggle on apps like Facebook, which reward those with lots of followers. Whereas the
Global recession
The likelihood of a global recession is growing and inflation is already taking a significant toll. A prolonged period of stagflation that painful combination of high inflation and low growth looks increasingly probable even if a global recession is averted. In 2007-09, financial dysfunction created more dysfunction, ultimately bringing the global economy to its knees.
Sri Lanka’s president resigns
It was unclear, in the run-up to the weekend, whether protesters would make it. The previous day, police had declared a curfew. Trains and other public transport were cancelled. The telecoms regulator told phone companies to turn off data services (they didn’t). Thousands of members of the security forces were deployed to guard Fort, the
new exceptionalism in America
American exceptionalism once seemed to be the cause of all sorts of transatlantic differences, for good and ill. America’s greater religiosity explained the intensity of the culture wars over gay marriage and abortion. Greater individualism explained the dynamism of America’s entrepreneurial economy, the willingness to move in search of something better and also, unfortunately, the