'DROP on steroids.' L.A. city workers double dip by retiring and getting hired at DWP, union alleges

Caroline Petrow-Cohen
Fri, March 15, 2024

The front of the headquarters of the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power in downtown Los Angeles. (Associated Press)


Some L.A. city employees are "double dipping" by retiring and then starting a new job at the Department of Water and Power while collecting a pension for the first job, according to a union leader.

Gus Corona, head of International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 18, which represents nearly all DWP workers, said the double dipping harms the city's finances and the DWP's retirement plan, and that it came about in violation of the union bargaining process.

In a cease-and-desist letter to City Atty. Hydee Feldstein Soto on March 11, Corona called the situation "DROP on steroids" — a reference to a police and firefighter program that allows participants to collect their salaries and pensions simultaneously for the last five years of their careers.

Read more: Veteran L.A. cops and firefighters can work one shift, then collect double pay for years

Corona wrote that his union “will not accept this or any threat to the city’s financial health, the financial health of DWP employees’ retirement plans or to the City’s obligation to bargain in good faith.”

The city attorney's office has "unilaterally changed its interpretation" of the city charter, Corona wrote, allowing workers to double dip despite a ban against employees in the Los Angeles City Employees' Retirement System taking another paid job with the city.

So far, Corona said in an interview, four to six city employees have retired from a LACERS position, then taken a new salaried position with DWP, which has its own pension system.

But in his cease-and-desist letter, he predicted "cascading effects," with employees rushing to take advantage and city taxpayers footing the bill.

"It would spark a flood of retirements from LACERS-covered positions, exacerbating the already extreme exodus of expert and experienced employees from key positions," Corona wrote.

City employees who transfer from a LACERS position to DWP would also be able to collect a DWP pension when they retire, Corona said.

A representative for Service Employees International Union 721, a union that represents civilian city employees who are covered by LACERS, declined to comment on the cease-and-desist letter.

The city attorney’s office said it is not unlawful to retire from a LACERS position and begin a DWP position, noting that the reverse has long been permitted.

“Under the Charter, the hard-working employees of the Department of Water and Power have, for more than 80 years, been able to retire, collect a pension, and then seek further employment with the City in LACERS-covered positions. This decades-old practice is not unlawful,” the city attorney’s office said in a statement.

“Just as DWP retirees have done for decades in other City positions, LACERS retirees can play a key role by bringing their expertise to positions with DWP,” the statement said.

Some of the dispute between the IBEW Local 18 and the city attorney's office boils down to whether the DWP is included in the city charter's prohibition against taking another city job after retirement.

In his cease-and-desist letter, Corona argued that a "city" job includes positions with the DWP.

IBEW Local 18 is also filing an unfair practices charge with the Los Angeles Employee Relations Board for the city's alleged failure to notify and "meet and confer" with the union about its revised interpretation of the charter.

The city attorney’s office said it plans to respond to Corona's letter in writing.

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.

GM UAW members frustrated by cap on 1st phase of $50K buyout, demand Fain take action

Jamie L. LaReau, Phoebe Wall Howard and Eric D. Lawrence, Detroit Free Press
Updated Fri, March 15, 2024 


At 5 a.m. Thursday nearly 50 UAW Local 14 members who work at General Motors' Toledo Propulsion Systems plant eagerly gathered to learn the long-awaited details of how the automaker's special attrition retirement program would work — and who could take advantage of it.

The program, negotiated last fall during the settlement of the UAW strike against the Detroit Three automakers, will pay a pretax lump sum of $50,000 to eligible workers who retire. GM agreed to offer buyout programs during the 4½-year UAW contract, but the timing of those programs and other details still needed to be negotiated.

Tom Ruddy was among those waiting. At 62, Ruddy wanted to retire two months ago after 38 years on the job. But he held off to see whether he could participate in the first phase of the buyout program.

Tom Ruddy, 62, is approaching his 38th year at General Motors' Toledo Propulsion Systems plant and is ready to retire, but is waiting on GM to determine the dates and details of a special attrition retirement program that will pay a pretax lump sum of $50,000.

"I felt total disappointment," Ruddy told the Free Press after he learned he likely won't be eligible now. "I am No. 294 on the seniority list. They came out with this (program) and only 2% of us can go. That is only 26 people at our plant. So all of us are just shocked. They rolled it out across all the GM plants and said, 'Only 2% per plant. That is what you get, no more.' "

The news that GM and the UAW International leaders agreed to 2% at each of GM's U.S. plants in this first phase of the program has left some members and local union leaders frustrated over the low number, and even worse, that the UAW agreed to it. Some are now demanding UAW President Shawn Fain step in and change it.

The 2% figure means about 900 of the approximately 46,000 union members across GM get the buyout in this first program phase. The UAW says about 7,800 GM hourly workers are eligible for retirement at the moment.

At Toledo Propulsion there are about 1,350 hourly employees and about 200 of them want to retire now, but UAW Local 14 President Tony Totty said he expects about 24 production and 3 skilled trades workers will be allowed under the program at this time. The rest will either have to wait for the next offering, whenever that might occur during the life of the contract, or retire without the extra cash.

“That meeting was rough and our members were mad and they have every right to be,” Totty told the Free Press after the meeting with GM.
'Leave a voicemail' for Fain and Booth

The UAW's agreement with GM will allow for all of the eligible employees who want to retire and get the buyout to do so during the life of the contract, just not in this first phase, and there's no news about the next opportunity.

“I am gone. I am done playing their game," Ruddy said. "I’ve worked here 38 years, I’ve had a great work record, I’ve been a valued employee at this place and loved working here and this is a sour end to it."

There were seven informational meetings held Thursday at Toledo Propulsion that drew about 250 members in total, Totty said. He and his members are so angry about the 2% cap in this first phase, that on Friday the Local 14 sent out a letter via text message to its 1,350 members — with plans to post it widely across social media later for all union members — urging them to call the UAW's Solidarity House in Detroit and "leave a voicemail" of protest to Fain and UAW Vice President for the GM Department Mike Booth over their agreement to the 2% cap in the first phase.

The letter, which is signed by Totty and Local 14 Shop Chairman Jeff King, states the two have heard the "frustration and dissatisfaction" from members over the 2% cap and that GM and the UAW are "not being fair."

Tony Totty, president of UAW Local 14 which represents the workforce at General Motors Toledo Propulsion Systems plant, wants to know the details of GM’s special attrition retirement program because he estimates about 200 of the local union’s membership there would like to retire

"Ford and Stellantis both have uncapped (buyout programs) for their 2023 agreements," the letter states.

During the strike, "we were told that members were the highest authority. Please use that authority to get fairness in this agreement," the letter states.

But as the Free Press reported last month, Booth wrote in a letter to membership warning them that not all who want to retire and get the buyout would be able to do so in the first phase. A GM spokesperson would not elaborate on why buyouts are being so limited in the first phase.

On Friday, the UAW emailed a statement from Booth to the Free Press. It said there are 7,800 UAW members at GM who are eligible to retire and that number is expected to nearly double over the life of the agreement.

“Every UAW member at GM who is eligible to retire during the life of this agreement will be provided the opportunity to retire and receive the $50,000 (buyout),” Booth said in the statement. “GM has the highest number of retirement eligible employees of the Big Three. It is not possible for thousands of workers to retire all at once and for the plants to keep running. So me and my staff have been negotiating for UAW members to be able to retire in phases.”

He said GM has agreed to have “as many phases as needed” to make sure that everyone who is eligible to retire and wants to receive the $50,000 bonus can do so.

“In this first phase, I agreed with the company to limit the number who can retire immediately to 2% of the total population of the workforce at a plant,” Booth said. “That means that 900 UAW members across all of GM will be eligible to retire immediately and receive the $50,000. But that’s just the first group. This is NOT the total number or anywhere close to the final number of those who will receive the (buyout).”

GM spokeswoman Genna Young declined to discuss details of the program with the Free Press. She emailed a statement saying the buyout program will be implemented in distinct phases, "and all interested eligible employees will have the opportunity to receive a (buyout) during the life of this agreement. We have started communications for the initial phase to ensure that eligible employees have the information they need. We are working to carry out fully the commitments we made under the national agreement."
People can retire, just not clear when for some

The UAW contract with GM states that prior to each of the times it will offer the buyout program, GM and the union will agree on the "timing, size, and scope of the offering." It is that caveat that has many union members frustrated that they did not get more clarity around what that would mean and that they didn't demand more answers before accepting the deal.

General Motors Wentzville Assembly employees at work Friday, Dec. 13, 2019, at the plant in Wentzville, Missouri.

"For us to not read that might be on our part, but (GM contract) says ‘size and scope to be mutually agreed upon’ so that means our union agreed to 2%," Ruddy said. "The way I understood it was, if 300 people wanted to go at the first of the year, they had to let 300 people go."

A GM hourly employee at a parts plant told the Free Press only two people in the plant will get to take the buyout in this first phase, "Needless to say, there are a lot of upset people at my facility, including me. I have 39 years seniority." The employee declined to be named for fear of retribution for speaking out publicly.
How it will work

According to interviews with several union locals' leaders and members and the documents the UAW sent to its members, here is how the GM program will work:

Enrollment for the first phase of the program starts March 23 and runs through May 6, documents said. The documents said 2% at each plant are eligible, with an equal split coming from production workers and skilled trades.

So, for example, if a facility has 1,000 union member employees and 900 of them are production workers and 100 are skilled trades, 2% of each group can take the buyout. So that would be 18 production people and two skilled trades people for a total of 20 people, or 2% of the total plant population. Totty said it is his understanding that if that facility only has, say, one skilled trades person who signs up for the program and is eligible for the buyout, then the other slot will go to a skilled trades person at a different facility.

The 2% cap this time around could result in a person with 30 years seniority at a large plant getting the buyout and a person with 40 years at a different, smaller plant, having to wait until the next phase or retire without the buyout.
Ford and Stellantis deals

The application window for the $50,000 buyout program at Ford opened up in January and ran through March 1. Ford negotiated it directly with the UAW, said Ford spokeswoman Jessica Enoch. At Ford, when a UAW member becomes eligible for retirement based on age or years of service, the retirement day would be on the first day of the following month, Enoch told the Detroit Free Press. So, for example, if someone has a working anniversary of April 15, they begin retirement on May 1.

There is no cap on the number of people who may apply to retire, she said. There are no waves of implementation, Enoch said. She declined to provide any retiree counts related to current or future buyouts as part of the UAW contract. Enoch said that 2024 is the only buyout planned for these workers during this union contract.

Striking Ford Motor Company employees represented by the UAW and Local 900 picket on the sidewalk across the entrance to Gate 9 at the Michigan Assembly in Wayne blocking independent truck drivers from getting into the plant on Friday, Sept. 15, 2023. A member of the Teamsters told the truckers that the strikers would be here all day and that it would be impossible for them to pull in for their deliveries or pickups.More

The only reason a retirement date wouldn’t take effect immediately, as outlined in the program specifics, is if there’s an operational need to retain employees longer and those are limited circumstances, Enoch said.

Last month, the Free Press reported the UAW-represented employees at Stellantis began receiving buyout offers and eligible employees have until Dec. 31 to accept the offer. Another lump sum deal will be offered in 2026.

More: GM announces a management shake-up as it loses 2 key executives

More: Analysts: And just like that, the pressure on GM CEO Mary Barra to execute, just escalated

Stellantis spokeswoman Jodi Tinson told the Free Press that the 2024 Incentive Plan for Retirement for UAW-represented members first went out to eligible employees over the Christmas holiday and any employee who meets the eligibility criteria can accept.

The exact date for the $50,000 payment is contingent on the employee separating on a date approved by management and is based on operational needs, Tinson said. That means an employee's separation date may be extended.

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: GM UAW members frustrated over new details of $50K buyout program

How the carnage on the Eastern Front transformed the First World War

Simon Heffer

TELEGRAPH
Fri, March 15, 2024

German trenches near Ivangorod, in occupied Poland, in 1915 - PA

It is an oddity of how the British have written and read history over the last century that the Great War, which started because of events in eastern Europe, has largely been interpreted and remembered through the prism of over four years of carnage taking place on a strip of land that ran from the Channel down the French/Belgian and French/German borders. Yet as Nick Lloyd reminds us in The Eastern Front, his exhaustive, highly-detailed and meticulously researched book, the consequences of the fighting in the central and south-eastern European theatres were profound for the future of the continent – indeed, of the world.

It was along this front – frozen in winter, baked in the summer – that the principal mistakes and executions of policy were made that put Britain, France, Italy and the United States in the victors’ chairs at the 1919 Versailles conference, changing the map of Europe forever and prompting the discord and instability that provoked the resumption of hostilities in 1939. The main combatants on this front were the Habsburg empire in Austria-Hungary, a genuine thousand-year Reich with roots in Charlemagne’s Holy Roman Empire, and whose determination to fight Serbia to avenge the murders of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife in Sarajevo made war inevitable. Austria went into the war thanks to the promise of support from Germany, a superior military power that had provided the so-called “blank cheque” to its allies in July 1914 to go ahead and do what it felt it must to gain that revenge.

The first power to mobilise, however, was Russia, which chose to fight to defend its fellow Slavs in Serbia. This dragged in Russia’s French allies in the Entente, and Germany’s decision to invade France through Belgium brought in the British Empire, completing the train of events that caused a world-changing and fundamentally disastrous war. Later, and also part of Lloyd’s picture of this front, the Italians came in to fight the Austrians, hoping for Trieste and other territorial gains; the Romanians came in behind the Allies too, while the Bulgarians joined the Central Powers. An important part of this book is also the detail of how an expeditionary force of French and British troops arrived by sea at Salonika and, eventually, led a campaign to liberate Serbia from the south.


Lloyd depicts a war in the east characterised by overstretch and attrition, and in which an old sense of almost feudal obligation to crown and country is swept away by the realities of a mindless conflict and what becomes its inevitable consequence, uprising and revolt by those pressed to fight. Germany has to fight in both the west and the east, which causes conflict within its high command and with its Austrian allies, who complain constantly that more German men and firepower would have quickly finished off an often incompetent and disoriented Russian enemy. Austria concentrated on seeing off the Russians in Galicia and the southern stretch of the front, but, whereas the Germans had thrashed Russia at Tannenberg in the autumn of 1914 and continued to harry their forces right to the end, the Austrians were in a constant back-and-forth with them. Nothing decisive happened until Russia turned in upon itself in 1917, and chose to fight the class struggle rather than any external enemy.

On taking power, Lenin rushed to withdraw Russia from the conflict - Getty

Lloyd describes the events of the Russian revolution clearly and illuminatingly, and has a particularly fine account of the conference at Brest-Litovsk in the winter of 1917-18 that confirmed Russia’s departure from the war. The Tsar’s army had, after February 1917 when the people had had enough, imploded in a lethal riot of indiscipline that progressed to murdering its officers and, in increasing number, refusing to fight. Once Lenin seized power in November 1917, he made it clear Russia would leave the war forthwith, though he tried to impose terms (through his plenipotentiary, Trotsky) that would have been better from a conqueror and not a supplicant. Germany then annexed a large swath of eastern Europe, Russia and Ukraine, and put Russia back in its box. The consequences of that, and subsequent, boundary revisions are still being fought out to this day.

Throughout the conflict on this front, a swift and decisive outcome was prevented because of insufficient war production – there were never enough guns, rifles, ammunition, warm clothing, boots, food or, in the end, men – and that was why the Central Powers eventually lost. Even after the great offensive of 1918 in the West, which seemed to have decided the Allies’ defeat, under-supply and plummeting morale ensured the collapse of Austria-Hungary and Germany.

Lloyd is right to salute the actions of Karl, the young prince who succeeded his uncle Franz Josef as Austro-Hungarian emperor and king in 1916, and almost immediately started to use his family connections to open channels with the French and British to end the conflict. The old military caste in Prussia and Russia would not hear of it, and so in the end the beleaguered and demoralised people spoke. In the east, especially, it was a predictably pig-headed end to a war whose fantastic destructiveness did not end in 1918.

The Eastern Front by Nick Lloyd is published by Viking

The Science Is Clear. Over 30,000 People Have Died in Gaza

Les Roberts

TIME
Fri, March 15, 2024 

Palestinians recite a prayer over bodies of persons killed in Israeli bombing in Deir el-Balah in the central Gaza Strip before their burial on March 14, 2024, amid the ongoing war between Israel and the Hamas movement. Credit - AFP-Getty Images

The first shock was the number of people killed in Israel—1,200 in a day, Oct. 7. But in the months since, the world has been taken aback by the number of deaths reported out of Gaza: 30,000 through the end of February. Because the death count is compiled by the local Ministry of Health (MOH), an agency controlled by Hamas, which governs Gaza, the tally has been subject to skepticism. Israel’s U.N. ambassador and online pundits have purported that the numbers are exaggerated or, as a recent article in Tablet alleged, simply faked.

Actually, the numbers are likely conservative. The science is extremely clear.

In December, the medical journal The Lancet, published two critiques of the death surveillance process done by extremely experienced scholars at Johns Hopkins and The London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Both concluded that the Gazan numbers were plausible and credible, albeit by somewhat different techniques and logic.

The Hopkins’ analysis looked at internal aspects of the data like comparing hospital trend reports to the overall numbers, but also compared the death rates among U.N. employees with the overall MOH reports in terms of trends and mechanisms of death. There are a huge number of U.N. employees in Gaza, and very close correlations between the rates of death of U.N. employees and the overall population, and regarding the fraction dying under bombs in their homes.

The London School’s analysis looked at some of the same issues, found near perfect correlation between Government bombing reports and satellite imagery, but focused on 7,000 deaths reported through health facilities and morgues during last October. In Gaza, there is a resident ID system which involves a number assigned to young children, and the assigned numbers have risen sequentially over more than half a century with a couple of exceptions. At two different times 20 years apart, there have been “catch-up” campaigns where people of any age who had been missed or had migrated to Gaza could get an ID number. The data analyzed by the London group came directly from many health facilities and morgues, and constituted most of the summary numbers later released by the MOH. In the data, when people’s ID numbers were plotted against the decedent’s age, there were two broad bands of age associated exactly with the ID numbers that had been given out in those catch-up campaigns. Given that this data was flowing from many different medical and morgue facilities, the authors concluded that it is very unlikely that there could be meaningful data fabrication.

Read More: What U.S. Doctors Saw in Gaza

But, the evidence supporting the Gaza MOH mortality number credibility goes beyond these two assessments.

In 2021, an assessment of the MOH mortality surveillance system found that the system under-reported by 13%. In past crises, Doctors Without Borders (MSF) and UN reports have aligned closely with those of the MOH in spite of Israeli dismissals. Most countries in the world record far fewer than 87% of their deaths, but Gaza has many characteristics that make surveillance work well. In spite of relatively high rates of poverty, this is a highly educated population that is engaged with the health system. For example, a USAID funded assessment found in 2014 that 99% of births were attended by a trained health professional compared to about 80% globally. Gaza is geographically small and people have a relatively short distance to reach health facilities. Thus, nothing about Gaza’s MOH high level of function should be triggering this skepticism.

Do the Gaza MOH numbers combine combatants and civilians? Yes, but this does not imply manipulation. Making the distinction is sometimes not called for and is functionally hard for the health system to do. There is something imperfect in every government measure, but that does not mean they should be ignored.

I speak from experience. In 1992, by a fellowship lottery process and a lot of luck, I ended up working in the Refugee Branch at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, CDC. The CDC was an amazing place, with so many inspiring people, and an ever-present sense of community and its history. In my four years at CDC, many times I heard about how CDC was the first institution to epidemiologically measure the death toll in real time during a war. Right at the close of the Biafra War in 1970, a young epidemiologist borrowed a technique from wildlife biology called capture-recapture, and estimated that half of the population within the enclave of Biafra had died. What I only recently discovered, is that this death toll was never reported in a public venue. It seems that Richard Nixon ran for office aggressively criticizing President Johnson for allowing the Biafran Famine to occur. Two years into his own Presidency, a revelation that probably between one and two million people had died, mostly on Nixon’s watch, would have been politically embarrassing.

It seems death tolls in wars have always been political. Be it the sinking of the Maine and the death of over 200 sailors in 1898, likely from a non-intentional fire, being used as an excuse to start the Spanish-American war, or General Wesley Clark in 1999 citing exaggerated numbers of dead in mass graves in Kosovo to justify that war. What is comforting, is that usually over time, reality and science have a way of gaining acceptance, sometimes even while the conflict is underway, such as Syria.

In fact, there may have never been a major conflict where real-time surveillance data about deaths was more complete than is unfolding in Gaza today.

There are certain building blocks of society that require agreement for us to work well collectively. Society is weaker and discourse less productive if we cannot agree on at least a few basic things. In the case of Gaza, acknowledging that there was an appalling and extremely deadly attack on October 7th, and that over 30,000 Gazans have died since, mostly women and children, seems like the most basic of cornerstones of reality on which to move toward constructive discussion and eventual resolution.

THE LAZY CLASS LECTURES US

'Retirement Is A Stupid Idea': Rich Political Commentator Says It's 'Totally Insane' To Believe You Should Receive Social Security After Only Working For 45 Years — But Those Who 'Actually Work For A Living' Argue Retirement Is The Dream Getting Them Through Each Day

Jeannine Mancini
Fri, March 15, 2024 at 1:42 PM MDT·4 min read

Ben Shapiro, a divisive conservative political commentator, stoked controversy with his recent remarks dismissing the concept of retirement as “a stupid idea.”

During the March 12 edition of his "Daily Wire" podcast, Shapiro said, “Frankly, I think retirement itself is a stupid idea unless you have some sort of health problem.”

The 40-year-old pundit, who has a reported $50 million net worth from his media empire, criticized the retirement age of 65 in the United States.

“No one in the United States should be retiring at 65 years old. ... It’s totally insane that you believe that you should be able to work from the time that you are essentially 20 to the time that you are 65 — 45 years — pay in, and then you’ll receive Social Security benefits sufficient to support you and your family for, like, another 20 years. That’s crazy talk.”

Shapiro’s diatribe against the traditional retirement model sparked backlash across social media, with many accusing the wealthy influencer of being out of touch with the realities facing working-class Americans.

“He’s a glorified influencer who does nothing more than sit behind a desk and talk to cameras to make a living. He has no right to lecture anyone on work,” one critic posted in a reaction video on YouTube.

Others highlighted the physical toll many professions take over a lifetime.

“Shapiro would never make it doing a physical labor job where your body is broken down after years of hard work,” another commenter wrote. “For those of us who actually work for a living, retirement is something we dream of.”

Trending: Boomers and Gen Z agree they need a salary of around $125,000 a year to be happy, but Millennials say they need how much?

The notion of retirement as an earned, well-deserved reprieve from decades of labor resonates with many Americans struggling with stagnant wages and increased longevity. As one user posted, “If you like making money, it makes sense to never retire, but most of us don’t really like what we do to make money and are only working so we no longer have to work. We are just in it for the money so we can retire early.”

The sentiment opposing raising the retirement age is reflected in a recent Quinnipiac University national poll of adults that found 78% of respondents are against proposals to increase the full Social Security retirement age from 67 to 70. Opposition remained firm at 62% even when respondents were told raising the age could help benefits last longer.

The controversy amplifies the larger debate around the fiscal pressures and societal attitudes surrounding retirement. With Americans living longer and the Social Security system facing potential insolvency, policymakers have long pondered increasing the retirement age. Yet for millions of workers in physically demanding jobs or lower income brackets, the dream of an eventual rest from labor is one of the few hopes carrying them through the day.

This disconnect between Shapiro’s privilege and most workers’ realities struck a nerve. Yet rather than depend solely on Social Security, retirement timing and financial independence are best planned through strategic investing and consulting financial advisers.

Financial advisers can provide objective guidance on building a portfolio and savings rate that supports your target retirement age and desired lifestyle without being beholden to solely federal benefits. With careful preparation, the dream of retirement remains attainable to people who prioritize it, regardless of personas like Shapiro diminishing its value.

CRIMINAL CAPITALI$M MODI'S INDIA

US probing Adani Group and founder over potential bribery, Bloomberg reports

Reuters
Fri, March 15, 2024 

A logo of the Adani Group is seen on a commercial complex in Mumbai

(Reuters) -The United States has widened its investigation of India's Adani Group to focus on the conduct of its founder, Gautam Adani, and whether the company may have engaged in bribery, Bloomberg News reported on Friday.

Prosecutors are digging into whether an Adani entity or people linked to the company, including Gautam Adani, were involved in paying officials in India for favorable treatment on an energy project, the report said, citing people with direct knowledge of the matter.


The U.S. Attorney's office for the Eastern District of New York and the Justice Department's fraud unit in Washington are handling the investigation and are also looking at Indian renewable energy company Azure Power Global, the report added.

"We are not aware of any investigation against our chairman," Adani Group told Bloomberg News.

Adani Group, Azure Power and the DOJ did not immediately respond to Reuters' requests for comments. The Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of New York could not be immediately reached.

Adani Group's stocks and bonds saw a massive selloff early last year after U.S. short-seller Hindenburg Research issued a report that alleged improper governance practices, stock manipulation and the use of tax havens by the group. The Indian company has denied these allegations.

(Reporting by Shivani Tanna in Bengaluru; Editing by Maju Samuel)

US Probing Indian Billionaire Gautam Adani and His Group Over Potential Bribery


Tom Schoenberg and Ava Benny-Morrison
Fri, March 15, 2024 


(Bloomberg) -- US prosecutors have widened their probe of India’s Adani Group to focus on whether the company may have engaged in bribery as well as the conduct of the company’s billionaire founder, according to people with direct knowledge of the matter

Investigators are digging into whether an Adani entity, or people linked to the company including Gautam Adani, were involved in paying officials in India for favorable treatment on an energy project, said the people, who asked not to be identified discussing the confidential effort. The probe, which is also looking at Indian renewable energy company Azure Power Global Ltd., is being handled by the US Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York and the Justice Department’s fraud unit in Washington, said people familiar with the matter.

“We are not aware of any investigation against our chairman,” Adani Group said in an emailed statement. “As a business group that operates with the highest standards of governance, we are subject to and fully compliant with anti-corruption and anti-bribery laws in India and other countries.”

Representatives for the Justice Department in Brooklyn and Washington declined to comment. Azure didn’t respond to requests for comment. Gautam Adani, his company and Azure haven’t been charged with wrongdoing by the Justice Department, and investigations don’t always lead to prosecutions.

In addition to being a monolithic presence in its home country, with ports, airports, power lines and highway developments, Adani Group attracts capital from around the world. US law allows federal prosecutors to pursue foreign corruption allegations if they involve certain links to American investors or markets.

Read More: Asia’s Richest Man Sells the World a Green Dream Built on Coal

Adani’s sprawling empire was rocked early last year by claims from short-seller Hindenburg Research that the conglomerate manipulated its stock price and committed accounting fraud. The group has vigorously denied those allegations and the shares have largely climbed back from their initial plunge.


Still, the report prompted the Justice Department, as well as the Securities and Exchange Commission, to look into some of the claims, Bloomberg News reported last year.

Read More: Adani Group Statements to Investors Draw US Scrutiny

The Adani probe is now at an advanced stage, according to the people. The DOJ can choose to pursue its investigations without notifying the parties.

Adani Group and Azure compete in India’s green-energy sector, and in recent years both have won contracts for projects as part of the same state-run solar program. Adani is seeking to position itself as world-leading renewable-energy company at a time when Prime Minister Narendra Modi, a perceived close ally of Gautam Adani, is pushing major green initiatives.

Azure has been dealing with fallout from whistleblower complaints of illicit payments and was delisted from the New York Stock Exchange late last year over delayed filings.

Azure said last year that it was cooperating with the Justice Department and SEC after an internal probe found evidence that people previously affiliated with the firm may have been aware, or been involved in, an “apparent scheme with persons outside the Parent to make improper payments in relation to certain projects.”

FCPA Cases

The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act makes it a crime for a company or person with US links — such as a public listing, American investors or a joint venture — to pay or offer something of value to another government’s officials for favorable treatment. Prosecutors in Brooklyn have a history of aggressively pursuing those cases. Adani Group doesn’t trade in the US, but it does have American investors.

So-called FCPA investigations can take years, complicated by the need to gather evidence and interview witnesses who may be outside the US. The cases, however, are often high-profile and can result in huge fines for companies and big wins for prosecutors.

Officials have increasingly sought to bring FCPA cases against executives, although it’s been uncommon for the head of a major company to be charged.

Adani Rebound

Gautam Adani, 61, has led the pushback against previous claims of impropriety. In a July speech to shareholders, he described Hindenburg Research’s allegations as “malicious” and “false narratives.”

After initially cratering on the short-seller’s claims, flagship Adani Enterprises Ltd. shares have gained more than 70% over the past year. Gautam Adani’s fortune has again surged toward $100 billion, making him the world’s 14th richest person, according to Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

India also is now poised to resolve its own investigations into the firm after the country’s top court in January ordered regulators there to conclude their investigation within three months, and said no more probes were needed. That came after a committee appointed by that court last year found no regulatory failure nor signs of price manipulation in Adani Group stocks.

Read More: Adani Fortune Hits $100 Billion Again as Short-Seller Pain Ebbs

From the start, the US scrutiny of Adani Group has been laced with geopolitical implications. The company is deeply intertwined with the economy in India, which the White House has been courting as an ally to counter China. Both Adani and Modi hail from the western Indian state of Gujarat and have known each other for years.

The DOJ probe hasn’t stopped Washington from working with Adani Group entities.

Last year, the US International Development Finance Corp. said it would provide $553 million in financing to an Adani unit for a port terminal in Sri Lanka’s capital, marking the government agency’s largest infrastructure investment in Asia, with a goal of curbing China’s influence in the region.

A senior US official told Bloomberg News that before authorizing the loan, the government found Hindenburg’s allegations weren’t applicable to the subsidiary spearheading the Sri Lankan project.

--With assistance from Patricia Hurtado.

A 15-year problem that has plagued corporate America is finally turning around

Josh Schafer
·Reporter
Sat, March 16, 2024 

American workers are becoming more productive.

Recent analysis from Bank of America showed the average revenue per worker for companies in the S&P 500 hit an all-time high in February after 15 years of no gains. This is one of several signs that labor productivity is rebounding after slumping during 2022.

Some on Wall Street think the developments in labor productivity could help the stock market survive stickier-than-expected inflation that has emerged as a concern in recent weeks.

"If productivity goes higher, then [companies] are able to cut costs, improve margins, things like that," Bank of America US and Canada equity strategist Ohsung Kwon told Yahoo Finance. "That's why companies are so focused on improving productivity. There's a lot of macro headwinds happening. So they are trying to find ways to improve productivity and sort of offset those headwinds."

The headwinds Kwon references include the risk the Federal Reserve holds off on cutting interest rates as inflation's path downward continues to prove bumpier than initially hoped. Two separate reports released this week showed inflation was hotter than economists expected in February. And annual wage growth during the month was higher than what economists have said the Fed wants to see to feel confident inflation is moving down to its 2% target.

The research team at Carson Group argues an increase in productivity could offset these concerns, though.

"With productivity soaring like it is and will hopefully continue like it can, you don't have to worry about inflation coming back, you really don't," Carson Group chief market strategist Ryan Detrick told Yahoo Finance.

Detrick's colleague Sonu Varghese explained that persistent wage growth can usually cause an inflation problem if consumers have more money to spend on goods. Demand for goods would rise as workers make more money, therefore pushing prices higher. This paradigm shifts, though, if productivity picks up. In that instance, the economy could sustain higher wages because companies would also be producing more goods. If both the demand and supply of goods pick up, then prices can remain stable.

Varghese highlighted two different instances where wage growth surged. In the 1970s, wage growth picked up but productivity didn't, leading to a decade-long battle with persistent inflation. In the 1990s, wage growth gains were met with a productivity boom and subsequently led to a prosperous stretch for both US economic growth and stock market gains.

As productivity picks up, it increases the overall trajectory of the US economic growth, Renaissance Macro head of economic research Neil Dutta told Yahoo Finance.

That's welcome news for stocks.

Companies can choose to use their increased financial gains from productivity in a variety of ways. One would be to keep boosting wages to lure in more workers. But recent shifts in the labor market show that likely won't be the case.

The labor market has shown some signs of softening and the large pay bumps needed to lure workers in the post-lockdown job market have eased. The quits rate, a sign of confidence among workers, hit its lowest level since August 2020 in January.

This would indicate that companies would take their additional revenues from increased productivity and use them to boost margins. Higher margins are usually a tailwind for future company earnings, which would in theory lift equities.

All of this comes without a mention of artificial intelligence, which has been lauded as a potential productivity booster.

"AI is kind of like the cherry on the top," Kwon said. "AI obviously is going to be a huge productivity enhancer. I don't know when that's going to happen. But we do think that is going to happen and be a huge boost to productivity as well."

Why a Native American Nation Is Challenging the U.S. Over a 1794 Treaty

Grace Ashford
Fri, March 15, 2024 

Joe Heath, a lawyer for the Onondaga Nation, at Onondaga Creek, south of Syracuse, N.Y., Nov. 30, 2023. (Lauren Petracca/The New York Times)

ONONDAGA NATION TERRITORY, N.Y. — Four or five years ago, Sidney Hill’s young son came to him with a question that Hill didn’t know how to answer.

The boy had learned that day about the millions of acres of land that his people, the Onondaga, had once called home, and the way that their homeland had been taken parcel by parcel by the state of New York, until all that was left was 11 square miles south of Syracuse.

“We lost all this land,” Hill recalled his son saying. “How can that be?”

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In many ways, Hill was the best person to answer that question. As Tadodaho, the spiritual leader of the Onondaga Nation, he was responsible for protecting its legacy and guiding it into the future. He was one of a handful of elders who have worked for decades on a legal and diplomatic strategy to fight back against the historic wrongs his son now sought to understand.

Even so, it caught him off balance.

The younger generation needed to know, he said. “But it doesn’t make much sense to them.”

Hill tried to reassure his son that all that injustice was in the past.

But he knew how hard it was to accept past wrongs, particularly when their consequences so informed the present. It was why he had spent so long pushing — first Onondaga elders, then the U.S. justice system and, finally, an international human rights commission — for a correction to that history.

The Onondaga claim that the United States violated a 1794 treaty, signed by George Washington, that guaranteed 2.5 million acres in central New York to them. The case, filed in 2014, is the second brought by an American Indian nation against the United States in an international human rights body; a finding is expected as soon as this year.

Even if the Onondaga are successful, the result will mostly be symbolic. The entity, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, has no power to enforce a finding or settlement, and the United States has said that it does not consider the commission’s recommendations to be binding.

“We could win against them, but that doesn’t mean that they have to abide by whatever,” Hill said in an interview.

The 2.5 million acres have long since been transformed by highways and utility lines, shopping malls, universities, airports and roller rinks.

The territory encompasses the cities of Binghamton and Syracuse, as well as more than 30 state forests, dozens of lakes and countless streams and tributaries. It is also home to 24 Superfund sites, the environmental detritus of the powerhouse economy that helped central New York thrive during the beginning and middle half of the 20th century.

Most notorious of these is Lake Onondaga, which once held the dubious title of America’s most polluted lake.

Industrial waste has left its mark on Onondaga territory, leaving the nation unable to fish from its streams and rivers. The history of environmental degradation is part of what motivates the Onondaga, who consider it their sacred responsibility to protect their land.

One of their chief objectives in filing the petition is a seat at the table on environmental decisions across the original territory. The other is an acknowledgment that New York, even if only in principle, owes them 2.5 million acres.

Across the nation, government officials have grappled with the notion of reparations to address historical injustices. In 2022, officials in Evanston, Illinois, began distributing $25,000 to Black descendants of enslaved people as reparations for housing discrimination.

In New York, people who were once imprisoned for marijuana crimes received preference for licenses to sell cannabis; Gov. Kathy Hochul last year also created a statewide task force to examine whether reparations can be made to address the legacy of racial injustice.

Some Native nations have been willing to drop land claims in exchange for licenses to operate casinos. But the Onondaga say they are not interested in cash. Nor are they interested in licenses to sell cannabis or operate a casino — which they consider socially irresponsible and a threat to their tribal sovereignty.

There’s really just one thing that Hill says would be an acceptable form of payment: land.

The Onondaga insist they are not looking to displace anyone. Instead they hope the state might turn over a tract of unspoiled land for the nation to hunt, fish, preserve or develop as it sees fit. One such repatriation effort is underway: the return of 1,000 acres as a part of a federal settlement with Honeywell International for the contamination of Onondaga Lake.

The United States has not contested the Onondaga’s account of how the nation lost its land. Indeed, the lawyers representing the United States in the Onondaga case have centered their argument on legal precedence, noting that courts at every level — including the U.S. Supreme Court — rejected the Onondaga’s claims as too old and most remedies too disruptive to the region’s current inhabitants.

To the Onondaga, the logic required to square these contentions seems unfair. Why should the United States be allowed to steal their land and face no obligation to give some back?

Joe Heath, a lawyer representing the Onondaga, said the refusal to acknowledge the past stands in the way of healing the future.

“If we don’t admit that those things have happened, how do we move forward together?” he said. But Heath understood that such an admission would have serious legal and practical implications.

“The problem is that all of the land in New York, in the United States, is stolen Indian land,” he said. “What does that mean in terms of U.S. property law?”

‘All of Our Country and for a Very Trifle’

There was a time when the United States worked with the Haudenosaunee, the confederacy that includes the Onondaga, Cayuga, Oneida, Tuscarora, Mohawk and Seneca nations, as the fledgling government sought to defuse conflicts in the aftermath of the Revolutionary War.

The federal government entered into three treaties that affirmed the confederacy’s sovereignty and ownership over much of the northern part of New York state. Critically, those treaties guaranteed that no one but the federal government would have the authority to deal with the Haudenosaunee.

But as early as 1788, New York state had started to chip away at the Haudenosaunee land and sovereignty. Over the next 34 years, the state would come to control nearly all of the Onondaga land — as well as most of that owned by the other Haudenosaunee nations — because of a series of transactions that the Onondaga say were illegal.

“The [New] York people have got almost all of our Country and for a very trifle,” Onondaga chiefs told federal officials in 1794, according to the papers of U.S. Indian Commissioner Timothy Pickering.

For the next two centuries, the Onondaga continued to fruitlessly press their case in numerous face-to-face meetings with presidents, members of Congress and governors of New York.

Legal options were limited: In New York, for example, Native people were not considered to have standing to sue on their own behalf until 1987.

When Indian nations did make it into the courtroom, many claims were dismissed.

The Onondaga’s decision to go to court was decades in the making, with the first discussions beginning more than 40 years ago. For the next 20 years, the council debated in the long house — a long, low structure made of whole logs used for ceremonial events and Haudenosaunee gatherings.

Hill is one of 14 chiefs on that council, each of whom represents a different clan. In the Onondaga tradition, these chiefs are male, but they are appointed by the clan mothers.

The chiefs did not initially embrace the idea of a lawsuit, seeing it as another venue for broken promises.

“Our elders were always afraid of going into courts,” Hill said. Many were concerned that losing in court could lead them to lose what little land they had left.

“We finally said: We have to do something,” Hill said.

In 2005, the Onondaga filed a version of their current claim in U.S. District Court in the Northern District of New York, naming as defendants the state of New York, its governor, Onondaga County, the city of Syracuse and a handful of the companies responsible for the environmental degradation over the past centuries. A similar case filed by the Oneida Nation was, at the time, pending before the Supreme Court.

But just 18 days after the Onondaga filed their petition, the Supreme Court rejected the Oneidas’ case. The decision referenced an colonial-era legal theory known as the Doctrine of Discovery, which holds, in part, that Indigenous property claims were nullified by the “discovery” of that land by Christians.

The “long lapse of time” and “the attendant dramatic changes in the character” precluded the Oneida nation from the “disruptive remedy” it sought, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg wrote in the majority decision.

The ruling appeared to doom the chances of any Native nation seeking recompense through the courts. The history seemed settled.

‘Disruptive to Who?’

Of the more than 1,600 words in the Supreme Court’s ruling, one stood out to Hill: “disruptive.”

“When I heard that, I said, ‘Well, OK, disruptive to who?’” he recalled. “It’s already been disruptive to us, as Indigenous people.”

Some might have left it at that: an admission that Native people could never be made whole for the profound wrongs perpetrated on them.

Instead, lawyers for the Onondaga used the rejection as the premise for a new argument. They contended that the U.S. court system’s refusal to find in their favor proved that they could not find justice in the United States.

The petition filed before the international commission amounts to the most direct challenge of the United States’ treatment of Indigenous people to date in terms of human rights — and the first to apply the lens of colonialism.

“What the Onondaga litigation is doing right now is to force a political dialogue with the colonial occupier,” said Andrew Reid, a lawyer representing the Onondaga, adding that a favorable finding could prompt a political conversation about the United States’ treatment of native people on the world stage.

Representatives for the State Department declined to be interviewed and did not respond to requests for comment. But in legal documents, the United States contended that the Onondaga’s central claims have been rejected in prior cases; that they have had “abundant opportunity” for their case to be heard; and that they are merely unhappy with the outcome. It also contended that the commission has no jurisdiction, given that the bulk of the nation’s losses took place two centuries before it was established.

“The judicial process functioned as it should have in this matter,” the United States wrote in legal papers.

The commission’s decision could come at any time, but Hill is trying not to focus on it.

Most days he is glad to have tried.

“We aren’t sure how it’s going to go,” he says. “But at least it won’t be hanging there for the next generation.”

c.2024 The New York Times Company

UK

Competition watchdog probes Barratt’s multi-billion pound Redrow deal

Laura McGuire
Fri, 15 March 2024 

The competition watchdog is to investigate Barratt’s £2.5bn acquisition of rival housebuilder Redrow.

The competition watchdog is to investigate Barratt’s £2.5bn acquisition of rival housebuilder Redrow.

This morning, the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) said it is: “considering whether it may be the case that this transaction, if carried into effect, will result in the creation of a relevant merger situation under the merger provisions of the Enterprise Act 2002”.

“And, if so, whether the creation of that situation may be expected to result in a substantial lessening of competition within any market or markets in the United Kingdom for goods or services.”

The CMA also said it is issuing a preliminary ‘invitation to comment’ to allow interested parties “to submit to the CMA any initial views on the impact that the transaction could have on competition in the UK.”

Barratt said at the time the deal would create the UK’s largest housebuilder and would help accelerate the “delivery of homes this country needs”.

However, the shock deal came shortly before the CMA published its review on the UK’s housebuilding sector, which hardly showered the industry with glory.

The competition regulator identified a number of issues with the market, including complex planning regulations holding back housebuilding, poor quality of homes constructed and high estate management charges during the year-long study.

The CMA also said it “found evidence” during the study, which indicated that some housebuilders may be sharing commercially sensitive information with their competitors. To that end, it launched a new review to investigate pricing practices in the sector.

An investigation has also been launched into some of the country’s biggest house builders, including Barratt, Bellway and Vistry.

The CMA said activity among housebuilders could be “influencing the build-out of sites and the prices of new homes.”

If formed, the ‘Barratt Redrow’ behemoth will have aggregate revenues of £7.45bn and build about 23,000 homes a year.

As part of the terms, Barrett’s shareholders will hold approximately 67.2 per cent of the combined group, whilst Redrow will account for the remaining 32.8 per cent.