Who's to blame for high commodity – energy, food, metals, prices – it's the producers, stupid, not the banks and speculators

Happy New Year everyone. This article of mine re markets might be of interest (also below). http://seekingalpha.com/article/245574-who-s-to-blame-for-high-commodity-prices-it-s-the-producers-stupid v=1294568746&source=tracking_notify In my view commodity markets have two price boundary ‘trend-lines’: a ‘sellers’ market’ upper boundary, where consumer demand destruction sets in, and a ‘buyers’ market’ lower boundary, where ‘production destruction’ sets in. The current situation, where finance […]

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The film "Minority Report" – Pre-Crime, and Pre-Bribe

People may have seen the rather good (IMHOP) film “Minority Report” starring Tom Cruise. The basic plot idea is that in the future the authorities have a means of detecting serious crimes just before they are about to happen, using a sort of hi tech clairvoyant. Tom Cruise and his hi tech cops then zoom […]

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Graduate attacks outsourcing of UK water engineering jobs to India etc as a cheap electoral gimmick by way of keeping water bills down.

The consultant I work for is undergoing a major redundancy process in the water engineering side of the business, with the majority of jobs being lost at graduate level and below.

We have been informed that the reasons for this are that the draft determination from Ofwat appears particularly tough and as such, we won’t be getting any work out of the water companies for possibly as much as a year. It is also apparent that when the work does start to come, unachievable efficiency will be required, forcing consultants to “offshore” work to India and the like.

To make graduates redundant in this country, only to employ staff in India in their place does not seem acceptable. If we, as an industry, are left with this as the only option to be able to survive, then it would seem that Ofwat has got it wrong and we should be doing more to influence its decision making.

This is a very important issue for the country as we have already practically lost manufacturing as an industry and cannot afford to lose construction skills overseas.

It is also clear that the reason for the harsh determination is that the government doesn’t want to put water bills up because it is still hoping to win the approaching General Election.

This is unacceptable and is destroying an industry. What is the ICE doing about this?

Joe Andrews, mailto:joekayaker at hotmail dot com

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Energy is everything – what is really behind the financial crisis – something which eludes bankers and economists

Great article on the present complete inability of economists and politicians to see what is actually going on: See full thing at: http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=8817&page=1   It is fascinating to watch the behaviour of our political and business leaders as they attempt to cope with the world’s deepening financial crisis. It is becoming clear that they don’t […]

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