Labor

In the latest clear sign that low oil prices are taking their indirect toll not only the US shale sector, leading to billions in capex cuts and hundreds of thousands of lost oil and gas jobs, on Friday Saudi newspaper al-Watan reported that the multinational construction conglomerate Saudi Binladin Gropu (which was founded in 1931 by Sheikh Mohammed bin Laden Sayyid, father of Osama bin Laden who was removed as a shareholder in the business in 1993 and disowned by the family) has laid off 50,000 staff as pressure on the industry rises amid government spending cuts to survive an era

While this should be no surprise to any rational non-establishment-teet-suckling economist, former McDonalds' CEO Ed Rensi exclaims, in a recent Forbes Op-Ed, that "a $15 minimum wage won’t spell the end of [fast-food brands].

The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ( EEOC) filed a lawsuit this week claiming that the  Mission hospital in North Carolina forced workers with religious objections to get flu shots and fired those who refused. According to Reuters: “The suit was filed in the U.S.

Authored by Project Chesapeake's Tom Chatham, via Alt-Market.com,

It has been said that history may not repeat but it sometimes rhymes. Just as the generals always seem to fight the last war people seem to prepare for the last depression. Times change and the mechanism that leads to misfortune changes with it. Looking at the past may not give us the clear answer to how to deal with the future but it can help us to determine what might happen and how to deal with it when the time comes.

Submitted by Kessler Companies

Output Gap Update - Q1 2016