We have updated our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use for Eurasia Group and its affiliates, including GZERO Media, to clarify the types of data we collect, how we collect it, how we use data and with whom we share data. By using our website you consent to our Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy, including the transfer of your personal data to the United States from your country of residence, and our use of cookies described in our Cookie Policy.
{{ subpage.title }}
Residents of Avellaneda protest against the DNU (Decree of Necessity and Urgency) and the Omnibus Law promoted by the government of Javier Milei.
The masses test Milei with major protest
Starting mid-day Wednesday, Argentina’s most powerful unions will stop work to demonstrate against the financial overhauls proposed by new President Javier Milei, as his omnibus spending bill works its way through Congress. An impressive turnout is expected for the march to the national Congress in Buenos Aires, with smaller solidarity protests across the country. Workers everywhere – from banks to domestic airlines to those informally employed – say they will join the strike.
Union leaders recognize the need for economic reform (with 211% inflation rates and 40% of Argentines living in poverty, who wouldn’t?) but object to the working class being tasked with carrying so much of the burden. Milei has already used his executive powers to slash subsidies for transport and energy, among other areas, but his administration says increases to childcare and food aid benefits are meant to prevent catastrophe for impoverished citizens. The radical cuts proposed in the omnibus bill are all but certain to be moderated in Congress, where Milei’s party holds only a small minority of seats — but no one expects a painless experience.
Is Milei’s honeymoon period ending? It’s one thing to wave a chainsaw around and yell about the “communist shits” in power, but it’s quite another to reverse Argentina’s century-long economic decline. A strong turnout against the cuts could put pressure on lawmakers to ease up, but don’t expect a collapse of the overhaul effort even in the case of a massive showing. The economic situation demands change – even unpopular change – and Milei’s rivals from former President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner’s party are only too happy to let Milei’s approval rating take a beating before they make their move.Men and paramedic staff help transport a man who was injured in a blast in Mastung to a hospital in Quetta, Pakistan.
Hard Numbers: Pakistan blast, mRNA Nobel win, Kaiser Permanente strike, escaping Nagorno-Karabakh, flights to Libya, cashing in rupees
59: Fifty-nine people were killed Saturday in a bomb blast at a mosque in Mastung, Pakistan, where people were gathering to mark the birthday of the Prophet Mohammad. Pakistan’s interior ministry accused India’s intelligence service of masterminding the attack, a charge Delhi denies.
2: Two scientists, Professors Katalin Karikó and Drew Weissman, won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine on Monday for having developed the technology that led to the mRNA COVID-19 vaccines. The same technology is now being tested to help fight other diseases.
75,000: In what would be the largest healthcare strike in US history, 75,000 workers at care provider Kaiser Permanente are threatening a three-day walkout as of Wednesday. While the company said hospitals and ERs would remain open, patients might see longer wait times and delays in lab work.
100,000:Over 100,000 ethnic Armenian refugees have fled to Armenia from Nagorno-Karabakh after Azerbaijan retook control of the territory. The UN has called for international assistance, and Armenia has asked the European Union for shelter assistance and medical supplies.
10: Flights resumed from Libya to Italy after a 10-year hiatus due to a ban imposed by the European Union. Medsky Airways is now offering twice-weekly service from Tunis to Rome, though it is unclear how it is getting around the EU ban that is still in force.
96: India is extending the deadline to Oct. 7 to cash in its 2,000 rupee notes, 96% of which have been returned to the national treasury. The bills, worth an estimated $24, were introduced in 2016 during a campaign to demonetize the economy in which higher-value notes were discontinued.
Striking UAW workers picket outside a Stellantis facility in Center Line, Michigan, on Sept. 22, 2023.
Biden’s auto dilemma
Today, President Joe Biden will join striking autoworkers on the picket line in Michigan.
Former President Donald Trump, meanwhile, will be in the Great Lake State tomorrow, but he’s expected to use a speech in Detroit to pit workers against leaders of their union, the United Auto Workers.
In some ways, Biden has the tougher political task. His image as “friend of the working man” stands at odds with the current image of his Democratic Party which, in the words of pundit and activist Paul Begala, “has gone from being the party of the factory floor to the party of the faculty lounge.” Biden’s outspoken support for labor unions – and the historical rarity of a US president joining a picket line – demonstrate his political commitment to win more working-class votes.
There’s an even more direct political calculus here. To win reelection, Biden badly needs Michigan, home to a big share of US autoworkers. The percentage of union members is also high in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. Trump won in 2016 because he won all three of these states. Biden won in 2020 because he won them all back for Democrats.
But… Biden’s policy agenda depends heavily on support for production of electric vehicles in the battle to limit climate change. The UAW has so far refused to endorse Biden’s reelection bid, in part, according to the union’s president, because Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act has provided large financial incentives to car companies to make more electric vehicles without including guarantees for better worker pay and conditions.
That’s why this strike, and Biden’s role in it, are important 2024 election stories to watch.
A United Auto Workers union member holds a sign outside Stellantis Sterling Heights Assembly Plant to mark the beginning of contract negotiations in Sterling Heights, Mich., in July.
US autoworkers drive a hard bargain
Unionized workers at America’s Big 3 automakers could be on strike as of Sept. 14. The 146,000 members of the United Auto Workers and their pugnacious president, Shawn Fain, are ready to rumble. For the first time, the UAW has not yet chosen a “target” company against which to strike but has threatened to walk off the jobs at all three at once.
What do they want?
The UAW is demanding a 46% pay raise, a 32-hour week with 40 hours of pay, and a restoration of traditional pensions. In response, Ford offered a 9% wage increase and one-time lump-sum payments, for a total raise of 15% over four years. Stellantis and GM have yet to file counterproposals, leading to the UAW recently filing charges of unfair labor practices against them.
What would a strike do to the US economy?
The auto biz makes up 3% of US GDP. A tripartite 10-day strike could cost workers and employers $5.6 billion. During a 40-day UAW strike in 2019, GM alone lost $3.6 billion. The union’s strike fund is estimated to last about three months, so this could be a long haul.
Canada’s 18,000 autoworkers and their union, UNIFOR, have also voted to strike on September 18, but will only target Ford. Analysts predict this could impact the Canadian supply chain and raise vehicle prices, further fueling inflation.
What are the political implications?
The strike puts US President Joe Biden between a rock and a hard place, just in time for a presidential election year. His focus on electrifying America’s vehicle fleet has sparked workers’ fears of wage and job cuts, as EVs require fewer and lower-skilled employees to produce.
The conflict is also playing out as part of a larger class war that is shaping politics around the globe. The Big 3 collectively posted income of $164 billion over the past decade and their CEOs earn multi millions annually. Fain has bitterly complained about one standard for the corporate class and another for ordinary workers. So far, he has refused to endorse Biden, but also said that the return of Republican Donald Trump would be “a disaster”.
What’s next?
Biden recently named a White House liaison to the union and the automakers. He claims a strike can be averted, but faced with the two sides so far apart, most industry watchers believe a strike is inevitable. As one Michigan analyst put it, “President Fain has declared war, and that usually means there’s going to be a battle, and that battle would be a strike.”
UK vaccine rollout a key chance to learn; Brexit trade deal is razor close
Ian Bremmer discusses the World In (more than) 60 Seconds:
COVID vaccine rollout has begun in the UK. What's next?
Well, I was so pleased to see that the second person to get the vaccine in the UK is William Shakespeare. Some 86-year-old guy living in the UK. Of course, of course he is. It's also nice for the UK, finally have some good news about something. It's been all Brexit and economic disaster and Boris Johnson, bad news on coronavirus. First, it's herd immunity, then it's not. It's lockdown, it's not. But the first advanced industrial democracy to start getting vaccines out there and capping off an extraordinary year in terms of vaccine development. Really Moore's law for vaccines. It's very, very, very exciting. What happens next is we learn a lot. One of the big mistakes that we made in the United States is we had a couple of weeks when the virus was exploding in Europe and we were twiddling our thumbs in the United States. We weren't prepping, we weren't watching what was happening in Italy and making sure that we understood the type of coordination we needed, the type of testing we needed, the type of contact tracing we needed. As a consequence, some critical time was wasted. We need to be watching very carefully what problems the UK has, challenges in rolling out this vaccine. First vaccine we see right now from Pfizer, that's the one that's most challenging from an infrastructure perspective. It's the one that needs the proprietary cold chain capability, super low temperatures, South Pole type temperatures. It needs labor on site that can dilute the vaccine right before it is administered. Those are things you can do easily in good hospitals. It's not an easy thing to roll out across a countryside.
And so, it's going to be very interesting to learn from the UK. Their successes, and also their failures. We're going to need them in the United States real, real soon. Also of course, seeing how they deal with misinformation, disinformation. How they deal with people talking about side effects that they get that are real side effects and actually do cause fever, for example, will take you out of work for a few days. All of that stuff we need desperately to get right. Especially in the United States, the world's largest economy with a very divided franchise here. We're very politically divided. We've been so divided on coronavirus. We don't want to be divided on vaccines. We've already started to see some of the nationalism play out. This New York Times story that Trump had an opportunity to buy a bunch of Pfizer vaccines in June or August and didn't. And so now the US isn't going to be able to get as many until summertime. We really don't want that to lead Trump to say, "No, we don't like the Pfizer vaccine. We only want the Moderna vaccine." We don't want Americans to think that one is good and one is bad. Because you're not going to have options. As soon as you can get a vaccine, you should be taking that vaccine that's available in the United States. So watching this rollout is going to be incredibly important. And again, lots of things that could go wrong.
Staying in the UK. Will a Brexit trade deal be reached before the end of year deadline?
It's close. The fact that Boris Johnson is going to meet with Ursula Von Der Leyen and negotiate in person gives him more flexibility, means that he wants personal responsibility for getting the deal done, it means it's more than 50/50. He's a very capable and charismatic leader and it's easier for him to do this individually than dealing with all of the politics within his own conservative party at home.
So, it makes me feel a little bit more optimistic. But things can go wrong. There are hard red lines, and the Europeans are negotiating for the entire group, not just for the EU as a whole. And while Boris Johnson suggested that Merkel and Macron be on the phone, in a call with Von der Leyen, she said, "No, you'll just talking to me." So, it's not done. So many of these things, they're razor edge, they're right at the end, and yes, we're still talking about Brexit. Kind of kills me.
Why are farmers in India going on strike?
Nationwide strike across India because Modi wants to create more efficiency in the agricultural sector. That means more market mechanisms and more ability for big corporates to do effective business. And the farmers are concerned that that will mean that they're going to lose income, they're going to lose pricing power. They're not going to be protected. And they have been protected. It's quite a protectionist ag sector in India. And so, they're angry and they started by demonstrating on Delhi and now they're engaging in shutdowns across the country. So, it's probably the most significant nationwide social dissent that we've seen economically under Modi and we'll see how he responds to it. If it's going to affect what he's doing with his own legislation. We saw it with Macron, big protests across France. They're used to big protests, made him pull back on his policing and surveillance, no surveillance law from people doing videos and the rest. We'll see if Modi decides to back down.
The Arecibo observatory telescope collapsed. Yes, it's true, in Puerto Rico. Should they rebuild for the next James Bond movie?
I hope they do. What an extraordinary thing. It was at the end of GoldenEye. It was an iconic telescope, watching it fall apart was so depressing. Just implode in on itself. Puerto Rico, of course, has had more than its share of disasters over the past few years. It's not like there's a lot of infrastructure money that's going into that territory. But I really would like to see it rebuilt. The first message that was ever sent by humanity to outer space, as far as supposed extra-terrestrials, was from Arecibo. And if it's gone and we don't rebuild it, then you know, they're going to look back and they won't know who it came from. You know? You got to have return address on this stuff. So, I'd like to see it rebuilt. I'm kind of a space buff. Not like a Star Trek space buff, though Trouble with Tribbles is a good episode and all that. But more just I think we should be investing in NASA. I like having public support for our space program.
I will also say, it's kind of interesting, you saw that in the last week in China, they've just gotten a lander on the moon and they've got a Chinese flag that's now on the moon. Unless you think that's all fake news, like the American space landing in 1969, of course. And taking some space rocks, going to bring them back to the world, to here to earth. The reason that China's space program is doing so well now is because back in the '80s and '90s, the United States didn't want to cooperate with China anymore. Said they were taking advantage. And so, we cut them off and that became a big moment for the Chinese to invest in their own program. And it led to a much more robust Chinese space program that we have today, much more competitive with the US. There's a big question as to what the United States has been doing on 5G, for example, is going to end up forcing the Chinese to cooperate more with the United States. Will it make them change their red lines? Will it destroy their advanced technology sectors around 5G infrastructure? Or will it force them to invest so much more to become more effective competitors in five to 10 years' time? If it's the latter, this will have been a big mistake. So, something worth thinking about and something worth talking about as we see this observatory that we may or may not be rebuilding.