Newsweek January 27, 2023

2016 “China is slowing more rapidly than we thought and isn’t as smart as we believed,” wrote Newsweek of the impact of the country’s economic slowdown. “The stunning drop in global commodity prices has been driven not only by the marked slowdown in China’s overall growth but also in the composition of that growth. The massive build-out over the past decade of both infrastructure and residential real estate is no longer the catalyst for China’s economy.” This year China’s GDP is forecast to grow by 4.4 percent, the slowest year in four decades, throttled by restrictive COVID policies. 1976 “The newest frontier in cancer research is the environment itself,” Newsweek said, with many experts regarding it “as a far more significant source of cancer than aberrant cellular mutation.” A 2022 report says environmental…

A flooded house in northern California on January 9 after a series of atmospheric rivers hit the area. The state’s latest wild weather swings have gone from extreme drought to extreme flooding with fierce storms, swollen rivers and flash mudslides. The pounding downpour over the last two weeks has killed at least 17 people, put millions in danger and caused hundreds of thousands of power outages. A new study published in Science Advances says California may bear the brunt of “megafloods” and experience a severe storm once every 30 to 50 years. Climate change has made those storms twice as likely as they were a century ago. The wet pattern is expected to continue until at least mid-month.…

WITH A NARROW AND HIGHLY FRACTIOUS REPUB-lican minority now in control, it is a safe bet the House of Representatives will be the site of loud debates over government spending in the coming months. As part of the fighting over things like raising the debt limit, expect to hear renewed talk about reforming Social Security. The GOP has made clear that what they mean by reform is cutting benefits. They’ll argue that we cannot afford Social Security and that the program is going bankrupt. Both arguments are false. Social Security does face a long-expected shortfall in the years ahead but closing the gap is a manageable task. And we need to do more than simply close the program’s funding gap. Millions of Americans are approaching retirement confronting a devastating decline in…

Q _ How is your book different from other retirement books? A _ Many retirement books focus on the reader who least needs help, people who have substantial retirement savings and investment portfolios who are looking for an additional edge. Having covered retirement for 15 years I saw that there’s a very substantial number of households getting close to retirement that are just not financially prepared. They haven’t saved much or anything and will be relying only on Social Security for income. What advice would you give those folks? I would start by trying to make a plan. There are do-it-yourself ways to do it or you can hire a planner. You look at your expected expenses and on what you project from your retirement income and to see if there’s a gap. A…

ON THE MORNING OF JAN-uary 11, the Federal Aviation Administration halted all airline takeoffs in the U.S. because of a glitch in a software system critical to flight safety. “There is no evidence of a cyberattack at this point,” said the White House press secretary. But would officials know it if it were? And would they disclose it to the public? Those are fair questions, given that in 2015 it took the FAA two months to disclose that hackers had planted malware in one of its computer networks. The federal government keeps tight wraps on what it knows about threats to American businesses and individuals. If hackers did indeed attack the FAA, it would be business as usual in the world of cybersecurity. On the same day, according to research firm Cybersecurity…

MOST COMPANIES THESE DAYS TALK A GOOD GAME ABOUT diversity. It is common to hear employers emphasizing their efforts to recruit and promote people of different ages, races, genders, sexuality and abilities. And that makes sense, not only because diversity is important particularly to younger job applicants, but also because it is well-documented that workplaces filled with people with different worldviews are more creative, more innovative and generally make better decisions. Employing a wide variety of people who feel comfortable and respected isn’t a desirable perk, it is simply good business. With the word “diversity” attracting so much lip service from companies, however, it can be tough for job applicants, customers and potential business partners to tell who is serious about supporting a diverse workforce and who is not. To that…