Tuesday, December 22, 2020

Schadenfreude as Chinese steel mills ask for help from Rio and BHP

CRAZY IVAN: Russian hackers hit US government using widespread supply chain attack.


Keeping the industry strong has been a priority for China's central government: in 2013, President Xi Jinping urged Chinese mariners to "build bigger ships and venture even farther and catch bigger fish".

When a vast Chinese armada appeared outside the Galapagos Marine Reserve in South America earlier this year, Ecuador's Government sounded the alarm.

China's 'dark' fishing fleets are plundering the world's oceans


WAIT, I’M SUPPOSED TO BE SURPRISED?  China Watch: Leaked Database Shows CCP in US Companies.


Trade wars

Schadenfreude as Chinese steel mills ask for help from Rio and BHP



From Emanuele Colonnelli and Niels Joachim Gormsen:

We conduct representative large-scale surveys of U.S. citizens aimed at measuring perceptions of large corporations’ environmental, social, and governance performance and investigate how these perceptions affect the public support for economic policies. The public demands corporations to behave better within society, a sentiment we label “big business discontent.”We experimentally vary individual perceptions by showing animated videos that highlight the“good” and the “bad” of corporate behavior in recent years. We show that higher big business discontent lowers support for corporate bailouts. The effects are present across the whole political spectrum, but they are stronger for liberals than for conservatives, and they persist even a week after respondents viewed the videos. A second randomized experiment shows that simply making respondents think about the role of large corporations in society lowers their support forbailouts, highlighting a key mechanism whereby the public’s pre-existing negative beliefs about big business influence behavior once these beliefs are manipulated or triggered. We conduct an additional experimental survey to show that individuals’ self-reported policy preferences are reflected in costly behavioral actions. A higher big business discontent makes respondents less likely to sign an online petition or contact U.S. senators to support corporate bailouts. Treated respondents are also less likely to donate to a non-profit organization supporting the genera linterests of top U.S. executives. Together, our findings suggest that the perceived strength of the social contract between big corporations and their stakeholders may impact the public support for important economic policies.

Here is a link to the paper


NEWS YOU CAN USE:  Your Guide to Not Getting Murdered in a Quaint English Village.


Katherine Eban – investigative journalist, Vanity Fair contributor and Andrew Carnegie fellow (also see her TEDMED Talk here). “A: Typically, the manufacturer name will be listed on the pill bottle’s dispensing label. However, this isn’t always the case. If you can’t find the name of the manufacturer on the packaging, call your pharmacist and ask which company manufactured the medicine in your prescription.  Although state laws vary, pharmacists are required to keep records of prescriptions dispensed to patients, including documentation of the drug manufacturer’s name, generally for a period of two to seven years. If the prescription is paid by a federal program, the records must be maintained for ten years.

Q: How can I be sure that the company that makes my generic drug is “safe”?A: Once you know the name of the manufacturer that makes your medicine, there are several steps you can take to learn more about their reputation.

  • Research the company: You can start by just Googling the company and seeing what you find. Are other patients complaining about the same drug by the same manufacturer? One helpful resource is The People’s Pharmacy, the website that accompanies an NPR radio program, where patients write in and share stories.
  • Check inspection records: The FDA inspects and ranks drug manufacturing facilities across the globe, giving each facility one of three grades: Official Action Indicated (OAI), Voluntary Action Indicated (VAI) and No Action Indicated (NAI). If a facility receives an “OAI” grade, it means the FDA found significant problems at the plant that require immediate correction. These rankings are available in the FDA’s Inspection Classification Database. If you enter the name of the company in the “Firm Name” field on this online form, and then click “search,” you should find inspection grades from the past ten years.
  • Check warning letters: If the FDA finds serious problems at a manufacturing plant, it will issue a detailed warning letter. You can find a list of these here. Though the letters themselves can be technical, one expert advises to look for two types of problems: issues with sterility and with data integrity (the latter reflecting negligence or possible fraud in the mishandling of manufacturing data). When both issues are present, this can be a clear indicator that the plant has serious quality control problems…”


Katherine Eban - How can I find out which company makes my generic drug?


Why were doctors and nurses uniquely attracted to Nazi philosophy, enlisting in much higher proportions than any other  Profession?  



Is strongman a useful category for political analysis? A new book stretches the definition beyond its limits 

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