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To: TobagoJack who wrote (25828)	11/29/2002 11:38:39 PM
From: elmatador	Respond to of 74559

Activists push global Buy Nothing Day. This is the reason why I think population replenishment would have worked wonders. <<Those countries should bring in the masses who would come there to replace the weirdo populations of fat cats. New blood. New and real brains. It would have worked. But people have a tendency of working against their own self-interest; hence deflation will work on, Jay!>> Activists push global Buy Nothing Day By Scheherazade Daneshkhu Published: November 29 2002 22:28 \| Last Updated: November 29 2002 22:28 .l { visibility: hidden; display: block; } Posters of a glowering Uncle Sam telling people "I want you to curb your consumption" are being plastered today by activists in New York's Times Square. Along London's Oxford Street, posters of a finger-wagging Queen carry the same message. Across Europe - in Germany, Denmark, Finland and Italy - protesters are staging stunts such as dressing up as Santa Claus and urging people to go home and enjoy the day without spending money. Saturday is one of the busiest retailing days on the calendar, when shoppers hit the streets in earnest for Christmas. But it is also Buy Nothing Day. Never heard of it? Until 1997, neither had Michael Smith, UK organiser of the 11-year-old movement that originated in Canada as a protest against consumerism. "There's a good vibe about this year, interest is much bigger," says Mr Smith, whose movement claims to have identified a new disease of "affluenza". The movement says this is a day of "cheerful and critical" protest against western over-consumption and the influence of advertising. The loose coalition of environmentalists and political activists likens consumerism to an addiction and promotes ethical consumption through fair trade groups. For nervous retailers, Buy Nothing spells disaster. A sudden drop in consumer spending would damage the economies of the US and the UK, where people's willingness to spend has offset a recession in manufacturing. But there are economic reasons for consumers to heed the spirit of Buy Nothing Day. "We're not saying stop spending," said Mr Smith. "It's more a case of reducing our consumption. We are borrowing our way out of recession and ultimately will hit a wall." The Bank of England has voiced concerns at the record levels of borrowing. The UK's Department of Trade and Industry, which published a report this week warning of the dangers of borrowing levels, found that a quarter of all UK households have been in financial difficulties in the past 12 months. This is despite benign economic conditions, such as low interest rates and unemployment levels. "Household debt is at historic levels; we find that's not yet spilling over into default rates as in the 1980s but Christmas could well tip people over into over-extended debt," says Ed Mayo, executive director of the London-based New Economics Foundation, a radical think tank, which publishes a paper on Monday on predatory lending in Britain. "I would expect Alan Greenspan [US Federal Reserve chairman], Gordon Brown [UK finance minister] and Eddie George [Bank of England governor] to be first in line to celebrate Buy Nothing Day, because it should be good for the economy; it would be a rational response to the irrational exuberance of over-consumption," he said. Reducing spending growth, not stopping it, could help address the UK's low savings rate. "Since 1998 UK saving as a percentage of personal disposable income has been low," says Ray Barrell, economist at the London-based National Institute of Economic and Social Research. "If consumers save more, about 7.2 per cent, instead of 5, then the saving ratio will return to its average of the early- to mid-1990s." That would imply no growth in consumption next year and, although in the short run output growth would slow, Mr Barrell says: "This is a good thing because we need to save for retirement and eventually investment and output will be higher." Patricia Morrison, a London-based charity administrator, approves of any encouragement to scale back on Christmas presents. She is setting up a new society called Parma - parents against rampantly materialist attitudes - whose first target is the bags of goodies given at children's parties. "We should be holding back the tide of presents and donating money to charity." Despite the posters in Times Square, the Buy Nothing campaign has attracted little US publicity and concerns centre more on a slowdown in consumer spending than overheating. US shoppers flocking to stores on Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, were greeted by promotions and markdowns, as retailers attempted to jump-start Christmas spending after a slow autumn. "Retailing and consumer spending are the function of a four-letter word: jobs," says Kurt Barnard, a US retail consultant and publisher of Barnard's Retail Trend Report. "People who have jobs today are very concerned about the possibility of being laid off. This is not the kind of economic background that encourages a shopping spree." Additional reporting by Neil Buckley in New York

To: TobagoJack who wrote (25828)	11/29/2002 11:48:48 PM
From: elmatador	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 74559

"concern about Hong Kong's commitment to its 19-year-old currency link to the U.S. dollar." Last country I've heard lost its commitment to the USD was that one whose capital is Buenos Aires!!! Hong Kong's deficit grows to HK$72.36 billion 30 November, 2002 11:30 GMT+08:00 HONG KONG (Reuters) - Hong Kong's budget deficit ballooned to HK$72.36 billion (US$9.28 billion) for the first seven months of the fiscal year, or about 60 percent higher than its target for the entire year. <<even after cutting the civil servnats salaries, Jay??>> The figure also showed a 15 percent deterioration from the HK$63 billion deficit recorded between April and October last year. The mounting deficit has raised concern about Hong Kong's commitment to its 19-year-old currency link to the U.S. dollar. The peg is often described as the rock on which the city's financial stability is founded, but some business people are increasingly calling for it to go, saying it is making the territory uncompetitive. Hong Kong's fiscal reserves, which may be used to back the peg, are rapidly being eroded as the government dips into them to meet its budget shortfall. Fiscal reserves fell to HK$300.1 billion at the end of October from HK$301.7 billion at end-September, the government said in a statement on Saturday. Hong Kong, which has been ravaged by two recessions in four years, already has one of the highest budget gaps in Asia. It represents about 5.6 percent of gross domestic product. For the first-half of the fiscal year, which ends in March, the government ran a deficit of HK$70.8 billion versus its full-year forecast of HK$45.2 billion. Commerce Secretary Henry Tang said this week that the budget gap could hit a historic high this year. Some analysts believe the government will have to hike taxes soon if the economy does not recovery as quickly as expected and boost revenue. But Tim Condon, chief economist at ING Financial Markets, said the government should cut taxes instead to spur consumer demand, even if it adds to the deficit in the short run. "Austerity is bad macro-economic policy," said Condon. Most economists now expect the full-year deficit to reach more than HK$80 billion, or about 6.4 percent of gross domestic product. However, the government said most of its revenues came in towards the end of the fiscal year ending March and that it was not unusual to have a large deficit early in the financial year. Government revenues have been hit hard by the sluggish economy, particularly the 65 percent fall in residential property prices since 1997, because its revenues rely heavily on the property sector for income from land sales, property rates, and stamp duty. The government posted a HK$63.3 billion shortfall last fiscal year, about the same as the level reached in the first seven months of that period. Credit rating agency Standard & Poor's last month lowered its outlook on Hong Kong's local currency rating to negative from stable, citing the weak economy and yawning deficit. Economists have said an ever-increasing deficit would sooner or later mean some form of higher taxation, undercutting the appeal of Hong Kong to foreign investors. Capital would probably take flight, pushing up the risk premium on debt denominated in Hong Kong dollars. The government would probably hike interest rates to stop the outflow, heaping even higher costs on companies. A task force report said earlier this year that the massive government reserves that underpin the peg could be wiped out by 2009 if the government did not tackle deficit. Business people have urged the government to dump or adjust the currency peg to make the territory more competitive and some analysts say the Hong Kong dollar is overvalued by 10 to 40 percent. But few expect the government will change its popular low-tax regime or tinker with the exchange rate as long as the economy remains weak.