The great social divide

FT: US companies are going to have to disclose the precise difference between their corporate pay packages and average salaries, in a move bound to embarrass a great many executives. The new rule is part of an overhaul of the US financial system, the Dodd-Frank Act, passed in July.
"S&P 500 chief executives last year received median pay packages of $7.5m, according to executive compensation research firm Equilar. By comparison, official statistics show the average private sector employee was paid just over $40,000."
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University of Chicago economist Raghuram Rajan argues that since the extension of easy credit by the US government and markets in an effort to extend the American Dream of home ownership to middle and low income households backfired, we should be wary of renewed attempts to bring about equality.
"The problem, as often is the case with government policies, was not intent. It rarely is. But when lots of easy money pushed by a deep-pocketed government comes into contact with the profit motive of a sophisticated, competitive, and amoral financial sector, matters get taken far beyond the government’s intent."
See How Inequality Fueled the Crisis.

IPCC criticised
Economist: Ahead of its next plenarey meeting in October, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change faces stiff criticism from a probe carried out by the umbrella group of the world's academies. "The report finds problems with the way the IPCC handles reviews of its work, the degree to which it shows fairness when considering areas that are disputed, and the way it communicates the certainty, or lack of it, wherewith it speaks."
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Guardian: Bjorn Lomborg, the 'sceptical environmentalist', will argue in a new book out next month that the world should invest tens of billions of dollars a year to combat climate change. '"Investing $100bn annually would mean that we could essentially resolve the climate change problem by the end of this century," the book concludes.'
See preview.

Peace talks start under a cloud
The Israeli and Palestinian leaders meet in Washington on Thursday for the ninth historical attempt to reach a peaceful settlement. But the Obama administration already faces a possible deal-breaking date. On September 26, Israel says it plans to restart settlement construction after the end of a moratorium.
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Palestinian PM Salaam Fayyad says "talks can and must" succeed.
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Iraq's former PM Ayad Allawi says "the environment is not right" for these talks to succeed. In an interview published as the US declares the official end of its combat presence in Iraq, he believes Iraq could still tip into chaos, with devastating results for the region. The country still has no government (Allawi is in talks with al-Maliki for a form of power-sharing) and its security forces are facing a resurgence in terrorism.

America should rethink its police across the Mideast and Asia, says Allawi, because it is a failure from Palestine to Afghanistan.
"Everybody is frightened. Every corner of the region is frightened. Even America is frightened, even Iran is frightened. We are heading towards a situation which almost compares to the Cuban crisis in 1962. There is an umbrella of fear spreading above us."
See interview.
US VP Joe Biden is in Iraq for the transitional ceremony in which the remaining 50,000 US troops will be baptised as supporting troops.
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Greek pessimism
79.6 percent of Greeks declared themselves slightly or not at all optimistic about the country's immediate future in a GPO poll released by Mega TV station yesterday. 20.1 percent said they were optimistic. Even among Pasok voters the pessimistic proportion was 65 percent. About 44 percent of voters do not believe the government's claim that further austerity measures will not be necessary this year. About 55 percent of Greeks believe the measures will lead back to economic recovery, but just under 43 percent fear bankruptcy. Asked which party's policy they trusted most to resolve the economic crisis, 31 percent said Pasok, 13.4 percent said New Democracy and 39.5 percent said neither. The poll showed that Pasok had lost a couple of points of its support since April this year to come to 28.6 percent of the vote were elections to happen now, while ND stood steady at 21 percent.
See full TV report.

Germany's new immigration debate
A new book by Thilo Sarrazin, a member of Detsche Bank's board, has sparked renewed debate in Germany about whether immigration is a good thing. Sarraziin argues that Germany's ageing population is being infiltrated by poorly educated Turkish labour. Many politicians have asked for Sarrazin's resignation.
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Ireland faces bank test
Ireland's banks will attempt to refinance 25bn euros' worth of debt in September, creating a test of whether they can do so at affordable rates.
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