Feiyue shoes worn by taiji exponents now seen as ‘cool’
By Peh Shing Huei 6 December 2008
BEIJING: Three months after the end of the Olympics, an obscure Chinese brand is turning out to be the Games’ biggest winner - despite not having paid a single cent as an official sponsor.
Feiyue, an almost-forgotten 1960s shoe brand, is suddenly hip again among young Chinese.
After the stylish taiji exponents wore it during the Games’ opening ceremony in August, it became a must-have for China’s youth.
‘It was crazy. Before the Olympics, no one wanted these shoes,’ said Madam Tang, a sales clerk at Heping shopping mall, one of the few places in Beijing selling the shoes. ‘After the Games, this place was packed with people grabbing four, five pairs each.’
The Feiyue manufacturers in Shanghai declined to be interviewed or provide sales figures. But anecdotal accounts pointed to a massive jump. The boom has had an effect on other old Chinese shoe brands as well, including Warrior and Double Star.
Madam Tang, who declined to give her full name, said she was struggling to sell half a dozen pairs a month before the Games. In September, she moved 2,000 pairs. Sales since then have cooled, but she can still easily sell half a dozen a day now.
Bye Bye Disco, a Beijing shop selling retro Chinese products, also reported brisk sales.
Netizens in the southern city of Guangzhou complained that it was hard to find Feiyue shoes because these were sold out in the few stores that had stocks.
These canvas sneakers - especially popular among students and athletes - were de rigueur daily wear in China up to the late 1980s. They were even regarded as ‘branded’ items, and those who managed to snag a state- issued coupon to buy a pair of Feiyue in the command economy were looked upon with envy.
With growing affluence and the invasion of international brands like Nike and Adidas, however, the local footwear waned in popularity. It became associated primarily with martial arts exponents and poor migrant workers from the countryside who could not afford foreign brands.
A pair of Feiyue, which means ‘flying forward’, costs about 40 yuan (S$9), while foreign-brand sneakers are usually 10 times that price in China.
‘It’s cool, and there is a rebellious feel to it because you are not chasing after the foreign brands like everyone else,’ said photographer Li Xiao, 25, who started wearing Warrior a few years back.
The local brands’ rediscovered popularity has even led to collectors wrapping up these shoes as vintage and setting up blogs to share their passion for old Chinese sneakers.
One such collector, Mr. Jia Wei, said that while patriotism is a factor behind this fever, it is not the driving force. He believed it is quite natural for the Chinese to rediscover something they or their parents grew up with.
Bye Bye Disco owner Sun Peipei, 25, told The Straits Times that the boom was, in fact, ironically fuelled by the shoes’ rebranding in the West.
In 2005, Frenchman Patrice Bastian took a liking to Feiyue and bought rights to the brand outside of China. He introduced more designs and sold it to the European market as a lifestyle fashion accessory for ¥50 (S$97), 10 times the price in China.
It has been a hit in the West, with Elle magazine featuring it a few times and even calling it a ‘must-have’. Hollywood star Orlando Bloom was spotted wearing it earlier this year during a shoot of the movie New York, I Love You.
Such Western ‘endorsements’, said Ms Sun, have made these old Chinese sneakers cool again.
Said Madam Tang: ‘The teenagers who bought it even kept its signature brown wrapping paper as memorabilia. It’s so funny how these shoes are now the latest ‘in’ thing.’
Always and forever Each moment with you Is just like a dream to me That somehow came true, yeah
And I know tomorrow Will still be the same Cuz we got a life of love That won't ever change and
[1] - Everyday love me your own special way Melt all my heart away with a smile Take time to tell me you really care And we'll share tomorrow together Ooh baby, I'll always love you forever
Ever, ever, ever There'll always be sunshine When I look at you It's something I can't explain Just the things that you do If you get lonely Call me and take A second to give to me That magic you make and
1930s beggar-thy-neighbour fears as China devalues
China has begun to devalue the yuan for the first time in over a decade, raising fears that it will set off a 1930s-style race to the bottom and tip the global economy into an even deeper slump.
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard 04 Dec 2008
The central bank has shifted the central peg of its dollar band twice this week in a calculated move that suggests Beijing aims to offset the precipitous slide in Chinese manufacturing by trying to gain further export share abroad.
The futures markets are pricing in a 6pc devaluation over the next year. "This is clearly a big shift in policy and we are now on alert," said Simon Derrick, currency chief at the Bank of New York Mellon.
The move follows a Politburo speech by President Hu Jintao warning that China is "losing competitive edge in the world market".
China has allowed a crawling 20pc revaluation over the past three years. Any reversal risks setting off conflict with the incoming team of President-Elect Barack Obama in Washington. Mr Obama called China a "currency manipulator" during the campaign, a term that carries penalties under US trade law.
Outgoing US Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson is viewed as a "friend of China". He called for a stronger yuan this week before embarking on a visit to Beijing, but the plea was couched in friendly terms. This soft-peddling may soon change.
Hans Redeker, currency head at BNP Paribas, said China's policy switch could set off a dangerous chain of events. "If they play this beggar-thy-neighbour game, it will cause a deflationary shock for the whole world," he said.
It makes sense for countries with current account deficits such as the UK, US or Turkey to let their currencies fall, but China has the world's biggest trade surplus.
Michael Pettis, a professor at Beijing University, said it was "very worrying" that a pro-devalulation bloc seemed to be gaining the upper hand in the Communist Party. "I really do believe that we are on the brink of a very ugly period for trade relations," he said.
China has relied on exports to North America and Europe as its growth engine, making it acutely vulnerable to the contraction in global demand. Mr Pettis said this recalls the role played by the US in the 1920s, a parallel fraught with danger. "In the 1930s the US foolishly tried to dump capacity abroad, but the furious reaction of trading partners caused the strategy to misfire. China already seems to be in the process of engineering its own Smoot-Hawley," he said, referring to the infamous US Tariff Act in 1930.
China showed restraint during the Asian crisis in 1998, holding the line against domino devaluations across the region. It may yet hold the line this time.
However, this crisis is more serious. The manufacturing sector has seen the steepest decline since the records began, with devastation sweeping the textile, furniture and toy sectors. Civil unrest has begun to rock the Guangdong and Longnan regions.
Beijing has slashed rates and unveiled a fiscal stimulus of 14pc of GDP, but most of the spending comes in the form of instructions to local governments to spend more – but without giving them the money. Does China really intend to step in to prop up global demand? The jury is out.
By Geoff Dyer and Jamil Anderlini in Beijing December 5 2008
The US urged China on Friday not to “roll back” the appreciation of its currency that has taken place over the last two years to prevent an even sharper economic slowdown.
Hank Paulson, Treasury secretary, said that the main reason for job losses among Chinese exporters was slowing global demand, not currency appreciation.
“Some people in China, looking at the slowing global economy and seeing what is happening to exports, might blame it on currency appreciation and seek to roll that back,” he said in Beijing. “China understands, as do we, how important currency reform is to rebalancing growth in China.
Mr Paulson was speaking at the end of the two-day strategic economic dialogue, a bi-annual meeting of US and Chinese ministers and officials. The meeting has been accompanied, after a relatively large drop in the renminbi earlier this week, by considerable speculation the Chinese central bank is weakening the currency against the dollar to help exporters.
The two governments warned against the danger of increased protectionism and pledged to boost co-operation to deal with the global financial crisis, promising to make $20bn of trade finance credit available to developing countries struggling to pay for US and Chinese exports.
Mr Paulson said the fiscal stimulus package announced by the Chinese government was “very welcome”. “The Chinese leadership is very focused on what is happening here and will do whatever it takes to maintain growth,” he said.
Chinese officials restated concerns about their heavy exposure to US public debt. Asked about China’s plans for future purchases of US Treasury bonds, Zhu Guangyao, China’s assistant finance minister, said: “We hope the US side will seriously consider China’s concerns and protect the interests of Chinese investors.”
Mr Paulson played down the risks of foreign governments selling out their holdings. ”It is a fact that China is an investor in US securities,” he said. “I do not see any countries with holdings so large that I view it as a threat.”
Both sides said it was important to continue the dialogues, which started in 2006, after the Obama administration is sworn in. “Ideas that work generally do not die,” said Mr Paulson, who before the financial crisis took hold had made relations with China one of his priorities.
Mr Zhu said President-elect Barack Obama had spoken on the phone with Chinese President Hu Jintao and emphasised his willingness to ”further strengthen constructive relations between China and the United States”.
The renminbi appreciated modestly on Friday as speculation about a shift in currency policy receded. Chen Deming, China’s commerce minister, said the recent weakening of the currency against the dollar was not aimed at helping exporters.
Economists said China was highly unlikely to push for a significant depreciation of its currency because of the trade tensions this would invite. However, if the dollar were to continue strengthening, China might slowly weaken the renminbi against the US currency to avoid excessive appreciation against the currencies of other main trading partners.
Sweeping Layoffs Expose Social Tensions; Isuzu Workers Sue
By JOHN MURPHY and MIHO INADA DECEMBER 5, 2008
FUJISAWA, Japan -- In the parlance of Japan's new brutal economy, Dan Yamamoto is a "disposable" worker.
For the past 2½ years, the 34-year-old has worked on Isuzu Motor Ltd.'s assembly line installing axles. His job -- like the "temporary" jobs of a third of Japan's work force -- comes with no security, few benefits, and lower wages than the jobs of permanent workers with longer-term contracts.
Two weeks ago, Isuzu said it would lay off all 1,400 temporary workers at its Japanese plants as the truck maker scaled back production amid the global economic turmoil.
"I feel angry but it cannot be helped," said Mr. Yamamoto, standing outside Isuzu's Fujisawa plant on the outskirts of Tokyo on a recent evening. His last day of work is Dec. 26.
As companies around the world slash jobs, the recent cuts of more than 30,000 temps like Mr. Yamamoto at Isuzu, Toyota Motor Corp. and other Japanese manufacturers may seem modest. But the sweeping cuts -- the first on such a scale since 2004, when Japan lifted restrictions on manufacturers' hiring of temporary workers -- have created a moment of reckoning, exposing the social costs of the country's embrace of more open style of capitalism.
For decades, many Japanese manufacturing workers were coddled with secure jobs that guaranteed them a middle-class lifestyle. That ended with a slump in the 1990s and early 2000s that lasted more than a decade. Deregulation measures earlier this decade helped spawn a vast and growing group of workers who say they are treated like second-class citizens.
"Japan has gone too far. We should think about the things we have thrown away," says Akiko Kamei, a member of the opposition People's New Party in Japan's parliament and a onetime temp worker. She says the cuts may breed greater poverty and social tensions.
Temps, or nonpermanent employees, earn about two-thirds what permanent full-timers do. Temps' contracts usually run for less than a year; they can often be hired and fired with just a few days' notice and receive no severance. Their numbers have ballooned to 35% of the work force from 24% in 1998 and 18% in 1988.
Japan's flagship exporters have hired temps by the thousands in recent years to keep labor costs low amid cutthroat global competition. Exporters' soaring profits helped lead Japan to six years of expansion. Now, as Japan buckles down for a long recession, the mass layoffs may allow companies to recover more quickly when the economy rebounds.
But their tough decisions have touched a nerve. Unlike permanent workers, many temps aren't entitled to government unemployment insurance.
On Thursday, two temp workers in Isuzu's engine plant north of Tokyo filed a lawsuit demanding that the company allow them to continue their contracts until they expire.
"I'm really, really mad," said Hirotoshi Matsumoto, 46, one of the temps who filed the suit. "I'm mad at both the company and the nation who came up with this kind of policy." Mr. Matsumoto had been working as a temp forklift driver at Isuzu since 2005. On Nov. 17, he was handed a sheet of paper informing him that his current contract, which expires in September, would end nine months early.
Isuzu declined to comment on the lawsuit. The truck maker has said the layoffs were necessary because of the downturn in sales this year. Isuzu said last month that it was slashing its net-profit forecast for the year ending in March by more than half because of sluggish sales and higher materials costs.
Japan's unemployment rate still remains low at 3.7%, though more layoffs are expected in the months ahead. Honda Motor Co. on Thursday said it will cut 490 temporary staff at its Japanese plants by January.
The government is fretting about the social impact of the cuts. Last week, the government established an emergency team to address the mass layoffs. Officials at Fujisawa's city hall are bracing for a flood of claims for food and housing from the newly unemployed workers at Isuzu, the city's biggest employer.
The temp agency that hired Mr. Yamamoto has told him there are no other manufacturing jobs available. So the father of two young daughters is focusing on trying to find another job.
"I have just one more month of work to go" at Isuzu, he says. "Then, it's going to get tough."
DUBLIN, Ireland (AP) – Ireland has issued an international warning for people not to consume Irish-produced pork products because they could contain dangerous levels of contaminants.
The government's departments of health and agriculture on Saturday jointly called for the recall or destruction of all Irish pork produced since Sept. 1.
The call comes after inspectors discovered potentially dangerous dioxins in pigs and pig feed at 80 to 200 times the safety limit.
Dioxins, which are naturally occurring and can enter an animal's system through its food or environment, accumulate in the pig's fat.
They have been linked to an increased risk of cancer in humans if ingested in sufficient volume and over a long enough period of time.
The government's warning that Irish pork may have been tainted for months threatens an industry worth more than $600 million (U.S.) annually in a country of 4.2 million people.
In a statement, the office of Prime Minister Brian Cowen said officials from the Agriculture Department and the Food Safety Authority of Ireland were still investigating "the extent of the contamination and to identify the processors and products involved."
The order dealt the biggest blow to Irish agriculture since the foot-and-mouth disease threat of 2001. At that time, Ireland successfully prevented the spread of the disease from neighbouring Britain – but still faced months of lost export business for its beef because of foreign fears.
The government asked grocery stores, pubs and restaurants in Ireland to ship back all Irish pork products to their manufacturers as part of the investigation and asked the public "as a precautionary measure not to consume Irish pork and bacon products at this time."
Ireland's farms produce more than three million pigs a year, nearly half of which are consumed within the Republic of Ireland.
But Irish pork also is heavily exported to neighbouring Northern Ireland and Britain – and appears in grocery stores and processed meats through much of Europe and Asia.
Ireland's major international competitors for pork-product exports are Brazil, the United States and Canada.
Royal Bank ditches full-year forecast after 15% fourth-quarter fall
RITA TRICHUR Dec 06, 2008
Royal Bank of Canada is bracing for deteriorating credit quality in fiscal 2009, predicting the economic malaise will trigger steeper job losses and more soured loans.
Canada's largest bank said yesterday it is preparing to absorb more credit losses, after posting double-digit declines in both its fourth-quarter and full-year profits.
Credit quality, already a worry for its U.S. bank, is being carefully monitored because 77 per cent of its loans are in Canada.
"Looking forward, assuming slower economic growth and higher unemployment in Canada, we would expect credit quality in Canada to weaken moderately in fiscal 2009," said chief risk officer Morten Friis. "Based on this, we would anticipate modestly higher average provisions across consumer, business and corporate credit portfolios."
During the fourth quarter, provisions for credit losses jumped to $619 million from $263 million in the same period last year. While the United States was a key trouble spot, Canadian banking also saw bigger provisions, "primarily reflecting portfolio growth and higher loss rates in credit cards."
RBC is the second major bank to disclose higher credit card losses. Earlier this week, Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce said it would continue tightening credit card lending in 2009 after losses accelerated in its latest quarter. CIBC administers Canada's largest credit card portfolio, both in terms of balances and purchase volumes.
According to its annual report, RBC has a 20 per cent market share of Canada's credit card purchase volume. However, it also claims to be the market leader in overall consumer lending, which also includes residential mortgages and personal loans.
Even with that No. 1 rank, RBC told investors it is pitching its annual performance targets, citing the "new realities of the business and economic environment." It is opting instead to outline "medium-term" goals that it hopes to achieve over three to five years, including diluted earnings per share growth in excess of 7 per cent.
RBC failed to meet most of its 2008 financial objectives after underestimating the severity and persistence of the credit crunch and market tumult. It now expects that elevated funding costs and bigger loan losses will continue to punctuate the deleveraging spiral that is sideswiping global banks. Bank of Montreal has also scrapped its annual performance targets because of the turmoil.
"We are maintaining our quarterly dividend at 50 cents in the first quarter of 2009, which we believe is prudent in this environment," said RBC chief executive Gordon Nixon. "Over time, our objective is to grow our dividend."
In the meantime, Nixon said the bank would intently focus on correcting the "underperformance" of its U.S. banking business.
RBC's fourth-quarter profit fell 15 per cent to $1.12 billion from year-ago $1.32 billion. Diluted earnings per share were 81 cents, down from $1.01 last year. The bank had warned earnings would be hurt by about $670 million in pre-tax trading losses. Full-year profits fell 17 per cent to $4.56 billion.
China's 1st private airline suspends flights early
December 7, 2008
BEIJING (AP) - China's first private airline, suffering from financial and management woes, began a planned one-month suspension of passenger service 10 days early Saturday after skittish airports insisted on cash to refuel its planes, state media reported.
Okay Airways has been locked in a messy dispute with its controlling shareholder. News reports this week said the Civil Aviation Administration of China ordered the flight suspension at the request of the shareholder, Shanghai-based Junyao Group Co.
A Junyao spokesman told the official Xinhua News Agency that Okay Airways suspended passenger service Saturday. An airline spokesman had said Thursday that the one-month suspension would start Dec. 15. Officials at the airline could not be reached for comment Saturday.
The suspension came earlier than expected because some airports, worried about the airline's financial troubles, would only refuel its planes for cash, Xinhua reported.
More than 2,000 stranded passengers at the airline's hub in the northeastern city of Tianjin and at other airports had to be transferred to other flights, Xinhua said.
The economic slowdown has hurt all of China's airlines, but the country's handful of private carriers cannot count on the kind of huge government bailouts that several state-run carriers are now seeking.
The loss-making Okay Airways is also caught in a dispute with Junyao about how the airline should be run, Okay Airways spokesman Li Wei said in a phone interview Thursday. Staff at Junyao refused to comment.
Okay Airways became China's first private carrier in 2005. Its 11 planes fly more than 20 domestic passenger routes, and its cargo operations are a local partner of Fedex Corp. The cargo operations are expected to continue.
The airline and Junyao agreed in March 2006 to share personnel, routes, marketing and managerial expertise as they struggled for a footing in China's intensively competitive air transport market.
But relations between the two are troubled. Junyao recently dismissed Okay's president, Liu Jieyin, Xinhua reported Thursday, citing Wang Junjin, who is chairman of both Junyao and Okay.
It said that Wang had promised not to cut jobs or reduce salaries during the one-month flight suspension.
The report said flights were due to resume in mid-January, just ahead of the Lunar New Year peak travel period.
It wasn't clear Saturday how the early suspension of flights would affect that plan. - AP
By SEAH CHIANG NEE Insight Down South December 6, 2008
The US economic meltdown will not only have financial implications for the island state but will also impinge on its demographic strategy.
ONE of the largest immigration waves in modern Singapore history may be brought to a halt by a severe economic downturn that could last for years.
The process could even be reversed, at least temporarily, if the job shedding becomes serious over the next two years, throwing back the republic’s ambition for a bigger population.
Many of the 1.2 million foreign workers may be forced to leave the city, and government officials have said that, if need be, foreigners will among the first to be retrenched.
Hundreds of jobless Burmese migrants have already returned home from Singapore, reported a Yangon newspaper, The Irrawady. It said higher-skilled workers like engineers and technicians are unable to find jobs.
Malaysian officials are also warning their citizens working here to be prepared for the worst.
If permanent residents (PRs) are included, foreigners make up some 35% of Singapore’s 4.84 million population. Many of them had flocked here to take advantage of Singapore’s long booming economy, which grew by 7.5% a year during 2002-2007.
Then the US financial meltdown hit the city, exporting what is shaping up to be one of its worst recessions.
The size of the expected exodus is not known; it depends on how severe and how long it will last. For now, no one really knows.
Analysts believe with an open economy that is heavily dependent on the ailing US, Singapore may be the worst hit country in Asia.
The impact could take on a historical perspective.
It will end, at least temporarily, the world’s biggest immigration inflow into any country during the past 20 years on a per capita basis.
Historically, Singapore is a migrant society with several waves of mass arrivals since it was discovered by Sir Stamford Raffles in 1819.
The current wave follows the previous one in the 40s and 50s when huge numbers of migrants flocked here from China, India and Indonesia to escape from wars, natural disasters or poverty. Singapore’s open door policy was responsible, but it was due in large measure to its strong economic expansion.
The pace of arrivals was strong, but steady — rather than in one tidal surge — but on a scale that caught many Singaporeans by surprise. It has transformed the republic and its people. In the past 10 years alone, the city’s population rose by 27.5% — on top of a 37% expansion in the previous decade.
That means Singapore is today inhabited by at least 75% more people than two decades ago, an expansion rate that few nations — if at all — could claim. The rate rose further — by a record 5.5% — in the 12 months to June 2007.
Having a larger population both for reasons of a stronger economy and international status is not confined to Singapore.
In the 70s, Thai dictator Gen Prapas Charusathien called for Thailand to raise its population to 80 million.
And former prime minister Datuk Seri (now Tun) Dr Mahathir Mohamad, too, had wanted a doubling of Malaysia’s then population to 40 million to 50 million.
In Singapore, the Minister Mentor once referred to a flourishing international city of 6 million to 7 million people by 2030 — but it has since been scaled back.
Some believe that — with the current crisis — today’s 4.84 million people may already be too much.
The job shedding has already begun here, but has been confined to a few big corporations sacking between 50 and several hundred workers. The retrenchments are in small lots but believed to be extensively stretched all over the island’s smaller businesses. Nevertheless, they add up to a painful scenario.
Big layoffs are expected beginning from this month to the end of 2009 when the economy may fall to a minus one-or-two per cent.
Apart from the demographic setback, a long deep recession may have repercussions on strategic factors as well. One possibility is that it may compel the city-state to redirect its growth policies, or even change some fundamentals, especially when Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew is no longer around.
The pursuit of higher returns by investing in riskier instruments may be replaced by a more patient, safer approach — even at the cost of lower dividends.
This consequence will become more apparent in future if the Western financial world takes a further turn for the worse. In the new world, there are fewer safe bets anywhere. Meanwhile, the profile of Singapore’s politics, as well as younger electorate, will change faster in the years ahead.
Every five-yearly election brings out 200,000-220,000 new voters who have turned 21, a new breed of less predictable voters.
They are more liberal-minded and a tougher lot to please. The post-Lee Kuan Yew leaders will need to win them over to remain in power.
The result could see a future government that pays less priority on “corporatism” (like profits and revenue) and more emphasis on helping workers and people, a “return to basics” emphasis. The ruling PAP, after all, operates a “democratic socialist” party constitution.
While the immigration cut-back may currently be forced upon the state, it is unlikely to result in any significant shift of the open door policy. The government believes that foreigners are an asset to Singapore’s talent pool and vitality.
A senior government official said that when the economic growth hits 6% again, “Singapore will need 87,300 more workers. Most have to come from abroad; the birthrate is only half of this.”
Happy Despite It All? Thank Your Friends, Study Shows
By Naomi Kresge
Dec. 5 (Bloomberg) -- Global recession got you down? Happy friends could do more to improve your mood than money, U.S. researchers said in the British Medical Journal.
Happiness is catching, rippling through social networks to up to three degrees of separation, researchers from Harvard Medical School and the University of California, San Diego, found after assessing more than 4,700 people over 20 years. The smaller the distance between friends, the bigger the effect, which lasted up to a year, the scientists said.
“This is probably the analogy that’s seen in financial markets where there’s a sudden stampede of emotional states,” said study co-author Nicholas Christakis, a professor in the department of health-care policy at Harvard in Cambridge, Massachusetts. “It’s like if greed is infectious, so is happiness.”
A person is 25 percent more likely to be cheered after a shift toward happiness in a friend who lives within 1 mile (1.6 kilometers), researchers found. Happy next-door neighbors made it 34 percent more probable that a person would feel good. Cheerful spouses, and siblings who live within a mile boosted happiness to a smaller degree, while co-workers didn’t have an effect.
The findings came from the Framingham Heart Study, which has been running since 1948 in the Massachusetts town of the same name. Researchers looked at questionnaires participants filled out from 1983 to 2003, using computer models to map 54,228 social ties listed by people in the study.
Happy, Hopeful
Researchers defined happiness as a perfect score on the questions “I felt hopeful about the future,” “I was happy,” “I enjoyed life,” and “I felt that I was just as good as other people.”
The Framingham data had been used before to assess depression as a risk factor for heart disease, but this was the first time researchers looked at happiness across a broad network, Christakis said.
“We show that your happiness depends not only on your friends and family but on whether your friends of friends are happy,” he said in a telephone interview. “There are clusters of happy and unhappy people in the network.”
Happiness spread more easily and consistently than unhappiness, he said.
People’s good feelings may spread even to someone they don’t know. Researchers saw that happiness in people three degrees removed could make an individual 5.6 percent more likely to be happy. Having an extra $5,000 only made people 2 percent more likely to be happy, the authors said in a statement.
‘Groundbreaking’
The study is “groundbreaking” because it shows that some psychological and social factors likely to influence health may spread across social networks, Andrew Steptoe, a professor at University College London, and Ana Diez Roux, a professor at the University of Michigan School of Public Health, wrote in an accompanying editorial.
Yale University researchers, however, said in a second study in the journal that social network research can be deceiving. Their research showed teenagers appeared more likely to have acne, headaches or be tall if those conditions were widespread among their friends, but that the results were insignificant once the data was adjusted for environmental factors.
12 comments:
Forgotten brand is hip after Games
Feiyue shoes worn by taiji exponents now seen as ‘cool’
By Peh Shing Huei
6 December 2008
BEIJING: Three months after the end of the Olympics, an obscure Chinese brand is turning out to be the Games’ biggest winner - despite not having paid a single cent as an official sponsor.
Feiyue, an almost-forgotten 1960s shoe brand, is suddenly hip again among young Chinese.
After the stylish taiji exponents wore it during the Games’ opening ceremony in August, it became a must-have for China’s youth.
‘It was crazy. Before the Olympics, no one wanted these shoes,’ said Madam Tang, a sales clerk at Heping shopping mall, one of the few places in Beijing selling the shoes. ‘After the Games, this place was packed with people grabbing four, five pairs each.’
The Feiyue manufacturers in Shanghai declined to be interviewed or provide sales figures. But anecdotal accounts pointed to a massive jump. The boom has had an effect on other old Chinese shoe brands as well, including Warrior and Double Star.
Madam Tang, who declined to give her full name, said she was struggling to sell half a dozen pairs a month before the Games. In September, she moved 2,000 pairs. Sales since then have cooled, but she can still easily sell half a dozen a day now.
Bye Bye Disco, a Beijing shop selling retro Chinese products, also reported brisk sales.
Netizens in the southern city of Guangzhou complained that it was hard to find Feiyue shoes because these were sold out in the few stores that had stocks.
These canvas sneakers - especially popular among students and athletes - were de rigueur daily wear in China up to the late 1980s. They were even regarded as ‘branded’ items, and those who managed to snag a state- issued coupon to buy a pair of Feiyue in the command economy were looked upon with envy.
With growing affluence and the invasion of international brands like Nike and Adidas, however, the local footwear waned in popularity. It became associated primarily with martial arts exponents and poor migrant workers from the countryside who could not afford foreign brands.
A pair of Feiyue, which means ‘flying forward’, costs about 40 yuan (S$9), while foreign-brand sneakers are usually 10 times that price in China.
‘It’s cool, and there is a rebellious feel to it because you are not chasing after the foreign brands like everyone else,’ said photographer Li Xiao, 25, who started wearing Warrior a few years back.
The local brands’ rediscovered popularity has even led to collectors wrapping up these shoes as vintage and setting up blogs to share their passion for old Chinese sneakers.
One such collector, Mr. Jia Wei, said that while patriotism is a factor behind this fever, it is not the driving force. He believed it is quite natural for the Chinese to rediscover something they or their parents grew up with.
Bye Bye Disco owner Sun Peipei, 25, told The Straits Times that the boom was, in fact, ironically fuelled by the shoes’ rebranding in the West.
In 2005, Frenchman Patrice Bastian took a liking to Feiyue and bought rights to the brand outside of China. He introduced more designs and sold it to the European market as a lifestyle fashion accessory for ¥50 (S$97), 10 times the price in China.
It has been a hit in the West, with Elle magazine featuring it a few times and even calling it a ‘must-have’. Hollywood star Orlando Bloom was spotted wearing it earlier this year during a shoot of the movie New York, I Love You.
Such Western ‘endorsements’, said Ms Sun, have made these old Chinese sneakers cool again.
Said Madam Tang: ‘The teenagers who bought it even kept its signature brown wrapping paper as memorabilia. It’s so funny how these shoes are now the latest ‘in’ thing.’
Always And Forever - By Luther Vandross
Always and forever
Each moment with you
Is just like a dream to me
That somehow came true, yeah
And I know tomorrow
Will still be the same
Cuz we got a life of love
That won't ever change and
[1] - Everyday love me your own special way
Melt all my heart away with a smile
Take time to tell me you really care
And we'll share tomorrow together
Ooh baby, I'll always love you forever
Ever, ever, ever
There'll always be sunshine
When I look at you
It's something I can't explain
Just the things that you do
If you get lonely
Call me and take
A second to give to me
That magic you make and
[Repeat 1]
秋风 - 黄莺莺 Tracy Huang
秋风吹起落叶飘
彷徨的我徘徊在十字街口上
是对是错我不知道
我的命运它是否在作弄我
蓝色的海洋不平静
我的心情也像海浪一样动乱
是爱是恨我不知道
过去的事真是叫我忘不了
来来 回来吧 甜蜜的爱
夕阳西下断肠人
你为何在天涯
蓝色的海洋不平静
我的心情也像海浪一样动乱
是爱是恨我不知道
过去的事真是叫我忘不了
来来来来来来来来
回来吧甜蜜的爱
为什么受伤的总是我 / Why Am I Always Hurt
Artist: 林志颖 / Jimmy Lin / Lâm Chí Dĩnh
Composer: 尧尧
天空下着雨
我从背后望着你
就这样走出我的生命
曾经的承诺
只像雨里的彩虹
我受伤的心真的好痛
为什么受伤的总是我
到底我是做错了什么
我的真情难道说你不懂
为什么受伤的总是我
如何才能找到我的梦
有一天有一个她真心爱我
1930s beggar-thy-neighbour fears as China devalues
China has begun to devalue the yuan for the first time in over a decade, raising fears that it will set off a 1930s-style race to the bottom and tip the global economy into an even deeper slump.
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard
04 Dec 2008
The central bank has shifted the central peg of its dollar band twice this week in a calculated move that suggests Beijing aims to offset the precipitous slide in Chinese manufacturing by trying to gain further export share abroad.
The futures markets are pricing in a 6pc devaluation over the next year. "This is clearly a big shift in policy and we are now on alert," said Simon Derrick, currency chief at the Bank of New York Mellon.
The move follows a Politburo speech by President Hu Jintao warning that China is "losing competitive edge in the world market".
China has allowed a crawling 20pc revaluation over the past three years. Any reversal risks setting off conflict with the incoming team of President-Elect Barack Obama in Washington. Mr Obama called China a "currency manipulator" during the campaign, a term that carries penalties under US trade law.
Outgoing US Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson is viewed as a "friend of China". He called for a stronger yuan this week before embarking on a visit to Beijing, but the plea was couched in friendly terms. This soft-peddling may soon change.
Hans Redeker, currency head at BNP Paribas, said China's policy switch could set off a dangerous chain of events. "If they play this beggar-thy-neighbour game, it will cause a deflationary shock for the whole world," he said.
It makes sense for countries with current account deficits such as the UK, US or Turkey to let their currencies fall, but China has the world's biggest trade surplus.
Michael Pettis, a professor at Beijing University, said it was "very worrying" that a pro-devalulation bloc seemed to be gaining the upper hand in the Communist Party. "I really do believe that we are on the brink of a very ugly period for trade relations," he said.
China has relied on exports to North America and Europe as its growth engine, making it acutely vulnerable to the contraction in global demand. Mr Pettis said this recalls the role played by the US in the 1920s, a parallel fraught with danger. "In the 1930s the US foolishly tried to dump capacity abroad, but the furious reaction of trading partners caused the strategy to misfire. China already seems to be in the process of engineering its own Smoot-Hawley," he said, referring to the infamous US Tariff Act in 1930.
China showed restraint during the Asian crisis in 1998, holding the line against domino devaluations across the region. It may yet hold the line this time.
However, this crisis is more serious. The manufacturing sector has seen the steepest decline since the records began, with devastation sweeping the textile, furniture and toy sectors. Civil unrest has begun to rock the Guangdong and Longnan regions.
Beijing has slashed rates and unveiled a fiscal stimulus of 14pc of GDP, but most of the spending comes in the form of instructions to local governments to spend more – but without giving them the money. Does China really intend to step in to prop up global demand? The jury is out.
Paulson urges China not to curb currency
By Geoff Dyer and Jamil Anderlini in Beijing
December 5 2008
The US urged China on Friday not to “roll back” the appreciation of its currency that has taken place over the last two years to prevent an even sharper economic slowdown.
Hank Paulson, Treasury secretary, said that the main reason for job losses among Chinese exporters was slowing global demand, not currency appreciation.
“Some people in China, looking at the slowing global economy and seeing what is happening to exports, might blame it on currency appreciation and seek to roll that back,” he said in Beijing. “China understands, as do we, how important currency reform is to rebalancing growth in China.
Mr Paulson was speaking at the end of the two-day strategic economic dialogue, a bi-annual meeting of US and Chinese ministers and officials. The meeting has been accompanied, after a relatively large drop in the renminbi earlier this week, by considerable speculation the Chinese central bank is weakening the currency against the dollar to help exporters.
The two governments warned against the danger of increased protectionism and pledged to boost co-operation to deal with the global financial crisis, promising to make $20bn of trade finance credit available to developing countries struggling to pay for US and Chinese exports.
Mr Paulson said the fiscal stimulus package announced by the Chinese government was “very welcome”. “The Chinese leadership is very focused on what is happening here and will do whatever it takes to maintain growth,” he said.
Chinese officials restated concerns about their heavy exposure to US public debt. Asked about China’s plans for future purchases of US Treasury bonds, Zhu Guangyao, China’s assistant finance minister, said: “We hope the US side will seriously consider China’s concerns and protect the interests of Chinese investors.”
Mr Paulson played down the risks of foreign governments selling out their holdings. ”It is a fact that China is an investor in US securities,” he said. “I do not see any countries with holdings so large that I view it as a threat.”
Both sides said it was important to continue the dialogues, which started in 2006, after the Obama administration is sworn in. “Ideas that work generally do not die,” said Mr Paulson, who before the financial crisis took hold had made relations with China one of his priorities.
Mr Zhu said President-elect Barack Obama had spoken on the phone with Chinese President Hu Jintao and emphasised his willingness to ”further strengthen constructive relations between China and the United States”.
The renminbi appreciated modestly on Friday as speculation about a shift in currency policy receded. Chen Deming, China’s commerce minister, said the recent weakening of the currency against the dollar was not aimed at helping exporters.
Economists said China was highly unlikely to push for a significant depreciation of its currency because of the trade tensions this would invite. However, if the dollar were to continue strengthening, China might slowly weaken the renminbi against the US currency to avoid excessive appreciation against the currencies of other main trading partners.
Japan's Recession Hits 'Temps'
Sweeping Layoffs Expose Social Tensions; Isuzu Workers Sue
By JOHN MURPHY and MIHO INADA
DECEMBER 5, 2008
FUJISAWA, Japan -- In the parlance of Japan's new brutal economy, Dan Yamamoto is a "disposable" worker.
For the past 2½ years, the 34-year-old has worked on Isuzu Motor Ltd.'s assembly line installing axles. His job -- like the "temporary" jobs of a third of Japan's work force -- comes with no security, few benefits, and lower wages than the jobs of permanent workers with longer-term contracts.
Two weeks ago, Isuzu said it would lay off all 1,400 temporary workers at its Japanese plants as the truck maker scaled back production amid the global economic turmoil.
"I feel angry but it cannot be helped," said Mr. Yamamoto, standing outside Isuzu's Fujisawa plant on the outskirts of Tokyo on a recent evening. His last day of work is Dec. 26.
As companies around the world slash jobs, the recent cuts of more than 30,000 temps like Mr. Yamamoto at Isuzu, Toyota Motor Corp. and other Japanese manufacturers may seem modest. But the sweeping cuts -- the first on such a scale since 2004, when Japan lifted restrictions on manufacturers' hiring of temporary workers -- have created a moment of reckoning, exposing the social costs of the country's embrace of more open style of capitalism.
For decades, many Japanese manufacturing workers were coddled with secure jobs that guaranteed them a middle-class lifestyle. That ended with a slump in the 1990s and early 2000s that lasted more than a decade. Deregulation measures earlier this decade helped spawn a vast and growing group of workers who say they are treated like second-class citizens.
"Japan has gone too far. We should think about the things we have thrown away," says Akiko Kamei, a member of the opposition People's New Party in Japan's parliament and a onetime temp worker. She says the cuts may breed greater poverty and social tensions.
Temps, or nonpermanent employees, earn about two-thirds what permanent full-timers do. Temps' contracts usually run for less than a year; they can often be hired and fired with just a few days' notice and receive no severance. Their numbers have ballooned to 35% of the work force from 24% in 1998 and 18% in 1988.
Japan's flagship exporters have hired temps by the thousands in recent years to keep labor costs low amid cutthroat global competition. Exporters' soaring profits helped lead Japan to six years of expansion. Now, as Japan buckles down for a long recession, the mass layoffs may allow companies to recover more quickly when the economy rebounds.
But their tough decisions have touched a nerve. Unlike permanent workers, many temps aren't entitled to government unemployment insurance.
On Thursday, two temp workers in Isuzu's engine plant north of Tokyo filed a lawsuit demanding that the company allow them to continue their contracts until they expire.
"I'm really, really mad," said Hirotoshi Matsumoto, 46, one of the temps who filed the suit. "I'm mad at both the company and the nation who came up with this kind of policy." Mr. Matsumoto had been working as a temp forklift driver at Isuzu since 2005. On Nov. 17, he was handed a sheet of paper informing him that his current contract, which expires in September, would end nine months early.
Isuzu declined to comment on the lawsuit. The truck maker has said the layoffs were necessary because of the downturn in sales this year. Isuzu said last month that it was slashing its net-profit forecast for the year ending in March by more than half because of sluggish sales and higher materials costs.
Japan's unemployment rate still remains low at 3.7%, though more layoffs are expected in the months ahead. Honda Motor Co. on Thursday said it will cut 490 temporary staff at its Japanese plants by January.
The government is fretting about the social impact of the cuts. Last week, the government established an emergency team to address the mass layoffs. Officials at Fujisawa's city hall are bracing for a flood of claims for food and housing from the newly unemployed workers at Isuzu, the city's biggest employer.
The temp agency that hired Mr. Yamamoto has told him there are no other manufacturing jobs available. So the father of two young daughters is focusing on trying to find another job.
"I have just one more month of work to go" at Isuzu, he says. "Then, it's going to get tough."
Warning issued for tainted Irish pork products
Shawn Pogatchnik
Dec 06, 2008
DUBLIN, Ireland (AP) – Ireland has issued an international warning for people not to consume Irish-produced pork products because they could contain dangerous levels of contaminants.
The government's departments of health and agriculture on Saturday jointly called for the recall or destruction of all Irish pork produced since Sept. 1.
The call comes after inspectors discovered potentially dangerous dioxins in pigs and pig feed at 80 to 200 times the safety limit.
Dioxins, which are naturally occurring and can enter an animal's system through its food or environment, accumulate in the pig's fat.
They have been linked to an increased risk of cancer in humans if ingested in sufficient volume and over a long enough period of time.
The government's warning that Irish pork may have been tainted for months threatens an industry worth more than $600 million (U.S.) annually in a country of 4.2 million people.
In a statement, the office of Prime Minister Brian Cowen said officials from the Agriculture Department and the Food Safety Authority of Ireland were still investigating "the extent of the contamination and to identify the processors and products involved."
The order dealt the biggest blow to Irish agriculture since the foot-and-mouth disease threat of 2001. At that time, Ireland successfully prevented the spread of the disease from neighbouring Britain – but still faced months of lost export business for its beef because of foreign fears.
The government asked grocery stores, pubs and restaurants in Ireland to ship back all Irish pork products to their manufacturers as part of the investigation and asked the public "as a precautionary measure not to consume Irish pork and bacon products at this time."
Ireland's farms produce more than three million pigs a year, nearly half of which are consumed within the Republic of Ireland.
But Irish pork also is heavily exported to neighbouring Northern Ireland and Britain – and appears in grocery stores and processed meats through much of Europe and Asia.
Ireland's major international competitors for pork-product exports are Brazil, the United States and Canada.
Credit fears in the cards for RBC
Royal Bank ditches full-year forecast after 15% fourth-quarter fall
RITA TRICHUR
Dec 06, 2008
Royal Bank of Canada is bracing for deteriorating credit quality in fiscal 2009, predicting the economic malaise will trigger steeper job losses and more soured loans.
Canada's largest bank said yesterday it is preparing to absorb more credit losses, after posting double-digit declines in both its fourth-quarter and full-year profits.
Credit quality, already a worry for its U.S. bank, is being carefully monitored because 77 per cent of its loans are in Canada.
"Looking forward, assuming slower economic growth and higher unemployment in Canada, we would expect credit quality in Canada to weaken moderately in fiscal 2009," said chief risk officer Morten Friis. "Based on this, we would anticipate modestly higher average provisions across consumer, business and corporate credit portfolios."
During the fourth quarter, provisions for credit losses jumped to $619 million from $263 million in the same period last year. While the United States was a key trouble spot, Canadian banking also saw bigger provisions, "primarily reflecting portfolio growth and higher loss rates in credit cards."
RBC is the second major bank to disclose higher credit card losses. Earlier this week, Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce said it would continue tightening credit card lending in 2009 after losses accelerated in its latest quarter. CIBC administers Canada's largest credit card portfolio, both in terms of balances and purchase volumes.
According to its annual report, RBC has a 20 per cent market share of Canada's credit card purchase volume. However, it also claims to be the market leader in overall consumer lending, which also includes residential mortgages and personal loans.
Even with that No. 1 rank, RBC told investors it is pitching its annual performance targets, citing the "new realities of the business and economic environment." It is opting instead to outline "medium-term" goals that it hopes to achieve over three to five years, including diluted earnings per share growth in excess of 7 per cent.
RBC failed to meet most of its 2008 financial objectives after underestimating the severity and persistence of the credit crunch and market tumult. It now expects that elevated funding costs and bigger loan losses will continue to punctuate the deleveraging spiral that is sideswiping global banks. Bank of Montreal has also scrapped its annual performance targets because of the turmoil.
"We are maintaining our quarterly dividend at 50 cents in the first quarter of 2009, which we believe is prudent in this environment," said RBC chief executive Gordon Nixon. "Over time, our objective is to grow our dividend."
In the meantime, Nixon said the bank would intently focus on correcting the "underperformance" of its U.S. banking business.
RBC's fourth-quarter profit fell 15 per cent to $1.12 billion from year-ago $1.32 billion. Diluted earnings per share were 81 cents, down from $1.01 last year. The bank had warned earnings would be hurt by about $670 million in pre-tax trading losses. Full-year profits fell 17 per cent to $4.56 billion.
China's 1st private airline suspends flights early
December 7, 2008
BEIJING (AP) - China's first private airline, suffering from financial and management woes, began a planned one-month suspension of passenger service 10 days early Saturday after skittish airports insisted on cash to refuel its planes, state media reported.
Okay Airways has been locked in a messy dispute with its controlling shareholder. News reports this week said the Civil Aviation Administration of China ordered the flight suspension at the request of the shareholder, Shanghai-based Junyao Group Co.
A Junyao spokesman told the official Xinhua News Agency that Okay Airways suspended passenger service Saturday. An airline spokesman had said Thursday that the one-month suspension would start Dec. 15. Officials at the airline could not be reached for comment Saturday.
The suspension came earlier than expected because some airports, worried about the airline's financial troubles, would only refuel its planes for cash, Xinhua reported.
More than 2,000 stranded passengers at the airline's hub in the northeastern city of Tianjin and at other airports had to be transferred to other flights, Xinhua said.
The economic slowdown has hurt all of China's airlines, but the country's handful of private carriers cannot count on the kind of huge government bailouts that several state-run carriers are now seeking.
The loss-making Okay Airways is also caught in a dispute with Junyao about how the airline should be run, Okay Airways spokesman Li Wei said in a phone interview Thursday. Staff at Junyao refused to comment.
Okay Airways became China's first private carrier in 2005. Its 11 planes fly more than 20 domestic passenger routes, and its cargo operations are a local partner of Fedex Corp. The cargo operations are expected to continue.
The airline and Junyao agreed in March 2006 to share personnel, routes, marketing and managerial expertise as they struggled for a footing in China's intensively competitive air transport market.
But relations between the two are troubled. Junyao recently dismissed Okay's president, Liu Jieyin, Xinhua reported Thursday, citing Wang Junjin, who is chairman of both Junyao and Okay.
It said that Wang had promised not to cut jobs or reduce salaries during the one-month flight suspension.
The report said flights were due to resume in mid-January, just ahead of the Lunar New Year peak travel period.
It wasn't clear Saturday how the early suspension of flights would affect that plan. - AP
Human wave slows as recession bites
By SEAH CHIANG NEE
Insight Down South
December 6, 2008
The US economic meltdown will not only have financial implications for the island state but will also impinge on its demographic strategy.
ONE of the largest immigration waves in modern Singapore history may be brought to a halt by a severe economic downturn that could last for years.
The process could even be reversed, at least temporarily, if the job shedding becomes serious over the next two years, throwing back the republic’s ambition for a bigger population.
Many of the 1.2 million foreign workers may be forced to leave the city, and government officials have said that, if need be, foreigners will among the first to be retrenched.
Hundreds of jobless Burmese migrants have already returned home from Singapore, reported a Yangon newspaper, The Irrawady. It said higher-skilled workers like engineers and technicians are unable to find jobs.
Malaysian officials are also warning their citizens working here to be prepared for the worst.
If permanent residents (PRs) are included, foreigners make up some 35% of Singapore’s 4.84 million population. Many of them had flocked here to take advantage of Singapore’s long booming economy, which grew by 7.5% a year during 2002-2007.
Then the US financial meltdown hit the city, exporting what is shaping up to be one of its worst recessions.
The size of the expected exodus is not known; it depends on how severe and how long it will last. For now, no one really knows.
Analysts believe with an open economy that is heavily dependent on the ailing US, Singapore may be the worst hit country in Asia.
The impact could take on a historical perspective.
It will end, at least temporarily, the world’s biggest immigration inflow into any country during the past 20 years on a per capita basis.
Historically, Singapore is a migrant society with several waves of mass arrivals since it was discovered by Sir Stamford Raffles in 1819.
The current wave follows the previous one in the 40s and 50s when huge numbers of migrants flocked here from China, India and Indonesia to escape from wars, natural disasters or poverty. Singapore’s open door policy was responsible, but it was due in large measure to its strong economic expansion.
The pace of arrivals was strong, but steady — rather than in one tidal surge — but on a scale that caught many Singaporeans by surprise. It has transformed the republic and its people. In the past 10 years alone, the city’s population rose by 27.5% — on top of a 37% expansion in the previous decade.
That means Singapore is today inhabited by at least 75% more people than two decades ago, an expansion rate that few nations — if at all — could claim. The rate rose further — by a record 5.5% — in the 12 months to June 2007.
Having a larger population both for reasons of a stronger economy and international status is not confined to Singapore.
In the 70s, Thai dictator Gen Prapas Charusathien called for Thailand to raise its population to 80 million.
And former prime minister Datuk Seri (now Tun) Dr Mahathir Mohamad, too, had wanted a doubling of Malaysia’s then population to 40 million to 50 million.
In Singapore, the Minister Mentor once referred to a flourishing international city of 6 million to 7 million people by 2030 — but it has since been scaled back.
Some believe that — with the current crisis — today’s 4.84 million people may already be too much.
The job shedding has already begun here, but has been confined to a few big corporations sacking between 50 and several hundred workers. The retrenchments are in small lots but believed to be extensively stretched all over the island’s smaller businesses. Nevertheless, they add up to a painful scenario.
Big layoffs are expected beginning from this month to the end of 2009 when the economy may fall to a minus one-or-two per cent.
Apart from the demographic setback, a long deep recession may have repercussions on strategic factors as well. One possibility is that it may compel the city-state to redirect its growth policies, or even change some fundamentals, especially when Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew is no longer around.
The pursuit of higher returns by investing in riskier instruments may be replaced by a more patient, safer approach — even at the cost of lower dividends.
This consequence will become more apparent in future if the Western financial world takes a further turn for the worse. In the new world, there are fewer safe bets anywhere. Meanwhile, the profile of Singapore’s politics, as well as younger electorate, will change faster in the years ahead.
Every five-yearly election brings out 200,000-220,000 new voters who have turned 21, a new breed of less predictable voters.
They are more liberal-minded and a tougher lot to please. The post-Lee Kuan Yew leaders will need to win them over to remain in power.
The result could see a future government that pays less priority on “corporatism” (like profits and revenue) and more emphasis on helping workers and people, a “return to basics” emphasis. The ruling PAP, after all, operates a “democratic socialist” party constitution.
While the immigration cut-back may currently be forced upon the state, it is unlikely to result in any significant shift of the open door policy. The government believes that foreigners are an asset to Singapore’s talent pool and vitality.
A senior government official said that when the economic growth hits 6% again, “Singapore will need 87,300 more workers. Most have to come from abroad; the birthrate is only half of this.”
Happy Despite It All? Thank Your Friends, Study Shows
By Naomi Kresge
Dec. 5 (Bloomberg) -- Global recession got you down? Happy friends could do more to improve your mood than money, U.S. researchers said in the British Medical Journal.
Happiness is catching, rippling through social networks to up to three degrees of separation, researchers from Harvard Medical School and the University of California, San Diego, found after assessing more than 4,700 people over 20 years. The smaller the distance between friends, the bigger the effect, which lasted up to a year, the scientists said.
“This is probably the analogy that’s seen in financial markets where there’s a sudden stampede of emotional states,” said study co-author Nicholas Christakis, a professor in the department of health-care policy at Harvard in Cambridge, Massachusetts. “It’s like if greed is infectious, so is happiness.”
A person is 25 percent more likely to be cheered after a shift toward happiness in a friend who lives within 1 mile (1.6 kilometers), researchers found. Happy next-door neighbors made it 34 percent more probable that a person would feel good. Cheerful spouses, and siblings who live within a mile boosted happiness to a smaller degree, while co-workers didn’t have an effect.
The findings came from the Framingham Heart Study, which has been running since 1948 in the Massachusetts town of the same name. Researchers looked at questionnaires participants filled out from 1983 to 2003, using computer models to map 54,228 social ties listed by people in the study.
Happy, Hopeful
Researchers defined happiness as a perfect score on the questions “I felt hopeful about the future,” “I was happy,” “I enjoyed life,” and “I felt that I was just as good as other people.”
The Framingham data had been used before to assess depression as a risk factor for heart disease, but this was the first time researchers looked at happiness across a broad network, Christakis said.
“We show that your happiness depends not only on your friends and family but on whether your friends of friends are happy,” he said in a telephone interview. “There are clusters of happy and unhappy people in the network.”
Happiness spread more easily and consistently than unhappiness, he said.
People’s good feelings may spread even to someone they don’t know. Researchers saw that happiness in people three degrees removed could make an individual 5.6 percent more likely to be happy. Having an extra $5,000 only made people 2 percent more likely to be happy, the authors said in a statement.
‘Groundbreaking’
The study is “groundbreaking” because it shows that some psychological and social factors likely to influence health may spread across social networks, Andrew Steptoe, a professor at University College London, and Ana Diez Roux, a professor at the University of Michigan School of Public Health, wrote in an accompanying editorial.
Yale University researchers, however, said in a second study in the journal that social network research can be deceiving. Their research showed teenagers appeared more likely to have acne, headaches or be tall if those conditions were widespread among their friends, but that the results were insignificant once the data was adjusted for environmental factors.
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