World’s richest 1% bagged 82% of global wealth in 2017, while poorest half got nothing – Oxfam The inequality crisis is worsening, according to a new study by global charity Oxfam, which found that the world’s richest 42 people own the same amount of wealth as the poorest 50 percent worldwide. [...]

The current administration is afraid of competition in the international arena in a number of directions, and behaves tougher than the Obama administration, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Monday. "It seems to me that despite President Trump's line during the election campaign, this legacy, unfortunately, has been preserved in the actions of the current US administration, [...]

Happy cultures are all alike. But this is not a happy culture. Sullen and sour, America seems like a country whose nerves are shot. And, after 16 straight years of war, why wouldn’t the political neurons be frayed? Each day the fear factor is being ratcheted up. New threats are being targeted. New wars being planned. A paralytic dread hangs over the Republic. [...]

Ukraine’s hryvnia has hit rock bottom, now 34 against the euro. This is the lowest point for the Ukrainian currency ever tracked. The hryvnia has also plunged to a record low against the Russian ruble, trading at 4.99 hryvnia to 10 rubles. The Ukrainian currency is on its hat-trick against the US dollar. One dollar is worth 28.44 hryvnia; the historical record was 30.01 hryvnia in February 2015. [...]

"America does not need Walls; it actually needs tens of millions of younger and working age immigrants who can function as tax mules to carry the burden of 105 million baby-boomer and retirees" Washington is drifting rapidly into a hellacious fiscal calamity and the only thin reed of resistance is the once and former party of fiscal rectitude. If it does not get its act together and screw-up some [...]

The Russian economy has recovered and is growing, according to President Vladimir Putin. Last year, Russian GDP grew after the recession of 2015 and 2016. The positive dynamic in the Russian economy goes on. We have a lower than expected budget deficit; our gold and foreign exchange reserves are growing.   [...]

Schiff/Trotsky funded AntiFA-like protests and false flags in Russia exactly like what is now happening in the west before they murdered the Czar. Same thing in France before the French Revolution. You don’t need to be a genius to see this new Bolshevik revolution in all the White European Christian established nations today and Muslims and non adamic races are being used as an army. This [...]

Russian Minister of Economic Development Maxim Oreshkin said Wednesday that Russia's national currency, the ruble, should be supported because a "big trend toward the de-dollarization" of the country's economy is growing at a steady pace. [...]

Commenting on the recent statement of White House Chief Strategist Steve Bannon that the US is at 'economic war' with China, Hong Kong-based political scientist Joseph Cheng explained to Sputnik that the US, in fact, can't do much to prevent Beijing from growing into the world's economic leader and why the two countries should avoid a trade war. [...]

China and Russia have already ditched the US dollar in their vast energy trade. Now China is leveraging Saudi Arabia to also abandon the greenback for oil sales. No wonder, it seems, that US policies are increasingly lashing out. US global power depends on its presumed economic prowess and military force. With its economy in long-term decline, precipitated by the teetering dollar, the US rulers [...]

A report by the Institute of International Finance (IIF) in the US has revealed that global debt levels have surged to US$217 trillion in the first quarter of 2017. This is 327 percent of the world's annual economic output (GDP). [...]

Thom talks with Dr. Richard Wolff about how the GOP health bill could kill 29,000 Americans in the next decade if implemented. He then talks with Sam Sacks and Bryan Pruitt to get their take on the healthcare bill as members of the GOP oppose it, causing a voting delay in congress, the return of camera-shy Sean Spicer to the visual press scene, and the White House’s plan to defund an counter-whi [...]

America is often referred to as the "Land of the Free," but as citizens prepare to celebrate the Fourth of July, their satisfaction with the country's freedom is significantly lower than it was a decade ago, according to a newly released Gallup poll. The survey found that although 91 percent of Americans were satisfied with the freedom in their lives in 2006, only 75 percent feel the same way t [...]

The Republican healthcare proposal amounts to a tax cut for the rich, and the US economy would benefit far more from establishing single-payer healthcare, according to Warren Buffett, one of the richest men in America. The 86-year-old Nebraskan is the chief executive of investing house Berkshire Hathaway and has a net worth of $75.6 billion, according to Forbes. He is the world’s second-riche [...]

The answer is crystal clear. For years, Social Security has served as a key source of income for millions of retired Americans. In fact, these days, an estimated 61% of retirees rely on their benefits to provide at least half of their income. The problem, however, is that Social Security was never designed to cover seniors' living costs in their entirety. So when we ask whether the average America [...]

Here’s hoping there's rent control in China: Employees at a factory that manufactures apparel for Ivanka Trump’s clothing business earn just $62 each week, for 60 hours of work, it has been revealed. There are 80 workers at the plant, which produces clothing for Ivanka Trump’s eponymous brand as well as for Tommy Hilfiger and Calvin Klein, The Washington Post reported. [...]

While markets are forecasting only a 10 percent chance of a global recession, Danish investment firm Saxo Bank puts the odds at over 60 percent. "Our main global macro outlook still maintains that recession is more likely than not in the near future (12 to 18 months) based on the global credit impulse having peaked simultaneously with global inflation," chief economist at Saxo Bank Steen Jakobs [...]

On March 25, the leaders of the 27 EU member-states signed a declaration to “restart” the badly divided European Union. In an interview with Sputnik, Gian Micalessin, a military reporter with the Italian newspaper Il Giornale, spoke about the political crisis facing the EU and its future relations with Russia. [...]

The ruble continues its seemingly unstoppable rally boosted by foreign investors seeking high yield returns. The currency has gained over 30 percent against the US dollar in just over a year. On Thursday, the ruble rose 0.4 percent versus the greenback and was trading at 56.35 at 7:35am GMT, and gained 0.6 percent to 60.60 against the euro.   [...]

Americans have shown that they strongly refute almost every aspect of the proposed budget of US President Donald Trump, a plan described as perfectly mirroring the agenda of his extremely wealthy cabinet members. A new Quinnipiac poll published Friday revealed that a wide majority of US citizens oppose the sweeping cuts proposed by Trump to popular long-term government programs. [...]

One-fifth of Medicare recipients are covered through Medicaid, including nursing homes and long-term care. The House Republican leadership’s Obamacare repeal bill will not only cause upwards of 24 million people to lose their health care coverage over the next decade, as the Congressional Budget Office has said, but it will also push millions of seniors already on the financial edge into deep an [...]

One in three American kids live in poverty, according to UNICEF. With 32.2 percent of children living below this line, the U.S. ranks 36th out of the 41 wealthy countries included in the UNICEF report. The United States ranks near the bottom of the pack of wealthy nations on a measure of child poverty. Nearly one third of U.S. children live in households with an income below 60 percent of the nati [...]