Here's an interview with Ryan by The Hill
This is very good news for lovers of freedom and economic opportunity.
Voters in Switzerland rejected three referendums that would have limited CO2 placed new taxes on motor fuel and airline tickets. This was all part of a plan under the Paris Climate Agreement. Other referenda would have banned the use of pesticides and chemicals in farming setting back one of mankind's great technological advanced. BBC reports:
Switzerland's policy on fighting climate change has been thrown into doubt after voters rejected key measures in a popular vote.
A referendum saw voters narrowly reject the government's plans for a car fuel levy and a tax on air tickets.
The measures were designed to help Switzerland meet targets under the Paris Agreement on climate change.
Many voters appear to have worried about the impact on the economy as the country tries to recover from Covid-19.
The referenda drew particularly strong opposition from young voters who rejected the measures in overwhelming numbers.
One reason the vote failed was lack of agreement among climate activists. Many rejected it because the law did not go far enough. But what is particularly interesting about this referendum is that the strongest opposition came from young people. 60-70% of the 18-34 year old voted No in the three categories.
Perhaps this is a sign that younger voters are starting to reject the heavy-handed, top down approach to climate issues so favored by the ruling classes in the EU and United States.
More here
Bloomberg reports that lots of millennials are fed up with 100% work from home.
While experienced employees often have established professional networks and dedicated home offices, younger staff say the pandemic has left them under-informed and cut off from their teams. There are now growing concerns that they are missing out on career opportunities older colleagues took for granted.
Well over half of staff aged 21-30 stressed the importance of being able to meet and work with colleagues in person again, according to a 6,000-person survey carried out for Sharp Europe, a part of Sharp Corp., results of which were shared with Bloomberg. Nearly 60% said working in a modern, collegiate office environment has become more important to them over the past year.
I've been blogging about how the lockdowns harmed the careers and mental health of young people. The shift to work at home may be great for older workers who have connections in the workplace. Young people may find work at home enjoyable in the short term but not so pleasant in the longer term.
There's some interesting data in the new Biden Budget. The budget assumes that inflation will be between 2.1 and 2.3 percent from 2022 to 2031. That will be above both short and long term interest rates. That means investors can expect a negative return on low risk assets--things such as bank deposit account and CDs--for the next decade. The chart below is an excerpt from the economic assumptions section of the Biden budget.
Financial repression--setting interest rates below the rate of inflation--will devastate small savers. This includes poor and middle income Americans. It will also hurt young people trying to accumulate wealth for the purchase of a home and the elderly who are generally more likely to favor low risk assets.
Financial repression also contributes to the growth of inequality. Wealthy individuals and the large banks have greater ability to take risk or to engage in sophisticated investment strategies that will yield higher returns. Poor and middle class Americans as well as smaller bank and financial institutions have less ability to bear risk.
This is further evidence that young Americans are and will face a far more difficult investing environment that previous generations did.
Young Americans were particularly hard hit by the lockdowns and by the slower than expected recovery from the pandemic. Given the combination of the twin shocks of the Global Financial Crisis and the COVID pandemic, it is not surprising that Millenials and Gen-Zers have had a harder time building wealth than previous generations as seen in the cart below.
Stanley Druckenmiller lays out how the Federal Reserve's asset purchases are increasing inequality in America. These asset purchases raise the price of financial assets. That benefits the holders but does little for those who don't own stocks.
Though framed in terms of the rich versus everyone else, Fed policy also increases inequality between the generations. Older generations have had time to build up their holdings of stocks and other financial assets. Their portfolios have benefitted form the run up of non-stop Fed simulative policies for the past thirteen years (low rates, massive asset purchases). Younger generations are the losers. Young savers and investors are confronted with having to buy into a massive asset bubble with inflated asset prices for everything--homes, stocks, bonds etc.--or to save with negative real interest rates.
As I have blogged before, the current investing environment is one of the worst for young people in the past 40 years. A big part of that is the never-ending stimulus of Fed programs.
Investment giant Charlie Munger tell it like it is at the Berkshire Hathaway annual meeting.
However, instead of offering some support to these newly-hatched capitalists who dream of achieving Buffett's success, however on a far more truncated timeframe, Charlie Munger had some stark words of discouragement when it comes to the next generation seeking to master the stock market.
“Bernie Sanders has basically won," the 97-year old said. "He did it by accident, but he won."
Munger then followed up with a sad truth which the largest US generation will hate to hear: "the millennial generation is going to have a hell of a time getting rich compared to our generation" the billionaire said, referring to its engagement with the stock market, where for now at least, millennials appear to be winning but Munger is confident that it will all end in tears.
