Dear Reader, While we’re at home avoiding crowds, China is holding an international event. I’m talking about the Beijing Auto Show. The show that was supposed to take place in April and was probably one of the few places around allowing masked crowds. You can catch a glimpse here. The event has given quite a lot to talk about. Not only about the crowds, but electric vehicles were also one of the big themes. Car sales are starting to recover in China, and auto makers are putting some faith into electric cars. BMW’s head of China Jochen Goller told the Financial Times he: ‘[P]redicts single-digit growth for BMW’s sales in China this year despite a 31 per cent year-on-year fall in the first quarter. An important aspect of that will be EV sales, which he said in China have evolved from a niche into the mainstream. “Only now [are electric vehicles] arriving in the core segment.”’ Porsche CEO Jens Puttfarcken told CNBC: ‘The electrical market in general is, like the whole automotive market, is a highly competitive market especially here in China where we see here a lot of brands that are unknown to the rest of the world, building up very interesting products and very highly sophisticated technologies.’ Tesla is also one of the big competitors there and Musk has said they’re looking to produce about a million vehicles there a year. Their model 3 is one of the best-selling EVs there, which just got cheaper in China. The tech race for a cheaper EV is on. It’s what’s interesting about EVs. As I wrote a couple weeks ago here, EVs aren’t a new thing. They were quite popular in the 1900s but failed to take off because of tech and economics. But we’re getting close this time to getting over those hurdles. The auto show wasn’t the only EV show in town this week, so to speak. While it got far less attention than the debate, US President Donald Trump took time out of his busy schedule to present Lordstown Motors Endurance, an electric pickup truck. The interesting thing about it is that the car has an electric motor on each wheel, which frees up space in the front trunk of the car to keep tools in. You can check out the video here. EVs do have a lot of perks. For one, they have fewer moving parts, making them cheaper to run and maintain. But I digress. Back to China. There’s quite a lot of optimism because China has put a lot of emphasis on electric cars for their recovery. One of the things lifting EVs in China is the government. When the pandemic hit, the government extended NEV subsidies and poured money into battery-charging infrastructure. It’s something they were already looking at before the pandemic, to be in the forefront of manufacturing electric vehicles. Not only to reduce emissions and pollution but to reduce dependency on other energy producing countries. China has also said they want 25% of new car sales to be electric vehicles by 2025, up from about 5% in 2019. They’ve also committed to go carbon neutral by 2060. I mean, we still need to hear what the plan is to get there. But the fact that our biggest trading partner is moving on this should give us something to think about. Europe is also seeing a push towards electric vehicles. According to McKinsey, Europe increased their vehicle sales by 44% in 2019. Their global share of electric vehicles grew to 26% of the market during the pandemic. Europe has already said that it’s looking to decrease its carbon dioxide car emission targets in the next years. EV owners could see more savings because governments are also giving incentives to make the switch and meet those targets. But also, carbon emissions could become more expensive in the future. I mean, it’s something that happened with the tobacco industry. There’s a shift happening towards green energy and it’s happening at a time when solar and wind are getting cheaper and consumers are producing their own energy too. My point with all this is that governments are changing. Industries are changing. Consumers are changing. It’s all aligning. Best, Selva Freigedo, For The Rum Rebellion ..............................Sponsored..............................Nick Hubble’s URGENT Gold Forecast: ‘One ounce of gold could easily cost you as much as AU$4,379 just months from now’ That’s if you can even get your hands on any... If he’s right, this could possibly be your last chance to buy bullion before it jumps out of your price raange thanks to supply shortages, ridiculous premiums and waiting times. Click here to learn why you should buy gold now. | ..........................................................................
Corrupt Elite Strangles the Economy By Bill Bonner We begin today with a new study by the RAND Corporation. It tallies a little more of the hidden cost of house arrest. ABC News reports: ‘Now, new data shows that during the COVID-19 crisis, American adults have sharply increased their consumption of alcohol, drinking on more days per month, and to greater excess. Heavy drinking among women especially has soared. […] ‘“The magnitude of these increases is striking,” Michael Pollard, lead author of the study and a sociologist at RAND, told ABC. “People’s depression increases, anxiety increases, [and] alcohol use is often a way to cope with these feelings. But depression and anxiety are also the outcome of drinking; it’s this feedback loop where it just exacerbates the problem that it’s trying to address.”’ The bills will continue to trickle in for years. Jobs lost. Companies bankrupted. Careers and families stifled and stunted. Job cuts Yesterday came more news of job cuts. Here’s Bloomberg: ‘American Airlines Group Inc. and United Airlines Holdings Inc. will start laying off thousands of employees as scheduled, spurning Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin’s appeal for a delay as he negotiates with Congress over an economic relief plan that includes payroll support for U.S. carriers.’ American is furloughing 19,000, while United is laying off about 13,000. Bloomberg also reports: ‘Tens of thousands of job cuts announced by blue-chip companies in a 24-hour period are a warning sign for the world’s recovery and emerge just ahead of two key reports forecast to show limited progress in the U.S. labor market. ‘In one of the biggest layoff announcements since the pandemic caused widespread economic shutdowns, Walt Disney Co. said late Tuesday that it’s slashing 28,000 workers in its slumping U.S. resort business. In the hours that followed, the pace of job cuts at some of the world’s biggest companies — across a range of industries from energy to finance — quickened. On Wednesday, Allstate Corp., the fourth-largest car insurer in the U.S., said it will cut 3,800 jobs, roughly 8% of its workforce. And Bloomberg reported that Goldman Sachs Group Inc. plans to cut roughly 400 jobs after temporarily suspending job reductions at the beginning of the crisis.’ High price When the figures are eventually toted up, they will show that the US paid a very high price — for nothing. Different countries (and different states) tried different techniques to control the spread of the coronavirus, from strict lockdown (as here in Argentina) to a light touch (as in Sweden). Their results are all over the place. Northern Italy had a high death rate; Southern Italy had a low rate. Sweden’s death rate was high in nursing homes, but low in the general population. The US, with the most sophisticated and expensive medical care in the world, has had more deaths than any other nation. But some areas had almost none at all. Africa, with minimal medical services, has had relatively few. As near as we can tell, it doesn’t matter what the feds do. The virus has a mind of its own. Why do it? But today, we are puzzling over a larger phenomenon: How come? If the payoff from lockdown lockup policies was so uncertain, why do it? Old people are about 1,000 times more at risk from the virus than young people (and seniors are 10 times more likely to die from something other than the coronavirus). Why not just advise them to lay low? Why inconvenience millions of young people for the convenience of a few old ones? Why make 300 million fearful…when only 30 million had much to worry about? But a similar question could be asked about a lot of things. Why are so many things set up that way? Each new bugaboo sends the nation into hysterics; many suffer and only a few benefit. The War on Terror benefited a few military/industrial/consulting companies in Northern Virginia; it cost the rest of the nation $6.4 trillion. The anti-racism industry makes billions; it puts everyone else at each other’s throats. Likewise, the poverty fighters have been gaining wealth and status on the front lines of the War on Poverty; poor people are just as poor as ever. The government’s medical care giveaways are designed, chiefly, for old people; the young pay. The Federal Reserve’s fake money/fake interest rate policies have shifted more than $30 trillion to the richest people in the country over the last 30 years; the poor and middle classes got nothing. Getting right to the point, the fix is in — a few benefit…most pay. Optical illusion And now, a geriatric elite controls the country…its businesses…its armed forces…its money and its government. Donald Trump is 74. Joe Biden is 77. Nancy Pelosi is 80. Mitch McConnell is 78. Jerome Powell is 67. Anthony Fauci is 79. Biden, Pelosi, McConnell, and Fauci have been in government for a combined 185 years. Naturally, they arranged the furniture to suit them. And what suited them all was a scammy, modern look — heavy on the trompe l’oeil, where things are never quite what they appear. That’s why the subject never came up in the presidential debate. The reds and blues may disagree on the details — who’s more corrupt? Who’s more dangerous, Antifa or Proud Boys? But there is one thing they agree on so completely that it is never even mentioned… Complete agreement The biggest threat to the US, and most of its people, remains hush-hush…like the source of a mobster’s wealth… And whatever else may happen…nothing can be allowed to interfere with it. The flimflam must go on. Not since the French Revolution has there been an elite so desperate to hold on to its privileges. The French aristocracy hoped to remain exempt from taxes. But the American geriatric aristocracy seeks an exemption from the laws of economics! Regards, Bill Bonner, For The Rum Rebellion ..............................Sponsored..............................(ALERT!) COVID just sparked Australia’s next boom sector First there was COVID. Then there was record global monetary stimulus. Now there is this. | .......................................................................... |