The Netherlands: Dutch government quits over 'colossal stain' of tax subsidy scandal - by Stephanie van den Berg

Prime Minister Mark Rutte’s government resigned on Friday, accepting responsibility for wrongful accusations of fraud by the tax authorities that drove thousands of families to financial ruin, often on the basis of ethnicity.

Read more at: Dutch government quits over 'colossal stain' of tax subsidy scandal | Reuters

ITALY: Formation of New Italian Goverment Fails As Italian President says It would endanger the EURO

Italy's efforts to form government fail as president defends euro

For the complete report, go to:

http://flip.it/_zcAC6

Sex Abuse: hyped by the Media is among, but not the most important issue the world is facing today

Life's experiences can make you bitter, hateful,  resentful or cynical if you let them. It's even worse if you trying to build a relationship with the opposite gender and you already had some share of disappointments in your life.

Sometimes it's good to go through all those things for some individuals, because sometimes you decide there and then that "I wouldn't never put anyone through what he or she put me through. " .

And  sometimes it's not good at all for others because they can decide that "I will never let anyone put me through this again, therefore I will hurt them before they hurt me" and they just do that. Hurt or hurting people hurts people,

But honestly isn't that what life is all about? Maybe the best way to to label that is experience.

Unfortunately, the Media, and Government, which influence the majority of the population around the world, are now all riding on the bandwagon of combating  "sexual abuse"which now mainly focuses on celebrities, the Catholic Church, and most recently NGO's like Oxfam.

Obviously, it is important to combat sexual abuse, but it certainly should not be on top of the list of all the other horrors the world is facing today, like war, poverty, the causes of mass migration, or weapons industry.

The number of people displaced from their homes due to conflict and persecution last year exceeded 60 million for the first time in the United Nations’ history, a tally greater than the combined populations of the United Kingdom, or of Canada, Australia and New Zealand, says a new report released on World Refugee Day today.

The Global Trends 2015 compiled by the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) notes that 65.3 million people were displaced at the end of 2015, an increase of more than 5 million from 59.5 million a year earlier.

The tally comprises 21.3 million refugees, 3.2 million asylum seekers, and 40.8 million people internally displaced within their own countries.

Measured against the world’s population of 7.4 billion people, one in every 113 people globally is now either a refugee, an asylum-seeker or internally displaced – putting them at a level of risk for which UNHCR knows no precedent.

In the past years Syria, Afghanistan and Somalia produce half the world’s refugees, at 4.9 million, 2.7 million and 1.1 million, respectively.

Colombia in Latin America had the largest numbers of internally displaced people (IDPs), at 6.9 million, followed by Syria’s 6.6 million and Iraq’s 4.4 million.

While the spotlight last year was on Europe’s challenge to manage more than one million refugees and migrants who arrived via the Mediterranean, the report shows that the vast majority of the world’s refugees were in developing countries in the global south.

In all, 86 per cent of the refugees under UNHCR’s mandate records were in low- and middle-income countries close to situations of conflict.

Nearly 1/2 of the world's population — more than 3 billion people — live on less than $2.50 a day. More than 1.3 billion live in extreme poverty — less than $1.25 a day. 1 billion children worldwide are living in poverty. According to UNICEF, 22,000 children die each day due to poverty.

Like it or not, dear feminists, you might find sexual harassment a terrible crime, so do most most of us, but there are also other crimes against humanity, which are far more dangerous and deadly.

Harvey Weinstein, one of Hollywood’s most revered moguls and influential kingpins, who has been sexually harassing and abusing women for nearly 30 years, is a terribly sad case, but in reality his case is only a drop of water on a hot plate, compared to the results of wars, proxy wars, hunger, or poverty around the world.

Unfortunately those horrific events hardly ever get the attention they deserve because those problems are usually the the result of our own governments deeds and actions and are shoved under the table.

Not one Western Government, which has taken part in the Middle East wars has ever been asked  by their Legislative Representation to justify the destruction and enormous number of casualties suffered by the local population, and the total failures of these wars. 

"We the people" are really the only ones who can do something about it. This destructive policy of wars has to stop and we should not get side-tracked by the smoke-screens our Governments and media are applying to divert our attention. 

It is high time our governments get their priorities right.

EU-Digest  

The above report can be used
 only if the source is mentioned

Stock Market Crash ? : Top Economist Says a Drop Is Coming - by Mark Zandi

If you are a stock investor, buckle in.

Investors have enjoyed an amazing run. Stock prices are up by nearly a third over the past 18 months and seem to be hitting new record highs daily. And the run-up has been almost a straight line, with stock price volatility—the ups and downs in prices—the lowest it has ever been.

But if you are an investor, soak all of this in, because it will soon be nothing but a memory. The stock market is due for a significant correction—defined as a greater than 10% decline in stock prices—and stock returns in the next several years will be very pedestrian if they increase at all.

It’s not that the stock market is a bubble ready to burst. Bubbles are created by speculation, when investors buy a stock simply because its price has risen strongly in the recent past, and therefore conclude it will rise strongly in the foreseeable future. This clearly characterized the tech bubble that inflated around Y2K. Investors piled into the stocks of dot-com companies, many without even understanding what the Internet was. Most of the companies weren’t making any money, and few had business models that seemed likely to ever generate profits. That bubble was also fueled by margin debt, as investors borrowed aggressively against their stock holdings to purchase even more stocks.

So why am I pessimistic? The stock market is overvalued. That is, stock prices are much too high despite the good outlook for corporate earnings. The only other time in the past half century that stock prices have been so highly priced was during the tech bubble. Yes, they’re even more overpriced now than prior to the 1987 market crash.

Corporate earnings are good, but they are set to grow more slowly, since businesses will have to give their employees bigger pay increases to hold onto them, let alone hire new workers. 

With unemployment falling toward 4%, wages will slowly, but steadily accelerate. Businesses will respond by raising prices more quickly, but they won’t be able to pass through all of their higher costs to customers. Margins will come under pressure.

Intensifying wage and price pressures means that the Federal Reserve will need to raise short-term interest rates more consistently, and begin to wind down its balance sheet, which will cause long-term rates to rise. It is hard to see investors being as enthusiastic about stocks when interest rates are rising. 

Higher rates will also make it more expensive for businesses to borrow money to buy back their stock, a common practice in the current bull market.

Then there is Washington. So far, the dysfunction there hasn’t been a problem; it has only meant that lawmakers have done nothing. That is fine for a growing economy. But doing nothing won’t be a winning strategy for much longer. 

Lawmakers must soon agree on a budget or risk shutting the government down, and they must raise the Treasury debt limit or risk shutting down the global financial system. Tax reform would be nice, but odds are that if there is reform it will fall short of what investors desire.

\

Of course, there is no timing a stock market correction. It could happen tomorrow, next quarter, or next year. But that time is at hand.

The author of this report is Mark Zandi is chief economist at Moody’s Analytics. He has investments of all of the companies mentioned in this article.

Read complete report by clicking here: Stock Market Crash: Top Economist Says a Drop Is Coming | Fortune.com