economy

Reports of a 245,772 euro temporary shower for Sarkozy spark public outrage

Team Observers — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 10:40:01 +0100

According to socialist lawmaker René Dosière, French President Nicolas Sarkozy had a 245,772 euro shower installed for him for a one day summit in Paris’ Grand Palais. The figure, although not entirely accurate, is just one of many reports emerging about the Sarkozy government’s extravagant spending.

A public audit report slammed the “opaque” accounting and “unjustified” costs of France’s EU presidency budget, the most expensive in the country’s history. The elaborate EU-Mediterranean summit at Paris’ Grand Palais on July 18, one of Sarkozy’s final EU presidency flourishes, was one such occasion. The audit report notably singled out a 1.07 million-euro dinner for 200 guests, which works out at 5,362 euros per guest. The webiste Mediapart also published published the list of event expenses considered ‘essential’ by the govenrment, including a full refurbishment of the Palace’s air conditioning system which cost 653,703 euros.

One of the most striking examples of lavish and misused presidential spending was a state of the art shower installed in the temporary Grand Palais presidential offices. It included a built-in spa system and massage chair, and was dismantled directly after the summit and reportedly never used. MP René Dosière claimed the shower cost 245,772 euros just as photos of the state-of-the-art installation were leaked on the web.

These photos were published by the website Mediapart, who obtained them from construction workers who took part in the massive Grand Palais refurbishment. The workers claimed they know the shower was never used, because the hot water tank counter was still at zero when they dismantled it.

French budget minister Eric Woerth tried to defuse rising public outrage by explaining that the figure of 245,772 euros was not just for the shower itself but for the entire 8-room presidential office area built in the Grand Palais, as confirmed by the French weekly Nouvel Observateur. The minister claimed that the shower wasn’t specifically for the President’s use, adding that his residence at the Elysée Palace was just a few minutes away.

Photos of the presidential office suite built for Nicolas Sarkozy in the Grand Palais. Photos : Mediapart

Elektra 1, the homemade electric car

Sophie Team Observers — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 17:30:58 +0100

Faraz Khan has something to be proud of. He drives around his home city of Karachi in one of Pakistan's few electric cars. And he built it with his own hands.

It's called the Elektra 1. From the outside it looks just like a Susuki Mehran, the region's most common car. Take a look under the bonnet however, and you'll see that Faraz has replaced the traditional petrol-run motor with one that runs entirely on electricity. On a "full tank", or 4-6 hours of charging, the car can run for 30km.

And up next, the Elektra 2, which is already under construction. This new model will be able to reach 110 km/h and travel for 160 km when fully charged. Faraz publishes step-by-step instructions to build both models on his blog, Elektra Automotive . For him, travelling on an electric battery brings both economic and environmental benefits. In 2006, pollution levels in Karachi were 20 times higher than the limit laid out by the World Health Organisation.

Business going bust? Lend out your labour

Julien — Fri, 15 May 2009 08:20:25 +0200

Some employees who have had their hours slashed in an attempt to avoid layoffs have received a tempting new offer from their companies: the option of working in another firm while waiting for business to get better. Such an exchange has been launched in Ardèche, France, by Inoplast, an auto equipment manufacturer facing troubling times. Some 100 of its part-time workers have been sent to Irisbus, a similar company in a neighbouring city that is experiencing a resurgence. Could this be a new way to help mitigate the unemployment crisis?

'Pro-Obama CNN' attacked at Tea Party

Team Observers — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 18:49:02 +0200

A CNN reporter who struggled to keep her cool during one of the anti-Obama demonstrations on Wednesday was subsequently attacked by both the immediate crowds and then the entire online Tea Party community.

The US is split over taxes. On one side, Obama supporters and stimulus package believers. On the other, conservatives and tax opponents. In the middle, the press. This video shows CNN journalist Susan Roesgen reporting from a Tea Party demo in Chicago on Wednesday. Her approach, which appears perhaps subjective, has only given strength to those who claim that CNN is pro-Obama. Gone are the days when Democrats moaned about CNN's support for Bush - it is now under fire for favouring the current president.

The video's been viewed over half a million times, blogged 213, and commented on 6,755.

'Let’s show the world how strong China is!'

Sophie Team Observers — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 10:16:57 +0100

The Chinese aren't really instigating a mass naked protest. So who's behind this ironic ad?

The caption reads "Let's show the world how strong China is! We, the Chinese workers, are going in to battle stark naked. We can overcome every difficulty."

'I’m in one hell of a mess'

Ségolène F24 — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 19:44:59 +0100

Michel Tudeng has been out of work since Dec. 19, 2008. He is one of some 80 temporary workers from the Arcelor-Mittal site in eastern France whose contracts have not been renewed.
Tudeng has been left with a bitter taste in his mouth in the wake of promises made by French President Nicolas Sarkozy on Feb. 4, 2008 to maintain all the activities of the steel works. Today, he feels like he has been fooled and accuses the head of state of lying.
He is finding it hard to get out of his financial difficulties. His wife is also out of work.

'Made in China': "the worth of our work is so low, and the price of our materials so immaterial"

Sophie Team Observers — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 16:52:00 +0100

One of our Nepali Observers gives her perspective on Asia's dependence on its exports market and the effect this has on the economic crisis.

A butterfly flutters its wings in one part of the world, and the flutter causes a hurricane on the other side. This causality, so widely cited by everybody from weather experts to scientists to economists looking at causes for seemingly-random but connected phenomena, becomes more relevant in this day and age when a global financial crisis is occurring. The collapse of one mortgage company in America, it appears, could trigger the collapse of the entire house of cards which we call the global economy.

That's why I am fascinated to find that, despite the crisis, the streets of Granada, a city in Southern Spain, is full of shoppers who throng the classy areas, buying clothes and boots and bags, buying jewellery and scarves and other bric-a-brac, all clearly manufactured in Asia. Despite the 'Made in Spain' stamp (written in English), I can recognize a pair of boots-or an entire store of boots-made in China when I see one. So the question presents itself-how can Southern Spain, whose main economy seems to rest on manufacturing pork and cheese and wine and olive oil, command such a strong currency that it's able to buy up entire storehouses of Asia at discounted rates? Are our workers so cheap, and our materials so inconsequential, that a winter coat can cost only €6.99? How is it possible, I wonder, that this kind of frenetic shopping can take place all over Europe, while in parts of Southern Asia we struggle to buy a good pair of shoes? How can the Zacatin (Granada's market street) be full of goods from Nepal, cheaper in price than if I tried to buy them in Kathmandu? I always buy clothes when I have the chance to visit Europe-not just because of the quality, which is always better than consumer goods you can find in the supermarkets of Nepal, but also because of the price, which is always more competitive and affordable. How on earth, I asked myself, is this possible?

The answer may lie less in economics than in a rather complicated internalization of self-image which I call the 'Thamel Factor'. In Thamel, that storehouse of Oriental goods, I invariably come upon shop assistants who give me an insufferably condescending look when I ask them if I can buy an embroidered cushion cover, or a slightly funky jacket. 'Well, okay, we´ll show you, if you insist', they will say. 'But really this is not for Nepalis. Our main market is Europe. Nepalis can't afford to buy stuff like this'.

And here lies the gist of the matter. That sneer, which bothered me for years, comes into focus as I look at the piles of scarves and t-shirts and jewellery, all made in Nepal, all half price and discounted in the window fronts of Spain. Precious and semi-precious stones of Nepal make it out of the country, meant for consumers other than the ones who produce and manufacture these objects. But in its stead, we get no wine and cheese. And why is that? Is it because the Europeans make us believe our goods are worth so little that they can buy up the entire marketplace for a pittance? Or is it because we, in some way, also believe this?

Yes, of course. An old college saying comes back to me; the colonizer and the colonized are always complicit. This could never happen if employers and factory owners in Asia, and Central America, and Africa, didn't play along. China brutalizes its people and makes them work at slavery rates. And everywhere else from free trade zones to maquiladoras, from Mexico to Bangladesh, the people reinforce over and over: the worth of a poor human being must remain low.

Does the fault lie only with the First World? Despite all my education in colonialism, I say no. The fault also lies with us, the people of the East who believe the worth of our work is so low, and the price of our materials so immaterial, that we can-indeed, should-sell everything to Europe and that the locals who make these objects can never be worth enough to buy them.

Imagine, for instance, if Ray Kroc had said: 'Be gone you stupid Americans, these luscious hamburgers are meant only for the Australians, who know how to appreciate a good hamburger when they see one'. Or if the Spanish had said: 'Vamooosh Chulos, this ham and cheese is not meant for you, it's only for our special customers, the French.' Imagine what would have happened then? Imagine if the French made their wine only for their special customers, the Americans, and refused to sell it to the locals? Would they be the great civilization that they are now?

But such is the case in Asia. We imagine that our customers are always the 'Others'-white skinned, fair-faced, pockets loaded with euros. We don't know that they are just like us, that they can only afford a closetful of clothes and after that even the most acquisitive of human beings tire of buying, and it would make sense to make less clothes but pay your workers more. Then, perhaps, a Nepali could also have enough money to buy some European oil and cheese, and olive oil owners in Spain wouldn't have to worry about how the market was doing badly.

At the moment, the asymmetry of the world rests on a pure economic illusion that people of one part of the world deserve more than the other. The illusion is maintained not just by the First World that suffers under this glut of overproduction, but also by the people in Third World countries who persist in thinking they are too poor to afford to pay their workers, too poor to buy quality goods, and too poor to have a symmetrical exchange rate.

This is all very well and good, you may think. After all, it's working in favour of one side of the planet so why change it, right? Well, that's when we come back to the butterfly. Because when one side of the world groans from poverty, unable to afford even three meals a day, when their schoolhouses have no electricity and their hospitals lack medicine, when they work years of their lives, for more than eighty hours a week, in foreign countries but return home with less money than when they left, then it's not just the psychic burden that Europe and America have to bear. It is also the fact that the lives of each and every one in the planet becomes inextricably intertwined, and poverty in one part affects the other. Affluence in the Third World would bring a boom in human cultural and economic growth, whereas right now all it brings about are individuals who struggle to find work (on both sides of the planet)-one side determined to dump its cheap goods made by slave-like labour while the other part sinks under the weight of Asia.

How long could such a state of affairs last? Well, now we know. Until 2009, when a butterfly fluttered its wings, and a global financial crisis that nobody understands took over the world. But change is not always bad. This may be the time to renegotiate-not just trade relations, and prices, and financial equivalence, but also the way in which we imagine ourselves as people of the world. The poor have to understand that they are only poor as long as they imagine themselves to be so. In Nepal, that means seeing a human being as somebody worth much more than he or she is today."

Sushma sent us these photos to illustrate her post:

Clearance sale. Posted by "reblog".

Sales. Posted by "Ah! Bilbao".

Sales over sales. Amazing discounts this year. From the major Spanish department store, El Corte Ingels.

Electricity bills are a laughing matter in the Czech Republic

Sophie Team Observers — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 12:29:52 +0100

Everyone moans about mounting electricity bills. But with Czech consumers, complaints come in the funniest forms.

The Czechs are not unused to seeing their electricity bills mounting - the country's supplier, CEZ, has a monopoly on the sector. However, when it was announced that they'd be celebrating the new year with a 9.9% increase to their electricity costs, the reaction was not celebratory. Czechs are famous for their ability to keep their sense of humour, even in hard times - Reinhard Heydrich, the Nazi governor of Bohemia, once called them "laughing beasts". True to the tradition, the Czech population decided to face the news not with riots, but with jokes.

This post was compiled and translated by Ostap Karmodi, our Observer in the Czech Republic.

Shanghai's public toilets make pots of money

Sophie Team Observers — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 17:51:08 +0100

One of our Observers in China is leading an investigation into... the public toilets at Shanghai train station. It might seem like a trivial subject, but Web users from the city don't think so - not when the WCs rake in 11 million euros each year.

Shanghai residents are infuriated with having to pay to use the public toilets and are wondering where their coins go after the pay pot at the entrance. Some have even totted up how much the local government must amass from the pay-as-you-go services, which are the most frequented in China. Their estimates sum up an astronomical amount – around 100m RMB, or €11m a year.

It's only one Yuan (0.1 euro cent) per person, but with up to 40,000 travellers passing through the station each day, the business is a profitable one. Our Observer Xiaodong Du went to the toilets in question to investigate. He came back with his own estimates... somewhat lower than rumour would have it.

400 dead: "All violence in Nigeria is driven by economics"

Sophie Team Observers — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 12:22:34 +0100

Image posted on citizen journalism portal Sahara Reporters.

Riots sparked by local elections have left around 400 people dead in the city of Jos, central Nigeria. While Western media blame the conflict on a rift between Christians and Muslims, one of our Nigerian Observers says it all boils down to economics.

Nigeria is broadly divided between a Muslim north and a Christian south, but suffers little conflict between the two religions. The violence that broke out on Friday morning is said to have been sparked after the Hausa ethnic group heard that their ANPP (All Nigeria People's Party) candidate had lost the local government chairmanship race to the ruling PDP (People's Democratic Party). The ANPP is a largely conservative party with a Muslim support base from the north, while the current party in power is more liberal and supported broadly by Christians, based in the south. When the Hausa group, who are considered settlers in the Jos area, heard of their defeat, they began burning tyres, which resulted in retaliation from Christian gangs. Two days of violence ensued before the Nigerian army managed to gain control over the city and impose a strict curfew. It's not the first time Jos has erupted into violence - so why the sporadic outbursts?