CNN Says Wages Are Skyrocketing – OpEd

 May 10, 2024

By Dean Baker

Actually, CNN wouldn’t say that, or at least not directly. What it said, in yet another major piece on how the economy is awful, is that prices are skyrocketing:

The mix of local residents visiting the Enfield Food Shelf in Connecticut has changed a lot in the last few years.

“Prior to the Covid-19 pandemic, many were elderly or disabled people on fixed incomes, said Kathleen Souvigney, the food pantry’s executive director for the past decade.

“But now, more of the folks seeking assistance are working families who are struggling to make ends meet as their cost of living skyrockets. Paying for child care, housing, cars, heating and other basic needs doesn’t leave enough money these days for food, which has also risen sharply in price, Souvigney hears time and time again.”

The key piece of data that CNN apparently was unable to obtain for this article was wage growth. Wages have actually outpaced inflation in many of the items that have seen “skyrocketing” prices according to CNN. And, according to advanced economic theory, if wages are rising more rapidly than a price that is “skyrocketing,” then that wages must also be “skyrocketing.”

Here’s the picture.

Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics.

For wages, I have used the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) average hourly wagefor production and non-supervisory workers. This group covers roughly 80 percent of employees. It is useful because it excludes most high-end workers, so that the average is not skewed by high pay for CEOs and professionals.

As can be seen, this wage has risen by 24.0 percent since the pandemic began in February of 2020. This is 3.6 percentage points faster than the overall CPI. It is worth noting that, in contrast to prior decades, the fastest wage growth has been at the bottom end of the wage distribution.

That is not great, but there have been many periods, including the Reagan presidency, when wages have not kept pace with inflation. Furthermore, we have been hit with a worldwide pandemic that led to a huge burst of inflation everywhere. The fact that U.S. workers are actually doing better than before the pandemic is remarkable, and their real wages are on or slightly above the pre-pandemic growth path.

We can also compare the rate of wage growth to the inflation in some of the items highlighted in the CNN piece. Starting with food, inflation at the grocery store has slightly outpaced wage growth over this period, rising 25.2 percent compared to the 24.0 percent increase in wages. This puts a crimp in people’s budgets, but we have seen many periods in which food prices have outpaced wages by larger amounts.

Next, we have rent. As can be seen, the overall rent index has risen faster than the overall CPI, but less rapidly than wages. So workers are still coming out ahead here. But there is an interesting twist in this story.

In addition to its overall rent index, which follows the rents in all units, the BLS also has a “new tenant” rent index which tracks the rent in units that change hands. This index has risen just 17.4 percent since the start of the pandemic.

This is a big deal for this story for two reasons. First, low- and moderate-income people tend to move more frequently than higher-income people. This means the new tenant rent index might be a better approximation of the rents that the people discussed in this piece are facing.

The other reason the new tenant rent index is important is that it leads the overall rent index. At the start of 2021, the new tenant rent index began to show a large jump in rental inflation, as people looked for more space to accommodate working from home. This later showed up in more rapid rental inflation in the overall index.

In the last year and half, the picture has turned around with the new tenant index being flat or even falling. There is enough error in these measurements that it is hard to be very confident about where rental inflation will end up in the rest of 2024 and into 2025, but we can be quite certain that it will be considerably lower going forward than it is now. This should be a big help to low- and moderate-income households.

The last item is childcare. The index for childcare has risen just 16.7 percent, far less than the rise in wages.

There are two important qualifications that need to be added. There are undoubtedly huge differences in the costs faced by parents, depending on the specific childcare available. Most care is subsidized by the government. Where governments have cut back on support, parents have seen far larger increases in tuition.

The other issue is simply one of availability. Many childcare providers closed in the pandemic, and some did not reopen. As a result, the shortage of affordable childcare slots, which was already a big problem before the pandemic, is worse today.

CNN Highlights the Negative in the Biden Economy

To be clear, there are always bad stories in our economy, even in the best of time. Our system of social supports is far weaker than in other wealthy countries. As a result, even in boom times, there will be tens of millions of people struggling to pay for food, rent, healthcare, and other necessities. It is important that the public be made aware of this suffering.

However, it is also important that the media give a clear picture of the state of the economy. And, by most measures, the current economy is among the strongest in the last half-century, and that is in spite of having to shake off the effects of a worldwide pandemic.

We are doing far better than every other wealthy country right now. It is understandable that people care about their own situation, not the situation of workers in Germany and France, but they should recognize that the impact of a massive pandemic that cannot just be wished away by politicians. CNN and the rest of the media have done almost nothing to educate the public on this point.

This first appeared on Dean Baker’s Beat the Press blog.

Dean Baker is the co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR). He is the author of Plunder and Blunder: The Rise and Fall of the Bubble Economy.

Venezuela becomes first country to lose all of its glaciers

At beginning of 20th century, Venezuela had 6 glaciers

By Ehren Wynder

May 9 (UPI) -- Venezuela is the first country in modern history to lose all of its glaciers after climate scientists declared its remaining glacier little more than an ice field.

Climatologist Maximiliano Herrera earlier this week posted on X that Venezuela's Humboldt Glacier has shrunk to an area of two hectares and has gone static, downgrading it to an ice field.

The Humboldt Glacier, also known as La Corona, was the last remaining one in Venezuela after the country lost at least five others in the past century due to the effects of climate change.

Several glaciologists now say the clump of ice clinging to the Sierra Nevada National Park in the Andes now is too small to be considered a glacier.

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While there is no global standard for the minimum size an ice mass must be to be considered a glacier, the U.S. Geological Survey said 10 hectares is a commonly accepted metric

Glaciologists James Kirkham with the International Cryosphere Climate Initiative and Miriam Jackson with the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development said in the joint statement to the BBC that glaciologists define a glacier as an "ice mass that deforms under its own weight."

Mark Maslin, a professor of earth system sciences at University College London, told the BBC that "glaciers are ice that fills valleys" and an ice field the size of Humboldt is "not a glacier."

In the beginning of the 20th century, Venezuela boasted six glaciers spanning a combined 386 square miles.

Humboldt used to cover 450 hectares, but researchers at the University of Los Andes in Colombia told the news media in March that it had melted to just two hectares.

A study from 2020 suggested the glacial area in Venezuela shrank by 98% between 1952 and 2019. The rate of glacial retreat rose around 1998 to a peak of nearly 17% per year from 2016 to 2019.

While researchers say glaciers are intimately linked with cultural identity, their rapid loss also leads to rising sea levels.

The Venezuelan government in December attempted to remediate the disappearing ice field by covering it with a thermal blanket, similar to covers used in European countries to protect ski slopes in warmer weather.

Climate scientists criticized the measure, arguing the synthetic cover will degrade and contaminate the environment with microplastics over time.

Maslin said mountain glaciers need enough ice to reflect the sun's rays and keep the air cool during the summer months. Now the Humboldt Glacier has lost so much ice that there's no direct way to reverse the melt.

"Once a glacier's gone, the sunlight heats the ground, makes it much warmer and makes it much less likely to actually build ice up over the summer," he said.

Kirkham and Jackson said between 20% to 80% of glaciers globally could be gone by 2100 and "a portion of this loss is already locked in" due to carbon emissions.

Rapidly lowering emissions, however, could save other glaciers, "which will have enormous benefits for livelihoods, and energy, water and food security," they said.

Herrera said on X that Indonesia, Mexico and Slovenia were the next countries most likely to face glacier extinction.

Maslin said those countries "make logical sense" because of their proximity to the equator and their low-lying ice caps, which are more vulnerable to global warming.

Icy reception for plan to 'save' Venezuela's last glacier

by Margioni BERMÚDEZ

MARCH 5, 2024

A small patch of ice among bare rock is all that remains of Venezuela's last glacier, which the government hopes to restore to its former glory using a geothermal blanket

Experts say that would be too little too late.

While glacier melt is a global phenomenon blamed on climate change, Venezuela is the first country in the Andes mountain range—which stretches all the way to Chile in the south—to lose all its glaciers.

Venezuela has lost five in total, adding up to some 1,000 hectares of ice, in the last century or so.

"In Venezuela there are no more glaciers," Julio Cesar Centeno, a university professor and advisor to the UN Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED), told AFP.

"What we have is a piece of ice that is 0.4 percent of its original size."

Centeno and other experts are convinced the loss of La Corona glacier on Humboldt peak, some 4,900 meters (more than 16,000 feet) above sea level, is irreversible.

But the government announced a plan in December to slow and even reverse the thaw by covering the area with a thermal mesh made of polypropylene plastic warding off the Sun's rays.

The cover was delivered to Humboldt peak by helicopter in 35 separate pieces, each measuring 2.75 meters by 80 meters, in December, but the government has not said whether it has already been unrolled.

The most optimistic estimates give the remaining ice cover four to five years.

Similar covers are used in European countries, mainly to protect ski slopes in warmer weather.

"It allows us to maintain the temperature of the area and prevent the entire glacier from melting," said Jehyson Guzman, governor of the western state of Merida that used to be home to Venezuela's glaciers.

Nothing left to save

But scientists of the University of Los Andes (ULA) are skeptical.

They say La Corona ceased to be a glacier since shrinking to just two hectares of the 450 hectares it used to cover. Scientists use a guideline of 10 hectares as the minimum size of a glacier.

Before La Corona, Venezuela also lost its glaciers on the peaks of El Leon, La Concha, El Toro and Bolivar.

"It is an illusory thing, a hallucination, it is completely absurd," said Centeno of the government's plan.

He and a team of other scientists will ask Venezuela's supreme court to scrap the project, which they say could have other, negative, impacts as the plastic blanket degrades over time.

"These micro plastics are practically invisible, they end up in the soil and from there they go to crops, lagoons, into the air, so people will end up eating and breathing that," he said.

The last remnants of La Corona are to be found on Humboldt peak some 4,900 meters 

above sea level.

Enrique La Marca, zoologist and ecologist, fears the cover could harm rare species of mosses and lichens, even hummingbirds that call the rocky environment home.

"That life will die because it will not have the necessary oxygen," he said.

An ice remnant

The most optimistic estimates give the remaining ice-cover "four to five years" before disappearing completely, said La Marca, who researches the impacts of glacier melt due to climate change.

Some calculations point to a mere two years.

"It's an ice remnant," not a glacier, added physicist Alejandra Melfo, a ULA expert on the topic.

Forestry engineer and mountaineer Susana Rodriguez said the disappearance of La Corona will also affect Venezuelan tourism, as many people who used to climb the Humboldt peak did so on the ice.

"Now everything is rock, and what remains is so deteriorated that it is risky to step on it. There are cracks," said Rodriguez, who has accompanied several outings on the glacier.

© 2024 AFP

Kebnekaise's southern peak continues to melt, and so do other Swedish glaciers

The alleged use of chemical weapons in Ukraine: How the international community can investigate

Commentary | 9 May 2024


Ahmet Üzümcü |Former Director-General of the OPCW, Former Permanent Representative of Turkey to NATO

There have been disturbing reports about the use of chemical weapons by Russia against Ukrainian troops. It is alleged that chloropicrin and riot control agents were used to dislodge Ukrainian soldiers from entrenched positions on the front with Russia. Russia denies these allegations.

Chloropicrin was widely used during the First World War and is now included in the list of Schedule 3 chemicals in the Annex on Chemicals of the Chemical Weapons Convention. States parties are permitted to produce this chemical in large commercial quantities for purposes not prohibited by the Chemical Weapons Convention (e.g., agriculture); however, they were included in the list because they can pose a risk due to their lethal or incapacitating toxicity. Thus, if such chemicals are used to harm people, they are chemical weapons under what is known as the “general purpose criterion”. Regarding riot control agents, States Parties to the Chemical Weapons Convention are allowed to possess and use them for their defined purpose, but it is strictly prohibited to employ them as a method of warfare.

The allegations against Russia are serious and pertain to the credibility and integrity of the Chemical Weapons Convention regime. An international, independent and impartial mechanism must investigate them. Different mechanisms have been used in the past decade, particularly in Syria.

Under the Chemical Weapons Convention, the mechanisms of a challenge inspection and an investigation of alleged use can be activated upon the request of any State Party. The Director-General of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) has no authority to invoke them. However, this mechanism has not been activated since the entry into force of the Chemical Weapons Convention in 1997.

The allegations against Russia are serious and pertain to the credibility and integrity of the Chemical Weapons Convention regime. An international, independent and impartial mechanism must investigate them. Ahmet Üzümcü
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In 2013, the United Nations Secretary-General’s Mechanism (UNSGM) was activated to investigate allegations of use of chemical weapons in Syria. Syria was not yet a member of the OPCW; thus, the UNSGM based on the 1925 Geneva Protocol was the only available mechanism for that purpose. The UNSGM, composed of a group of experts from the OPCW and the WHO, investigated the chemical attack in Ghouta and determined the use of sarin, a nerve agent. After Syria joined the Chemical Weapons Convention in October 2013, while the elimination of its chemical weapons program was underway, the allegations of use continued. Considering that the OPCW could not remain indifferent to these allegations, I established a Fact-Finding Mission (FFM) modelled upon many years of international practice in United Nations bodies. The Syrian government accepted the Terms of Reference we developed. The FFM has now investigated more than eighty reported incidents and determined that chemical weapons were used in more than twenty of them. However, neither the UNSGM nor the FFM were mandated to identify the perpetrators of the attacks.

In August 2015, the United Nations Security Council established the OPCW-UN Joint Investigative Mechanism (JIM), which conducted in-depth investigations based on the findings of the FFM. In the reports it produced, the JIM concluded that the Syrian armed forces had used chemical weapons in three cases and ISIS in another one. Due to a Russian veto, the Security Council did not extend the JIM’s mandate at the end of 2017.

In June 2018, the OPCW Conference of States Parties adopted, at a special session, a decision on “Addressing the Threat from Chemical Weapons Use”. A new mechanism called the “Investigation and Identification Team” (IIT) was established based on this decision. After exhaustive investigations that again followed best practices for international fact-finding mechanisms, the IIT concluded that the Syrian armed forces were the ones responsible for the use of chemical weapons in five cases and ISIS in one. The IIT continues to work on incidents wherein the FFM has determined that chemical weapons were used in Syria.

Meanwhile, in March 2018, following the chemical attack on Yuri Skripal and his daughter in Salisbury, the British Government requested technical assistance from the Secretariat of the OPCW under Article VIII, paragraph 38(e) of the Chemical Weapons Convention. OPCW experts travelled to the United Kingdom to provide the requested technical assistance, including sending the samples they collected to two independent laboratories outside the United Kingdom, which confirmed the findings of the British authorities. A nerve agent, Novichok, was used. In September 2020, the German Government made a similar request and invited an OPCW technical team to take samples from Alexei Navalny, who was brought for treatment to Germany after he was poisoned in Russia. The use of Novichok was again determined. However, in both cases, the OPCW was not mandated to determine the identity of the perpetrators.

One of the strengths of the OPCW’s robust verification and compliance regime has always been its level of expertise and objectivity in the area of chemical weapons. The international community could leverage these strengths to test the veracity of the allegations that have been levelled against Russia about chemical weapons use during the armed conflict in Ukraine. Ahmet Üzümcü
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Based on paragraph 20 of the June 2018 decision of the OPCW Conference of States Parties, the OPCW Director-General has been given the mandate to provide technical expertise to identify the perpetrators, organisers, sponsors or those who are otherwise involved in the use of chemical weapons, if requested by a State Party investigating the possible use of chemical weapons on its territory. This mechanism has not yet been implemented in any country other than Syria.

I have summarised above the different mechanisms employed in the recent past to investigate allegations of the use of chemical weapons. I believe that one of them might be activated to investigate reported incidents in Ukraine. Whichever is selected may not enjoy the support of the whole membership; however, if one of the options is chosen, it needs to be practical and produce concrete results despite the challenges associated with the ongoing conflict. One of the strengths of the OPCW’s robust verification and compliance regime has always been its level of expertise and objectivity in the area of chemical weapons. The international community could leverage these strengths to test the veracity of the allegations that have been levelled against Russia about chemical weapons use during the armed conflict in Ukraine. The States Parties to the Chemical Weapons Convention should support such an initiative for two reasons: first, to provide a deterrent effect against further alleged uses of chemical weapons, and second, to uphold the integrity and credibility of the Chemical Weapons Convention, which is one of the pillars of the rules-based international order.

The opinions articulated above represent the views of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the position of the European Leadership Network or any of its members. The ELN’s aim is to encourage debates that will help develop Europe’s capacity to address the pressing foreign, defence, and security policy challenges of our time.

Sudanese paramilitary forces have carried out ethnic cleansing in Darfur, rights group says

HRW says attacks by Sudanese paramilitary forces in the western region of Darfur raise the possibility of "genocide" against non-Arab ethnic communities.

The New Arab Staff & Agencies
09 May, 2024


Newly arrived refugees from Darfur in Sudan, sit on a vehicle before being taken to a new camp on April 23, 2024 in Adre, Chad [Getty]

A leading rights group said on Thursday that attacks by Sudanese paramilitary forces and their allied militias, which killed thousands in the western region of Darfur last year, constituted a campaign of ethnic cleansing against the area’s non-Arab population .

The paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, which has been fighting Sudan's military for over a year, allied with armed militias to carry out attacks against the ethnic Masalit and other non-Arab groups in El Geneina, the capital city of West Darfur state, Human Rights Watch said in a new report.

Sudan has been rocked by violence since mid-April 2023, when tensions between the military and the rival paramilitary erupted into open fighting. Clashes quickly spread to other parts of the country, and Darfur was engulfed in brutal attacks on African civilians, especially the Masalit tribe .

According to the New York-based watchdog, the paramilitary forces and their allied militiamen targeted predominantly Masalit neighborhoods in El Geneina from April to June 2023, with attacks intensifying also last November.

At least thousands of people were killed and hundreds of thousands were displaced during the attacks, according to the report, entitled 'The Massalit Will Not Come Home: Ethnic Cleansing and Crimes Against Humanity in El Geneina, West Darfur, Sudan.'

Masalit who were captured were tortured, women and girls were raped and entire neighborhoods were looted and destroyed, the report says.

HRW said it interviewed more than 220 people who fled Darfur into neighboring countries and analyzed photos, videos and satellite imagery connected to the attacks.

United Nations experts have estimated that at least 10,000 people were killed in the city of El Geneina in 2023. More than 570,000 people, mostly Masalit, were displaced and sought refuge in neighboring Chad .

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Human Rights Watch said the campaign of attacks on the non-Arab people in Darfur, including the Masalit, with the “apparent objective” of pushing them out, “constitutes ethnic cleansing.”

“Governments, the African Union, and the United Nations need to act now to protect civilians,” Tirana Hassan, HRW's executive director, said Thursday.

“The global inaction in the face of atrocities of this magnitude is inexcusable,” Hassan said. “Government should ensure those responsible are held to account.”

The group called for the United Nations, African Union and states from the International Criminal Court to investigate whether the atrocities documented in the report reveal a specific intent by the RSF paramilitary and armed allies “to commit genocide” by destroying the Masalit and other non-Arab groups in West Darfur.

The media office of the Rapid Support Forces did not immediately respond, following the HRW report.

In late January, the International Criminal Court’s prosecutor, Karim Khan, said there are grounds to believe both the RSF and the Sudanese military may be committing war crimes , crimes against humanity or genocide in Darfur.

Two decades ago, Darfur became synonymous with genocide and war crimes, particularly by the notorious Janjaweed Arab militias, against populations that identify as Central or East African.

The Rapid Support Forces were formed from Janjaweed fighters by former Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, who ruled the country for three decades before being overthrown during a popular uprising in 2019 .

He is wanted by the International Criminal Court on charges of genocide and other crimes during the conflict in Darfur in the 2000s.

Offshore wind farm cancellations raise doubts about industry's future

By Christopher Niezrecki, UMass Lowell


Secretary of Interior Sally Jewel watches as construction begins on the United States' first offshore wind farm on Block Island off the Rhode Island coast on July 27, 2015. File Photo by Department of the Interior/UPI

May 9 (UPI) -- America's first large-scale offshore wind farms began sending power to the Northeast in early 2024, but a wave of wind farm project cancellations and rising costs have left many people with doubts about the industry's future in the U.S.

Several big hitters, including Ørsted, Equinor, BP and Avangrid, have canceled contracts or sought to renegotiate them in recent months. Pulling out meant the companies faced cancellation penalties ranging from US$16 million to several hundred million dollars per project. It also resulted in Siemens Energy, the world's largest maker of offshore wind turbines, anticipating financial losses in 2024 of around $2.2 billion.

Altogether, projects that had been canceled by the end of 2023 were expected to total more than 12 gigawatts of power, representing more than half of the capacity in the project pipeline.

So, what happened, and can the U.S. offshore wind industry recover?

I lead UMass Lowell's Center for Wind Energy Science Technology and Research WindSTAR and Center for Energy Innovation and follow the industry closely. The offshore wind industry's troubles are complicated, but it's far from dead in the U.S., and some policy changes may help it find firmer footing.

Long approval process's cascade of challenges

Getting offshore wind projects permitted and approved in the U.S. takes years and is fraught with uncertainty for developers, more so than in Europe or Asia.

Before a company bids on a U.S. project, the developer must plan the procurement of the entire wind farm, including making reservations to purchase components such as turbines and cables, construction equipment and ships. The bid must also be cost-competitive, so companies have a tendency to bid low and not anticipate unexpected costs, which adds to financial uncertainty and risk.

The winning U.S. bidder then purchases an expensive ocean lease, costing in the hundreds of millions of dollars. But it has no right to build a wind project yet.

Before starting to build, the developer must conduct site assessments to determine what kind of foundations are possible and identify the scale of the project. The developer must consummate an agreement to sell the power it produces, identify a point of interconnection to the power grid, and then prepare a construction and operation plan, which is subject to further environmental review. All of that takes about five years, and it's only the beginning.

For a project to move forward, developers may need to secure dozens of permits from local, tribal, state, regional and federal agencies. The federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, which has jurisdiction over leasing and management of the seabed, must consult with agencies that have regulatory responsibilities over different aspects in the ocean, such as the armed forces, Environmental Protection Agency and National Marine Fisheries Service, as well as groups including commercial and recreational fishing, Indigenous groups, shipping, harbor managers and property owners.

For Vineyard Wind I -- which began sending power from five of its 62 planned wind turbines off Martha's Vineyard in early 2024 -- the time from BOEM's lease auction to getting its first electricity to the grid was about nine years.

Costs can balloon during the regulatory delays

Until recently, these contracts didn't include any mechanisms to adjust for rising supply costs during the long approval time, adding to the risk for developers.

From the time today's projects were bid to the time they were approved for construction, the world dealt with the COVID-19 pandemic, inflation, global supply chain problems, increased financing costs and the war in Ukraine. Steep increases in commodity prices, including for steel and copper, as well as in construction and operating costs, made many contracts signed years earlier no longer financially viable.

New and re-bid contracts are now allowing for price adjustments after the environmental approvals have been given, which is making projects more attractive to developers in the U.S. Many of the companies that canceled projects are now rebidding.

The regulatory process is becoming more streamlined, but it still takes about six years, while other countries are building projects at a faster pace and larger scale.

Shipping rules, power connections

Another significant hurdle for offshore wind development in the U.S. involves a century-old law known as the Jones Act.

The Jones Act requires vessels carrying cargo between U.S. points to be U.S.-built, U.S.-operated and U.S.-owned. It was written to boost the shipping industry after World War I. However, there are only three offshore wind turbine installation vessels in the world that are large enough for the turbines proposed for U.S. projects, and none are compliant with the Jones Act.

That means wind turbine components must be transported by smaller barges from U.S. ports and then installed by a foreign installation vessel waiting offshore, which raises the cost and likelihood of delays.

Dominion Energy is building a new ship, the Charybdis, that will comply with the Jones Act. But a typical offshore wind farm needs over 25 different types of vessels -- for crew transfers, surveying, environmental monitoring, cable-laying, heavy lifting and many other roles.

The nation also lacks a well-trained workforce for manufacturing, construction and operation of offshore wind farms.

For power to flow from offshore wind farms, the electricity grid also requires significant upgrades. The Department of Energy is working on regional transmission plans, but permitting will undoubtedly be slow.

Lawsuits, disinformation add to the challenges

Numerous lawsuits from advocacy groups that oppose offshore wind projects have further slowed development.

Wealthy homeowners have tried to stop wind farms that might appear in their ocean view. Astroturfing groups that claim to be advocates of the environment, but are actually supported by fossil fuel industry interests, have launched disinformation campaigns.

In 2023, many Republican politicians and conservative groups immediately cast blame for whale deaths off the coast of New York and New Jersey on the offshore wind developers, but the evidence points instead to increased ship traffic collisions and entanglements with fishing gear.

Such disinformation can reduce public support and slow projects' progress.

Efforts to keep the offshore wind industry going

The Biden administration set a goal to install 30 gigawatts of offshore wind capacity by 2030, but recent estimates indicate that the actual number will be closer to half that.

Despite the challenges, developers have reason to move ahead.

The Inflation Reduction Act provides incentives, including federal tax credits for the development of clean energy projects and for developers that build port facilities in locations that previously relied on fossil fuel industries. Most coastal state governments are also facilitating projects by allowing for a price readjustment after environmental approvals have been given. They view offshore wind as an opportunity for economic growth.

These financial benefits can make building an offshore wind industry more attractive to companies that need market stability and a pipeline of projects to help lower costs -- projects that can create jobs and boost economic growth and a cleaner environment.

Christopher Niezrecki is director of the Center for Energy Innovation at UMass Lowell. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of the author.

A DANGEROUS MENAGE A TROIS

The Triangular Relationship between Iran, Israel and the US: An Ongoing Crisis

Marianna Charountaki
May 9th, 2024

I

ranian drones flying over the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem, 13 April 2024. 

Source: Mehr News

The 2011 crisis in Syria facilitated an era of international non-polarity and signalled the revival of the Middle East’s regional powers, among which Turkey and Iran have particular prominence. In this context, the Palestinian cause has, once more, become a pretext for the actors involved to take steps to get the upper hand and project power. The assault on Gaza has rejuvenated regional conflicts, most significantly the Palestinian issue, giving fresh impetus to the need for a resolution. For the first time since 2010, Iranian foreign policy and its role in the regional order is front and centre, giving international opponents to Iran an opportunity to rally.

Despite major regional tensions that had been on the verge of escalating into a direct military confrontation, such as those between Iran and Saudi Arabia since 2016, who had cut off official ties until April 2021 (Aljazeera, 2023), it is only very recently that Iran has been confronted militarily by Israel. Such direct attacks against Iran, as was the case with the 1 April 2024 Israeli strike on the Iranian consulate in Damascus and most recently on an Iranian airfield in Isfahan – the cradle of Iran’s nuclear programme – are important developments which should not be underestimated. The fact that Israel pushed Iran to respond alone constitutes an interim success, though all sides involved currently appear hesitant to pursue this path further given the number of unknown factors concerning conflict escalation. The US, for instance, has revived its discourse about the threat to regional stability posed by Iran’s policy of ‘destruction throughout the region’ (Kurda, 2024). At the same time though, former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s call for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to resign in addition to Democratic lawmakers urging the halt of US weapons provision to Israel (Singh, 2024) stand in stark contrast to the US foreign policy agenda to curb Iranian influence in the region, dating back to the George W. Bush era (2001–9). The Israelis’ challenge vis-à-vis Iran’s foreign policy showed that they are the only player adjusting the power balance in the wake of a new and unexpected Iranian policy shift.

Iran’s long-term strategy to divert international attention from internal issues, in view of the debate over its nuclear capabilities and the wider turmoil engulfing the region, demonstrate why a focus on instability or changes in the regional status quo strengthens Tehran’s agenda (Charountaki, 2018: 14). A closer observation of Iran’s revolutionary foreign policy indicates that its focus on instigating instability has remained consistent. Iran’s foreign policy is based ‘on a strategic approach against US hegemony’ (Ibid: 16). Concurrently, the US has perpetuated its dual-track policy of reset and withdrawal, consolidated since the Obama era, but now its foreign policy is represented by Biden’s five C’s (consult, convene, compartmentalise, calm, compete). The latter is focused on ‘rehabilitating America’s reputation as a champion’ (Grunstein, 2021) in line with the traditional US foreign policy discourse that aimed at ‘the nation’s international prestige as a world leader’ (Reagan, 1988: 4). Such a task in the current unpredictable world order necessitates the reconsideration of traditional US foreign policy practices in the Middle East.

Along similar lines, Israel’s challenge to Iranian foreign policy constitutes an attempt to rebuild its prestige following the 2006 Israel–Hezbollah War, as well as Hamas’ more recent miscalculation of the time and possibly severity of the response its action itself against Israel. The mechanisms of the state Leviathan, epitomised by the current conflict, are now mobilised in the name of self-defence and ‘limited’ attacks (Amir-Abdollahian, 2024) vis-à-vis Iran’s assurances about its reluctance to continue acts of warfare as its only means of survival. Indeed, the recent meetings between Tehran and the Kurdistan Region in Iraq (Tehran Times, 2024) seeking to develop cooperative relations in the context of a good neighbourhood policy is a case in point. Thus, developments in this conflict should not be understood merely as an Iranian-Israeli confrontation, but as part of the international and regional containment of Iran. Whether containment remains at the forefront of international players’ foreign policy agendas will determine any future concrete shifts in Iran’s own foreign policy towards international legitimacy.

At present, the Gaza conflict is taking its intended shape as the fighting is now between the actors at the heart of the conflict: Iran and Israel. Thus, the central question of this conflict (that has changed from an indirect to a dynamic one) is whether it can facilitate the transition from a state’s mere survival, according to the realist tradition, within a hostile environment, to a state’s pragmatic functioning – a shift that can only be evaluated at the political level.

About the author

Marianna Charountaki is Senior Lecturer in International Politics at the University of Lincoln and a Research Fellow at Soran University (Erbil, KRI). She is the author of The Kurds and US Foreign Policy: International Relations in the Middle East since 1945 (Routledge, 2011) and Iran and Turkey: International and Regional Engagement in the Middle East (I.B. Tauris, 2018) and is the co-editor of Mapping Non-State Actors in International Relations (Springer, February 2022).

Iran’s new nuclear policy between deterrence and pragmatism

Analysis
May 9, 2024
Zakiyeh Yazdanshenas, Alam Saleh




The recent escalation in tensions between Israel and Iran has sparked concerns about a potential shift in Tehran’s strategy toward full weaponization of its nuclear program. On April 14, in retaliation for an Israeli strike on the Iranian consulate in Syria on April 1 that killed seven Iranians, including Quds Force Gen. Mohammad Reza Zahedi, Iran launched over 300 drones and ballistic missiles against Israel, in its first ever direct attack on the country. Given Israel's reportedly sizable, undeclared nuclear arsenal, analysts have interpreted this move as a sign that Iran intends on becoming a declared nuclear power.

From strategic patience to active deterrence

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) defines the threshold for creating an atomic bomb as approximately 42 kg of uranium enriched up to a purity of 60%. The latest IAEA report indicates that Iran possesses 121 kg of uranium enriched to this level — enough for nearly three bombs. Despite Iran's claim that it is not seeking to develop nuclear weapons, it remains the only country enriching uranium at this level without a confirmed nuclear weapons program. Maintaining its status as a threshold nuclear power is likely to be Iran's chosen strategy under the current circumstances. This is in line with the country’s new proactive and preemptive grand strategy, as compared to its previous approach of strategic patience.

While Iran previously refrained from directly retaliating against Israel for its alleged covert operations, including assassinating Iranian nuclear scientists and operatives of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), it has decided to adopt a new stance. In the words of Hossein Salami, the commander-in-chief of the IRGC, “Henceforth if Israel attacks our interests, assets, figures, and citizens anywhere, it will be met with a counterattack from within the Islamic Republic of Iran.”

The failure of the 2015 nuclear deal, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), and Israel’s alleged covert activities in Iran in recent years have led Tehran to abandon its policy of strategic patience, no longer willing to fight a shadow war by relying on its regional non-state allies. Recent incidents, such as Iran’s mid-January missile strike on Pakistan in response to a Jaish al-Adl terrorist attack on the port city of Chabahar and its mid-April drone and missile strike on Israel, reflect a change in Iran's stance and a new willingness to take more assertive measures. According to a post on the social media platform X by Mohammad Jamshidi, President Ebrahim Raisi’s deputy chief of staff, "Iran's era of strategic patience is over."

However, contrary to many analysts’ fears, Iran is aware of the benefits of remaining a latent nuclear power, rather than becoming an openly declared one. As the Iranian authorities see things, possessing threshold nuclear capabilities will not only deter large-scale military attacks but also provide greater leverage in negotiations with the United States and other adversaries. In addition, it could reinvigorate the possibility of regional de-escalation and improve bilateral relations with important neighbors, processes that have been underway since March 2023, following the China-brokered rapprochement between Saudi Arabia and Iran.

Being a threshold nuclear power and its deterrence benefits

Iranian officials clearly believe that the acquisition of nuclear weapons is not necessary to deter a direct attack by Israel, as its ability to launch a large-scale assault on Iran without US support is limited by geopolitical constraints. Both the US and Iran have been highly reluctant to engage in a direct, large-scale conflict since the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks on Israeli soil, which sparked a spiraling escalation in the region. Since Oct. 7, Tehran and Washington have managed to handle regional tensions relatively successfully.

Following Iran's retaliatory strike on Israel, Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian assured the US that Iran had no intention of targeting American bases in the region, and Washington reiterated its stance of non-participation in Israel’s offensive operations against Iran. From Iran's perspective, Israel's attack on an air base in Isfahan on April 19 was a clear attempt at sabotage. According to Iranian media, this incident, similar to a previous operation reportedly carried out by the Israelis in January 2023, involved small drones believed to have originated from within Iranian territory. Iranian officials assert that their air defense system successfully intercepted and destroyed the drones mid-flight.

In response to perceived threats from the US and Israel in the region, Iran has employed a combination of internal and external balancing strategies that has effectively safeguarded its security thus far. In terms of internal balancing, Iran relies on enrichment and reprocessing facilities like other latent nuclear states, such as Japan. Nuclear latency refers to states with the potential ability to assemble a nuclear arsenal in a relatively short period of time in the event of an existential threat. By maintaining the ability to rapidly build nuclear weapons without actually doing so, a policy known as the “Japan Option,” Iran remains in compliance with the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. In addition, Iran also relies on its conventional military strength and the exploitation of strategic geopolitical assets. In terms of external balancing, Tehran has built a network of partners and allies across the Middle East who share the common goal of countering US and Israeli hegemony. Iranian policymakers view these internal and external components as interconnected, creating a stable equilibrium to safeguard Iran’s security and interests.

Iran's defense doctrine is based on the concept of active deterrence, whereby a predetermined countermeasure is carried out if deterrence alone fails, thus reinforcing deterrence of further actions by belligerent actors. In this regard, the recent tit-for-tat exchange of missile strikes between Iran and Israel does not signify a major shift away from this doctrine and toward nuclear armament, but rather signals a new stage in an ongoing active deterrence approach. Israel's emphasis on keeping the scope of conflict limited and the American commitment to non-involvement in military engagements with Iran indicate that the doctrine has been effective in deterring broader military action against Iran thus far.

As a threshold nuclear power, Iran maintains strategic ambiguity around its nuclear capabilities and can use this as a political bargaining chip. According to the IAEA, from June 2023 on, Iran reduced the rate at which it was enriching uranium (up to 60%) for a few months, before reversing course in November 2023 and increasing the rate of production of enriched uranium (up to 60%) to 9 kg per month. The most recent report from the IAEA indicates that while Iran has been enriching uranium at the same rate since the beginning of 2024, it also downblended about 31.8 kg of its 60%-enriched uranium stockpile, reducing its total reserves by 6.8 kg.

These fluctuations in the production and reserves of enriched uranium suggest that clandestine negotiations and agreements between Iran and the United States may have been taking place in recent months. Despite the ongoing war in Gaza, Iran managed to export approximately 1.56 million barrels of oil per day in the first three months of 2024, the greatest volume since late 2018. While Iran has been able to master various methods of circumventing sanctions during this period, it seems that the Biden administration is reluctant to enforce strict secondary sanction measures that would further impede Iranian oil sales.

Deterrence against the US-Israel bloc

While the war in Gaza has provided Iran with new opportunities to affect regional power dynamics, being a threshold nuclear power does not impose extra costs on it. Rather, it provides Tehran with significant leverage if external pressures increase. As such, Iran's nuclear capabilities serve as both a deterrent and a bargaining tool. Currently, Tehran views the United States and Israel as its primary external threats. Consequently, it shapes its regional security strategies with these two nuclear powers in mind. As a component of this approach, Tehran endeavors to reduce threat perceptions among its Arab neighbors by implementing a neighborhood policy and initiating confidence-building measures, such as expanding bilateral diplomatic relations.

Iran seeks to continue strengthening its relations with its neighbors, break out of its political isolation, and, to some extent, address its lagging economic development. Its economy, hindered by sanctions, needs to be revived, and in this context, Tehran remains acutely aware of the material and relative costs of declaring itself a nuclear power. The suspicions of analysts, predicting a surge in Tehran’s enriched uranium production, may be unmerited given the many benefits that Iran could reap from remaining a threshold power.

Nevertheless, there is a real prospect that Iran could become a nuclear power — a move that would have dire implications — and this is more likely to occur if or when Iran perceives a threat to its security that cannot be adequately managed by its existing use of active deterrence. Were the US and Israel to jointly carry out a significant military strike targeting Iran's key nuclear and military installations, this could render Tehran’s current deterrence strategy unviable, ineffective, and unsustainable. On April 18, Gen. Ahmad Haqtalab, commander of the Nuclear Centers Protection and Security Corps, stated that if Israel attacks Iran's nuclear facilities, Iran may seriously reassess its nuclear strategy.

There are several steps key regional players could take that would ensure this does not happen. First and foremost, resuming diplomatic negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program and establishing clear rules for preventing its weaponization, in return for a reduction in the scale and impact of economic sanctions, would benefit all stakeholders. Second, as an additional step, encouraging neighboring countries, particularly Gulf Cooperation Council member states, to develop constructive diplomatic and economic relations with Iran would discourage Tehran from pursuing further uranium enrichment, disincentivize engagement in more small-scale military confrontations, and build on Iran's tentative commitment to assume the role of a responsible regional actor. Finally, resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, as distant as that might seem right now in the midst of war, would be a crucial step toward mitigating the risk of escalating tensions between Israel and Iran as well as alleviating the heated security crisis that currently plagues the region.



Zakiyeh Yazdanshenas is a Senior Research Fellow at the Scientific Research and Middle East Strategic Studies Center in Tehran. You can follow her on X @YzdZakiyeh.

Alam Saleh is a Senior Lecturer in International Relations and Middle Eastern Studies at Australian National University. You can follow him on X @alamsaleh1.

Photo by ATTA KENARE/AFP via Getty Images


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Asia’s billionaire capital: What Mumbai’s rise means for India?

Recent global rich list showed Mumbai has overtaken Beijing as Asia’s billionaire capital for the first time

Ahmad Adil |09.05.2024 - AA


- Mumbai’s climb is ‘quite exciting because it also positions India as a pivotal country in terms of wealth creation in the world,’ says researcher

NEW DELHI

A global rich list released earlier this year threw up a particular surprise for Asia, where a new city emerged as the continent’s billionaire capital – India’s financial hub Mumbai.

Mumbai took the crown from Beijing for the first time as its number of billionaires swelled by 26 to 92, edging past the Chinese capital’s 91, according to the list prepared by the Shanghai-based Hurun Research Institute.

On the global level, Mumbai is now only behind London and New York, who have 97 and 119 billionaires, respectively.

India’s overall count increased by 94, placing it third in the world – behind the US and China – with 271 billionaires, who have collective wealth amounting to $1 trillion, or 7% of the world’s total, according to the report.

The exponential growth seen in Mumbai is “quite exciting because it also positions India as a pivotal country in terms of wealth creation in the world,” Anas Rahman Junaid, founder and chief researcher at Hurun India, told Anadolu.

Mumbai has always been the epicenter of wealth creation in India as most family-run businesses have historically been based here, he said.

“Mumbai is always the place of choice for anybody who wants to set up their business and expand across India,” he said.

Another important factor is Mumbai being a port city, which made it a trade and finance hub throughout history, according to economic expert Abhijit Mukhopadhyay.

‘Industrial groups amassing wealth’

For Mukhopadhyay, it is clear that the number of billionaires in India is “going up only in a few pockets.”

“The Mumbai story is not detached from the India story. Whether the number of billionaires increasing is an achievement that can be proudly worn on the sleeve or not remains a question,” he told Anadolu.

India’s market structure is decisively shifting towards an oligopoly, with very few players dominating across all major profitable sectors, he said.

“For example, many American billionaires, like Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos etc., made their fortunes, at least initially, by creatively innovating,” he said.

“But that is not the case in India. Policy favors and direct incentivization enabled a few industrial groups to amass wealth by getting into all the current profitable sectors and then consolidating those profits.”

That is why he believes there will not be many more billionaires emerging “either in Mumbai or in any other city in India.”

“It is an exclusive club indeed,” said Mukhopadhyay.

According to Hurun report, India’s dominant industries when it comes to billionaires include pharmaceuticals, automobile and auto components, and chemicals.

The country’s richest people are also highly influential industrialists Mukesh Ambani – the wealthiest person in Asia – and Gautam Adani, head of the Adani Group energy conglomerate.

‘Overall inequality has increased very dramatically’

Experts like economist Santosh Mehrotra have also pointed out how the burgeoning wealth of a few is “integrally connected” to the country’s other problems such as spiking youth unemployment.

Nearly 83% of the country’s jobless population is from the youth demographic, according to the India Employment Report 2024 jointly published by the International Labor Organization and the New Delhi-based Institute of Human Development.

“They are integrally connected … because what the increase in billionaires … clearly shows is that there is something going on in the capital market here. Hurun’s list is based on the net worth of billionaires based on capital markets,” Mehrotra told Anadolu.

“Overall inequality has increased very dramatically in the country and that is what is getting reflected in the Harun list. The overall inequality in wealth and income is leading to certain people controlling the corridors of power and making sure decisions are being taken,” he said.

He believes that India has become “one of the most unequal countries in the world in the last 10 years.”

“Inequality was dropping for about 30 years after independence (in 1947). But it slowly started increasing and, now in the last 10 years, it has worsened. The wealth inequality is showing in billionaire numbers shooting up,” he added.

The Indian government, however, has said that unemployment rates have been declining in the country.

“During 2017-18 to 2022-23, employment has increased by 9.2%,” the Labor Ministry said in a written response to lawmakers in February.

Could any other Indian city follow Mumbai?

When it comes to other Indian cities that could catch up with Mumbai, Mukhopadhyay believes the capital New Delhi is the only potential candidate.

He said Bengaluru, an IT hub in southern India, was once considered a primary contender but has fallen down the list due to emerging urban issues, such as a recent water crisis.

“As things stand now, it does not seem that any other city can replicate Mumbai in terms of creating billionaires, if we exclude Delhi. Delhi may have the potential to do that in future,” he said.

Anas from Hurun India, however, had a more optimistic view of the situation, stressing that the country will definitely see a lot more “democratization of wealth across geographies in the coming years.”