Mudanca climatica para Al Gore: 70 milhoes por quase nada... - The Wall Street Journal

Primeiro a notícia, resumida:

Al Gore stands to gain about $70 million after selling Current TV to al-Jazeera
Al Gore, who shared the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize for his fight against global warming, may gross about $70 million from the sale of his Current TV network to al-Jazeera, the cable channel funded in part by oil-rich Qatar.

Agora o artigo de opinião no WSJ:

Al Gore Is Good at Rent-Seeking (and Microsoft Isn't)
By HOLMAN W. JENKINS, JR.
 The Wall Street Journal, January 4, 2013

Current TV may not have been a success, but the ex-vice president's style of entrepreneurship is in vogue.

As far as we can tell, Al Gore has managed to amass a Romneyesque fortune without ever satisfying a customer. The closest thing to an exception may be his board membership at Apple, where Mr. Gore earned his keep by leading the board inquest that exonerated Steve Jobs of any options-backdating peccadilloes. Doing so was unquestionably a service to Apple shareholders.

But, otherwise, his environmental investments have prospered thanks to government handouts and mandates. His Current TV, in the process of being sold to Al-Jazeera, attracted a minuscule audience in its seven-year existence. It averaged just 42,000 viewers per evening recently. Yet the payday coming to Mr. Gore will be somewhat greater than zero—$70 million to $100 million, depending on which estimate you prefer.

We never subscribed to the theory regarding success in life that "It's not what you know but who you know." We may have to rethink.

What Current had going for it was Mr. Gore, who would drop in on media moguls and explain why it was in their political interest to put Current on their networks and dun subscribers five or 10 cents a month for a channel they never watch. Saying no just wasn't worth it to companies that must run a daily gauntlet of Democratic regulators in Washington. Not to oblige Mr. Gore would be to face, at every congressional hearing, the likelihood of some legislator lambasting them for "censoring" a progressive voice.

So the industry became habituated to transferring $100 million a year in what might otherwise be its own profits to owners of a cable channel nobody watched. These carriage agreements were Current TV's sole valuable assets. And the fact that nobody watched was probably not unrelated. If you're not pleasing the viewer, you're pleasing somebody else—usually in a way that makes for dreary programming. Living on the sufferance of cable moguls certainly didn't help Current put on rollicking liberal TV in the manner of MSNBC, which justifies its existence by actually attracting viewers.

But all gravy trains must come to an end: In a world of Netflix and cord-cutting, an extra nickel or dime is no longer so easily slipped past cable subscribers. Time Warner Cable was the first to bid good riddance, dropping the channel from its lineup the moment the sale was announced. Mr. Gore is clearly getting out just in time, though not before extracting one last political rent in return for using his famous name to help Al-Jazeera expand in a skeptical U.S. media marketplace.

Don't look for us, however, to milk the irony of Mr. Gore, warrior against climate change, pocketing a fortune from Mideast petrocrats. Mr. Gore has been in cash-in mode for a while. What's more, his style of entrepreneurship is the rising thing in our world, so respect must be paid.

Which brings us to this week's other news: Microsoft still tries to make money by selling consumers products they want, though it has launched some stinkers in this regard—the "Kin" cellphone line comes to mind. But its latest stinker was more up Mr. Gore's alley: a multimillion-dollar investment in trying to foment a government antitrust crackdown on Google .

That effort went conspicuously bust Thursday when the Federal Trade Commission let Google go with token remonstrances about its business practices.

Given the elastic principles of antitrust, there was nothing terribly far-fetched about Microsoft's effort to frame Google as a public utility that must be closely regulated. Many stranger things have passed muster in the intellectual cult of trustbusting. Where Microsoft went wrong was in failing to orchestrate the multiple points of pressure to convince five commissioners of the FTC that their own interests would be served by bringing a case.

If you think these things don't matter as much as the alleged merits of a case, think again. Recall the long drum roll of societal vilification that preceded the Justice Department's cautious decision to file a case against Microsoft. As FTC chief Jon Liebowitz acknowledged this week, antitrust agencies live to bring "big cases." The FTC staff, whose revolving-door career interests would be enhanced by a Google prosecution, was an easy sell. Less so the agency's political appointees who must decide yea or nay. The media wasn't clamoring for a Google crackdown. Congress was less than enthusiastic. The Obama White House, known to be close to Google, was disturbingly mute.

Antitrust is supposed to be entirely about clinical economics but never is. FDR's antitrust chief Thurman Arnold once said that antitrust was a collective squeal of resentment against businesses that annoy us with their success. Google hasn't been sufficiently annoying.

Notice, by the way, that the astute Arnold went on to found Arnold & Porter, one of the great Beltway law firms—and as much a model in its time of Beltway influence-peddling as Al Gore is today.

A version of this article appeared January 5, 2013, on page A15 in the U.S. edition of The Wall Street Journal, with the headline: Al Gore Is Good at Rent-Seeking (and Microsoft Isn't).

Aprendizes de feiticeiros nas contas publicas: magicas da alquimiaeconomica do governo

Manobra contábil para cumprir superávit deteriora política fiscal, dizem analistas
Reuters
Por Luciana Otoni
BRASÍLIA, 4 Jan (Reuters) - A manobra contábil feita pelo governo para cumprir a meta de superávit de 2012 deteriora a política fiscal, mina a credibilidade da política econômica e levanta suspeitas de que esses artifícios possam ser usados também em 2013, avaliam especialistas consultados pela Reuters.
Nos últimos dias, o governo publicou uma série de medidas de triangulação financeira, envolvendo o Fundo Soberano, o Fundo Fiscal de Investimento e Estabilização (FFIE), a Caixa Econômica Federal e o Banco Nacional de Desenvolvimento Econômico e Social (BNDES), para engordar o caixa do Tesouro em 19,4 bilhões de reais em dezembro.
Essas operações, publicadas no Diário Oficial da União desde a semana passada e algumas com data retroativa a 31 de dezembro de 2012, são legais, mas não são legítimas, avalia o economista-chefe da SulAmérica, Newton Rosa.
Para ele, o governo deveria assumir que teve que adotar uma política fiscal expansionista no ano passado, devido a desaceleração econômica, e que por isso não deverá cumprir a meta de superávit primário de 139,8 bilhões de reais.
"O governo está usando artifícios (contábeis) para buscar um número melhor para o superávit, mais próximo da meta. Mas isso não esconde a deterioração da política fiscal", disse Rosa.
Dos 19,4 bilhões de reais em receita adicional que entrará nas conta em dezembro, 12,4 bilhões de reais saíram do FFIE e foram repassados ao Fundo Soberano, informou à Reuters uma fonte do Ministério da Fazenda. Além desse montante, o Tesouro recebeu 4,7 bilhões em dividendos pagos pela Caixa e mais 2,3 bilhões de reais em dividendos pagos pelo BNDES.
Dos 12,4 bilhões sacados do FFIE, 8,8 bilhões de reais referem-se ao resgate de títulos que o fundo recebeu do BNDES em pagamento pela venda de ações da Petrobras. O restante, 3,6 bilhões de reais, eram recursos que o FFIE possuía.
Simultaneamente a essas operações, o Tesouro repassou 5,4 bilhões de reais em ações de empresas à Caixa. E também transferiu 15 bilhões de reais em títulos federais ao BNDES, recursos esses que fazem parte do aporte de 45 bilhões de reais acertado em 2012 e que somente deveriam ser repassados em 2013.
Apesar de ajudar o governo a cumprir a meta de superávit primário, essas manobras elevam a dívida bruta do governo federal.
"A dívida líquida está em trajetória de queda, mas a dívida bruta tem crescido fortemente desde 2008 devido à política do governo de capitalizar os bancos públicos", disse Rafael Bistafa, economista da Rosenberg Associados.
"O uso de mecanismos contábeis é a pior maneira de se fazer superávit", acrescentou ele.
Para o economista-chefe do Banco Fator, José Francisco de Lima, o governo fez a escolha certa.
"O governo se defrontou com a situação de que não iria cumprir o primário cheio e entre ser criticado por não cumprir a meta e ser criticado por cumpri-la com artifício contábil preferiu essa última opção", disse. "Do ponto de vista conceitual essa solução é a melhor porque o Fundo Soberano é uma receita primária", acrescentou.
No acumulado do ano de 2012 até novembro, a economia fiscal do setor público consolidado foi de 82,7 bilhões de reais, o que significa que será necessário realizar um superávit de 31,5 bilhões de reais em dezembro para cumprir a meta, já descontados 25,6 bilhões de reais em investimentos do Programa de Aceleração do Crescimento (PAC).
Por conta da economia menor do governo, o déficit nominal, que inclui o pagamento dos juros da dívida, do setor público está crescendo, apesar da queda na taxa de juros. Nos 11 primeiros meses do ano passado, o déficit nominal ficou em 112,1 bilhões de reais, ou 2,79 por cento do Produto Interno Bruto (PIB), ante 2,36 por cento do PIB em igual período de 2011.
A elevação ocorreu mesmo diante da queda de 10 por cento na despesa com juros entre janeiro e novembro de 2012 em comparação a igual período do ano anterior.
"O superávit primário menor está ofuscando o efeito da redução da despesa com juros (da dívida pública) ocorrido com a queda da taxa Selic. O resultado é que estamos com déficit nominal elevado", disse Newton Rosa. "Isso pode se repetir em 2013 se a atividade mostrar um ritmo aquém ao desejado", complementou.
Para Lima, a dificuldade do governo em cumprir a meta de superávit cheia em 2012 deve se repetir também em 2013 diante das incertezas que cercam a recuperação da economia brasileira.

Leia mais sobre esse assunto em http://oglobo.globo.com/pais/manobra-contabil-para-cumprir-superavit-deteriora-politica-fiscal-dizem-analistas-7202148#ixzz2H4fSPJdS
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Juizes malucos podem ser as pessoas mais perigosas que existem, porqueinimputaveis...

Pois bem, com base neste post abaixo transcrito de meu duplo colega (diplomata e blogueiro) e amigo, o embaixador portugues (ex no Brasil) Francisco Seixas da Costa, posso finalmente discordar daquele historiador italiano, Carlo Maria Cipolla (procurem no meu blog), que dizia que os idiotas sao os individuos mais perigosos que existem, ja' que existem, soltinhos por ai, juizes perfeitamente malucos, que causam prejuizos enormes 'a sociedade sem nunca serem cobrados por isso. Penso, por exemplo, naquele juiz maluco do Mato Grosso que, em 2003, decretou fichamento discriminatorio dos cidadaos americanos nos aeroportos brasileiros apenas por discordar de uma medida perfeitamente legal tomada pelo Congresso dos EUA.
Existem varios outros malucos soltos por ai, um deles em Brasilia, ou varios deles em Brasilia, que incita esse tipo de prepotencia.
Volto a dizer: deveria haver uma camara para controlar preventivamente juizes malucos, e depois puni-los pelos prejuizos que causaram ilegalmente...
Paulo Roberto de Almeida

Juizo
Francisco Seixas da Costa
Blog Duas ou Tres Coisas..., 4/01/2013

A decisão de um juíz brasileiro de arrestar um avião da TAP, como forma de obter os recursos necessários à satisfação de uma demanda de funcionários administrativos da estruturas diplomáticas portuguesas no Brasil, pode parecer uma espécie de anedota de Ano Novo. Não é. Trata-se da junção de várias realidades, onde se misturam a má-fé profissional de uns com o ridículo uso de poder de outros, somado ao isco mediático garantido. Nada que uma "liminar" de sentido contrário, recomendada pelo bom-senso, não acabe por resolver, mas com custos acrescidos e efeitos inapagáveis na opinião coletiva.

Não cabe aqui entrar nos detalhes de uma questão que, pelas funções que exerci no Brasil, julgo conhecer, embora a ela tenha sido completamente alheio. Apenas direi que entendo que o Estado português tem toda a razão. Mas porque não tenho paciência para comentar espertezas de alguns advogados, fico-me por aqui.

Choca-me, com frequência, a ligeireza das decisões de certos juízes, muitos deles seduzidos pelas luzes da ribalta mediática, com contornos a roçar a irresponsabilidade. E mais me choca que, revertida essa decisão por uma outra instância, nenhuma responsabilidade possa ser pedida a quem tomou a primeira - pelos vistos errada, caso contrário não prevaleceria a segunda. Alcandorados na sua "independência", os tais juízes a quem a instância superior tirou o tapete profissional, aí estão prontos para outras, ficando imunes à responsabilização, civil ou outra, pelos efeitos, patrimoniais ou humanos, que a sua decisão acarretou. Não quero particularizar, mas apenas direi que foi graças a uma atitude dessa natureza que o túnel do Marão acabou por não estar concluído, já há vários anos, com muitos milhões de euros de prejuízos e incontáveis custos para toda uma região.

A absurda sacralização que paira sobre estes operadores judiciais, armados em impolutos "orgãos de soberania", impede, por exemplo, que um qualquer cidadão possa chamar incompetente a um juíz incompetente, sem o risco de cair na imediata alçada ... de outro juíz! Às vezes, trata-se de uns miudecos acabados de sair das escolas de magistratura, sem experiência da vida e do foro, produtores de decisões absurdas e irresponsáveis, que ganham logo à sua volta uma espécie de temor reverencial, que os protege da denúncia de que "o rei vai nu".

A "importância" que certos juízes se atribuem a si próprios, foi sempre ridicularizada pelos seus pares mais responsáveis, pouco satisfeitos com o impacto negativo que esse abuso do conceito de "independência do poder judicial", pode provocar sobre a classe.

Um dia dos anos 90, essa grande figura que é o magistrado José Matos Fernandes, ao tempo secretário de Estado adjunto e da Justiça, olhou do gabinete do ministro para a rua e, de repente, chamou quem estava na sala: "Olhem! Olhem! Vai ali um órgão de soberania!" Toda a gente arrancou para as vidraças que davam sobre a varanda. Lá em baixo, no terreiro do Paço, havia gente a cruzar a praça. Que queria ele dizer com o "órgão de soberania"?, perguntou alguém? Com aquele sorriso magnífico com que lhe ouvi algumas das mais deliciosas histórias da vida judicial, ele esclareceu: "Então não viram? Ia ali um juiz..." E lá apontou uma dessas figuras para quem a sala de audiências era um mero cenário que intervalava as suas aparições perante as câmaras televisivas.


http://duas-ou-tres.blogspot.com/2013/01/juizo.html

FMI tropeca nos multiplicadores fiscais, admite economista chefe -Washington Post

An amazing mea culpa from the IMF’s chief economist on austerity
Posted by Howard Schneider
Wonkblog of the Washington Post on January 3, 2013 at 12:17 pm
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/01/03/an-amazing-mea-culpa-from-the-imfs-chief-economist-on-austerity/?tid=pm_business_pop

Consider it a mea culpa submerged in a deep pool of calculus and regression analysis: The International Monetary Fund’s top economist today acknowledged that the fund blew its forecasts for Greece and other European economies because it did not fully understand how government austerity efforts would undermine economic growth.
The new and highly technical paper looks again at the issue of fiscal multipliers – the impact that a rise or fall in government spending or tax collection has on a country’s economic output.

IMF chief economist Olivier Blanchard writes that the fund misjudged the impact of austerity on European economies.

That it comes under the byline of fund economic counselor and research director Olivier Blanchard is significant. Fund research is always published with the caveat that it represents the views of the researcher, not the institution itself. But this paper comes from the top, and attempts to put to rest an issue that has been at the center of debate about how fast countries should move in their efforts to tame large debts and deficits.
If fiscal multipliers are small, countries can cut spending faster or raise more in taxes without much short-term damage. If they are large, then the process can become self-defeating, at least in the short run, with each dollar of government spending cuts, for example, costing the economy more than a dollar in lost output and thus actually increasing debt-to-GDP ratios.
That is what has been happening with a vengeance in Greece, where fund forecasters, as part of the country’s first bailout program in 2010, predicted that the nation could cut deeply into government spending and pretty quickly bounce back to economic growth and rising employment.
Two years later, the Greek economy is still shrinking and unemployment is at 25 percent.
Of course no two circumstances are alike. Shut out of international bond markets, Greece had little choice but to begin bringing its public finances into line or face a catastrophic default. Financing wasn’t available to sustain prior spending levels. For an economy that has been reeling for several years, however, a billion or two in extra government programs or investment could have kept a few small businesses open and kept a few more families employed and spending.

“Forecasters significantly underestimated the increase in unemployment and the decline in domestic demand associated with fiscal consolidation,” Blanchard and co-author Daniel Leigh, a fund economist, wrote in the paper.
That somewhat dry conclusion sums up what amounts to a tempest in econometric circles. The fund has been accused of intentionally underestimating the effects of austerity in Greece to make its programs palatable, at least on paper; fund officials have argued that it was its European partners, particularly Germany, who insisted on deeper, faster cuts. The evolving research on multipliers may have helped shift the tone of the debate in countries like Spain and Portugal, where a slower pace of deficit control has been advocated.
But the paper includes some subtle and potentially troubling insights into how the fund works. Blanchard – effectively the top dog when it comes to economic science at the fund – writes in the paper that he could not actually determine what multipliers economists at the country level were using in their forecasts. The number was implicit in their forecasting models – a background assumption rather than a variable that needed to be fine-tuned based on national circumstances or peculiarities.
Heading into a crisis that nearly tore the euro zone apart, in other words, neither Blanchard or any one of the fund’s vast army of technicians thought to reexamine whether important assumptions about the region would still hold true in times of crisis.
That, it turns out, was a big mistake. Multipliers vary over time: They may be low in a country where the economy is growing, interest rates are normal and the banking system is sound. As this research showed, they get larger if interest rates are low, output is falling and the banking system is creaky – conditions that make everyone, from households to investors, less likely to spend, and thus makes the role of government-generated demand that much more important.
Blanchard and Leigh deduced that IMF forecasters have been using a uniform multiplier of 0.5, when in fact the circumstances of the European economy made the multiplier as much as 1.5, meaning that a $1 government spending cut would cost $1.50 in lost output.
What are the implications for the future?
This paper may not be an official position of the IMF, but coming from the agency’s top economist, it is bound to change how the agency generates forecasts.
As for fiscal policy – an issue of interest as the U.S. debate turns towards austerity – Blanchard and Leigh said a better understanding of multipliers does not produce any definitive conclusions.
Many countries still need to cut their deficits – some faster, some slower, depending on a host of other factors.
“The results do not imply that fiscal consolidation is undesirable,” the two write. “Virtually all advanced economies face the challenge of fiscal adjustment in response to elevated government debt levels and future pressures on public finances from demographic change. The short-term effects of fiscal policy on economic activity are only one of the many factors that need to be considered in determining the appropriate pace of fiscal consolidation for any single country.”

TAGS
Austerity, Austerity and its discontents, IMF, Olivier Blanchard

palintropos
6:39 PM GMT-0200
This is an example of burying the message with a contradictory headline. Towards the end of the article it seems to say IMF cannot trust data from the country level. That is buck-passing, no? So, no mea culpa (my fault).
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ticked
5:46 PM GMT-0200
It's pretty simple stop wasting $1.5+ TRILLION a year on defense, 146 security forces, 16 intel agencies/depts and 700+ foreign military bases....approx. two times all rest of world combined military spending quit spending on destruction, killing and maiming.and use the money on fixing America
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RonScheurer
4:35 PM GMT-0200
Is it budget cuts or spending priorities that need a more serious look? If the US cut spending on all Middle Eastern civil wars, Arab and Israeli; and the quiet one in Pakistan, (and quite possibly in other places where transparency does not exist), there might be no need to raise the debt limit. Republicans would not like that because military activity does not involve positive economic, inventory accountability.

Destruction itself is seen as positive. Reducing educational options for student financial aid decreases the size of an intelligent populace while increasing cannon fodder. Reducing health benefits increases collateral body counts as does the pirating of those benefits by drug companies and insurers. Reducing Social Security to the under $30,000 a year folks guarantees an increase in their attrition rate into poverty.

"Happy Days Are Here Again" are a long way off unless both parties wake up, shed their internecine squabbling, and do for all of the voters, rich, poor, and between, what they are being paid to do - create equity for all, not equality, EQUITY. Equality is a myth.
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h3lt025
4:34 PM GMT-0200
What every single economist, in the entire world, needs to do TODAY is to publicly admit that they have no idea what they are doing and what they are doing is NOT A SCIENCE. They can predict NOTHING reliably with variables like "fear", "greed" and "desire". It is 100% crap, and it is being applied in ways that MASSIVELY affect people's lives.
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DavidGonzales
4:12 PM GMT-0200
An excellent, eye-opening article. May every Republican read this--read it and weep. The multipliers are connected to a country's condition and the IMF economists didn't even bother to investigate the conditions of the countries under consideration, as it says in the article--they just took it for granted that the number proposed as a multiplier was correct. Oh, brother.
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DavidGonzales
4:18 PM GMT-0200
I forgot to mention that the Republicans want too much austerity for the condition of the US right now--Republican austerity will cause needless suffering and damage the growth of the economy as well.
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jdgreger@yahoo.com
2:20 PM GMT-0200
Hey Eddie14 and all Krugman clowns, Greece is suffering because their economy was a government central planned structure and debt based economy. If you stop spending, the economy suffers cause you have no private sector producing. Greece along with Europe and eventually US are all based on flawed Keynesian "economics" (it's really a pyramid scheme) of spending and borrowing instead of saving and producing. See Japan the past 20 years, all they've done was build bridges and roads and they are still in deflation mode and now their debt to GDP is 240%...lol

You can't spend your way to prosperity because the gravy train eventually ends (e.g. greece), then eventually the United States. The interest rates are only low here because the FED is buying and keeping them artificially low. They can't do that forever and our debt masters will stop lending and or ask for higher rates and that's when the crap really hits the fan.

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JEHR
3:58 PM GMT-0200
jdgreger, do you even know what you are saying? When austerity is imposed, spending ends and so does saving. If money was spent on creating jobs (instead of propping up zombie banks), then the people would earn a salary, could spend on their needs and the economy would begin recovering. The secret is making jobs available. If the private sector can't (or won't) create jobs, then the government should. It can always afford to create jobs just as it can always afford to bail out banks to the tune of trillions of dollars.

All economies are "centrally planned" by someone!
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DavidGonzales
4:09 PM GMT-0200
Hey, jdgreger, did you read the article? Every country has its own multiplier connected to the conditions at the time under consideration--the cuts in Greece were too deep and caused a lot of needless suffering and underspending.

palintropos
1:52 PM GMT-0200
Following the logic of most commenters, the wealthiest countries should have been communist ones.
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OpenMindDC
1:45 PM GMT-0200
If only the righties read this stuff.
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ggant
1:36 PM GMT-0200
Can anyone get this the Idiots in the House? Do even read papers. Oh No facts, keep away , keep away. Facts are bad.
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scatchy
1:33 PM GMT-0200
This is an important admission, as it shows that the Republicans plans for austerity, which basically mirror what was put in place in Greece and the rest of Europe, would have undermined our economic recovery.
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Anacronismos trabalhistas - Editoral Estadao

Em toda sinceridade, sabem quando ocorrera' a reforma da legislacao trabalhista?
Not in your lifetime...
Alias, precisaria acabar tambem com a Justica do Trabalho, a maior criadora de conflito que existe neste pais....
Paulo Roberto de Almeida

Anacronismos trabalhistas
Editorial O Estado de S.Paulo
Simplificar as relações trabalhistas, sem afetar direitos e rendimentos do empregado, é não só possível sem grandes dificuldades políticas, mas urgente, para tornar mais claras as garantias dos trabalhadores, facilitar a administração empresarial, reduzir a insegurança jurídica nessa área e, em particular, melhorar a eficiência das empresas e impulsionar a produtividade. Estas, em resumo, são as razões que levaram a Confederação Nacional da Indústria (CNI) a elaborar um conjunto de 101 medidas de modernização e de racionalização da legislação trabalhista. O documento foi apresentado durante o 7.º Encontro Nacional da Indústria, realizado em Brasília.

"O trabalho formal no Brasil tem um alto grau de conflito e de insegurança jurídica, é excessivamente onerado e configura uma barreira ao crescimento da produtividade", segundo o presidente da CNI, Robson de Andrade.

A entidade reconhece que houve avanços na formalização do trabalho nos últimos anos. Entre 2000 e 2011, o número de empregos formais passou de 25 milhões para cerca de 44 milhões e o índice de desemprego baixou para menos de 6%. Observa, no entanto, que, entre os que trabalham no País há cerca de 52 milhões que não estão registrados como empregados nem são funcionários públicos. Parte desse contingente tem atividades formalizadas, como autônomos ou proprietários de empresas de diferentes portes, e conta com a proteção da legislação trabalhista e previdenciária. A maioria, porém, está na informalidade e não dispõe desse tipo de proteção.

O objetivo da CNI é assegurar a formalização desses trabalhadores por meio de um sistema trabalhista moderno, que substitua o atual, em que quase tudo é regulado e quase nada é negociado.

Para a indústria, a rigidez da legislação inibe a geração de empregos, impõe um excesso de obrigações ao empregador, pode gerar passivos trabalhistas e previdenciários e, desse modo, atua no sentido contrário ao aumento da competitividade e da eficiência da economia.

Além de excessiva, a regulação trabalhista, criada no início da década de 1940, tornou-se anacrônica e gera situações que hoje parecem absurdas - ou "irracionais", como prefere a CNI. Por causa da legislação trabalhista em vigor, o Brasil é o único país do mundo que, além da hora convencional de 60 minutos, tem também a de 52,5 minutos para o trabalho noturno, que é remunerado com adicional de 20%. Isso cria dificuldades para adequar as jornadas de trabalho e gera confusão no cálculo do salário.

Para simplificar, sem afetar a remuneração, basta utilizar a hora normal e ao salário-hora acrescentar 37,14% (resultado cumulativo do adicional de 20% mais 14,2% correspondente a 7,5 minutos de trabalho adicional por hora).

Outro absurdo é a manutenção, até hoje, do regime de sobreaviso, a que se submetiam empregados das ferrovias na década de 1930. Eles tinham de estar sempre preparados, em sua casa, para a eventualidade de serem convocados para o trabalho fora de sua jornada regular.

Num tempo em que não havia telefone nas casas, nem muitas formas de lazer, o sobreaviso impunha sacrifícios ao empregado e, por isso, ele era remunerado com o equivalente a um terço do salário-hora. Com as novas tecnologias de comunicação, o regime tornou-se um anacronismo, mas a Justiça do Trabalho o estendeu a todos os que podem ser convocados para o trabalho fora da jornada regular. Para estes casos, deveria aplicar-se o regime de sobrejornada, remunerada de acordo com o tempo trabalhado.

São apenas alguns exemplos de uma legislação ultrapassada e que requer urgente reforma. Ao propor medidas que não implicam perdas de renda para o trabalhador, a CNI espera abrir um debate produtivo com as lideranças sindicais, parlamentares e o governo, na esperança de que o diálogo transcorra sem enfrentamentos.

A discussão não pode ser mais protelada, se o objetivo for, como é necessário para o País, criar um ambiente mais favorável à formalização do emprego, sem prejudicar os trabalhadores e sem onerar ainda mais as empresas.

Ouro, essa reliquia barbara... e preciosa

AS REFINARIAS DE OURO NA SUÍÇA
BBC Londres, 27/12/2012

Quatro das maiores refinarias de ouro do mundo estão na Suíça, três delas no cantão sul de Ticino. Apesar de não haver minas de ouro suíças, cerca de dois terços do ouro do mundo é refinado no país. "Tem a ver com a história", explica Roberto Grassi, da consultoria financeira Fidinam. "Os grandes bancos suíços eram os proprietários das refinarias. Durante a Segunda Guerra Mundial, devido à grande quantidade de ouro que era armazenado na Suíça, os bancos decidiram criar as suas próprias refinarias para produzir lingotes". Atualmente os bancos já não são mais donos das refinarias, mas o refino e a produção de barras de ouro estão no auge.

Em 2011, último ano para o qual existem dados disponíveis, a Suíça importou mais de 2.600 toneladas de ouro bruto, com um valor de 103 bilhões de dólares. Do lado de fora, a refinaria de ouro Pamp se parece com qualquer outra fábrica moderna. Mesmo a entrada não é particularmente notável, além de algumas medidas de segurança maiores do que o normal. Mas por dentro, as coisas são muito diferentes. Em uma sala, o mineral fundido é despejado em moldes para fazer barras de ouro pesando 12,5 kg. O preço do ouro hoje está cerca de 1.700 dólares a onça. Como há 32 onças em um quilograma de ouro, apenas um lingote vale 680.000 dólares.

3. Alberto Candiani, diretor de produção de metais preciosos na refinaria, mostra com orgulho a mercadoria, que vai desde barras de ouro de 50g até a variação de 12,5 kg. Existem enormes pilhas desses lingotes, e outras mais saindo da linha de produção. Mas ao perguntar a Candiani exatamente quantas são produzidas em um dia, ele se torna mais contido. "Isso eu não posso dizer", diz sorrindo.

The unstavable beast: a armadilha dos servicos publicos - Kenneth Rogoff

The unstavable beast
Kenneth Rogoff
Project Syndicate, January 3, 2013

CAMBRIDGE – As the world watches the United States grapple with its fiscal future, the contours of the battle reflect larger social and philosophical divisions that are likely to play out in various guises around the world in the coming decades. There has been much discussion of how to cut government spending, but too little attention has been devoted to how to make government spending more effective. And yet, without more creative approaches to providing government services, their cost will continue to rise inexorably over time.

Any service-intensive industry faces the same challenges. Back in the 1960’s, the economists William Baumol and William Bowen wrote about the “cost disease” that plagues these industries. The example they famously used was that of a Mozart string quartet, which requires the same number of musicians and instruments in modern times as it did in the nineteenth century. Similarly, it takes about the same amount of time for a teacher to grade a paper as it did 100 years ago. Good plumbers cost a small fortune, because here, too, the technology has evolved very slowly.

Why does slow productivity growth translate into high costs? The problem is that service industries ultimately have to compete for workers in the same national labor pool as sectors with fast productivity growth, such as finance, manufacturing, and information technology. Even though the pools of workers may be somewhat segmented, there is enough overlap that it forces service-intensive industries to pay higher wages, at least in the long run.

The government, of course, is the consummate service-intensive sector. Government employees include teachers, policemen, trash collectors, and military personnel.

Modern schools look a lot more like those of 50 years ago than do modern manufacturing plants. And, while military innovation has been spectacular, it is still very labor-intensive. If people want the same level of government services relative to other things that they consume, government spending will take up a larger and larger share of national output over time.

Indeed, not only has government spending been rising as a share of income; so, too, has spending across many service sectors. Today, the service sector, including the government, accounts for more than 70% of national income in most advanced economies.

Agriculture, which in the 1800’s accounted for more than half of national income, has shrunk to just a few percent. Manufacturing employment, which accounted for perhaps a third of jobs or more before World War II, has shrunk dramatically. In the US, for example, the manufacturing sector employs less than 10% of all workers. So, even as economic conservatives demand spending cuts, there are strong forces pushing in the other direction.

Admittedly, the problem is worse in the government sector, where productivity growth is much slower even than in other service industries. Whereas this might reflect the particular mix of services that governments are asked to provide, that can hardly be the whole story.

Surely, part of the problem is that governments use employment not just to provide services, but also to make implicit transfers. Moreover, government agencies operate in many areas in which they face little competition – and thus little pressure to innovate.

Why not bring greater private-sector involvement, or at least competition, into government? Education, where the power of modern disruptive technologies has barely been felt, would be a good place to start. Sophisticated computer programs are becoming quite good at grading middle-school essays, if not quite up to the standards of top teachers.

Infrastructure is another obvious place to expand private-sector involvement. Once upon a time, for example, it was widely believed that drivers on privately operated roads would constantly be waiting to pay tolls. Modern transponders and automatic payment systems, however, have made that a non-issue.

But one should not presume that a shift to greater private-sector provision of services is a panacea. There would still be a need for regulation, especially where monopoly or near-monopoly is involved. And there would still be a need to decide how to balance efficiency and equity in the provision of services. Education is clearly an area in which any country has a strong national interest in providing a level playing field.

As US President in the 1980’s, the conservative icon Ronald Reagan described his approach to fiscal policy as “starve the beast”: cutting taxes will eventually force people to accept less government spending. In many ways, his approach was a great success. But government spending has continued to grow, because voters still want the services that government provides. Today, it is clear that reining in government also means finding ways to shape incentives so that innovation in government keeps pace with innovation in other service sectors.

Without more ideas about how to innovate in the provision of government services, battles such as one sees playing out in the US today can only become worse, as voters are increasingly asked to pay more for less. Politicians can and will promise to do a better job, but they cannot succeed unless we identify ways to boost government services’ efficiency and productivity.