Octopus Overlords

Isgrimnur wrote: ↑Fri Jan 07, 2022 1:42 pmQui tam

REPORT Lufthansa group confirmed that 18,000 flights had been flown empty to keep airport slots

EU rules require that airlines operate a certain percentage of scheduled flights to keep their slots at major airports.

Under these “use it or lose it” regulations, prior to the pandemic carriers had to utilise at least 80pc of their scheduled take-off and landing slots.

This was revised to 50pc as coronavirus saw travel become increasingly difficult – but airlines are still struggling to hit this target.

As a result of Lufthansa Group’s latest figures, the Belgian federal government has written to the European Commission, calling for a change to the rules on maintaining slots.

Isgrimnur wrote: ↑Tue Jan 11, 2022 2:33 pm Before anyone goes all "freedom frankfurter":

Isgrimnur wrote: ↑Tue Jan 11, 2022 2:33 pm Before anyone goes all "freedom frankfurter":

Bosses are recommitting to their company offices — even as Omicron extends remote work for many employees.

...

Nearly three-quarters of respondents to a recent survey by international workforce consulting firm Korn Ferry said they would return to the office now if mandated to do so, but 27% said they would refuse to go back in, even part-time, or would simply quit.

While 64% said it would make them “happy” to socialize with their co-workers again and nearly half said a return to the office would be good for their mental health, 51% said coming back to the office would have a negative effect on their mental health.

One misconception about Japan's political response to COVID is that it is a lovey-dovey response that's all about caring for the people. Nothing could be further from the truth. Notice how in this government video, they keep talking about business and economic practicalities. That's all they really care about, in a way that is quite brutal. The people don't even get access to free RATs or PCR testing. The real difference in the JP govt response is that it is driven by a dominant neo-Keynesian macroeconomic paradigm, so unfashionable in the Anglosphere. It's a model that believes in nation-building through central investment in technologically based infrastructure. The end result is they give away thousands of free CO2 monitors to businesses and invest in clean-indoor air infrastructure as a business centred economic stimulus programme.

If there is a benefit to citizens, it is indirect and structurally mediated. Keynesian macroeconomics is “demand-side economics”. That means you don't want to kill, maim, sicken and furlough workers and consumers in the economy by the millions. They are not considered disposable as they consume goods and services. The difference between the COVID outcomes in the UK vs JP can thus be regarded as a difference in their respective dominant macroeconomic paradigms. The Anglosphere has been dominated by Classical supply-side macroeconomics for some decades—never mind that Keynes was a Briton. Cracks in the Classical paradigm first appeared with the GFC, which forced governments to intervene with corporate bailouts, stimulus packages, and the adoption of the Japanese practice of quantitative easing. COVID represents a big double whammy to rock that paradigm.

As a post-script, there's an “I told you so” aspect to this story. The Omicron wave caused business and consumer confidence to crash, crushing the “animal spirits of the market”—to paraphrase a famous quote from Keynes. The effect was worse than a lockdown

Kraken wrote: ↑Thu Feb 03, 2022 10:47 pm Da hell is up with cat food, anyway? Both nearby grocers' shelves have looked like this for weeks.

“We would expect more supply challenges over the next four to six weeks,” he said on a conference call with Wall Street analysts after Albertsons reported earnings. “As a business we’ve all learned to manage it, we’ve all learned to make sure that the stores are still very presentable—give the consumers as much choice as we can get.”

Omicron is exacerbating disruptions in food supply chains that are already stressed. Rising U.S. infections mean more workers are getting sick at farms, factories, distributors and retailers, crimping the flow of goods to shoppers just as the variant prompts people to eat at home more. Port congestion and winter weather in parts of the country aren’t helping, either.

Online searches are surging for basic products, reflecting consumer anxiety over supplies. As of Tuesday afternoon, the list includes chicken, potatoes, spinach, pasta, meat, lettuce, eggs, cream cheese, and cat food.

Bank of America slashed its first-quarter economic outlook for the United States on Friday because of disruptions caused by the Omicron coronavirus variant.

Economists at Bank of America (BAC) said in a report to clients they now expect US gross domestic product to increase at an annual rate of just 1% during the first three months of this year.

That's a sharp downgrade from the bank's prior call for 4% growth in the quarter. And yet it could prove to be optimistic.

That would break a streak of six consecutive quarters of growth that began in the summer of 2020.

The Atlanta Federal Reserve's GDPNow forecasting model, released on Friday, is calling for 0.1% growth in the first quarter. That would be a rapid slowdown from the 6.9% annual rate of growth during the final quarter of 2021.[/url]

Kraken wrote: ↑Fri Feb 04, 2022 12:29 pm I might have to resort to buying it online. I hate to generate extra packaging, but my boys gotta eat. Back when Warren decided he was a vegetarian I tried boiling and shredding some chicken thighs, but he wasn't tempted. So I made chicken salad.

Jaymann wrote: ↑Fri Feb 04, 2022 12:58 pm Why don't they make mouse flavored cat food?

LawBeefaroni wrote: ↑Fri Feb 04, 2022 4:29 pm

Jaymann wrote: ↑Fri Feb 04, 2022 12:58 pm Why don't they make mouse flavored cat food?

Mice are fun to play with but they aren't good eating.


But the real reason is that people buy cat food, not cats. The flavors are marketed to people.

Kraken wrote: ↑Fri Feb 04, 2022 5:02 pm

LawBeefaroni wrote: ↑Fri Feb 04, 2022 4:29 pm

Jaymann wrote: ↑Fri Feb 04, 2022 12:58 pm Why don't they make mouse flavored cat food?

Mice are fun to play with but they aren't good eating.


But the real reason is that people buy cat food, not cats. The flavors are marketed to people.

Plus, pet food is made from human food byproducts. There's no reason for Purina to start a mouse ranch.

Jaymann wrote: ↑Sun Feb 06, 2022 12:45 pm

Kraken wrote: ↑Fri Feb 04, 2022 5:02 pm

LawBeefaroni wrote: ↑Fri Feb 04, 2022 4:29 pm

Jaymann wrote: ↑Fri Feb 04, 2022 12:58 pm Why don't they make mouse flavored cat food?

Mice are fun to play with but they aren't good eating.


But the real reason is that people buy cat food, not cats. The flavors are marketed to people.

Plus, pet food is made from human food byproducts. There's no reason for Purina to start a mouse ranch.

Couldn't they just synthesize the flavor? I think it is more a case that humans find mice disgusting, but don't seem to have a problem slaughtering farm animals.

Blackhawk wrote: ↑Mon Feb 07, 2022 5:27 pm Shopping has gotten to the point that it's a huge hassle. I go in with a list, and come out with 1/2 to 2/3 of the list. And luxuries don't go on the list - the list is just the necessities.

We're on a very tight budget right now after some unavoidables. I grew up poor. I've lived poor. I know how to eat cheap without eating crap. But I've been to a different store every week for the past three weekly shopping trips, and not one item in my 'toolbox' of low-budget foods has been available in any of them. Not one.

I'm getting really, really tired of ramen and peanut butter.

Blackhawk wrote: ↑Mon Feb 07, 2022 8:05 pm I keep oyster sauce around, but I buy it at the local Asian market.

Tyson said it raised meat prices to offset higher costs for labor, transportation and grains used for animal feed. Its cost of goods rose by 18% in the quarter, and King told reporters he expects grain prices will continue to rise.

To respond, Tyson restructured its chicken pricing strategy to make it more flexible and has asked customers to pay for freight rates that jumped 32%, King said.

"They're dealing with a very inflationary environment across kind of all their businesses," said Adam Samuelson, lead agribusiness analyst at Goldman Sachs.

Canadian truckers protesting coronavirus restrictions and vaccine mandates on Tuesday partially severed a key trade artery between the U.S. and Canada, threatening to further disrupt new car and truck production that already has been hampered by a prolonged shortage of computer chips.

After blocking streets in the capital Ottawa for 10 days, the truckers brought their anti-government blockade to the Ambassador Bridge, which links Windsor, Ontario, with the city of Detroit.

Each day, $300 million worth of car and truck parts, agricultural products, steel and other raw materials flows across the bridge, according to Flavio Volpe, president of the Auto Parts Manufacturers Association in Toronto.

U.S. manufacturers rely on daily or near-daily shipments to and from their Canadian partners. Just one or two more days of interrupted deliveries could lead to temporary layoffs or plant closures, Volpe said.

“We work in 24-48 hour contingencies. Everybody is thinking about what that means for tomorrow’s production,” he said. “A few dozen people are getting in the way of the American economy."