No problem playing with inflation economics. Stop robbing the seniors, retirees and unemployed that have no income

 Keeping inflation up is to keep cost of operation up. Honestly, I do not believe that inflation is that low when everything is going up in prices by leaps and bounds. The answer is always 'still affordable'. How long is that going to last? Do these people calculating inflation ever go to eat at coffeeshops or hawker centers or do marketing?

Keeping rentals up by the use of tendering of coffee shops and food outlets means vendors pay more and just have to pass the increases on to customers. Ever wonder why so many vendors and hawkers just close their business after decades of operation during the last year and this year?

Keeping transport costs up by the use of bidding for COEs is to keep operation costs up as well for businesses. It is just like the cat chasing its tail. Salary increases are for workers to cope up with the cost-of-living which businesses have to bear, but salaries will always lag behind increases in cost of living. Business owners of food outlets can only cope the best they can until they just give up.

In Red Dot, they Government is able to continue doing all that by throwing chicken wings now and then, but the rich get richer, while the poor and retirees have no room to wriggle. Rich entrepreneurs just pass on the high rental bids to vendors who then unload the increases to customers. And the Government and every rich businessman just keep laughing all the way to the bank.

Anonymous

America is depending on a one product economy and a balloon in the stock market

Which is why there are so many widespread uncertainties regarding AI and data centers. The USA Government is all out to make sure that AI does not fail, as all its eggs are in one basket now.

China is just content to keep updated on tech developments, with AI among its many avenues for survival. China's manufacturing and dominance in many other fields will ensure it does not fall flat depending on just one particular sector. This is what is meant by self-reliance in everything, which is China's priority moving forward.

China puts its eggs in many baskets, and no country can attempt to make China collapse by blockading one sector. Even in energy, that China depended on in a big way, has been an attempt to cripple China's manufacturing with the war on Iran and the energy blockade in the Middle East. China had discounted that by sourcing energy from Russia, building huge hydro-electric generating facilities, building up its renewable energy infrastructures, construction many more nuclear power plants and expanding its oil storage facilities deep underground.

China builds to safeguard its future, not for vanity reasons, like building ballrooms, upgrading reflecting pools, placing names on monuments for posterity reasons, minting golden visa cards and coins in the hope that people will remember the enabler.


Anonymous

Operation Kill Iranians - Iran the main beneficiary...end of American presence in the Middle East

 The American and Israeli terrorists went all out to wipe out the Iranians using the lie that Iran wants to build nuclear weapon. In the process they have spent at least US$50 billions in the Operation with the stupid American taxpayers paying the bulk of the costs. And what have they achieved? A better question is what have the Iranians achieved despite the vicious and barbaric attacks by the American and Israeli terrorists? 

Thousands of Iranians had died in the hands of the American and Israeli terrorists. Many infrastructures have been destroyed. But the bulk of the bombs landed on Iranian mountains, causing little harm but a lot of money to the stupid Americans. Mountain warfare is a strategy that the Iranians are using to the fullest, protected by thick layers of mountain rocks, untouchable by the expensive American bombs. All vital installations and the IRGC are under the mountains of rocks, safe and sound.

On the positive side, Iran have made many great achievements and gains from this vicious attack by the American and Israeli terrorists. All American bases in the Middle East have been destroyed and dysfunctional. The Iranians have effectively kicked out the Americans from the Middle East and stopped them from controlling the Arab and Muslim states. 

The Iranians have put the Chinese strategy of A2AD, Anti Access and Area Denial, into practice and working well. Not only American bases and military facilities have been wiped out, American forces have been kept out of the region, especially the mighty American fleet, including aircraft carriers, warships and air force. Iran could hit everyone of them at will. The two aircraft carriers, Abraham Lincoln and Gerald Ford, had been hit quite badly and stayed very far away from Iranian coasts. The official American version, sabotaged by unhappy American sailors. Choose which version you wish to believe. The truth or fact, they had to stay far away and cannot engage directly in the attack against Iran.

Iran has effectively taken control of the whole Middle East and become a regional power, and the Americans cannot do anything about it except a nuclear option. American military power and influence in the Middle East are over. The Iranians are in full control of the Strait of Hormuz and the Strait of Bab El Mandeb. Period. And while the Americans are bleeding dry its weapon stocks, Iran is getting more weapons and getting stronger by the day.

The silly Americans have made Iran great again. Iran is the unchallenged regional power in the Middle East, in full control of land and sea in the region without having to claim it. Trump and his rogues have made false claims of wiping out Iran and in control of the Strait of Hormuz are all lies.

West no more laughing at China but crying over China

 I do not think they are laughing at EVs, shipbuilding, high-speed railways, drone technology, solar panels, wind turbines, rare earth and other minerals largely controlled by China both in raw resources and refining, space exploration and the Tiangong Space Station.

Some of the other rarely mentioned things include domination in artificial diamonds, tunnel boring machines, legacy chips, agricultural machineries, commercial vehicles like E-buses, trucks, excavators and construction machinery. These are very much cheaper than those from conventional sources like Germany and Japan and selling well in Global South countries.

So, the USA and the West can keep laughing, while China keeps up its overcapacity in everything catering largely to the Global South market. Things too cheap cannot sell in the USA and Europe and must be considered junks and kept out from consumers in the USA. Manufacturing inside the USA and Europe need expensive machineries and raw materials to make expensive goods for their own citizens. China is no longer interested in making high-end goods making a pittance and letting big names put on a label and make exorbitant profits. Those days are over and China is going to make all the profits for itself. Just let them feel good by massaging their own egos, that brings little benefit.

Now, what is happening in Europe with all the protest spreading? It is all about cost of living ignited by side issues. One thing leads to another as people wised up and start to see the picture. Sure, those protests can be stamped down by force, but the underlying reason cannot just go away. It will fester and explode.

When violent protest erupted in Hong Kong, a lot of accusation against the Hong Kong law enforcement use of force against protestors was all over the media. Did the media say anything about the high-handed action against protestors in France. Oh, the Hong Kong protestors were very peaceful attacking Government buildings and those in France were violent. Just listen to the hypocrisy.

Anonymous

Traitor Marco Rubio wants Cuba to become a colony of the USA

Marco Rubio is asking the Cubans to work with the CIA. The underlying message is to create a regime change in Cuba. Working with the CIA is like putting your hands into a snake-pit, where the only benefit is getting bitten. What have the people in Iraq and Libya gained supporting the USA to overthrow its leaders? Chaos and frustration are all they get. Lives do not improve and in fact worsened.

Cuba has survived almost 65 years of sanctions by the USA and its allies. The fact that Cuba did not collapse is testimony to the failure of those sanctions spearheaded by the USA. So, Marco Rubio is trying another tactic by telling the Cubans to let in the CIA to destabilize the country from the inside. Just like what they did with Venezuela. Letting the devil into the house is easy, getting rid of it later is difficult. Just keep the devil out whatever persuasive power it has and whatever many carrots are dangled.

The Cubans are not stupid. They have suffered 65 years of misery, all due to the USA and asking the Cubans to forgive and forget and let the USA just take over the country? Who can be more stupid than the Venezuelans, losing everything they had - their sovereignty, their oil, their elected President, their dignity and trustworthiness. China lost its investments in Venezuela for nothing and has probably written that off. No Chinese investments are going there for sure.

The West has a grand plan. The USA wants to control North and South America, claiming on letting the Russians control Europe and Middle East while letting China dominate Asia. That is not the agenda of Russia nor China. China and Russia have been fighting colonization for decades in Africa and does not want to tarnish their image by being colonizers in Europe and Asia. That is the USA doctrine for decades after WW2. That is also the message delivered by Marco Rubio asking the Europeans to return to their colonizing days.

With such a mindset put out by the USA, what are the Japanese and Taiwanese going to say if it really happens? I'll leave that to the two colonies of the USA to think about when the shit hits the fan.

Suffice to say, never trusts the USA. Just the one thing never to be forgotten.


Anonymous