Tag: Inflation

Protecting Your Wallet: How To Adapt Your Spending in Times of Inflation | Wealth of Geeks

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Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you are probably aware that inflation is hitting the pocketbooks of Americans (and the rest of the world) hard.

To combat inflation, it’s wise to tweak your money strategy.

Inflation is an economic phenomenon that affects the purchasing power of individuals and erodes the value of money over time. The same amount of money can buy fewer goods and services as prices rise.

To effectively manage your personal finances, it is crucial to understand the impact of inflation on your spending habits and make necessary adjustments.

This article will explore how your spending should change in response to inflation.

How To Adjust in Times of Inflation

Recognizing The Effects of Inflation

Inflation is natural in any economy, and consumers can feel its impact daily.

Recognizing that the value of money decreases over time is the first step in adjusting your spending habits. Prices of goods and services tend to increase, and if your spending remains unchanged, you will face the full brunt of inflation head-on.

Don’t ignore it. It’s here. The only question that remains is what you are going to do about it.

Reevaluating Your Budget

To accommodate the effects of inflation, you must reevaluate your budget regularly.

Start by examining your current income and expenses to understand your financial situation. Take note of any areas where you can adjust, such as discretionary spending or non-essential purchases. Consider reallocating your resources by reducing expenses in those areas to accommodate the rising prices of essential goods and services.

Also, prioritize your essential expenses, such as housing, food, healthcare, transportation, and utilities, and allocate a significant portion of your budget towards these necessities (more below). It may also be necessary to review your savings and investment goals to account for the impact of inflation on their growth potential. By reevaluating your budget, you can ensure that your spending remains sustainable and that you maintain financial stability in the face of inflationary pressures.

By reallocating your resources, you can better adapt to the changing economic landscape and maintain financial stability.

Prioritizing Essential Expenses

In times of inflation, it becomes crucial to prioritize essential expenses.

These include housing, food, healthcare, transportation, and utilities. Allocate a significant portion of your budget towards these items, as they are necessary for your well-being. Cut back on non-essential purchases to ensure you have enough funds to cover these essential needs.

For instance, cutting back on eating out might be necessary to ensure enough money is available for your non-negotiables. The things you cannot live without should be number 1 on your list of priorities, but be honest about these expenditures.

Saving and Investing

Inflation can eat away at the value of your savings if left unaddressed. Consider allocating a portion of your income towards savings and investments to counteract this.

Saving ensures you have a financial cushion to fall back on during uncertain times.

Investing in assets that outpace inflation, such as stocks, real estate, or diversified portfolios, can help preserve and grow your wealth in the long run.

Shop Smart and Compare Prices

Being a smart shopper becomes even more important when prices rise due to inflation.

Compare prices across different stores or online platforms before making a purchase, and don’t be afraid to buy a store’s generic brand instead of the more expensive name-brand products.

Use sales, discounts, or loyalty programs to maximize your savings. Additionally, consider buying in bulk for frequently used items to save money in the long term.

Consider Alternatives and Substitutions

Inflation can make certain products or services unaffordable or less accessible. In such cases, it’s wise to explore alternatives or substitutions.

For instance, if the price of your preferred product brand increases significantly, try out a different brand that offers similar quality at a lower price. Flexibility in your choices can help you maintain your desired standard of living without straining your budget.

Reviewing Debt and Interest Rates

Inflation can impact interest rates, affecting your existing debt obligations.

If interest rates rise, the cost of servicing debt also increases. Review your debts, such as mortgages, car loans, student loans, or credit card balances, and consider refinancing options if they can help reduce your interest payments.

Managing your debts effectively can alleviate some financial pressure caused by inflation.

Continuous Financial Education

Staying informed about economic trends, financial news, and personal finance strategies is vital when dealing with inflation.

Engage in continuous financial education to understand the implications of inflation and explore ways to protect and grow your wealth. Attend workshops, read books, follow reputable financial blogs, and consider seeking professional advice to stay ahead of the curve.

Inflation is inevitable in any economy, and its effects can impact your finances. By recognizing the impact of inflation and adjusting your spending habits, you can mitigate the strain on your budget and maintain your financial stability.

Reevaluating your budget, prioritizing essential expenses, saving and investing wisely, shopping smart, considering alternatives, and staying informed are all crucial steps in navigating the challenges posed by inflation.

Adopting these strategies ensures that your spending aligns with the changing economic landscape and protects your financial well-being in the long run.


Steve Adcock is an early retiree who writes about mental toughness, financial independence and how to get the most out of your life and career. As a regular contributor to The Ladders, CBS MarketWatch and CNBC, Adcock maintains a rare and exclusive voice as a career expert, consistently offering actionable counseling to thousands of readers who want to level-up their lives, careers, and freedom. Adcock’s main areas of coverage include money, personal finance, lifestyle, and digital nomad advice. Steve lives in a 100% off-grid solar home in the middle of the Arizona desert and writes on his own website at SteveAdcock.us.


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Germany’s economy is stagnating. And these 5 charts show how

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Germany entered a technical recession on May 25, and economists have predicted that GDP growth is set to stagnate for the rest of the year, painting a gloomy picture for Europe’s largest economy.

Anadolu Agency | Anadolu Agency | Getty Images

With Germany already in a technical recession, economists predict that GDP growth is set to stagnate for the rest of the year and have painted a gloomy picture for Europe’s largest economy.

In May, the German statistics office revised its first-quarter GDP readings from zero to -0.3%, which followed a 0.5% contraction in the last quarter of 2022.

But a faltering gross domestic product isn’t the only figure that suggests that the German economy is stuttering.

Here are five charts that show how the historical engine of Europe is faring.

High inflation

The consumer price index measures the average change in the price of goods and services purchased by consumers, and is a solid indication of monetary value trends.

Germany’s inflation rate is expected to hit 6.4% for June, according to provisional data from the German statistics office, which is an increase from the 6.1% recorded for May. Despite the projected increase, the figure is still a significant decrease from its near-50-year high of 8.8% in October, but remains well above the country’s 2% target.

“It looks like, for at least the next couple of months, inflation will stay on very high levels. Expect maybe for the second half that inflation might come down to a certain extent,” Joachim Nagel, president of Germany’s central bank, the Bundesbank, told CNBC in March.

While inflation may start to sink, Germany’s central bank estimates that it won’t reach 2% until at least 2025. German consumers have felt the impacts of long-lasting high inflation as they’ve had to make their euros stretch further, but the financial pressure on households doesn’t look set to ease any time soon.

Interest rates

Germany’s place in the euro zone means that its interest rates are determined by the European Central Bank, giving the country limited autonomy when it comes to tackling sticky inflation. 

While the government can’t necessarily control inflation, it can mitigate the impact it has on the German population, Sylvain Broyer, chief EMEA economist at S&P Global Ratings told CNBC.

“What the fiscal authority can do in the face of high inflation is to alleviate the pain of inflation on the most fragile citizens,” he said.

Higher interest rates are taking their toll on business activity, economist says

The government introduced multiple relief packages in 2022, designed to help Germans cope with the rising cost of living brought about by high inflation, including increased child benefits and one-off payments for students and pensioners.

The European Central Bank has consistently raised rates since July 2022 as it attempts to bring down inflation across the region, and the main rate currently sits at 3.5% after a further 25-basis-point hike on June 15.

Energy prices

The current bout of inflation can largely be attributed to high global energy prices, which came as a result of pent-up pandemic demand followed by a post-pandemic recovery. Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine then brought huge uncertainty to the market and caused a further spike in prices.

While some energy sources are starting to settle to their pre-war prices, the energy crisis is continuing to impact some of Germany’s biggest industries.

“Energy intensive industrial production is reduced substantially. The automobile sector [has also been] having difficulties for some time and substantial restructuring is still ahead,” Endowed Chair of Monetary Economics at Goethe University in Frankfurt, Volker Wieland, told CNBC.

Utilities costs are still expected to increase in 2023, according to a January report by Allianz. Electricity bills are expected to increase by around 35% this year, while industrial power prices are set to rise by around 75%, the report said.

Export figures

German exports unexpectedly nudged lower in May, coming to a total of 130.5 billion euros ($142 billion), which is a 0.1% drop compared to April, according to provisional data by the German statistics office. Analysts polled by Reuters had anticipated a 0.3% uptick month-on-month after April export figures surprised to the upside.

“The global interest rate hikes are naturally also dampening demand for products from Germany,” Veronika Grimm, professor of economics at Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg, told CNBC.

But the fall in exports may not be as bad as the headline numbers suggest, S&P Global Ratings’ Broyer told CNBC, and he attributed the dip to a price effect reflecting factors such as the recent lower cost of energy.

“The foreign trade figures for May show that the terms of trade are continuing to recover. The German economy has already recouped half of the losses in terms of trade incurred over the last two years and the energy crisis,” he added.

China is Germany’s main business partner, with the countries having traded goods worth 298.9 billion euros between one another in 2022, and Germany has been buoyed by China’s much-hyped, post-pandemic re-opening.

Germany doesn't have a clear China strategy, says former vice chancellor

But Europe’s biggest economy has shown hesitation in further strengthening its trading relationship with Beijing, with the country’s Economy Minister and Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck saying that while trade is open, Germany is not “a stupid market” and needs “to be careful.”

Aging population

Germany has the largest aging population in Europe, with a growing percentage of Germans in retirement, and that demographic is only set to grow in the coming decades.

The number of people at retirement age (67 years or older) will rise by roughly 4 million by the middle of the 2030s, according to the German statistics office, bringing the total number of retirees to at least 20 million.

The growing elderly population has exacerbated concerns about the country’s pension system, which is “on the verge of collapse” according to Rainer Dulger, president of the Confederation of German Employers’ Associations, who spoke to Germany’s Bild newspaper in October.

Contributions to Germany’s public pension plans are expected to represent 12.2% of the nation’s GDP by 2070 under the current system, according to The 2021 Ageing Report published by the European Commission. That’s a 2-percentage-point increase on the 2019 figure, and one of the highest forecasted changes in the European Economic Area.

Combined with a labor shortage crisis that has prompted the country to overhaul its immigration rules to bring in more workers, and enthusiastic engagement with digitalization to make the most of the workers it does have, Germany’s quickly-aging population is having ripple effects throughout the country’s economy.

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For Sri Lanka’s forex-earning garment workers, it’s a daily battle for survival

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“I came to Colombo with a dream. Now I have lost it,” the young garment factory worker said, sounding dejected.

She left her hometown in Jaffna, in northern Sri Lanka, six years ago to take up a job at the Free Trade Zone in Katunayake, about 35km north of capital Colombo. “The current cost of living is so high that I barely manage to survive, let alone save a penny,” she said, requesting anonymity. For many like her in the island nation, the economic crisis of last year has hardly let up, although shortages have eased and queues have vanished.

At the end of June, the Central Bank of Sri Lanka pointed to a “sharp decline” in headline inflation, to 12%, and a decrease in food inflation to 4.1%. Except, the figures are in relation to last year’s dramatic rise in prices, as headline inflation surged past 70%, and food inflation hit almost 95%. While cold data may show a reduction in the rate of inflation, consumers do not feel any relief yet. Especially since wages and incomes, across most sectors, have remained stagnant.

Sri Lanka’s apparel industry, which took off on a big scale after the country liberalised its economy in 1977, has proved crucial to both its economy and labour force. It is the island’s largest foreign exchange earner — $5.6 billion in 2022 — and employs nearly a million people, mostly women, directly and indirectly across some 400 factories. Garments made in Sri Lanka are exported largely to the U.S. and the EU, to big brands, including, C&A, GAP, H&M, Marks and Spencer, PVH and Victoria’s Secret. The growth and global reach of the industry would make for a great “success story”, if only workers did not have their own story to share.

“Even if we work really hard and make some 30,000 rupees a month (roughly ₹9,340) with all the incentives, it is worth much less today. We are unable to afford the very basic life we lived before the crisis,” said another worker, explaining how her salary has drastically shrunk in real value. “A small bun at the tea shop round the corner used to cost 50 [Lankan] rupees (roughly ₹13). Now it’s 150!” She, too, requested not to be named, fearing punishment for speaking to the media. “Even if this job is hard and pays much less than I need, I can’t afford to lose it. I must somehow support my children,” the mother of two said.

The apprehension of workers is not baseless. Far from isolated personal experiences, their accounts reflect the predicament of scores of workers employed in Sri Lanka’s apparel industry, according to unions and labour rights organisations.

“The financial pressure on workers, especially manpower [contractual] workers, is very high. Despite their best efforts braving exacting working conditions, their wages are just not enough to cope in our country’s current situation,” contended Ashila Dandeniya, Executive Director of Stand Up Movement. “Desperate to supplement their incomes so they can support their families, many young women are taking up commercial sex work in the area. And there are many challenges that come with that,” she said. Instead of spending on “so-called” CSR activities, manufacturers need to pay workers a fair living wage, in her view.

Manufacturers are yet to heed to the demand. For Sri Lanka’s garments sector, the first big blow came well before the economic meltdown, in the form of COVID-19. As factories were forced to shut, workers were left in the lurch. When operations resumed, many found themselves jobless. Worker unions have estimated about 50,000 job losses in the industry through the pandemic and economic crisis in Sri Lanka. Those who remained had their share of difficulties waiting.

In a study on the impact of the pandemic on Sri Lanka’s apparent sector, Shyamain Wickramasingha, research fellow at the University of Sussex, U.K., found that workers’ take-home pay has decreased by LKR 15,000 to 20,000 due to the lack of overtime and other incentives, while targets increased by 50% or more. “Many workers said they were skipping meals, water, and even washroom breaks in order to meet these targets,” Ms. Wickramasingha said, while presenting her findings at Colombo’s Social Scientists’ Association recently. If the plight of permanent workers is difficult, that of manpower or contractual workers is only more precarious, according to Rashmini De Silva, an independent researcher studying gender and labour. “Many of them stand by the entrance to the EPZ [export processing zone] by 4.30 a.m. for a shift that starts at 7 a.m. to make sure that they make it to the quota of workers chosen for work that particular day. The manpower agencies negotiate a daily wage per worker with the factories, and often keep 25-30% of the pay meant for the worker to themselves,” she said, based on her recent research. Further, she found that trade union leaders were under heavy scrutiny by the employers, and abrupt, illegal dismissal of workers engaging in trade union activity was not uncommon.

Despite evidence from multiple research studies, garment manufacturers have repeatedly refuted allegations of rights violations or exploitation. On the other hand, they point to challenges facing the industry owing to the global economic slowdown. “Recent data shows apparel exports declining by 14.95% year-on-year to $1.18 billion in the first quarter of this year… which is the lowest since the first quarter of 2013. The industry projects it could be five to six more months before it sees a recovery in global demand,” observed Yohan Lawrence, secretary general of the Joint Apparel Association Forum (JAAF), in an interview to the State-run Sunday Observer last month.

The Forum, made up of Sri Lanka’s top garment manufacturers, has also been making a fervent case for the EU to renew Sri Lanka’s ongoing Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) plus status — a trade incentive offered to vulnerable developing countries — to help the industry recover from the crisis.

Workers and their unions, however, do not see the GSP+ status in isolation, even if it might help secure jobs in the sector. “We want the GSP+ status, but we also want human rights and labour rights to be respected and protected in Sri Lanka. We want our environment to be safeguarded,” Ms. Dandeniya said. The EU regularly monitors if GSP+ beneficiary countries implement the international conventions, including on human rights, labour rights and climate protection, and Sri Lanka is due for review end of this year.

Unions are already voicing concern over likely labour law reforms that authorities are mulling. Last week, the Ranil Wickremesinghe government’s decision to recast pension funds, including EPF, brought more bad news for workers, including in the apparel industry. In a letter to the Central Bank Governor last week, Anton Marcus, joint secretary of the Free Trade Zones and General Services Employees Union, slammed the government for taking a decision that would impact millions of workers, without any consultation.

Meanwhile, the average worker is hardly preoccupied with Sri Lanka securing trade benefits in the EU, or her own rights when everyday survival has become a battle. “I don’t know what to say about my future. I am struggling to find my dream again, because I must first find my next meal,” the worker from Jaffna said.

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Bullish Tidings: Breadth Rallies, Oil Service Makes its Move, Bonds Survive Yield Scare

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Three weeks before the Fed’s next meeting, investors who have missed the AI/tech rally have thrown caution to the wind.

That urgency to catch up has led to an encouraging improvement in the market’s breadth and a marginal new high in the S&P 500 index ($SPX). The combination is likely setting the market up for what could be an impressive upward thrust. See below for full details.

And if June is any sign of what July may be, the bulls will rule the roost. Here are some grounding facts:

  • The S&P 500 index has returned an average of 3.3% in July from 2012–2022.
  • SPX rallied 9% in July 2022.

Of course, there are no guarantees that history will repeat itself. But it pays to be always ready. So, which sectors are likely to benefit? I have some thoughts just below.

Bond Yields Survive Yield Scare

I wouldn’t be surprised if the Fed joined the other global central banks that have raised interest rates in the last few weeks. However, from a trading standpoint, the action in bonds is more important, as bond yields have largely disagreed with the Fed’s perception of the economy since late 2022.

What I mean, of course, is that even as the Fed raised interest rates after October 2022, bond yields have fallen since then, setting up a divergence.

Certainly, there has been some volatility in yields. For example, the 10-Year US Treasury Yield Index ($TNX) bounced higher on June 29, 2023, as a surprising upward revision of US GDP to the 2% growth rate raised the odds of a rate hike at the upcoming FMOC meeting in mid-July. Yet, the flattening out of the Fed’s favorite indicator, the PCE inflation gauge on June 20, 2023, calmed things down.

That leaves the resistance band between 3.6–3.85% as the area to monitor. If TNX rises above 3.85%, we may see a move toward 4%, which would be very negative for stocks, especially the interest rate-sensitive homebuilders and real estate investment trusts (REITs).

The Fine Print in Housing Stats: Supply, Supply, Supply

As would be expected, as TNX flirted with 3.85%, there was a pullback in the homebuilder stocks. But as we’ve learned over the recent past, the correlation between the direction of bond yields and the action in the homebuilder stocks is nearly 100%. As a result, when bond yields, as I described above, hit resistance at 3.85% and turned lower, the homebuilder stocks regained their upward trend.  

Overall, the housing sector continues to deliver mixed news. For example:

  • New home sales recently rose—bullish for homebuilders.
  • Existing home sales are flattening out—neutral for brokers.
  • Pending home sales fell—not what you may be thinking.

The quiet part is all three stats above have two things in common—low supply and steady-to-rising demand. So new home sales are rising because builders are building enough of them to sell to enough people who are looking for housing. Existing home sales are flat because no one wants to sell a house with a 3% mortgage and buy a new one with a 6% mortgage. And, of course, if no one wants to sell their house, then you get a fall in pending home sales.

The bottom line remains unchanged. Low supply of steady demand favors the homebuilders.

Overall pending home sales fell 2.7% month to month. And if you’re wondering how each U.S. region fared in the pending home sales data here you go:

  • The Northeast delivered a 12.9% increase.
  • The South registered a 4.4% decrease.
  • The Midwest dropped by 5.3%.
  • The West’s sales dropped by 6.1% (a 62% decrease since 2001).

Moreover, the National Association of Realtors noted that there are still three pending offers per sale.

Mortgage rates ticked up last week, along with bond yields. Homebuilder stocks pulled back slightly before recovering. Several homebuilders will be reporting earnings in July, near the date of the Fed’s next meeting.

For an in-depth look at the news and trends in the housing and real estate market, check out my new publication, Joe Duarte’s Real Estate Weekly, here.  You’ll find crucial and detailed real estate market updates in an easy-to-follow and highly accessible format. This crucial information complements the stock picks at Joe Duarte in the Money Options.com. For more details on how to trade the bullish housing megatrend, check out my latest video here.

Oil Service Makes its Move

The bullish action in stocks on June 30 might be at least partially related to window dressing. That’s where portfolio managers who missed the rally play catch up to show their clients that they own stocks in groups that are rising. That means that the bullish action may or may not remain in some of the more extended market sectors, such as AI.

On the other hand, some portfolio managers use the cover of window dressing as a stealthy way to put money to work in sectors that offer value. As a result, while everyone is looking at the hot sectors, such as AI, it pays to look at sectors that have underperformed in the first half.

One of them is oil service. As the price chart illustrates, the Philadelphia Oil Service Index (OSX) shows some bullish characteristics. Note the broaching of the 200-day moving average after the recent double bottom it carved out over the last three months.

Moreover, its accompanying ETF, the Van Eck Vectors Oil Service ETF (OIH), looks even better. You can see that OIH has crossed above its 200-day moving average, marking what looks to be the start of a bullish reversal.

In addition, you can see that the Accumulation Distribution Line has begun to move higher as the On Balance Volume (OBV) indicator has bottomed out. Together, these two indicators confirm the emerging price trend in OIH as money moves in.

I have several oil service stocks in my Joe Duarte in the Money Options portfolios which are worth considering. One of them just broke out to a new high. You can check it out with a FREE trial to my service here.

NYAD Recovers and Gathers Upside Momentum

In a bullish development, the New York Stock Exchange Advance Decline line ($NYAD) turned on a dime last week and moved decidedly higher, breaking above short-term resistance. This comes after a short-lived dip below the 50-day moving average.

The Nasdaq 100 Index ($NDX) also turned around, finding support at its 20-day moving average. ADI and OBV have turned short-term negative.

The S&P 500 made a new high since the October bottom in stocks. As with NDX, SPX found support at its 20-day moving average. This is a bullish development. Both ADI and OBV stabilized.

VIX Is Likely to Bounce

After its recent new lows, the Cboe Volatility Index ($VIX) is poised to rise, as July often marks a bottom. On the other hand, VIX is at such a low level that it could take a while before the negative effects of a rising VIX affect the bullish action in stocks.

When the VIX rises, stocks tend to fall, as rising put volume is a sign that market makers are selling stock index futures to hedge their put sales to the public. A fall in VIX is bullish, as it means less put option buying, and it eventually leads to call buying, which causes market makers to hedge by buying stock index futures. This raises the odds of higher stock prices.

To get the latest information on options trading, check out Options Trading for Dummies, now in its 4th Edition—Get Your Copy Now! Now also available in Audible audiobook format!

#1 New Release on Options Trading!

Good news! I’ve made my NYAD-Complexity – Chaos chart (featured on my YD5 videos) and a few other favorites public. You can find them here.

Joe Duarte

In The Money Options

Joe Duarte is a former money manager, an active trader, and a widely recognized independent stock market analyst since 1987. He is author of eight investment books, including the best-selling Trading Options for Dummies, rated a TOP Options Book for 2018 by Benzinga.com and now in its third edition, plus The Everything Investing in Your 20s and 30s Book and six other trading books.

The Everything Investing in Your 20s and 30s Book is available at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. It has also been recommended as a Washington Post Color of Money Book of the Month.

To receive Joe’s exclusive stock, option and ETF recommendations, in your mailbox every week visit https://joeduarteinthemoneyoptions.com/secure/order_email.asp.

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Why the Red Cross’ crisis is causing aid groups to rethink their financing

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The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) last month announced it would lay off nearly 10 percent of its global staff and roll back dozens of its operations across the world. Although the ICRC’s crisis can partly be blamed on the war in Ukraine and resulting inflation, it also reflects a much more worrying problem plaguing the world’s humanitarian aid groups: with the world more in need of humanitarian action than ever before, donations are failing to keep up with demand.

March 30 was a dark day for the ICRC. It was the day that the governing board in Geneva approved the “difficult decision” to implement a €440 million savings package in a bid to save the 160-year-old aid group’s finances.

“Several end-of-year pledges did not come through at the level we had anticipated,” it said in a statement, adding also that its costs “were higher than anticipated partly because of inflation”. 

Two months later, the details of the cost cuts were made public, and they were nothing short of brutal: the ICRC would slash 1,800 of 20,000 jobs worldwide, and either close or scale down operations in 26 of its 350 locations, including in Mauritania, Malaysia and Greece.

The ICRC’s new president Mirjana Spoljaric, who took office in October, explained that the cuts were necessary because of the group’s expectations that donations will continue to decrease next year.

Internally, the cutbacks were met with outrage, prompting 2,500 staff to sign a letter blasting former ICRC leaders for a “budgetary drift” over the past decade. They accused managers of having tried to make the ICRC grow too fast, pumping massive amounts of money into humanitarian assistance operations to the detriment of its core activity of providing life-saving relief and protection to people living through armed conflict.

Struggling to fill the gap

But the ICRC is hardly the only global aid group that has suffered a drop in donations lately. Last year, the United Nations recorded an unprecedented deficit in its humanitarian operations, having raised just $24 billion out of the $52 billion needed.

Jens Laerke, spokesman for the UN’s Humanitarian Coordinating Agency (OCHA), said that although 2022 had actually been a record year for donations, it was also a record year for funding shortfalls.

“So, the problem is the following: that the needs in the world are rising much, much faster than the donor funding is coming in,” he said.

In France, the trend is much the same. A study by the NGO collective Coordination Sud showed that French funding for international aid groups had soared 43 percent between 2016 and 2020, driven by a 63 percent growth in public donations and a 22 percent rise in private donations. But despite the increase, the donations still come nowhere near to meeting the demand.

“On the one hand, we have ambitious goals for which we are very mobilised, but on the other hand, the crises are multiplying, to which the climate challenge can be added and which is generating enormous needs,” said Valérie Huguenin, deputy head of the civil society organisations unit at the French Development Agency (AFD).

Covid-19 and war in Europe

The world’s aid groups have also been hit hard by two major crises in the past few years and which have crippled them financially: the Covid-19 pandemic and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

The war in Ukraine immediately garnered massive western support for Kyiv, but it also made it harder for aid groups to collect funds for other humanitarian crises in the rest of the world, despite their urgency. This has particularly been the case for so-called “long-lasting” crises such as that in Afghanistan, Yemen, Democratic Republic of Congo, Venezuela or Haiti.

“This phenomenon is certainly not new, but it is particularly visible with the war in Ukraine,” said Pierre Micheletti, president of the French NGO Action Against Hunger (ACF). “This conflict on our doorstep is generating a great deal of local solidarity, but it is also taking away some of the generosity shown towards crises further away.”

Politicising donations

In a bid to bridge this gap, many international aid groups rely on donations that are not earmarked for a specific crisis, but which allow the NGOs to respond to what they judge to be the most urgent humanitarian situations.

But according to the ICRC, these kind of funds are becoming more and more difficult to raise.

“The International Committee of the Red Cross is unique in that it is only financed by voluntary contributions from governments,” Frédéric Joli, ICRC’s spokesman in France, explained. “But most governments prefer to allocate their funds directly. This is an issue that is the subject of constant negotiation.”

ACF’s Micheletti said that more than 80 percent of government aid, “which is our main source of funding”, is earmarked before it is used – and it’s becoming a real problem.

“By choosing the causes they want to give to, governments politicise humanitarian action, and encourage a compassion with variable geometry,” he said. “We try to compensate for this with the unrestricted private donations we receive, but we don’t have enough resources.”

A more dangerous world

The war in Ukraine, and the soaring inflation that has come with it, has hit NGOs particularly hard – not only have their own food and energy costs risen, but those of the donors have too, resulting in fewer donations. In 2022, French donations grew just 1 percent, compared with 4 percent in 2021 – not nearly enough to keep up with the costs linked to rising global inflation, which stood at 8.7 percent last year.

The fact that the world has also become a more dangerous place for humanitarian workers in the past few years has also affected aid groups, forcing them to spend more and more to keep their staff safe on the ground.

In 2021, more than 140 humanitarian aid workers were killed in attacks – the highest number in eight years.

An outdated model?

Worried that the current situation of spiralling costs and growing humanitarian needs might continue, the aid group sector is trying to reinvent itself. The political situation in the United States, which is the world’s biggest donor, is a particular cause for concern – as is the potential for a recession due to a stalemate in the war in Ukraine.

For the ICRC, whose donation forecasts for the next two years remain bleak, there was no other choice than to return to its operational basics – “To protect civilians in conflicts and the fate of captured fighters, in accordance with international humanitarian law,” as spokesperson Joli said.

In a bid to avoid the trap that the ICRC fell into, many NGOs are now trying to reduce their dependence on governments and better diversify their funding sources.

Huguenin said the French Development Agency is currently staging an awareness campaign targeting the private sector, particularly French foundations.

“Ninety percent of their humanitarian investments are focused on France,” she said. “This is of course very useful, but we are calling on them to step up their actions outside our borders too.”

ACF’s Micheletti, who has written a book on the need for wealthy countries to finance international humanitarian aid, is also in favour of NGOs reducing their dependence on governments – but he wants a strict framework put in place.

“The problem today is that 80 percent of public funding comes from 10 or so donor countries, with some large countries like China, India and Brazil investing very little,” he said. “To reduce our dependence on these large donors, we need to increase their numbers through compulsory contributions. If the 90 richest countries invested 0.03 percent of their gross national income in humanitarian aid, the gap between the donations and the need would finally be closed.”

“Let’s face it, the humanitarian funding model as we know it today has become almost obsolete,” he said. “The financial crisis currently affecting the ICRC is yet another example of this. We need to rethink the very framework of the system.”

This article has been adapted from the original in French.

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#Red #Cross #crisis #causing #aid #groups #rethink #financing

The unlikely rise of orange juice as a stock market darling

Post By World , , , , ,

Orange juice has become the most profitable raw material for investors, according to French daily newspaper Les Échos. While average prices for many raw materials have fallen, stocks for the popular breakfast drink have seen a spectacular rise since the start of the year that shows no signs of slowing.  

“More profitable than oil, traders flock to orange juice,” the financial newspaper Les Échos said in an article published on Monday. 

Prices for the drink have soared since the start of the year, and investors have been paying attention. “Orange juice is quite simply the most profitable raw material right now,” said Alexandre Baradez, market analyst at financial services company, IG France. 

The company has listed orange juice as one of the best commodities to invest in over the coming months along with copper and gold.  

A 30 percent increase in six months 

Market speculators often have a preference for raw materials, the stock prices of which can fluctuate dramatically due to current events. Petrol, gas and wheat prices, for instance, have been significantly impacted by the war in Ukraine. For traders investing in these materials on the stock market, there is significant risk but also the prospect of large returns.  

Orange juice, though, has not been impacted by fighting in Bakhmut, sanctions on Russia, or lack of Ukrainian cereal exports. Even so, prices for the drink have soared by 30 percent since the start of the year. 

In the same time period, the average price for raw materials overall has fallen by 11 percent, according to Bloomberg. Stock prices for petrol have fallen by 12 percent since January. 

“The performance of orange juice is remarkable,” said Baradez. “Even more so because the increase has lasted for some time already, which is in itself quite rare.”  

While prices for raw materials tend to be cyclical with periods of high volatility, orange juice stocks have been high for months and are expected to keep rising.  

“Orange Juice rose from circa $90/lbs at the start of 2020 to over $285/lbs last month. While the traditional breakfast drink has now fallen back to $255/lbs, further moves upwards could be imminent,” a report from IG said. 

Florida oranges 

The US state of Florida has long been a hub of orange juice concentrate production for North America – a market that strongly influences global prices for the raw material. In recent years, “Florida has been hit by a succession of factors that have pushed prices higher”, Baradez said. 

Historically, Florida has produced more than 80 percent of US orange crops each year but production has been plummeting for years.  

Just over five years ago, the state-wide industry was worth $9 million and employed some 70,000 people. Today, that number has fallen to 32,000 employees and the industry value has fallen to $6 million, according to the Washington Post. 

The US Department of Agriculture expects 2023 to bring the worst harvest of Florida oranges in 80 years, producing 16 million boxes of orange juice – down a historic 61 percent on the 41 million produced in 2022.  

Poor tree health, the Covid pandemic and harmful weather events have all played a role.   

In 2005, orange trees in Florida were found to have a small type of bacteria that was making them sick. This was the start of a bought of yellow dragon disease (also called Huanglongbing) that had spread to almost 90 percent of commercial orange groves in Florida by 2015. 

There is no known cure for the disease, which kills trees within five years and makes fruit produced in the interim significantly more bitter.   

As Florida has struggled to maintain production, demand for orange juice began to soar. The Covid pandemic boosted sales in the US, as the drink is typically seen as a way to load up on vitamins and ward off illnesses such as colds and flus. By the end of March 2020, US sales of orange juice were up 38 percent compared with the same period the previous year.   

Then, another blow for farmers. In 2022, hurricanes Nicole and Ian devastated citrus fields in Florida. Damage caused by Hurricane Ian alone cost Florida’s orange juice industry $247 million. 

A new market? 

The current situation is “the result of a classic discrepancy between supply and demand”, said Baradez.  

To try to make up the shortfall, California has increased its orange juice production. Brazil – the largest global exporter of orange juice – has also increased sales to North America. But these measures are not having a significant impact on the financial market, which has its own influence over prices.  

Market speculators “have played a role in accelerating this phenomenon”, said Baradez.

A small number of powerful hedge funds and traders have an enormous influence on commodity prices. There are around 20 who wield enough power to decide “whether it will rain or shine” on the markets, according to Les Échos. And their influence is even stronger for a stock like orange juice, which has less investors than for traditionally popular markets such as oil, wheat, sugar and coffee. 

Looking to the future for orange juice prices, “there is no reason for the trend to reverse”, said Baradez. There is still no remedy for yellow dragon disease (which was also detected in California in 2018) and Florida is one of the US states most susceptible to seasonal hurricanes. 

As such, price increases look set to persist around the world ­– bad news for orange juice consumers who, in turn, are likely to see supermarket prices for orange juice continue to rise.  

There is also the potential for wider impact public health issue. “This is becoming a problem for many governments which rely on cheap OJ to get vitamin C into the general population,” the IG report said.  

While orange juice becomes too expensive for some, demand may grow for cheaper alternative sources of vitamin C such as medicines and food supplements. Ultimately this could push prices up for these products too – no doubt creating a ripe new market for stock market investors.

This article has been adapted from the original in French.

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#rise #orange #juice #stock #market #darling

Moldova ramps up EU membership push amid fears of Russia-backed coup

Post By Politics , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

CHIȘINĂU, Moldova — Tens of thousands of Moldovans descended on the central square of the capital on Sunday, waving flags and homemade placards in support of the country’s push to join the EU and make a historic break with Moscow.

With Russia’s war raging just across the border in Ukraine, the government of this tiny Eastern European nation called the rally in an effort to overcome internal divisions and put pressure on Brussels to begin accession talks, almost a year after Moldova was granted EU candidate status.

“Joining the EU is the best way to protect our democracy and our institutions,” Moldova’s President Maia Sandu told POLITICO at Chișinău’s presidential palace, as a column of her supporters marched past outside. “I call on the EU to take a decision on beginning accession negotiations by the end of the year. We think we have enough support to move forward.”

Speaking alongside Sandu at what was billed as a “national assembly,” European Parliament President Roberta Metsola declared that “Europe is Moldova. Moldova is Europe!” The crowd, many holding Ukrainian flags and the gold-and-blue starred banner of the EU, let out a cheer. An orchestra on stage played the bloc’s anthem, Ode to Joy.

“In recent years, you have taken decisive steps and now you have the responsibility to see it through, even with this war on your border,” Metsola said. “The Republic of Moldova is ready for integration into the single European market.”

However, the jubilant rally comes amid warnings that Moscow is doing everything it can to keep the former Soviet republic within its self-declared sphere of influence.

In February, the president of neighboring Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, warned that his country’s security forces had disrupted a plot to overthrow Moldova’s pro-Western government. Officials in Chișinău later said the Russian-backed effort could have involved sabotage, attacks on government buildings and hostage-taking. Moscow officially denies the claims.

“Despite previous efforts to stay neutral, Moldova is finding itself in the Kremlin’s crosshairs — whether they want to be or not, they’re party of this broader conflict in Ukraine,” said Arnold Dupuy, a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council think tank in Washington.

“There’s an effort by the Kremlin to turn the country into a ‘southern Kaliningrad,’ putting in place a friendly regime that allows them to attack the Ukrainians’ flanks,” Dupuy said. “But this hasn’t been as effective as the Kremlin hoped and they’ve actually strengthened the government’s hand to look to the EU and NATO for protection.”

Responding to the alleged coup attempt, Brussels last month announced it would deploy a civilian mission to Moldova to combat growing threats from Russia. According to Josep Borrell, the EU’s top diplomat, the deployment under the terms of the Common Security and Defense Policy, will provide “support to Moldova [to] protect its security, territorial integrity and sovereignty.”

Bumps on the road to Brussels

Last week, Sandu again called on Brussels to begin accession talks “as soon as possible” in order to protect Moldova from what she said were growing threats from Russia. “Nothing compares to what is happening in Ukraine, but we see the risks and we do believe that we can save our democracy only as part of the EU,” she said. A group of influential MEPs from across all of the main parties in the European Parliament have tabled a motion calling for the European Commission to start the negotiations by the end of the year.

But, after decades as one of Russia’s closest allies, Moldova knows its path to EU membership isn’t without obstacles.

“The challenge is huge,” said Tom de Waal, a senior fellow at Carnegie Europe. “They will need to overcome this oligarchic culture that has operated for 30 years where everything is informal, institutions are very weak and large parts of the bureaucracy are made viable by vested interests.”

At the same time, a frozen conflict over the breakaway region of Transnistria, in the east of Moldova, could complicate matters still further. The stretch of land along the border with Ukraine, home to almost half a million people, has been governed since the fall of the Soviet Union by pro-Moscow separatists, and around 1,500 Russian troops are stationed there despite Chișinău demanding they leave. It’s also home to one of the Continent’s largest weapons stockpiles, with a reported 20,000 tons of Soviet-era ammunition.

“Moldova cannot become a member of the EU with Russian troops on its territory against the will of the Republic of Moldova itself, so we will need to solve this before membership,” Romanian MEP Siegfried Mureșan, chair of the European Parliament’s delegation to the country, told POLITICO.

“We do not know now what a solution could look like, but the fact that we do not have an answer to this very specific element should not prevent us from advancing Moldova’s European integration in all other areas where we can,” Mureșan said.

While she denied that Brussels had sent any official signals that Moldova’s accession would depend on Russian troops leaving the country, Sandu said that “we do believe that in the next months and years there may be a geopolitical opportunity to resolve this conflict.”

Ties that bind

Even outside of Transnistria, Moscow maintains significant influence in Moldova. While Romanian is the country’s official language, Russian is widely used in daily life while the Kremlin’s state media helps shape public opinion — and in recent months has turned up the dial on its attacks on Sandu’s government.

A study by Chișinău-based pollster CBS Research in February found that while almost 54 percent of Moldovans say they would vote in favor of EU membership, close to a quarter say they would prefer closer alignment with Russia. Meanwhile, citizens were split on who to blame for the war in Ukraine, with 25 percent naming Russian President Vladimir Putin and 18 percent saying the U.S.

“Putin is not a fool,” said one elderly man who declined to give his name, shouting at passersby on the streets of the capital. “I hate Ukrainians.”

Outside of the capital, the pro-Russian ȘOR Party has held counter-protests in several regional cities.

Almost entirely dependent on Moscow for its energy needs, Moldova has seen Russia send the cost of gas skyrocketing in what many see as an attempt at blackmail. Along with an influx of Ukrainian refugees, the World Bank reported that Moldova’s GDP “contracted by 5.9 percent and inflation reached an average of 28.7 percent in 2022.”

“We will buy energy sources from democratic countries, and we will not support Russian aggression in exchange for cheap gas,” Sandu told POLITICO.

The Moldovan president, a former World Bank economist who was elected in 2020 on a wave of anti-corruption sentiment, faces a potentially contentious election battle next year. With the process of EU membership set to take years, or even decades, it remains to be seen whether the country will stay the course in the face of pressure from the Kremlin.

For Aurelia, a 40-year-old Moldovan who tied blue and yellow ribbons into her hair for Sunday’s rally, the choice is obvious. “We’ve been a part of the Russian world my whole life. Now we want to live well, and we want to live free.”



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#Moldova #ramps #membership #push #fears #Russiabacked #coup

Why young adults in Italy and Ireland have to live with their parents

Post By World , , , ,

In the face of rising inflation and the cost-of-living crisis, Euronews investigates the reasons why young people are struggling to get on the property ladder or afford to pay rent.

Sophie is just one of 350,000 young adults in Ireland between the ages of 20-35 still living in her family home. Like many millennials in Ireland, the 28-year-old marketing executive from Galway is locked out of the housing market.

This problem is not unique to Ireland, according to Eurostat, approximately 67% of people (between 16-29) in Europe live at home with their parents or relatives, but for some, this is not a choice.

The Galway native told Euronews that rising inflation coupled with the cost-of-living crisis is largely to blame: “It’s so frustrating, I have a master’s degree, a good salary and like so many of my friends I’m saving to buy a house.

“But I had to move back in with mum and dad because I was struggling to save money, let alone pay rent, even now it is going to take me forever to save a deposit,” she said.

Affordability is a major issue, as Ciarán Lynch, a former member of the Irish Parliament explained: “House prices have never been so expensive and interest rates are increasingly rising for people coming into the housing market.

“They are almost as close to the figures from two years ago when interest rates were particularly set by the European Central Bank”.

The Mortgage Crux

Considering that house prices on average in Ireland are 94% above those of the EU, Sophie’s dilemma is not surprising.

In order to be eligible for a mortgage in Ireland, first-time buyers are limited to a loan of four times their gross annual income, a prospective mortgage is also capped at 90% of a property’s value.

However, house prices across the country have risen 537% since 1988 and are not in line with today’s earnings.

According to recruitment solutions giant Morgan McKinley, professionals in Ireland take home an average salary of €45,000. However, the Irish Central Statistics Office (CSO) recently revealed that the average Irish house price is now a record-breaking €359,000.

So, for single-income, first-time buyers with a salary of €45,000, the maximum amount they can borrow is €180,000, which is slightly more than half of the average house price.

Ireland vs Italy

House prices and rents vary from one EU Member State to the next, in fact, in some EU countries, house prices have dropped in recent years. Italy, for example, experienced a boom until the financial crash in 2008 and then the cost of property steadily dropped. According to Eurostat, prices were cheaper in 2022 compared to 2010.

While rents have increased in Italy, the differences are marginal compared to Estonia, Lithuania, or Ireland where the average monthly rent stood at €1,733 in December 2022, that’s 126% higher than in 2011.

If the Italian house prices are more attractive to potential buyers, does this translate to higher levels of property ownership among young adults? On the contrary, a higher percentage of young adults live at home with their parents in Italy than in Ireland.

So, what are the drivers behind this trend in both countries?

Ireland’s lack of supply

While median gross salaries in Ireland are considerably higher than in Italy, available homes are also few and far between on the Emerald Isle.

“In 2010, we had 24,000 rental properties advertised on Daft (Ireland’s top property site) on any one day of that year, compare this to recent figures when we had just 700 properties available right across the country,” said Mark Rose, the managing director of Rose Properties.

“So now we have approximately 3% of what was available in 2010, we need thousands of rental properties to be loaded onto the market today, tomorrow or as soon as possible, they are urgently, urgently needed,” Rose added.

Limited properties are increasing demand and are placing a serious strain on rents and potential buyers, as the managing director of Dennehy Auctioneers in Cork told Euronews: “The rental market in Ireland is totally and utterly dysfunctional. We put a house up to rent two weeks ago at 12:55 pm and by 13:20 pm we had 90 emails (enquiries)”.

“We need thousands of apartments in cities to keep up with demand, however, Ireland is a victim of its own success, a lot of people want to come and live and work in this country and are attracted by the lifestyle, but our population is also growing and we can’t keep up,” Dennehy said.

The Central Statistics Office estimated that the population in Ireland increased by 88,800 between April 2021 and April 2022, the largest 12-month population increase since 2008. This is largely due to a 445% surge in migration and according to Dennehy, foreign direct investment is part of this trend: “Ninety per cent of the inquiries I am currently receiving for a new housing development in Carrigaline (a commuter town in Cork) are from non-nationals, and ninety per cent of those again are non-EU”.

“The professionals coming here have good jobs, they are well paid and they love this country”.

But former deputy Lynch who chaired the Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform in October 2012, said non-nationals with money to burn are also running into problems: “Foreign direct investment is a very, very significant part of the Irish economic model. And job creation has become a problem because it’s not that the jobs aren’t there, but the houses aren’t actually there for the employees when they get those jobs.”

The Italian job

“Property might be cheaper in Italy but the problem lies with the country’s stagnant labour market,” said Mimmo Parisi, a sociology professor from the University of Mississippi.

The senior advisor for European and data science development told Euronews: “Everyone is looking for that dream job in Italy and professionals don’t move around much, once they find a dream position they stay, often for life. As a consequence, there are fewer job openings and it’s difficult for young adults to enter the job market”.

High youth unemployment in Italy is a major factor. According to Italy’s national statistics institute, ISTAT, the unemployment rate (for youths aged 15-24) was 22.9% in January 2023, nearly eight points higher than the EU average of 15.1%, as a consequence young Italians are less financially independent.

“Add dubious work contracts, slow wage growth and low salaries to the mix and it is easy to see why young Italians are stuck at home despite falling house prices. It is also difficult for university graduates to secure relevant short-term work experience when the labour market works in favour of an ageing workforce,” explained Parisi.

According to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), Italy is the only European country where wages fell between 1990 and 2020, all the other Member States experienced a rise with Lithuania leading the charge with a 276.3% increase.

“Many students stay in university that bit longer when hunting for that dream job, which as we’ve learned is difficult to come by. This forces young adults to be more reliant on their parents until that happens,” Parisi said.

To add to the plight of youths, an Italian bank will not approve a mortgage without a permanent work contract otherwise known as ‘il contratto a tempo indeterminato’, which creates additional obstacles.

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#young #adults #Italy #Ireland #live #parents

Why can’t youths in Italy and Ireland afford to move out of home?

Post By World , , , ,

In this three-part series, Euronews investigates the reasons why young people in Ireland and Italy are struggling to get on the property ladder or afford rent amid the cost-of-living crisis.

Sophie is just one of 350,000 young adults in Ireland between the ages of 20-35 still living in her family home. Like many millennials in Ireland, the 28-year-old marketing executive from Galway is locked out of the housing market.

This problem is not unique to Ireland. According to Eurostat, approximately 67% of people aged 16-29 in Europe live at home with their parents or relatives. But for some, this is not a matter of choice.

Galway native Sophie told Euronews that rising inflation, coupled with the cost-of-living crisis, is largely to blame: “It’s so frustrating, I have a master’s degree, a good salary and like so many of my friends I’m saving to buy a house.

“But I had to move back in with Mum and Dad because I was struggling to save money, let alone pay rent. Even now it is going to take me forever to save a deposit,” she said.

Affordability is a major issue. Two years ago, for example, interest rates, particularly those set by the European Central Bank, were still at record lows.

 “But now we are now seeing situations where quarter upon quarter the ECB is increasing its interests rates by at least half of a base point” Ciarán Lynch, a former member of the Irish Parliament, told Euronews.

The Mortgage Crux

With average house prices in Ireland, 94% higher than those in other EU countries, Sophie’s situation is perhaps not surprising.

In order to be eligible for a mortgage in Ireland, first-time buyers are limited to a loan of four times their gross annual income. A prospective mortgage is also capped at 90 per cent of a property’s value.

However, house prices across the country have risen 537 per cent since 1988 and are not in line with today’s earnings.

According to recruitment solutions giant Morgan McKinley, professionals in Ireland take home an average salary of €45,000. However, the Irish Central Statistics Office (CSO) recently revealed that the average Irish house price is now a record-breaking €359,000.

So, for single-income, first-time buyers with a salary of €45,000, the maximum amount they can borrow is €180,000, which is slightly more than half of the average house price.

Ireland vs Italy

While house prices and rents are generally increasing across the European bloc, in some EU countries property prices have dropped in recent years. Italy, for example, experienced a boom until the financial crash in 2008 and then the cost of property steadily dropped. According to Eurostat, prices were eight per cent cheaper in 2022 compared to 2010.

While rents have increased in Italy, the differences are marginal compared to Estonia, Lithuania, or Ireland where the average monthly rent stood at €1,733 in December 2022, that’s 126% higher than the figures seen in 2011.

If house prices in Italy are more attractive to potential buyers, does this translate to higher levels of property ownership among young Italian adults? On the contrary, a higher percentage of young adults live at home with their parents in Italy than in Ireland.

So, what are the drivers behind this trend in both countries?

Ireland’s lack of supply

While median gross salaries in Ireland are considerably higher than in Italy, available homes are also few and far between on the Emerald Isle.

“In 2010, we had 24,000 rental properties advertised on Daft (Ireland’s top property site) on any one day of that year, compare this to recent figures when we had just 700 properties available right across the country,” said Mark Rose, the managing director of Rose Properties, Cork.

“So now we have approximately 3 per cent of what was available in 2010.  We need thousands of rental properties to be loaded onto the market today, tomorrow or as soon as possible. They are urgently, urgently needed,” Rose added.

The limited availability of properties is increasing demand and placing a serious strain on rents and potential buyers. 

Roy Dennehy, managing director of Dennehy Auctioneers, told Euronews: “The rental market in Ireland is totally and utterly dysfunctional. We put a house up to rent two weeks ago at 12:55 pm and by 13:20 pm we had 90 emails (enquiries).”

“We need thousands of apartments in cities to keep up with demand. However, Ireland is a victim of its own success. A lot of people want to come and live and work in this country and are attracted by the lifestyle, but our population is also growing and we can’t keep up,” Dennehy said.

The Central Statistics Office estimated that the population in Ireland increased by 88,800 persons from April 2021 – April 2022, the largest 12-month population increase since 2008. This is largely due to a 445 per cent surge in migration, and according to Dennehy, foreign direct investment is part of this trend. “Ninety per cent of the inquiries I am currently receiving for a new housing development in the town of Carrigaline, Cork, is from non-nationals, and ninety per cent of those again are non-EU”.

“The professionals coming here have good jobs, they are well paid and they love this country”.

But former deputy  Ciarán Lynch, who chaired the Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform in October 2012, said non-nationals with money to burn are also running into problems.

 “Foreign direct investment is a very, very significant part of the Irish economic model,” he said.

 “And job creation has become a problem because it’s not that the jobs aren’t there, but the houses aren’t actually there for the employees when they get those jobs.”

The Italian job

“Property might be cheaper in Italy but the problem lies with the country’s stagnant labour market,” said Mimmo Parisi, a sociology professor from the University of Mississippi, who is a senior adviser for European data science development.

Parisi told Euronews: “Everyone is looking for that dream job in Italy and professionals don’t move around much, once they find a dream position they stay, often for life. As a consequence, there are fewer job openings and it’s difficult for young adults to enter the job market”.

High unemployment among youths in Italy is a major factor. According to Italy’s national statistics institute, ISTAT, the unemployment rate for youths (aged 15-24) was 22.9 per cent in January 2023, nearly eight points higher than the EU average of 15.1 per cent.  As a consequence, young Italians are less financially independent.

“Add dubious work contracts, slow wage growth and low salaries to the mix and it is easy to see why young Italians are stuck at home despite falling house prices. It is also difficult for university graduates to secure relevant short-term work experience when the labour market works in the favour of an ageing workforce,” explained Parisi.

According to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) Italy is the only European country where wages fell between 1990 and 2020, all the other Member States experienced a rise with Lithuania leading the charge with a 276.3 per cent increase.

“Many students stay in university that bit longer when hunting for that dream job, which as we’ve learned is difficult to come by. This forces young adults to be more reliant on their parents until that happens,” Parisi said.

Banks place another obstacle in the way of young Italians. An Italian bank will not approve a mortgage without a permanent work contract otherwise known as ‘il contract contratto a tempo indeterminato’, which creates additional obstacles.

Stay tuned for the next article in this three-part series in the coming week.

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#youths #Italy #Ireland #afford #move #home

The EU greenwashed fossil gas. Today, we are suing.

Post By Politics , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Last July, EU policymakers decided to greenwash fossil gas. Today, the WWF European Policy Office, Client Earth, BUND and Transport & Environment are taking them to the European Court of Justice.

We are doing it to reassert a basic truth: all fossil fuels are dangerous for the planet. Only last summer, European cities baked under fierce heatwaves, rivers across our continent ran dry, and whole swathes of France, Spain, and Portugal were burned by unprecedented wildfires. In the midst of this devastation, the EU approved a new chapter of its supposed green investment guidebook — the EU Taxonomy — which stated that fossil gas-fired electricity is ‘green’. In fact, fossil gas is a fossil fuel that can cause plumes of methane that harm the climate just as badly as coal.

However, under the guise of climate action, the gas Taxonomy could divert tens of billions of euros from green projects into the very fossil fuels which are causing those heatwaves, droughts, and wildfires. This is while scientific experts at the International Energy Agency and the United Nations continue to stress that we must halt any expansion of fossil fuels and invest exclusively in developing clean energy sources. Even the EU’s own experts have said we must use much less gas by 2030. The gas Taxonomy is not just at odds with the science: it also flies in the face of market dynamics. Renewable investments across the world reached $500 billion last year, which shows that there is already a massive, readily available alternative to gas-fired power.

For all these reasons, having previously filed a request for the Commission to review the gas Taxonomy, we are filing a case at the CJEU today. We will argue that the gas Taxonomy, and the Commission’s refusal to review it, clash with the European Climate Law, the precautionary principle, and the Taxonomy Regulation — the law on which the Taxonomy is built. It also undermines the EU’s obligations under the Paris Agreement. We expect a judgment within the next two years.

Fossil gas at the heart of two European crises

Europe faces two interlocking crises: an inflation crisis and a climate crisis. Fossil gas is at the heart of both. Had we decided to invest with more determination in renewables and energy efficiency even just 10 years ago, our continent would not have been so dependent on energy imports. We would not have faced such great spikes in energy and food prices, which disproportionately hurt our poorest citizens. We would be closer to meeting our Paris Agreement goals.

Instead,  largely due to decades of industry pressure — the gas lobby spends up to €78 million a year in Brussels alone — our continent has remained extremely dependent on destructive fossil fuels. That dependency must end. It is high time to direct billions of euros into installing more renewables more quickly, with a focus on secure, cheap wind and solar power. It is time to expand the technologies to back them up, such as building insulation, energy storage, and strong grids. And above all, it is time to stop the lie that putting money into any fossil fuel will help the green transition. That is the purpose of our legal case.

Policymakers and financial institutions beware

EU policymakers are increasingly inserting references to the EU Taxonomy into other policies. If our case is successful, and the Taxonomy’s gas criteria are overturned, any legislation tying gas financing to the Taxonomy would become inapplicable.

Policymakers beware: the Taxonomy is on shaky ground, and you should not use it to justify new gas investments. Fossil fuel companies that get hooked on green funding will face a rude awakening if our legal case cuts that support off. They may even incur steep losses if they have made investments based on EU policies only to find that gas has been struck out of them.

Fossil fuel companies that get hooked on green funding will face a rude awakening if our legal case cuts that support off.

Financial institutions also face real reputational, financial and legal risks from the gas Taxonomy. Fossil gas is excluded from the global green bond market. Leading institutions such as the European Investment Bank or the Dutch pension federation have openly criticized the Taxonomy’s greenwashing. What is more, taxonomies in several other countries exclude fossil gas-fired power, so the European one lags behind. Any financial institution that uses the EU Taxonomy to justify investing in fossil gas assets therefore risks direct, robust and repeated attacks on its reputation.

The inexorable public policy shift towards energy efficiency and renewables, and the plummeting price of wind and solar power, have made fossil gas-fired power uncompetitive. Investments in more fossil gas, even if encouraged by the EU Taxonomy, would quickly result in stranded assets and could even cause billion-euro losses. Financial institutions must guard against these risks by stopping their support for gas expansion now.

Finally, if our case is successful, financial institutions could find they have purchased or sold products mislabeled as ‘green’. They must be careful to verify the legal consequences of such an event, particularly for its impact on any climate claims they have made.

Our message to the EU

Policymakers and financial institutions should note that the Taxonomy faces four further court cases: one from the governments of Austria and Luxembourg, one from Greenpeace, one from the Trinational Association for Nuclear Protection (ATPN) and another from MEP René Repasi. The EU’s greenwashing is now being discredited from all sides – amongst scientists, in financial markets, and soon, we expect, by the judiciary.

Our message to the EU is simple: do not help fossil lobbyists to block our continent’s move to clean, cheap and secure energy. If you do, we will meet you head-on.

Victor Hugo once said that nobody can stop an idea whose time has come. Today, despite much fossil fuel lobbying, denial and delay, it is the turn of the green transition. Our message to the EU is simple: do not help fossil lobbyists to block our continent’s move to clean, cheap and secure energy. If you do, we will meet you head-on.

See you in court.



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