Hal Austin
Introduction:
Barbadians are now getting some external scrutiny of the economic mess the nation is in and shining a torch in those cobwebbed corners is not a happy site. According to the recent IMF report, government has finally committed itself to a number of key proposals, but these still remain opaque and unarticulated, even if they had to be dragged kicking and screaming to admit there are in a deep economic hole. However they may manoeuvre, it is clear the offer of redundancies and a few cutbacks in spending are not the answers the economy needs at this time nor, indeed, do the growing army of un(and under)employ young people want.
The report itself admits this in its introduction, pointing that in December 2011 a previous IMF delegation had stressed that the widening fiscal deficit and debt were the key areas of concern and proposed a “credible fiscal consolidation plan” to resolve the issue. But, the DLP government asked for a postponement because of the general election, which, as we know, the DLP won. So, it is clear, that political chicanery won the day and the DLP deliberately misled the Barbadian electorate during the February 2013 campaign, especially its promise that there would not be any redundancies.
The reports also makes it clear that there is no available full information on financial performance of public enterprises, not only revealing the opacity of government, but, I suggest, not only hiding one of the key sources of heavy leaking of taxpayers’ money, but of gross managerial incompetence. The real problem with the Barbados economy, however, is structural, and deeply so: a public sector which is lacking in up-to-date technology, a working force that believes that taxpayers have a duty to keep them in jobs, a political culture that mistakes the ruling political party as the state, and a portfolio of small businesses and land that the state should not own but should dispose, if only to rebalance its finances. The only real reason for this ever-expanding portfolio of state-owned assets is the control it gives politicians, in terms of jobs for their supporters and a sense of personal social status.
Analysis:
With the ‘great’ IMF now delivering its sermon from on high, a bit Washington Consensus light, all froth but not substance, the DLP Government has still not made clear what its strategy for recovery is. As I write, the nation is yet to know how many people will be made redundant from the public sector, although the IMF states 13 per cent. Given the absence of accuracy numbers, it is very difficult to enter any serious debate or carryout a legitimate analysis of government policy. So, let us assume that there are about 30000 people on the public sector pay roll, 13 per cent of those will about 3900; so far government has said it will be sending home 3000 workers by the end of March. But this is not the end of the matter, since that will impact in a number of ways. Government tax take will diminish, however slightly, a matter that has so far not been raised, not even in parliament; most, if not all of these people will at some point be eligible for state benefits and there will be a drop in national insurance contributions. Consumer spending will also be down, leading to pressure on some parts of the private sector, which may lead to redundancies or at least wage cuts.
As the report states: “Central government gross debt has risen sharply since 2009. The debt-to-GDP ratio has climbed from under 60 per cent in 2009 to 94 per cent at end-September; including government securities held by the national insurance scheme (NIS), it rose from about 80 per cent to 128 per cent. “The gross financing requirement in 2013/14 is 15.4 per cent of GDP including the rollover of short-term debt. The deficit has been financed increasingly with short-term funds from domestic sources. “In the first six months of 2013/14, domestic financial institutions and the central bank provided the bulk of the financing in the form of T-bills, while the NIS provided about 11 per cent in the form (of) longer term debentures. “NIS holdings of government paper are estimated at about 67 per cent of its portfolio, above the guideline recommended in the 13th actuarial review to limit holdings in government securities to no more than 57 per cent.” It warns: “Going forward, the capacity of the NIS to absorb new government debt will be limited by balance sheet constraints as the operating surplus has declined to near balance.” The report does not make clear that the main reason why government has to depend on domestic credit is because with its record borrowing in the international markets will be prohibitive.
For the last five years the main developed markets – the US, Japan and UK – have had central bank interest rates of below one per cent. Had the Barbados economy not been in such trouble, it would have been relatively easy borrowing in the international markets at under six per cent, rather than a domestic market that is charging up to 15 per cent. Further, the report’s condemnation of the mis-use of NIS funds does not take in to consideration the contradiction of conventional investment strategies, especial for a fund with long-term liabilities.
We know very little about how the NIS is run, whether it uses passive or active managers, its asset allocation policies, who undertakes its research, the diversification of its portfolio, all this is kept carefully hidden from public view. Even investing 57 per cent of the NIS fund in government gilts, as the IMF reveals, is a bad strategy since market efficiency should dictate that the fund’s investment universe should be global, and it should have a proportionate percentage invested in accumulation (equities, to grow the fund), fixed income (gilts and corporate bonds to meet near-time liabilities), property, small amounts in cash and a similar amount in high-risk alternative investments. I suspect a lot of the lending is to do with political pressure and ignorance on the part of senior executives and the board of the NIS, a number of whom have no real professional experience in fund management although some may have academic familiarity with the process.
The report continues, and I quote because there have been points raised by myself and a number of other observant people on numerous occasions which are very similar. In paragraph 7, under the sub-headline: Monetary policy has not been consistent with the fixed exchange rate framework, the report continues: “A new interest rate policy was instituted in 2013 that made the three-month Treasury Bill rate the benchmark rate and directed the central bank to intervene in the auction market. “Under this policy, the CBB (central bank) absorbed about 44 per cent of T-bills issued in the first 11 months of 2013 and short term interest rates fell by about 50 basis points. Credit to the private, which had been contracting since 2011, nonetheless continued to fall.” Again, it is basic macroeconomics: the refusal of the foreign-owned banks to lend to small and medium enterprises, the key driver of the economy, was the main obstacle to financial intermediation. The central bank could have used its purchasing power of government gilts not to buy freshly minted short-term bonds, but to buy gilts off the banks on condition that the additional liquidity would have been used to lend to small and medium enterprises. Further, government, either through ignorance or stubbornness, has in fact refused to substitute that lack of bank funding with shadow banking or a strategically planned quantitative easing (on par with Obama’s funding of the Detroit car industry, which is now back on its feet) – the cheapest and most effective way of which was the creation of a post office bank (with a 17-strong established distribution network) or by introducing legislation to create a trade union/credit union/cooperative retail bank. So, there is a vacuum where an effective, well capitalised, well supervised and regulated banking system and monetary policy ought to be.
The other failing is that the government, like previous governments before it, has depended too much on the national insurance scheme as a piggy bank, which it can dip in to as it likes, and a mountain of commercial credit to pay for their programmes. This credit-based growth, as Lord (Adair) Turner, the former chairman of the UK’s Financial Services Authority and one of the most authoritative public intellectual economists in Britain, has led to rising leverage and debt overhang, a natural outcome of this credit-intensive growth. It is a policy based on a total disregard of the investment strategies and actuarial assumptions behind a hybrid contributory and pay-as-you-go pension scheme and ignores completely the scheme’s future liabilities. Part of the inept management of public accounts is reflected in the increase in the growing current account deficit, which the report could have said more about. Explained in simple terms, if the government gets Bds$100 in revenue during the tax year, but its expenditure is Bds$101, it is living beyond its means. This principle applies to households as it does to governments. The basic principle is for government to forensically audit its outgoings and cut back where necessary. This is true in principle, even if a government differs from a household in that it also invests for future generations. But that a government, fully aware of the global economic crisis, can still continue to spend taxpayers’ money as if it was going out of fashion borders on the fraudulent.
The other mantra which has captured the thought processes of most Barbadians is the redundant one of accumulating foreign reserves, presumably in preparation for an external shock of some kind. It is an obsession that has no basis in modern macroeconomics, the mantra of an evangelising old guard tat is convinced that financial economics has not moved on since the 1960s and 70s. This obsession with foreign reserves only serves to obscure the real shortcomings of the central bank’s reluctance to enter the futures and derivatives markets and its overall bad management of the nation’s finances. By entering the futures and derivatives markets the central bank will free-up much needed cash that can be invested in other more urgent and pressing assets. (Without overburdening this analysis, see: Joshua Aizenman, et al : “International Reserves and Swap Lines: Substitute s or Complements”, National Bureau of Economic Research, Working Paper 15804). Continuing to stockpile foreign reserves, in the vain expectation of some severe externality, is voodoo. By definition, we do not know what the external shock would be, but the last real shock the Barbados economy faced was on September 22, 1955, Hurricane Janet, and two years later the nation had entered a contract with the construction engineers Costain to embark on the biggest capital project in its history. Huge reserves will not be of any real use if the external shock is a new strain of bird flu from China, or some terrorist attack on Grantley Adams International Airport. The foreign reserves mantra is preached mainly by worn out economists who did their studying in the 1960s and early 70s and have not really freshened up their knowledge of macroeconomic theory since graduation. Some of them probably even continue to teach from their old undergraduate notes.
Global Economy:
But the world in 2014 is a different place to that in 2007/8. We have already seen China’s economy, for most of the last 14 years the most dynamic in the world, has recently returned growth figures of 7.7 per cent, most impressive for the majority of developed economies, but a wake-up call to what was the fastest-growing and largest emerging market in the world. As Jay Bryson of Wells Fargo has pointed out, at the end of 2012, developing nations accounted for 49.6 per cent of global GDP, and although 2013 figures have not yet been confirmed, it looks as if this figure will rise to over 50 per cent. This growth confirms what Pascal Lamy, the former director-general of the WTO called the Geneva Consensus, the increasingly central role that developing nations now play in global trade. These developments, the new normal, play on the blind side of the people who manage the Barbados economy and are responsible for monetary and fiscal policy. None of this figures in their analyses or debates on economic policy, what little discussion they have narrow-focuses on foreign reserves. It is like asking someone on the eve of the discovery of the internal combustion engine what mode of transport would he prefer, knowing full well most people would ask for a faster breed of horse. There is a paradigm shift, and has been with a vengeance since the early 1990s, in the way we manage national accounts and currencies, and the stockpiling and warehousing of foreign reserves is not it; even at a household level we no longer stash our money in a savings account, we invest, make it work for us. It has gone further than this. In the old days of the 1980s, when we talked about a developing economy we often meant one based on the development economic theories of Sir Arthur Lewis, Gerard M. Meier, Joseph Stiglitz and others. Modern developing economies are increasingly consumption driven, rather than just producing the raw material for a commodity-hungry developed world. We now live in a global economy in which 35 per cent of exports from developed countries now go to developing economies, up from 20 per cent in 2000, and that trajectory is going further north and faster. But a lot of this growth is based on debt, about US$8trn, an increase from US$5.7trn in 1997, as Lord Turner has pointed out. The world has changed and policymakers and academics who fail to keep up will be left behind.
Conclusion:
The DLP government is learning the hard way that we now live in a globalised world and governments and their advisers can no longer operate in an opaque and deceptive way. Further, all economies, no matter how small, are now globally inter-connected, and a high wind one part of the world can lead to crashing waves the other side. It is relevant therefore to remember how the Asian crisis of the late 1990s occurred. All the key nations were linked to the dollar, all had huge current account deficits and falling foreign reserves. This cocktail of macroeconomic imbalances came tumbling down like a deck of cards once the Thai government decided to devalue the baht in July 1997. The Stuart government has not yet learned this simple fact of global economics and is still operating as if it is the repository of all wisdom when it comes to the financial economic government of the nation. Even though the IMF report should act as a wake-up call, it does not deal with the offloading of non-core assets, such as the state-owned Transport Board, a portfolio of under-performing hotels, a massive land bank, massive shares in LIAT, post offices, the inability to auction a television licence, an inability to collect VAT and national insurance. The decision to establish a revenue authority is not the same thing as collecting outstanding revenue. This is made worse when one considers that VAT is a tax paid at the point of business with the private sector acting as collectors for the state. All civil servants have to do is to collect the money, failing which the guilty party will be prosecuted and barred from running a business. It is organisational competence, not creating a new organisation, that is the real solution.
Equally, the lack of up-to-date and accurate information on the financial performance of public sector enterprises, including statutory bodies, is not a coincidence, but a deliberate attempt to mislead the IMF and the general public.
Any competent organisation would have produced annual reports, giving details of the business, future plans and its profits and losses, if only for internal use. The report’s authors also make a mistake of assuming that the financial sector is well capitalised, but has produced no evidence for this, apart presumably from central bank assurance.
But there is another way of looking at the banking sector (since there is no substantial shadow banking or non-banking sectors, apart from insurance), and that is to assume that the regulatory and supervisory systems are weak and that the banks manipulate a local light-touch regulatory regime lacking in expertise. How does the central bank carry out its stress tests? By examining capital adequacy and depending on the inadequate Basel III requirements? It is common knowledge that banks have one of the most flawed business model in modern capitalism, with some major international banks at the dawn of the global crisis having an asset to liability ratio of six per cent. Even local businesses have a minimum average ratio of 30:70. If any small business person had such a ridiculous asset to liability ratio and went to a bank to borrow money s/he would be chased out of the building. Banks are allowed to get away with this because of the discrepancies in their accounting practices. Banks do not have to explain in their annual reporting their liabilities in a way that any other ordinary business will have to. In this way they avoid runs, the main concern of governments, especially if the central bank is lender of last resort and will have to rescue troubled institutions.
But this is not the case in Barbados. It is almost certain that banks do not explain to supervisors or regulators their lending assumptions, therefore their capital adequacy is not properly explained; and, even if they were, they will tell the central bank that their foreign parent banks will cover any short falls. And they will get away with it, be they subsidiaries or branches because the banking regulatory and supervisory systems operate by deference. The report’s authors have at times taken the self-confirming myths of central bank and civil service staff too much to heart, such as that Barbados is highly competitive. Although this is qualified, by pointing out that that is when compared with other Caribbean nations, it is really still disingenuous.
Its claim that ‘domestic’ banks appear to be well capitalised, lacks a clear definition since domestic is a mute point, given it also makes clear that the foreign-owned banks – with the parent companies of three are domiciled in Canada, two in Trinidad and Tobago and one in the US, with the assets of the Canadian-owned banks accounting for 75 per cent of total banking assets. This raises further serious regulatory issues since it is not clear who regulates local banks and, if the central bank, as is the legal position, who the real regulator is. To be competitive, an island 166 square miles and in which most official business is concentrated in the space between the City, Bay Street, Whitepark and Warrens, it should not take longer than five working days for an entrepreneur to register a new business. Where there is a cash purchase for a property, the entire process should not take longer than two working days for the sale and purchase of that property. Of course, all this is not the civil servants’ fault, although they are responsible for a large part of it. The bulk of it is caused by lazy, and in many cases, dishonest lawyers who tend to operate like a Mafia.
Good government would break up this professional monopoly by separating out advocates, those with permission to appear before the high courts and the Caribbean Court of Justice, and legal consultants, those permitted to give advice in their chambers but not to appear in court. Government should also introduce licences for conveyancing, labour law specialists, health law specialists and others, people who on qualifying would have the right to appear in the high courts representing clients on those specific subjects. Of course the lawyers and their supporters will scream, but this is one way of introducing a new professional competitiveness in the economy. We also need transparency in governance, with politicians and senior civil servants who appear to be living above their official incomes explaining the source of their wealth or having it seized and face criminal prosecution for abuse of public office. In real terms, Barbados has had nearly five decades of under-performance, years of lost productivity, which are now creeping up on us like disease in old age. We know our knees are not what they used to be, but we hardly remember when as teenagers we were kicking hard breadfruits around the playing field. Those days off from work, and when at work talking more than working, taking the children to school and then arriving at work just before lunchtime, not answering the telephone and leaving work early, all these and more will eventually come back to haunt us – and they have. One black hole that is not talked about by unions, policymakers or politicians is the massive cost to the taxpayer of absenteeism, but again the IMF appeared to have overlooked this. It would be worth while if the government commissioned a report on this from the university.
As Dilaka Lathapipat and Thitima Chucherd, writing about the Thai economy reminded us of developing economies: “In addition to building up a highly-educated and well-trained workforce, having a well-functioning labour market is crucial for a country to enhance its economic efficiency and competitiveness.” The authors also remind us of the definition of labour market efficiency: flexibility, controls on wage fluctuations, easy re-allocation of workers. We only have to look at the public sector trade unions, like the 10 per cent pay claim put in by the National Union of Public Workers, just months before a massive redundancy programme.
Of course,, most of these approaches are outside the IMF remit and are rightly the concerns of the ruling party, but it is basic macroeconomics that unless there is an improvement in productivity there will be very little or no growth.
It is also important to note that poor productivity in Barbados, in particular the public sector, is not just cyclical; it is rooted in deep structural flaws and in a post-independence culture that the state will provide. Making a few people redundant without fixing the fundamental problem is just pushing the can down the road. The machine of state is grinding to a halt because it is out of oil and it needs fixing.
In the final analysis we urgently need a new national mind-set, which places things such as fashion, cruises, whisky, four-by-four petrol guzzlers, foreign holidays, home improvements, and other materialistic trivia come second to securing one’s financial future. We have to get real as a people and as a society.
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Reading: Rene M. Stulz: “Should We Fear Derivatives”, NBER Working Paper 10574, 2004;
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Neil Irwin, The Alchemists: Inside the Secret World of Central Bankers
This writer like to talk about ‘analysis’. What is really needed is a systems analysis. In the absence of a systemic approach the writer recoils to episodic rantings which are largely unhelpful.
Nowhere to Run?Hal Austin… Plantation Deed have them long time , Glad you can finally catch up to the fraud on the people , But the IMF and Moodys, S&P know more than you love to write , But we glad to see you wrote , for we can always go back on BU and see what you dont want to write about , The Crooks , liars and Scumbags.
We got them , Weather you think so or Not , We have the FACTS and the Proof ,
We did not read what you wrote as yet , Just replying to the title,
If you read thereport the IMF said this problems stem in mid 2000s Mid 2000s would put us back to 2005. Trying to win a 2nd election did not send home people in the first term did not send home the people Owen had given jobs too. Also in December 2007 Owen abolish casual workers and those workers became temporary workers. Also did you know Owen was apart of the Tom Adams government tha thad to go to the IMF with ina 5 year period twice? can a man who was in Jamaica seeing it privatising all of government liquid-able assets know how to get us out of the mess he started? I don’t think so.
The truth that we do not want to accept is that there is a possible issue with the foreign exchange: with no bank or ICBL to sell and plug a hold, I dont think the Bees understand what to do.
To end this MIA could had gain a lot of ground by amending the contribution to cut government salaries and letting the 3000 people continue to work, she ent care bout then either
Even at this stage we are in deep doo doo we just don’t get it.
@John Chapman
“The Barbados Workers Union (BWU) has tabled a range of alternatives to the government in a bid to avert plans by the Freundel Stuart administration to retrench more than 3,000 public servants as it seeks to revive an ailing economy. Sir Roy Trotman, BWU General Secretary, who held talks with Finance Minister Chris Sinckler and officials from the Ministry of Finance and the Civil Service, has proposed among other measures, that all government employees volunteer for a pay cut.”
“Sinckler described as “interesting” some of the proposals submitted by the unions to deal with the situation, adding others would have challenges (and that they would not take us where we want to go.
The long and short of the matter is people, we did not get to this point in history because the DLP brought us here; we are at this point in our history because the politicians in their quest for riches and power did everything they needed to do too get rich at any cost even if it meant destroying their fragile economy at the expense of satisfying their greed,. The writing on the wall is clear concerning this administration and those in opposition -. they are all callous and Barbados should launch and investigation into their accumulated wealth dating back from he days of Barrow and Tom Adams. People, like that pop belly shire Duguid should not be allowed to abandon Barbados with all his thieving wealth., to live large in Canada, They should go after ‘No Good’ Noel Lynch as well who was able to accumulate millions in a short space of time and Michael Lashley and his JADA connections, where is drinking from the fountain of 5 -10 for every match box house he built she should be trembling in fear at the thought of who at Dodds will be the first to sample his rear end, I mention these few because it is obvious and well known what they were doing, This is what my backward country should be engaging and that is to pull down the strong circle of the political cartel that is corrupt and arrogant, But such action is a mere figment of the imagination..
Thanks John. You have shed greater light on this economic mess, originated as you so clearly stated from Owen Arthur Administration. Obviously, some here have failed to realized that the past with its good and evil lives in the present.
Hal, your article was brilliantly written. Sound the alarm, Barbados is heading down the path of Detroit, Michigan. Retirees will soon, lose some of their pensions, to help clean up this financial fiasco. The raid on pensions, is a very real possibility.
@Hal In the final analysis we urgently need a new national mind-set, which places things such as fashion, cruises, whisky, four-by-four petrol guzzlers, foreign holidays, home improvements, and other materialistic trivia come second to securing one’s financial future. We have to get real as a people and as a society. My friend, if ever someone spoke truth to power, this is it. I am an expatriate sitting here at work, and i wish I could give you a hug. The truth needs no defence, and you have written the truth. Thank you so very much.
Re: http://www.nationnews.com/articles/view/uwi-guild-predicts-roll-fall/
This is a significant, unfortunate change, but it does not appear to be the disaster that some believe it to be. Possible solution: UWI and the student loan program work together to allow each Barbadian student access to a student loan to cover the fees; (b) the student pursues his/her program of studies, except, hopefully, more focused than before, with no or little excess time; and (c) the loan administrators enforce collections, so that the fund continues, to revolve, to assist future students.
Where is the financial analysis in local media?
A little bit of nostalgia here. Remember when politicians talked with each other, and not at each other? Remember when we all looked out for each other, and we truly personified the notion of it taking a village to raise a child. Look, Barbados is a gift from god, placed in its own eastern potpouri, surrounded by its own Kaleidascope of magnificence, we engender the richess and the sweet tapestry of our Africaness. Remember, when we could stand outside, and talk for hours with our neighbors. whatever happened to that? Remember when time was of little import, and sharing was always first, a plate of food on nights when mama didn’t have much was a shared experience, remember? And remember the sweet truth of my people, no matter where we were, no matter our stations in life, we could appeal to our collective generosities, whatever happened to that, remember? Oh my beloved Barbados I love you so, my brothers and sisters I share with you, a storied history of simple magnificence, the exquisite quaintness of your souls. I am expatriated from you now, and I miss you, the simplicity of what once was, rest in my heart. What is progress, if not to be enjoyed by all. The key to our collective success lays within our reach, can we be divided without facing our truth, our fears? Will we let what can be conquered, conquer us? Many may intimate that we are bucolic, so what? We are the most easterly of all caribbean islands for a reason, the wisdom,knowledge, understanding and truth of King Solomon’s day, can be found on the shores of our Island home. I’ve said all of this to say, that those of you who collaborate in your wise writings here, possess the brain thrust to help solve, Barbados’ problems. We just need to remember when we were all each others friend. I love you my bajan brothers and sisters, I always pray fro all of you and your families.
@ David
What financial analysis? In any event finance is only one aspect. We called for a systems analysis. It is therefore impossible to understand these problemS with numbers alone.
@Pacha
The conversation must begin, if it does at the financial core and the drivers that affect why quibble about the how?
@ Victor R Callender | February 15, 2014 at 8:45 AM |
“Look, Barbados is a gift from god, placed in its own eastern potpouri, surrounded by its own Kaleidascope of magnificence…”
VRC, that is just a load of jingoistic nostalgic bullshit. Why don’t you also “remember” when ‘Barbadoes’ was full of slaves?
What about when there was ingrained apartheid in the social and economic structures in the island from the plantation to the Church and manifested in the brown (‘red-skin’, for people like you) vs. black dichotomy and even practised in the “tenantries” and black villages of deprivation?
The Barbados of today is a much better place for black people.
It’s a pity the “Paradox of Life” is about to pay it a visit.
In the coming months many of the social and economic gains made in the last 50 years will be steadily rolled back to a life in time you seem to hanker over.
Its also tragically funny the same political party excessively (and misleadingly) credited for creating the environment that led to blacks escaping the grinding poverty of your make-believe halcyon days would be condemned as the black pied piper that took them back to your ‘utopian’ village where they started led by a blind Latin-speaking clown in full colonial costume running after a black cat hiding in a ship of drowning rats called the SS DLP torpedoed by cruise missile marked “IMF”.
@millertheanunnaki, Pitiful indeed, because you are so rapped up in your own miserable self pity, you wouldn’t understand the causation of your ignorance. It is people like you, magnificently myopic, who play the blame game to full effect. You have no hope, no vision for the promise that the future offers Barbados. Your attempt to lure me into an intellectual fight has worked, but remember this, I never come to a gun fight with an icepick. Seemingly, you were not the beneficiary of our nations fine educational system, for had you been, you would have a lot to be thankful for, even nostalgic about. Instead of tearing down, why don’t you come down off of your selfish, and ignominious rants and contribute something other than criticism. What have you built, intellectually or otherwise, what do you offer, besides fatalism. The reason that failure can even come into the lexicon of bajans, is because of people like you. You believe in very little, and your contributions here, are representative truly, of a person lacking vision.Every situation has a begining, and if colonialism and all of failures, happened to be Barbados’ so what. Your inept attempt at historical resitation proves nothing more than that we should all work together for the common good. It does not matter which government is at the helm of power in Barbados, you would still condemn, simply because condemnation is fashionable, and you my friend have no solutions. It was once said by a great thinker from the past “Condemnation without investigation, is the height of ignorance.” if you’re not willing to be the change that’s necessary, then just do what you’re doing, nothing. But just remember, “If you keep on doing, what you always did, you keep on getting, what you always got.” Peace.
“…..in a ship of drowning rats called the SS DLP torpedoed by cruise missile marked “IMF”.
…and exactly how is this IMF torpedo going to single out the DLP people from the BLP people? Don’t you think that if anything it will be the DLP people who will have access to the riot equipment that the AG does not know anything about?
….sometimes Bushie wonders about your level of maturity Miller….you mean you so much hate DLP people for winning the last elections that you are hoping for the IMF to torpedo us all….?
Shiite man! THAT is hate!!!
@Victor Callender and Bush Tea
I thought I was the only one who noticed that MilerdeNukie is a nuisance. I think this forum is important and I do know that the political yardfowls will spin their thing on behalf of their respective parties. But I have more respect for some body like AC whose partisan position he or she does not hide, as opposed to MillerdeNukie who comes here pretending to be this unbiased commentator when in actual fact he is just another yardfowl hoping for gloom and doom to ensue for the sake of selfish, partisan political greed and benefit.
@ Bush Tea | February 15, 2014 at 10:33 AM |
You were warned Bushie over and over again. The same way you pretend to clairvoyant with your special gift from BBE, other sons and daughters are similarly gifted but with the Truth of foresight.
But aren’t you wishing the same thing on the same brass bowls?
Isn’t your BBE scheduled to intervene and send brimstone and fire on the just and unjust Bajans? Who can be more nihilistic and fatalistic than you Bushman, with your BBE nonsense?
You are a man that boasts to be a god of having the answer to all of mankind’s problems. When are you going to start up your PUP or BUP to save Bajans from the IMF cruise missile, motor mouth?
@ Victor R Callender | February 15, 2014 at 10:28 AM |
Victor my dear, what do you think about a programme of privatization as recommended by the IMF?
How about the decriminalization of marijuana?
Shouldn’t you be turning the cultivation and processing of the plant into a forex saving and earning business to replace your dead sugar industry?
Is that intellectual enough for you or do you think marijuana is evil?
Isn’t that being positive and uplifting with a clear vision for a bright and proactive Barbados?
You see Vicky, I did not attack you personally just offered and alternative view can be turned into practical outcomes for the benefit your country.
Now you look on the bright side of the future instead of living in the ‘dark’ past!
@millertheanunnaki, Man what is your problem? What has Bush tea or anyone done you on this blog? You’re allowed to have your opinion, and you want to limit ours. There must be some deep psychological hang up that is really fucking with you. Ok tell us did you dress up in girls clothes, sit in some bathroom reading national geographic and masturbating as you watched the Wildebeest? What’s your sick fatalistic obsession about. I bet that you’re the sort of “Girlieman” who gets all happy when other people fail. You need a life, stop obsessing @ zero dak thirty about this shit, Bush Tea is having fun, fool, and so are most of the participants to this sight. I think you were the kid that everyone picked on in school, the person who needed acceptance, and that manifest in your writings here. It will be alright, your psychological profile is understood by everybody, so we all know that you are a “Yardfowl” and that you wish for Barbados’ demise. But i wonder one thing, are you a Trinidadian, where will you go, if you can’t enjoy living in Barbados, and having as fucked up an opinion as you do?
@millertheanunnaki, Poor fellow you just don’t get it. Let me do what I do best. You want to talk about economics, the Fiat economic presence Barbados finds itself in, started under Owen S Arthur. Please pull up a chair. The system was made worst when Mr. Arthur failed to read the economic indicators back then correctly. Mr. Arthur should have instituted economic austerity measures to stem the high balance of trade deificit, back then, but he failed to do that. “Gresham’s Theory” then entered into Barnados’ fiscal sytem millertheanunnaki, and because the current political administration similarly, failed to control interest rates and excessive borrowing, we are at the precipice of disaster, created long before Freundel Stuat was Prime Minister. Why can’t you see and understand these facts, people are looking to solutions, but you are obsessed with writing Barbados and bajan off. Man, come down off of your high horse, and lets figure something out.
@Victor R Callender | February 15, 2014 at 11:28 AM |
Come out, things!
There is only one omission from your attack. The mirror scene as you mentally rehearse the writing of your autobiography.
We are now seeing the real Victor. Not a Victor brought up in Christian Barbados of yore as a well mannered and civil young man but a Victor from the social gutter. But what do we expect from those that drink from the cesspool in George Street.
Yes Vicky your right about one thing. The miler is indeed a “Trickidadian”. One that loves Barbados so much he practically owns it, and the people too. Pity you have passed your ‘sell-by-date’.
Look here, the DEMS try to keep jobs and not fallout with the People. We are not in deep do do yet but have the potential to get there because of low or zero economic growth. we have a good cover of foreign exchange but that is under treat because the US or UK economies have not recover.. Reducing the deficit must be done but the real deal is , BWU and NUPW put foward on behalf of it’s members a salery cuts. For MIA to refuse it is a sign that she really dont care how people hurt, just hurt then and let us win the election.hum will not work
@Well Well
Before you repeat your accusation please share the evidence.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reinsurance
Come out things!!
Hal…….regarding your concerns on the inability of journalists to do their jobs in Barbados, this is the best example you will ever get regarding why they can’t……..as you may have noticed regarding my comments on Consumers General Insurance (CGI) and it’s owners Bruce Bailey, Peter Harris and their many years of a no-pay-claims policy against injured Bajans, their years of despite denying bajan claims, still presenting those claims to Lloyds of London and receiving payments to enrich themselves and whomever is greedy enough to continue aiding and abetting them in this simple but lucrative and elaborate criminal venture, not to mention their ability to become extraordinarily wealthy from just one company based in Barbados while CGI’s claimants remain in pain, misery and penniless.
That is the perfect example of the journalists in Barbados being totally kept in a strangle hold of silence and unable to report on this or any similar human interest story on the island. The politicians involved will effectively ruin the life of any journalist completely if they so much as try to right this wrong.
In saying that, we very recently engaged an investigative journalist in the UK where the likes of Harris et al have no reach, even though Harris lived in the UK very briefly as a small child he is unable to weave any web of corruption in these particular circles in London. This journalist will do what he does best and what Bajan journalists are unable to do with the story to make sure it remains out there in the public domain for all to see and not hidden somewhere under a carpet in Parliament in Barbados, compliments of the politicians involved. This journalist has no connection to Barbados so there is no cover up to fear and he will certainly have a real life scoop. He may very well end up with some award in London when it’s over, but as long as these island criminals are exposed, we don’t care if he becomes a millionaire for doing his job.
Not even if i tried could i have made up a better example of how journalists in Barbados are not allowed to practice true journalism devoid of political interference. As usual they have the politicians, lawyers and their many corrupt friends to thank.
When it rains, it pours…….come out things.
@ Well, well
If what you say is true, I will certainly like to see the evidence. Plse contact me at hal.austin@ft.com
I see a whole lot of braying jackasses on this thread,blissfully asleep in their ignorance that the stinking Democratic Labour Party did not bring Barbados to its lowest ever in its short history of self governance.Even the much abused plantocracy did a better job than these incompetent fools led by a man whose head is seen before you see his torso,aided and abetted by liars Sinckler,Quisling Boyce,Ince and the toy car expert,Worrell, who produces his own statistical data as he hides the real data from the overseers called the IMF.
You braying apologists for the stupidity of the DLP,bray on,the IMF is behind you and they have a big rock to lick you down wid later this year!!
@ Victor
Your analysis of Miller the nooksie is frighteningly on the ball…
Amazing! LOL
In the big picture what matters is how are we going to improve FX inputs to pay for the import bill. The Barbados dollar is worthless. There is no market to exchange Barbados dollars for currencies needed to pay the import bill. The Central Bank been printing Barbados dollars and giving them to the Government who in turn been spending them, and then the people where it spent been spending those dollars on imported things like gasoline and cars that need to be paid for in FX. You don’t need a Harvard MBA degree to figure out why FX has taken such a big reduction. Our main FX generator, tourism, is in decline and as a destination for long term visitors, we are about 3 times more expensive than other places that are now taking our tourists from us such as Cuba, Costa Rica, Brazil and DR. If we don’t get competitive there will be a continued drain of FX reserves. Laying off 3000 people will help reduce FX outflows but without significantly increasing the inflows, 3000 wont cut it. The GDP per person that we have of about $16500 US is based upon a unsustainable value of our currency being pegged at 2 to 1 to the US$. With a $100 million fall in FX reserves in January the slide continues. There does not appear to be a plan to fix the slide so it almost a certainty that devaluation will be a necessity to make our tourism product more competitive. Almost half the work force is employed in tourism related employment so making it competitive is key. It is so far out of wack on a cost comparison basis there simply is not enough time to bring into line without some massive cost adjustments. We don’t have 3 or 4 years to fix it, we have 8 to 12 months to get it done.
@SITH
Actually what matters is how do we change the attitudes of our people who live in a small nation to be aligned to a system of sustainable productivity.
In other words living within our means.
David….there is now an investigation outside of Barbados regarding the issue, I was sharing information with Hal and you of course, but now it’s out of my hands, the less said at this point the better…….as a matter of fact I only said what is public knowledge on the island, any documentation will be passed on to investigators, I will be able to share that with you after the process and I will but I am not in charge of anything going forward.
@David
You are 100% correct because the world is going to change that for us if we don’t. I cant imagine how someone might want to begin local production of a product when the imported product that he or she may plan on competing against has received a 10 to 15% reduction because of the growth in the value of the US$. It seems to me that many competitive destinations recognized that having an independent monetary policy that was unpegged was a key to growth. We have developed a mentality that a fixed peg is a saviour and it maybe, but only if all the competitors are doing the same. That is where the rubber meets the road. We have been outmaneuvered.
Hal……………I will contact you
@SITH
I continue to admire your analysis of the dollar issue.
@SITH
We have to accept a reality i.e. we can’t have our cake and eat it too. We are said to have a per capita income of 16,000USD +. To reorder economic fundamentals cost of production must come down or we have to generate times more revenue which does not seem possible given our current trajectory. What is not being discussed is what price as a country we are prepared to pay for forex generating projects, are we prepared to produced at a premium?
@ VS
“You want to talk about economics, the Fiat economic presence Barbados finds itself in, started under Owen S Arthur. “
I thought all along it was the global recession. Anyhow my one question: Was the situation made worse by the David Thompson and Freundel Stuart led DLP?
.
Hi David
Please post a copy of the Estwick proposal which I am sure you have access to so the BU family can read it in its entirety
@BUPPS
Don’t have it.
Obviously the leak to the Nation newspaper has been orchestrated. They (Nation Newspaper) have milked it to sell some newspapers. It is ironic when one considers the Nation continues to be vilified by the DLP.
@ SITH
I find you postings on the 2-1 fixed exchange rate to be must reads. Have you given any though to the long term effect of the endless printing of money by the Federal Reserve Bank (U.S.A.) on the value of the Barbados dollar?
@ Victor R Callender
Are you stating that the government running large current account deficits for the last 4-5 years wasn’t a major contributing factor to the present economic difficulties?
In my view, the major error P.M. Arthur and the other regional prime ministers made was allowing the WICB to railroad them into hosting World Cup 2007. The security cost for such events since 9/11, 2011 makes profitability almost impossible, and the construction cost and continued upkeep and maintenance of the stadiums built in the various countries for WC 2007 make them White Elephants rather than the revenue earners envisioned.
@Bajan in NY
What is legacy?
Then the collaspe on Wall Street occurred.
Who could have predicted it?
@ David
I never bought into the legacy talk. I knew that Montreal was until recently still paying off debts incurred to host the 1976 Olympic, I knew that Greece paid many time what it originally estimated the 2004 Olympic would cost, and I know that good accounting would show that such events generally struggle to break-even financially.
My concern was always eventually recovering the cost of the New Kensington Oval given the way cricket tours are scheduled in recent years, and the inability of folks in the region to come up with creative ways of utilizing such facilities on a regular basis.
@Bajan in NY
We were intoxicated by the times of plenty.
@SITH
In the world of FIAT what alternative currency or basket can guarantee flatline stability of currency rate?
@bajan in New York
The US$ is the worlds reserve currency. I believe population growth there in the last year was somewhere around 2 million people and because, among other things , it is becoming a energy giant and moving towards self sufficiency I don’t see anything that is going to replace it. There has to be continued printing of money in the USA to support the GDP and population growth. The effect on the Barbados dollar is that it gets dragged along to the currently ever increasing value of the US$ but unfortunately there is no corresponding increase in GDP on the island. When Barbados gained independence from Britain the exchange rate for British sterling was perhaps twice what it is today so for Brits it is now twice as expensive to visit as it was back then. If you go back to the 50’s one British pound would get you $4.00. Now it gets you$1.50. One of the new source markets was said to be Brazil. In the last 2 years the Barbados currency has grown in value by about 40% over the Brazilian real. So for our competitors who do not peg to the US$, we are now 40% more expensive to visit than they are, We are increasing the cost of our main export, tourism , and reducing the cost of imports which in turn discourages local production because of the wealth generation in GDP growth in the USA. The long term effect of this continued trend can only be bad without a major new revenue source such as massive oil discoveries. I suspect very few people know of any economic advantage we get from pegging to the US$ rather than the pound sterling or a basket of currencies from our source markets. What if there is a 20% gain in the US$ against the Euro and sterling pound in the next 24 months? What will that do to us.? My belief is we have hit the glass ceiling on the exchange rate and our competitors have not. It is the tortoise and hare story. The competition have been slowly sneaking up on us.
“If you go back to the 50′s one British pound would get you $4.00. Now it gets you $1.50.”
US or Bds $1.50?
@ Enuff
It was Bds$4.80. Nixon changed all that.
@ Sith
The Greenback is indeed the major reserve currency, but this is unlikely to be so by 2020.
Nations do decline and the US will remain the world’s leading economy, but its economic power will diminish.
@Hal Austn
so you agree it is time to get the Barbados dollar valued at some other currency? What would you recommend considering (cut and pasted) the economy of the United States is the world’s largest single national economy. The United States’ nominal GDP was estimated to be $17.1 trillion in December 2013,[1] approximately a quarter of nominal global GDP.[2] Its GDP at purchasing power parity is also the largest of any single country in the world, approximately a fifth of the global total
@ SITH
I can’t fault your reasoning and listing of the negatives that come with the 2-1 peg, but there must be an equal if not stronger set of reasons and lists of positives that has enable every minister of finance, and every governor of the central bank since 1975, to convince the majority of Barbadians that revaluing the dollars would be an unpardonable sin.
@Bajan in NY
Politicians don’t have the balls to be frank and forward thinking in telling the masses the truth. The 5 year election cycle is about winning elections and telling the masses what they want to hear.
That’s why no one would trust to do any investigations in Barbados or through bajan journalists anymore, the whole profession has been comprised and is now like a dog and pony show.
@ Well Well
the whole profession has been comprised and is now like a dog and pony show.
dog and pony?!? ….more like mule and jackass…
@bajean in NY
1n 1975 we did not have to borrow money to pay the import bill and we had a relatively upbeat tourist sector and a strong balance of FX funds being generated. Today we have to borrow money to pay for the imports. I know you must be aware that we had no takers a few months back for a borrowing offer we put out into the open market. So we cant borrow money under normal market terms and we lost $100 million in FX last month alone. So the issue is we are not getting enough FX in and tourists are going other places such as Cuba, DR, Costa Rica and one of the main reasons for that is cost. $2500 for a week in Barbados are $800 for a week in Cuba or Costa Rica or Dominican. They are getting our FX and we have not yet cut back on our expenditures. So we gotta get more money coming in and less going out. It is quite simple…we are in do do because we are spending opm (other peoples money). What are the positives? Do you have a few you can share with us.
@david
“In the world of FIAT what alternative currency or basket can guarantee flatline stability of currency rate”
Guarantee of flatline stability is what we think we have now. The whole ideal of a pegged currency is you must have a greater degree of FX inflows than you do outflows along with the ability to trade dollars on a market.
As long as that is the case then all things are wonderful and no adjustments of any type are required. But our system of a pegged currency also has FX controls that eliminate the normal market action of valuation. There is no place to sell Barbados dollars. So nobody outside of the country wants them Hope we discover oil real soon then we will be like the middle east countries most of who have a pegged exchange rate to the US$.
@ SITH
First of all, let me repeat, I think your arguments make sense and I was only trying to find out if as someone so well versed in the matter, you had heard the arguments of the pro 2-1 peg folks who make the decisions.
I’ll tell you this, I have a Jamaican 1 dollar note which was signed by the members of an opposing Jamaican team in the early 70s. At that time the exchange rate was Bds$ 2.36 = Jam$ 1, which was more than the exchange rate for a U.S. dollars. As you know, the Jamaican dollars suffered numerous devaluations over the last 3 decades and at present the exchange rate is approx Jam$107 = US$1. I believe authorities in Barbados are afraid of something similar happening over a period of time if a decision is made to devalue the Barbados dollars.
It is obvious imports would become more expensive if the Bds dollars is devalued, but that maybe a blessing, since the island would most likely only import what it can afford to pay for.
Bajans had a choice either the IMF or the Guyanese and they chose the IMF.
Reading the Friday paper (14-02-2014) on Estwick’s presentation to the Cabinet, it beggars the serious questions: who is advising the DLP gov’t on economic matters????? But looking at how the economy is being “run” the REAL QUESTION would be, is Fumble and Stinkliar even taking ANY advice on the running of this economy????? Looking at how the economy has “progressed” from 2008 to 2014 and comparing it to Estwick’s analysis it is CLEAR that this DLP govt is only running this economy in such a way AS to fortify their position in this country, doing it in a recession and to the dangerous DETRIMENT to the economy. THE DEMOCRATIC LABOUR PARTY MUST UNDERSTAND THAT WHEN IT ASSUMES GOVT THEY ARE THE GOVT OF ALL BARBADOS AND NOT OF DLP SUPPORTERS ONLY!!!!!!!!!!!!
Mr Estwick’s presentation, in my opinion, is not one that any experienced economist couldn’t have made so it is telling me that Stinkliar and by extension Fumble, not being trained economists, MUST have been largely ignoring the advice from their “advisors”. That is INCREDIBLE, PREPOSTEROUS and DOWNRIGHT RIDICULOUS but at the same time it is not surprising!!!!!!!. I remember Dr Frank Alleyne a (former?) economic advisor to this gov’t on Brass Tacks basically impling that this govt is ignoring him. It is almost painful to think that our economy is being run this way!!!!!!!!
Further actions, since assuming govt in 2008 and even with their own admission that the world is going through a recession, tells me that the gov’t is run by LUNATICS!!!!!!! Their first budget in 2008 had me asking “ARE THEY SERIOUS??. Then Fumble and his mindless declaration that no one will be sent home in (2013 elections) even after knowing that the NIS was being used to pay public workers salaries . Then there is the rumour that they hired >2000 people into the public service just before the election is an act of pure unadulterated LUNACY in itself!!!!!!!!
The $3000 question would be what next for Fumble and Stinkliar. If Fumble does not heed Estwick’s “advice” it only confirms as I stated earlier that this economy is only run to benefit the DLP’s “image”. if this is so then Freundel Stuart MUST BE REMOVED AS PRIME MINISTER for bringing the economy to ruins and not doing what is required to save it. If , however, Freundel follows Estwick’s advice then what of Sinckler then!!!!!!!!!!. Fumble then by inference and contrary to earlier statements would have lost confidence in Sinckler!!!!!!!!!
@ SITH
As you have outlined, this situation is as simple as they come.
We are spending more money than we are making. To cover the difference, we have been borrowing money from others.
Meanwhile, we have been fooling ourselves with shiite talk about “first world status”, and we actually seem to now believe that we are ENTITLED to this standard of living…..on OTHER PEOPLE’S MONEY….
Wuh OBVIOUSLY lenders will demand their repayment…
..and obviously new lenders will be REAL FOOLISH to give us more money….so now we will have to use the already INSUFFICIENT income to maintain our lifestyle – AS WELL AS to repay the debts we built up over the last 30 years….. In short, our ass is grass.
In the news today the joker from the NUPW was complaining that “nowhere had the IMF’s intervention resulted in a better life for the citizens”…. LOL… He is an idiot?
The IMF is a reality check.
.. Its job is to remind brass bowls that champagne taste cannot be sustained on mauby pockets.
@bajean in new York
There is no need to devalue if the products we are exporting (tourism) generate enough money to cover the imports. That apparently is no longer the case. So what has to be done to generate more FX? That is what needs to be solved and when near on 50% of the workforce is employed in one industry being tourism, it had better be very very competitive. Well, it isn’t. We are no longer competitive. The world is not going to continue to give us money to spend unless 1) we earn it and 2) we can repay it. If we cant figure out how to do that then what is going to happen? We don’t have to worry about correcting the value of our currency if we are generating FX surpluses, but we are not and that is the big problem. There is a reason why the Barbados dollar is rated in the same category as junk bonds. It is because nobody we trade with wants them. And they don’t want them because you cant spend them anywhere except in Barbados. Try taking your Barbados dollars to a bank in New York and see if you can get US$ for them. That is what the government recently did by putting an offering to finance on the table for a bunch of hundreds of millions of dollars. The result was thanks, but no thanks. There is where we are at.
@ Sith
I have said on a number of occasions. Uncouple from the Greenback, fix against a basket of a basket of currencies and commodities and float against the others.
There are now other reserve currencies, the most important of which is the renimbi, which is now the main trading currency in Asia. The euro will also bounce back and the Greenback and freal will battle for influence in Latin America.
When you consider that China has a middle class the sie of the entire US and the eurozone is 500m strong and trades mainly internally, the days sof the Greenback are numbered.
Well Well | February 15, 2014 at 6:20 PM |
That’s why no one would trust to do any investigations in Barbados or through bajan journalists anymore, the whole profession has been comprised and is now like a dog and pony show.@
WellWell. YOU ARE SO RIGHT . ITS MORE LIKE A JACK AND ASS SHOW.long ass talk that goes no where.it can make you sick fast, some people now use lnternet only
I am not sure, that with the abysmal state of economic affairs in Barbados, that any political party is equipped with the mindset to solve the problems facing Barbados in the short term. What is required from the political establishment, is working across both political aisles, and the allowance for political vulnerabilities on both sides. This current crop of politicians show no propensity to merge their ideas for the betterment of Barbados. Clearly evident is that the ship of state is fastly running to a state of “Dry Dock” and politicians yelling across the aisle, has manifested itself into only useless diatribe. The folks who have all contributed here on this blog, seem to be more in touch with the truth about Barbados’ economic affairs, than the people elected seem to be. Mr. Sinckler and the Prime Minister are now in survival mode, and appear to be, hoping for the miracle, that does not seem to be coming. On the other side of the aisle, the opposition BLP can now point to sytemic failures, as well they should, but can they solve Barbados’ economic woes?. If the opposition BLP can, then my question to Ms Mottley is why then for the good of the country, are you not attempting to walk across the aisle, and offer the services of the opposition to the Stuart administration? Maybe I’m living in a fantasy world, but at this stage of facing an economic crisis, anything possible should be tried. These politicians have to reach across the parliamentary aisle, face this dilemma head on, and allow themselves to admit to the people of Barbados, that serious economis miscalculations have occurred, while both parties controlled the instruments of government. There’s enough blame to go around, it’s time to get busy, and produce solutions to bring Barbados back, from the brink of economic ruination. I want to see from the government and the opposition in Barbados, what I see and read here on this blog, a comittment to working and merging for the good of the bajan people. All politics are local, but the call now should be for national unity.
@Hal
You are aware the Chinese manipulate their currency rate and no one has been able to make them stop?
@ Victor R Callender | February 16, 2014 at 6:13 AM |
“Maybe I’m living in a fantasy world, but at this stage of facing an economic crisis, anything possible should be tried.”
But you are living in fantasy land!
This is precisely what we have been trying to get over to jokers like you. But what did we get in return other than a barrage of invectives which made people think you and the miller were “friends”.
To whom are you directing your call to arms? The politicians or Bushie’s brass bowl John Citizen? Who is listening to the critics; certainly not the Chief?
Do you really understand what is happening to your sweet “Bubadus”? The current administration has been told on numerous occasions ad nauseam the fiscal path it was following was the wrong one that would only lead to where you are now, in serious crisis.
But what did the so-called prophets of doom and gloom got other than what you did to the miller?
The present administration listens to no one; not even their own ‘in-house’ critics.
Ryan Straughn gave constructive advice for many months for government to rein in its fiscal profligacy but what did he get in return other than what you are engaging in? Even now he, Ryan, is not being taken seriously when he suggests the government goes to the IMF for assistance before it is forced into a one-sided arrangement that would bring tremendous grief to ordinary innocent citizens by way of a sharp adjustment of the local currency. To use Bushie’s words, an IMF designed reality check is what the brass bowls are about to experience.
Another classic example of the intransigence of the current administration is the one of privatization. Here we are pushing for an early programme that could facilitate the much desired goal of black economic enfranchisement even if executed according to Bushie’s “Cooperative” model.
However, the current administration is bent on ensuring the State owned assets remain under the control of politicians to exercise the principles of the fatted calf economics and fiscal management.
Eventually, the IMF will sell off the assets at knockdown prices, not to black Bajans but to people with loads of foreign money including the Trickidadians whom Bushie and his ilk loathe so much.
PS: Victor, unless you are one of the “eminent persons” don’t expect your suggestions to be entertained far less ever see the light of day.
Your sweet country is ready to be towed into “Dry Dock” minus an incompetent clueless captain who wrecked the ship everybody knew was in bad shape prior to 2008.
@ Miller
Look chief!
You are right about the intransigence of Stuart. But are you suggesting that Mia or Arthur would be any different?
Mia was the first person bout here publicly talking bout shutting down the social media…and limiting free speech…remember?
Mia was behind the World Cup inspired wire tapping for political reasons scam….remember?
…she burn down Glendairy too….but that is another story….
…and don’t talk bout Arthur,….even if a fellow disagreed with him privately, he would get drunk and call you at 3a.m. Bwussing and carrying on….that sort of thing is intimidating to an ordinary citizen…(but he CAN’T bwuse like a bushman 🙂 )
This is what Victor is saying….both political parties are IMPOTENT in the current crisis.
SO THEN WHAT IS YOUR SOLUTION?
On privatization…if things get tight with your family – do you rush to sell the family house to Bushie?
Of course the bushman will let you rent it…but in 5 years you will have paid the full cost to Bushie ….and your youngest daughter would have paid up even more…
NORMAL people would sacrifice, cut back meals, do odd jobs and negotiate other deals…in order to maintain the family home and assets.
Bushie thought it was only people like Peter Wickham who were willing to sell their birthrights for a pot of porridge…..
….you ain’t Peter nuh? LOL Ha. Ha
@millertheanunnaki, Is there anything that’s good that you hope for us? Everyday you intellectualize the gloom and doom of Barbados and bajans. I don’t have the answers, and I will concede that I’m not the smartest person on this blog, but I’m willing to listen, even to you. Why are you so angry with everybody. Don’t you think that you could channel that anger into some positivity. You seem to be a very well read and competent person, a person from whom I could learn. But rather than build up,you tear down, you demoralize, and at the end of the day, I am left gasping for air. Please offer us some solutions, I beg you. I am not eminent, far from it, but I am Barbadian. I come here with no pretense, only with a relatively pure heart. You sir, are my countryman, not my enemy. I apologize if I have offended you. I offer you an olive branch, so that we can reconcile our differences and pray for and search out the truth, for our beloved Barbados. Many will be affected by poor planning and lack of austerity measures, are you willing to lend your voice to help with solutions that will be a national call to action, against this government, and all politicians. The governed are the employers of the government. We have a right to be heard, and to demand truth and honesty from those who are governing. Help me understand sir, how to frame a conversation, that has impact for change. Thank you, sir. If the government is talking and no one is listening, and they have been tuned out by the masses, then it’s time for a no confidence vote.
@millertheanunnaki But you are living in fantasy land!
This is precisely what we have been trying to get over to jokers like you. But what did we get in return other than a barrage of invectives which made people think you and the miller were “friends”. You will find out sir, how much the other side, I’m talking about the BLP is lacking. You will find out that Ms Mottley, does not garner the suppot of most of those in her own party, let alone the entire country. Did you know that the BLP kept bringing Mr Arthur back, primarily because Ms Mottley’s leadership was questionable. Are you prepared for a caretaker BLP administration. Who stands out in the BLP with strong fiscally responsible skills, ready to take on the challenges of Barbados’ economic future. Many are ready to fire salvos across the bow of a disabled ship, there are those ready for the mutiny, but who will captain our Island home out of the perilous waters. Tell me, what ministry did Ms Mottley run sucessfully? Did Owen S Arthur follow the advice of the IMF. Both Athur and Mascoll who are trained economist have offered what solutions to fix the current economic crisis. If I am drowning sir, I don’t care who saves me, I just want to be saved.
one would never get the truth from miller ,,for five years he huffed and puffed that the govt should get rid of the bloated civil service,which he pissed allover ,,,with the most demeaning names,,now the time have arrived govt dismiss civil servants guess what he hollers and throw all kinds of sissy fits about govt being cruel,,,his solutions what ever they may be cannot be taken seriously as his rabid political discourse is soely intertwined with one of selfishness and not one for country,,hence one will always him rant and rave about the “Selling barbados to the highest bidder to pay the debt down…
Mr Miller, it was your party,who with George Payne and the other co-conspirators that resurrected Owen S Arthur. They did that because, it is said they found Ms Mottley’s personal lifestyle objectionable. Now, do you think that Ms Mottley has forgotten that? Where can she lead Barbados, if she can’t muster the troops in her own party. What awaits Barbados under Ms Mottley,will be constant strife, and bickering Mr Miller, and guess what, Barbadians will continue to suffer. Please remember, her own party members begged Owen Arthur, who was basically done, as a party leader, to retake the political reigns. Besides an article written by Mr Mascoll recently, and a few comments in the Nation by Mr Arthur, what economic strategy has the BLP offered at anytime relative to this crisis. I show you how inept the BLP political methodology is, they stood on political platforms with the country in crisis, ranted and raved with two genius economist in their party, and never saw the economic fiasco that awaited the Barbadian people. Please Mr Miller, and you are asking us what? to criminalize the current administration? Mr Bush Tea is fair and willing to look at all sides, but you Mr Miller, you can’t see the forest for the trees. Two trained economist failed to see the economis alerts, that foretold Barbados’ economic future, and all they had to do was show the Barbadian people the convincing evidence that they should have had, and political change would have been a certainty. Mr Miller no disrespect, Mia Mottley can’t do it. If the BLP is returned to power, remember this, Barbados will be in a dire economic condition, probably worse that it is now. I am not taking any particular side, I am not taking any side, I am looking at the big picture. I am still waiting for Ms Mottley’s economic solution. She accuses Mr Stuart of being quiet, she hasn’t been to talkative about the current state of economis affairs in Barbados, with any specificity. All of Ms Mottley’s conversations, have been generalities, aimed at appeasing the population.
@ Bush Tea | February 16, 2014 at 8:31 AM |
Bushie as you were told before the miller knows very little of which you rant and rave other than by your gossip and rumour-mongering about the past sins of some BLP administration. An administration that has been exonerated and officially forgiven by the same “intransigent Stuart”.
But how would your strategy of continuing blaming the past administration deal with the challenges facing the current one?
Are you going to blame the past administration (including your favourite character “Wuk-fuh-Wuk”) for sending home 3,000 public sector workers, ignoring the IMF recommendations of 2011, manipulating for narrow partisan electoral ends economic and fiscal data for which the Central Bank should be the independent custodian and presenter and, most of all moving, the national indebtedness from $ 4.7 billion to $10.9 billion in less than 6 years?
We know for sure your contrite admission of an IMF reality check will not be by way of a cruise missile but by a series of depth charges to fatally raise the DLP submarine that has torpedoed the Bajan economy.
It’s always better to sell your family house to locals looking for a deal (and make a surplus to liquidate your other debts) when things get tough than to wait until the mortgagee repossesses and kick your entire family out when the house goes on the auction block that your “Trickidadians” loaded friends will snap up for a song.
Don’t you think it’s time you stop with your “looking-back” series and deal with the present and future?
We notice your total lack of your ‘opinionated contributions regarding the Estwick plan and his propensity to ‘destabilise’ your preferred administration hanging on to dear life by a ‘twine of time’.
What’s up Bushie the black bald pooch cat got your uncontrollable tongue?
One thing rational thinking people on BU know for sure your BUP or PUP (or is it the BBE) organization will never get off the ground to save Barbados as long as Dictator Bushie is around. Even Caswell has given up on you!
LOL @ Miller…
Victor here pelting licks in your ass and you fixated with Bushie? ….hmmmmm passing strange….!!
Bushie must have touched a nerve…. Ha Ha …oh Shiite!!!
Boss man, if you are so asinine to sell your family home and expose your children to the whims and fancies of Bushie ….well sell um yuh idiot!!! …..thank God you don’t have any real children….
That is obviously a LAST RESORT ACTION, only taken when the alternative is death and total surrender…. But as Victor has laid out for everyone to see….that appears to be your (and the collective politicians’ – both B & D) mentality.
Steupssss…. You could really start back blogging under your real name do…..
Victor R Callender re. your post of February 16, 2014 at 8:56 AM;
What is your solution to the problem. Leave FS and his merrie band to continue wrecking the economy? Freundel has clearly demonstrated that he cannot pilot the ship successfully to calmer waters and the various Ministers have also demonstrated that they were complicit in the ruining of the economy between 2008 and now. They can’t successfully lead the recovery. But at least there are some in the BLP who have track records of good management of significant sectors in good and not so good times. No one in the current DLP has a track record of doing anything substantively and successfully for the advancement of the country. Rather, they have essentially destroyed our economy as is clear from the IMF reports.
IMHO, any solution that leads to FS demitting his high office and perhaps CS leaving the Finance Ministry, will stand the country in good stead.
It is not a Hobson’s choice at this stage. I think that the Estwick imbroglio could offer a possibility of a path to a change that could lead to better political leadership and management of this country and a possibility of transitioning to economic growth sometime in the future . Too bad the seemingly purblind leader and his band are not likely to take it.
@ David – BU
What do you make of the Nation’s report of Sir Roy Trotman replacing Amb. Joe Goddard at the U.N. coming out at this time?
The Bushman……………..it’s really sad.
@ David
China is a communist state, nothing happens without the approval of the state. The valuations on their companies are always dodgy, that is why so many have withdrawn from the New York stock exchange.
In China, what you see is not what you get.
@Hal
How can you suggest we look at the Chinese currency as an alternative to US peg?
Plantation……………I remember one journalist in Barbados back in the 70s and 80s, Timothy Slinger, who was never afraid to investigate any issue that was relevant to human interest, now no human interest is taken seriously in Barbados, It’s frightening.
@are-we-there-yet? What is your solution to the problem. Leave FS and his merrie band to continue wrecking the economy? Freundel has clearly demonstrated that he cannot pilot the ship successfully to calmer waters and the various Ministers have also demonstrated that they were complicit in the ruining of the economy between 2008 and now. I will never maintain that the current administration, handled the current fiscal crisis competently. But let us not pretend that the opposition BLP was free and clear of all of this, either. Bad decisions about Barbados’ fiscal health were started under Mr Arthur, who grew government to an inordinate, unsustainable size, and facilitated for outrageous spending, at a time when Barbados needed to have begun to look at reducing high interest rates and placing a cap on borrowing. Barbados had at its helm a trained economist in Arthur, who allowed Barbadians to borrow without fiscal restraint, and initiated a fiscal free for all with the IMF. It is now fashionable to place the blame on Mr Stuart, though he has been acquiescent in his ability to measurably deal with this fiscal casm, it must be said that both parties are to blame. Ms Mottley sat as Mr. Arthur’s most noted lieutenant during these days of fiscal mismanagement, and unheralded bungling of many projects, started and not properly finished by the BLP over the fifteen years of Mr Arthurs administration. Hind sight being 50/50 I don’t understand why many will not look inside the mistakes made by the trained economist, both in Mr Arthur’s administration and at his central bank. In Mr Arthur’s last stand he was able to secure the services of Mr. Mascoll who came over from the DLP, I’ll spare you the details, yet with two very learned economist, and a trusted deputy prime minister, the BLP was unable to do right by Barbados. History has a way of repeating itself, and those who ignore history will eventually find themselve paying homage to the mistakes of the past. I would concede to you, that mismanagement and inept leadership on the part of this current administration, should be met with severe penalties at the polls, if this admininstration cannot turn around the current fiscal dilemma. However, we should all be mindful, that across the aisle political discourse, offered with efficiency and constructiveness, may lend itself to solving the malfeasance of poltical culture, that now exist in Barbados. There’s a saying in the USA whose motto is hailed from the show me State of Missouri, and that is “Show me.” The long serving BLP who had control of the instruments of power, dropped the ball, and now they want it back. Perhaps the solution to the problems of Barbados, is to go back to the place where it all started, under the watching eyes of Owen, Mia, Clyde and the rest of them, and then come forward to Mr, Stuart and Mr Sinckler.
@BushTea
Talk about ignominy!! You are all over the place with your argument, but that is expected from the dangerous. The discussion is about economic management and you resorted to an argument based on OSA “bwussing” people.
@ VCallender
I am not one to give much credence to arguments that are based on emotion/belief rather than FACTS., unless you are clairvoyant.
@ Victor R Callender | February 16, 2014 at 9:21 AM |
“I am still waiting for Ms Mottley’s economic solution. She accuses Mr Stuart of being quiet, she hasn’t been to talkative about the current state of economis affairs in Barbados, with any specificity. All of Ms Mottley’s conversations, have been generalities, aimed at appeasing the population.”
The more than yellow tail monkey climbs the more he shows his true-blue colours.
Can you understand that Ms Mottley is NOT the PM? It is not her responsibility to act or implement. Her party was not given the mandate to govern, only to oppose (in general) the incumbent administration when its policies and programmes are viewed as anathema to the interest o f the general populace.
Even if the Opposition were to offer specific alternative solutions are you aware that the current administration is not even prepared to listen far less implement? Ask Estwick if you doubt that!
Lying to the IMF will cost the country dearly in the coming months. So here is a specific and easily implementable solution to a very ‘taxing’ problem involving the integrity and reliability of the economic and financial data used for decision-making.
The Opposition calls on the government to fire immediately the untrustworthy and unprofessional Guv of the CBB.
What do you have to say about that Victor, since we can expect total silence other than invectives from BT?
But shouldn’t both you and Bushie be dealing with the widening chasm between Dr. Estwick and the Stuart’s administration rather than wasting time attacking the foolish miller whom Bushie wants to eliminate.
If Bushie is so sure the Mr. Miller is blogging under a pseudonym why is he following the jackass miller in blogging under the moniker B T (bare talk)?
Let the BU people like Caswell see who is this messiah to save Barbados with his BBE inspired PUP.
Now who would go to the voting both and cast an X against the name Bush Tea other than a blind idiot?
Victor C Callendar;
I ask again, What is your solution? You appear to lean towards one which allows the current lot to continue since you do not appear to grasp the clear fact that they and they alone were responsible for the rapid decline in the economy over the past 3 to 5 years or so. The IMF and all the relevant data says so. Harping on the ills of the OSA administration without reference to gains made at that time is of little merit. The fact is that practically no government in this region started a serious effort of structural transformation during those times of relative plenty. Why would you expect the OSA administration to be different? It is what it is. Move on.
I say that for us to progress upward from where we now are the current hapless leader and some of his team must go. Estwick offers a pathway to that part of the solution and perhaps other aspects of it as well. The remainder of the solution will follow, in whatever sensible political configuration fortune allows us.
DLP minus FS; BLP; a new Coalition; or whatever.
FS and the current configuration of the DLP cannot lead us up from the bottom of the economic cliff.
Yet when DE puts an option on the table we easily dismiss it. Face it, political prisms are at play.
@ Enuff
Wait bozie…you want to tell Bushie how to argue now too…
Wuh Looka Bushie crosses nuh!!! (You done know Bushie like to mash your corns…)
Miller …stop getting on like a woman do!
Bushie like pseudonyms. That way we can focus on ideas and not people. The POINT is that your slip is showing…..
@ David
What Dr Estwick idea what?!
Clyde Mascoll had a great idea with hardwood too….and Owen had one about solar water heaters in Nigeria…. Great idea Bushie’s ass!
It has to make sense.
Bushie like Estwick, …but shiite is shiite…
If your daughter comes home and tell you that Bushie offered to lend her $10,000 because ‘he likes her’ would you consider that to be a great idea? Steupsss… You ain’t know Bushie intentions…
These doctors are all the same… (Watch GP let loose now 🙂 )
…a patient has developed high blood pressure and diabetes and THEIR solution is some shiite medicine that allows you to continue for a while by masking the symptoms….pain killers and nuff expensive pills…
Bushie’s solution is to CHANGE the DIET and HABITS that is the root cause of the illness in the first place….and you would see how fast and how lasting your recovery will be…..LOL…especially if you choose the natural ‘bush’ medicines…
@ Are we there yet
Why are you obsessed with dumping Fumble unless we KNOW that we have a workable alternative in place?
The FACT of the matter is that the MAJORITY of Bajans voted for the current jokers. Are you joining with Bushie in deeming Bajans to be brass bowls whose judgement cannot be allowed to stand?
Can we afford the drama and trauma of ejecting a legally and constitutionally elected government at a time when we are under such imminent threat…?
…or should we join together to survive the assault….and THEN dump the jokers AND reform the system….?
When you jump from one leaky boat to another rudderless one in the middle of a storm …what do you achieve?
It is like in first aid….priorities priorities priorities…
Breathing
Bleeding
Consciousness
..right now we need to get our breathing going again – before dealing with consciousness (sleepiness) 🙂
@ BTea
I don’t have corns, but have sussed you out…can’t fool me. Nuff ah wunna shame, so all of a sudden EVERYBODY inept, clueless etc even when the facts/track challenge that thesis. The Dems faack up, therefore the Bees would have also–that is the argument of your kind.
@Bush Tea
What Estwich has done is to provoke/generate the kind of discussion about how we should be managing our litttle economy in a way that has not been done before. He has departed from Westminster conventions which should give hope.
Fenty | February 15, 2014 at 6:02 AM |
“Thanks John. You have shed greater light on this economic mess, originated as you so clearly stated from Owen Arthur Administration. Obviously, some here have failed to realized that the past with its good and evil lives in the present.”
Are you people just plain stupid, ashamed or playing devil’s advocate?
If there was any doubt about who was responsible for our present economic predicament; your own Minister of Agriculture, Dr David Estwick, outstanding DLP parliamentarian put the issue to rest when he unequivocally declared for all to hear -except the sycophantic DLP apologists- that his administration was responsible for the present economic crisis.
@ Enuff
Bushie is not ashamed to confess that he is ASHAMED in truth….
It never crossed the Bushman’s mind that a party could be worse that the Owen Arthur BLP of VECO / 3S/ Greenland / World Cup/ Dodds fame…..
But the DLP has managed to achieve that…… Ah shame!
What the hell you want Bushie to do now….step back from “worstest” to “worser” …..
Bushie’s last hope for wunna is BUP….
LOL…you mind the bushman…..BT done got he name mark on a lifeboat name BBE hear….
@ David
How is that?
By borrowing money from a different source?
That whole thing should have been an internal battle – and the winner should have been broadcasted as a DLP initiative…
The public nature of the whole thing says that it is a power play – FULL STOP!
Perhaps it is even well conceive. BUT it is no innovative solution.
“Perhaps the solution to the problems of Barbados, is to go back to the place where it all started, under the watching eyes of Owen, Mia, Clyde and the rest of them, and then come forward to Mr, Stuart and Mr Sinckler.”
I was trying to keep out the quagmire because I wouldn’t know where to turn if I start getting licks like Miller but to he credit he trying but licks coming too fast and furious and Prodigal like he keeping far too but seriously though what am I to believe, Mr Callender’s opinion/feeling or the revelation from someone who was in the thick of things as MInister of Agriculture, former Minister of Economic Affairs and former Chairman of the Cabinet Committee on Economic matters Mr David estwick. Is Mr Estwick blatantly lying on the organisation he loves and cannot leave irrespective of how he is treated and ignored. After all he is not totally hand-to-mout like the rest and his parliamentary pension is already secured.
@ Bushie
CARSICOT, Coverley, CLICO, Clico “contract” at the yet to finish houses at Constant that led to the eating of Marilyn Rice-Bowen, the venezuelan housing project, St.Joseph’s hospital and the $3.3m gratuity happened too.
As for your BUP–STUUUUPSE same players.
@ David
We are compelled to generally agree with Bushie. At best DE is still trying to tinker. We have long assessed that the time for tinkering, even under the guise of reformation, has long past. That an empty vessel like DE could pretend to have something important to say while he imposes his nothingness on the GOB is telling.
@ David
Simple. Already on some measures the Chinese is sthe world’s dominant economy; the Asian economies, ASEAN members, the fastest growing developing economies are trading in the renimbi.
In time, nations that go cap in hand to China will do part of their trading in the renimbi since the loans will be coming from China and they will be buying in Chinese products.
In the meantime, decoupling will mean the dollar, stil the dominant currency, will be one of many – the renimbi and a strengthened euro.
BUSHIE U right .i gone bosie to empty my topsy brass bowl cause it brimming ova wid BLP sh..it,,,,,,,,,,,,,,MIA ain’t got nuh answers ,,,and Now DE wid gimmick no 2 ,,,but i still like de ole pit bulll……
Ralph Jemmott’s column is fine reading:
http://www.nationnews.com/articles/view/the-big-picture-our-politics/
What DE has done is to agitate and complicate….furthermore his proposals would put us in a holding pattern for sometime to come .sacrifice might be the only solution everybody hates medicine but the country can no longer wait for vodoo medicineto take effect
“How does the Central Bank Governor go from telling the head of the IMF that the IMF gives “bad advice” to countries like Barbados and that the IMF’s model is “simply wrong” – to now saying that the DLP’s policies are in line with what the IMF is recommending?”
The apologists for the beleaguered piss-poor DLP administration are always challenging the critics to put alternative solutions on the table.
Well, here is a low-hanging fruit for easy picking.
Fire the Governor of the Central Bank forthwith! His retention as governor is clearly untenable. Such a straightforward decision would be clearly in line with IMF policies and expectations.
The garden gnome has lost all creditability and has set himself up as the first sacrificial lamb of the many casualties to follow in the coming months. The MoF ought to be next.
Victor R. Callender, what is your view about this proposal placed on the table? Or do you still have your head buried in a national Geographic magazine with nubile Nubians displaying their breasts and ‘jacking off’?
@ ac | February 16, 2014 at 4:55 PM |
“sacrifice might be the only solution everybody hates medicine but the country can no longer wait for vodoo medicineto take effect”.
Finally, you have come around to the kind of thinking you should have embarked upon 2 years ago by siding with the miller instead of cussing him like your arch-enemy Bushie and his new found sidekicks Oilslick and Victoria R.
So ac, are you going to support the miller in his call for a programme of privatization and outsourcing or are you going to remain in that abusive relationship with Bushie and his two goons?
The miller loves you honey. Just say the word and his foot will be in your mouth ‘until death do us part’.
PS: The IMF has been asked to be best man at the wedding. Island gal and Onions are invited. But we don’t want Bushie to be in attendance with his garrulous mob.
@Miller……..
How can you not invite Bag Juice. the wedding. No wine will be served but frozen Bag Juice for Stinkliar, Fumble, Delisle and the crew. You are right, no invitation for Bushie, ac and the mob if not Bag Juice will be in short supply. (DWL)
Can’t believe that Miller would tie the knot with ac – and not invite Bushie….LOL @ bag juice….you feel that ac would have orange juice at her nuptials before some good bush…? 🙂
@Hal Austin
“I have said on a number of occasions. Uncouple from the Greenback, fix against a basket of a basket of currencies and commodities and float against the others.”
I agree with your comments above and floating would also mean removal of most foreign exchange controls. That is the only way you can have a float.
However I disagree with your assumptions about the Chinese currency and in general about the Chinese economy. While they have made tremendous strides forward they have a long long way to go. They are going to have some massive health care costs coming at them not that far down the road caused by the vast number of people who smoke and the pollution that was created with the mass migration of people from the country to the city. More and more companies are pulling back production from China to their home countries because they don’t see a long term viability. Without a doubt the next 10 years will be very interesting but I am more interested in seeing solid contributions to the FX problem Barbados has. I see little if any leadership being given by Government to this matter. My bet would be it is worse than we are being told and the “gurus” are scratching their heads on how to move forward. The easy way out is let the IMF figure it out for them. How can we drop a $100 million in January and not hear any alarm bells.
Well Well, Timothy Slinger, is a dam crook also , He came to do a story on Violet Beckles , When he saw the Estate was real , he look to be part of her committee to help ,,One day she game him a check for $ 6000.00DBS to change for her and he came back $ 2500bds short ,He came to looking to be paid, I was told he said it was for cell phone and driving up and down? Remember no one else took a dime , not even me for HELPING.
In 2009 when the Fraud was sent to looking in the the Estate By David PM , Violet Beckles told the fraud Squad what he did and nothing was ever done . One day driving we saw him on the road and he turned his head away , like he think we dont know it was him ,Barbados have no less then 2 ways to know you ,, what you drive and the plate number.
He was the one who took her to Ralph Thorne,, another crook who took her money for a case. All the work he did was to make a call and get a fax. , Also talk to his wife a so called judge for advice
He use that time to pay him self with her land on Tudor street on Baxter’s road with the help of the now dead Caroline Hurbert,
As we watch the 2 none Bajans white make a false police report and one get 6 months , the woman got twice the time as the man for writing a bad check to rent a car.Making the police look bad ,, they were dealt with and jailed fast.
No such luck for Violet Beckles,
But you can make up all the land marking you want , shift land and deeds and titles, take plantations, houses and cash from older people and live free to enjoy,
POOR POOR WHITES , if they would have join the DLP they would be home now , But because there were white they go fast attention to their own fraud matter,You ever seem an case move so fast and Violet Beckels move so slow?
Sandy Lane Baby
@ Sith
Although the Chinese economy is growing much faster than the US, its per capital income is still only a fraction. This will grow in time, and is already growing.
Companies are pulling production out of China because of rising wages, not politics, and moving them to Mexico, Vietnam and other low cost regions. In time it will be Africa’s turn.
On the demographics, although China has a rapidly ageing population, its Confucian principles are such that families are responsible for the care of the elderly.
If China adopts the Western principle of the State providing care, this will be gradual. China (Asia) is still a saving culture, something Barbadians do not fully understand.
Further, remember that for Chinese to live in urban areas they must still get state permission.
The problem in Barbados is the financialisation of small and medium enterprises. Government must devise a way of doing this in light of the foreign-owned banks refusing to.
The cheapest and best way of doing this is by creating a state bank. The sale of BNB was a grave disservice to Barbadian businesses.
@Hal
For clarity can you list the benefit(s) a state bank brings compared to non government.
@ David
The preference will be for a post office/credit union, cooperative, trade union bank – a retail bank from the third sector. Only in the absence of any such bank will a state-owned bank be preferable.
In the case of Barbados, setting up a post office bank will be easy. We have about 17 post offices, so that will look after the distributional branch network; we can also buy in to payments systems at a low cost, giving us a global reach when it comes to payments; we can buy technology off the shelf and introduce it incrementally ie start out of town and gradually work our way in, training up post office staff, who perform a lot of retail bank duties already.
In terms of lending policy, that will be determined by circumstances, for example, lending for residential mortgages will be a proportion of deposits, and lending to small businesses will also be a proportion; some of this cam be secured or on an equity for loan basis.
The key advantage is that a state-owned/local bank will be focused on the local economy, not head office in Port of Spain, Washington DC or Toronto.
The economy will not grow unless their if some financialisation. Foreign-owned banks take their orders from elsewhere and we do not have a shadow banking or venture capital sector. .
To all who tout China’s fast growing economy, remember this, they cannot build the major products needed for infrastructural development, and they are having problems feeding their people. China cannot sustain itself, period, time will show everyone this. They have to import the most basic of sustainable items to be found on the periodic table. What will happen when they can’t get Russian oil, Timber from various other countries, and their smog causes the highest incidences of respiratory illnesses on the planet earth. The Yangtze River is already massively polluted, earthquakes continuously destroy fragile infrastructure, and their experiment with limited democracy, will prove castastrophic, as most of their best minds will transfers their brain thrust elsewhere on the globe. New money always attracts everyone, but folks better be careful, china has major underlying economis woes. Remember when understanding world financial markets, always research the “Rotchilds” then most would understand why the major global reserve currencies stay within the control of either England, or the USA.
@ Victor Chandler
Like most things, you are half right and half wrong. At the turn of the 20th century the two leading economies were the US and Argentina, with most people betting on Argentina to be the world’s leading economy by the end of the century. As we all know, Argentina is now an economic basket case.
What is driving China is not just economics, but China’s perception of its place in history. For most of the last thousand years China and India were the two dominant economies. The rise of the European industrial revolution and mercantilism capitalism and its accompanying colonialism put paid to that.
China sees itself as correcting the last 200 years of history.
Don’t measure China with a western liberal democrat stick.
Hal, I only measure china by its population and its insatiabilities. China for centuries did not even register as an Asian economic tiger. Japan, because of the Meiji Restoration and Manifest destiny in the USA, causing westward expansion across the Pacific Ocean, was more economically potent than china, Hal. I am not measuring the chinese by western standards, they do a good enough job at westernization themselves.Feeding 1.35 billion people is not easy. The crumbling chinese ecosystem, and rapid advancement wll cause the chinese poor moving into the middle class to rapidly consume china’s limited natural resources and ultimately, impede China’s wealth.
@ Victor
If this is the view of China being sold to the American public then I am sorry for them. The US enjoyed the boom years living off Chinese credit – now about US$3trn.
It is the doubt over the US economy that has forced China to diversify – which is how cheap loans to Barbados come in to the picture – with investments in major capital projects in the UK and mainland Europe.
Wall Street and US manufacturing had a ding don with Wall Street shifting American jobs to low-cost China which led to Walmart at one time selling RVs at $1 each, after manufacturing in the US, sailing across the Pacific and travelling 3000 miles across the US by rail and road. I am not good at maths, but something is wrong in this pricing.
In the meantime, the Chinese middle class has grown to over 300m, more than the entire population of the US, and they too want the things that middle classes all over the world wants: cars, fridges, televisions, overseas holidays, etc.
China is now focusing on moving up the manufacturing food chain and meeting the needs of its people.
The US has got about 45m people who cannot even afford their own health care. The US is not in a good place, with most of its wealth held by a tiny minority. Young black people in particular are suffering from this wealth inequality.
On the other hand, the eurozone has 500m people, with higher per capita incomes than the US, and it is recovering from the post 2007/8 crisis.
Remember, China is not India, where corruption and casteism (racism) runs through its veins.
By the way, do you remember that it China led the call for a reserve currency managed by the IMF, and just over a year ago Brazil raised the questions of currency wars?
Watch this space.
@Hal
It begs what is the status of the credit union bank. Has sir Courtney submitted his report?
What China has on the world is that it has the never ending capacity to recruit cheap labour as well ask a virgin domestic market.
@ Victor R Callender | February 17, 2014 at 8:00 AM |
“The crumbling chinese ecosystem, and rapid advancement wll cause the chinese poor moving into the middle class to rapidly consume china’s limited natural resources and ultimately, impede China’s wealth.”
What you said might have a ring of truth about it. What we would also like you to do is to look at the other (Western) side of the geopolitical equation. How will America ever repay the massive debts (estimated to be $1.2 trillion and growing) due to the Chinese?
China is slowly gearing up itself for the inevitable fallout between a spendthrift debtor and a cash rich creditor.
BTW, why do you think China has moved into sub-Sahara Africa in a massive way? To spread religion?
Absolutely, Miller. And in Europe, the US and Latin America. At a time when Panama is expanding the canal China is building a Pacific to Atlantic railway across South America.
China is also looking for a fight with Japan and Philipines and is spending a huge part of its GDP on its military. Read the various Pentagon reports.
We are either going to have a military clash across the Pacific or China will rule the world with a rod of correction. I think it will be a war myself.
@ David
I am told by a credit union source that the report has not yet been passed to individual credit unions. I think they should make a move and soon.
If ever there was a time, now is the time for credit unions to act collectively. They are shooting at an open goal.
Hal, the gist of your very well written piece, lends credence to why these white countries will never allow anything different from themselves to control global power. The established global central banking system, as was structured through the “Rothchild Family” will never allow ever again, the domination of a non-european currency to be prevalent world wide. If you remember back to the 70’s Hal, the USA aided china, by removing itself from the “Gold Standard.” I trust you remember when President Nixon went to China, and out of that visit, the “Gold Standard” became a thing of the past. The fact that they have a middle class that is larger than the entire US population, supports my argument, that globally, the socio-economic impact that China will sustain, very shortly will force immense economic shifts and catatrophise the Global economy. The fact that the chinese middle class can now enjoy a western standard of living, does lend itself to the serious economic twist and turns that the country of China is about to face. China is new to democracy, and/or democratic principles, so guess what, with the new found freedom of the chinese people, watchout for a serious new migration, to greener pastures.
@ Victor
China is NOT a democracy. It is a communist state with a bit of state capitalism. But the recent plenary session of the party outlined the blueprint, the four top banks are owned by the state, people still need state approval to move to urban areas, especially Beijing.
And, in case you have forgotten, China has a bigger Muslim population than the population of Syria.
I like your point about the shift in global economic power. Rather interesting. By the way, Africa has a population of 1.2bn (ignore the 54 states), up there with China and India.
How is Africa going to punch its weight? I do remember the Nixon decision, followed by the oil crisis, which meant that when the Barbados central bank was created in the summer of 1975 the rational thing to do was to peg to the Greenback. It is not rational now.
@ Hal Austin | February 17, 2014 at 8:35 AM |
“If ever there was a time, now is the time for credit unions to act collectively. They are shooting at an open goal.”
The credit unions (as a collective) are the only vehicle on the island to facilitate the move towards black economic enfranchisement in any meaningful way.
Why not make a move towards the ownership and control of mass transportation using the takeover of the Transport Board (TB) as the first major step towards that goal?
Why should the TB be allowed to deteriorate so bad only to be ‘sold as is’ at a give-away price to the Simpson Group to increase the stranglehold they presently have over the economy?