Baltic Dry Index. 1366 Brent Crude 51.34
Spot Gold 1890
Coronavirus Cases 02/04/20 World 1,000,000
Deaths 53,100
Coronavirus Cases 31/12/20 World 83,067,119
Deaths 1,812,189
"Prediction is very difficult, especially if it's about the future."
Nils Bohr.
A safer, happy, more prosperous, 2021 to all.
‘Tis the last day of year 2020, and time to foresee the future. Of course, no one can foresee the future, least of all our corrupt central banksters who have never yet foreseen a recession, or for that matter a crisis, or even an inflation, or pandemic. Then again, neither can your LIR editor.
"In economics, hope and faith coexist with great scientific pretension."
J. K. Galbraith.
Up first, a very real vaccine concern.
Vaccinated US nurse contracts COVID-19, expert says Pfizer shot needed more time to work - ABC
December 30, 2020 8:22 AM
(Reuters) - A nurse in California tested positive for COVID-19 more than a week after receiving Pfizer Inc's vaccine, an ABC News affiliate reported bit.ly/2L8iBel on Tuesday, but a medical expert said the body needs more time to build up protection.
Matthew W., 45, a nurse at two different local hospitals, said in a Facebook post on December 18 that he had received the Pfizer vaccine, telling the ABC News affiliate that his arm was sore for a day but that he had suffered no other side-effects.
Six days later on Christmas Eve, he became sick after working a shift in the COVID-19 unit, the report added. He got the chills and later came down with muscle aches and fatigue.
He went to a drive-up hospital testing site and tested positive for COVID-19 the day after Christmas, the report said.
Christian Ramers, an infectious disease specialist with Family Health Centers of San Diego, told the ABC News affiliate that this scenario was not unexpected.
“We know from the vaccine clinical trials that it’s going to take about 10 to 14 days for you to start to develop protection from the vaccine,” Ramers said.
“That first dose we think gives you somewhere around 50%, and you need that second dose to get up to 95%,” Ramers added.
Ten Ways Covid-19 Has Changed the World Economy Forever
Wed, December 30, 2020, 12:01 AM GMT
(Bloomberg) -- Economic shocks like the coronavirus pandemic of 2020 only arrive once every few generations, and they bring about permanent and far-reaching change.
Measured by output, the world economy is well on the way to recovery from a slump the likes of which barely any of its 7.7 billion people have seen in their lifetimes. Vaccines should accelerate the rebound in 2021. But other legacies of Covid-19 will shape global growth for years to come.
Some are already discernible. The takeover of factory and service jobs by robots will advance, while white-collar workers get to stay home more. There’ll be more inequality between and within countries. Governments will play a larger role in the lives of citizens, spending—and owing—more money. What follows is an overview of some of the transformations under way.
Leviathan
Big government staged a comeback as the social contract between society and the state got rewritten on the fly. It became commonplace for authorities to track where people went and who they met—and to pay their wages when employers couldn’t manage it. In countries where free-market ideas had reigned for decades, safety nets had to be patched up.
To pay for these interventions, the world’s governments ran budget deficits that add up to $11 trillion this year, according to McKinsey & Co. There’s already a debate about how long such spending can continue, and when taxpayers will have to start footing the bill. At least in developed economies, ultralow interest rates and unfazed financial markets don’t point to a near-term crisis.
In the longer run, a big rethink in economics is changing minds about public debt. The new consensus says governments have more room to spend in a low-inflation world, and should use fiscal policy more proactively to drive their economies. Advocates of Modern Monetary Theory say they pioneered those arguments and the mainstream is only now catching up.
Even Easier Money
Central banks were plunged back into printing money. Interest rates hit new record lows. Central bankers stepped up their quantitative easing, widening it to buy corporate as well as government debt.
All these monetary interventions have created some of the easiest financial conditions in history—and unleashed a frenzy of speculative investment, which has left plenty of analysts worried about moral hazards ahead. But the central-bank policies will be hard to reverse, especially if labor markets remain fractured and companies continue their recent run-up in saving.
More
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/ten-ways-covid-19-changed-000121052.html
In other news, how secure is GB and Europe’s telecom systems from a Nashville man made attack or natural disaster? Hopefully, someone, somewhere, in Her Majesty’s Government, is looking into the lessons of Nashville.
Nashville bombing froze wireless communications, exposed 'Achilles' heel' in regional network
December 29, 2020.
NASHVILLE, Tenn. – The vulnerability of the telecommunications system in Nashville and beyond became clear Christmas Day when AT&T's central office in downtown became the site of a bombing.
Mayor John Cooper called the blast on Second Avenue an attack on infrastructure. The effects of that attack are sure to ripple through the region for weeks, as the telecom giant scrambles to restore services while maintaining the integrity of an active investigation site teeming with federal agents.
State and local officials and experts say the fact that a multistate region could be brought to its knees by a single bombing is a "wake-up call," exposing vulnerabilities many didn't know existed and predicting it would lead to intense conversations about the future.
The bombing and the damage to the AT&T office was a "single-point of failure," said Douglas Schmidt, the Cornelius Vanderbilt professor of computer science at Vanderbilt University.
"That's the Achilles' heel. The weak link," he said. "When one thing goes wrong and everything comes crashing down."
More
But for today and tomorrow, let’s just be thankful and enjoy ourselves.
The Selkirk Grace, Robert Burns:
Some hae meat and canna eat,
And some wad eat that want it,
But we hae meat and we can eat,
Sae let the Lord be Thankit!
Our year end musical diversion.
A. VIVALDI: Violin Concerto in B-flat major RV 365, La Serenissima
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h10oRITRAXE
Is 5G really safe. A German scientist explains, (in English. Approx. 17 mins.)
All you need to know to understand 5G
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FBsP-bmDLOo
Finally, after a trying 2020, lets end it with a little amusement. The good old days, when we just did things and didn’t ask why, or is that wise?
The Exploding Oregon Whale
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AtVSzU20ZGk
"Those who have knowledge, don't predict. Those who predict, don't have knowledge. "
Lao Tzu
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