How the world sees Greece
Government spokesman Dimitris Tzanakopoulos said that Finance minister Euclid Tsakalotos will most certainly remain in his post until the end of the upcoming bailout negotiations with Greece’s international lenders in August 2018. “I’m certain that ...
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Until last year, few Greeks had heard of Marina Satti. The architecture student-turned-classically-trained singer had performed in musicals and ancient Greek plays, but her music career was largely under the radar. She played what she calls "blender" music ...
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President Trump is facing widespread criticism for his latest comments on the deadly white supremacist protest in Charlottesville, Virginia. Speaking at Trump Tower on Tuesday, Trump said the violence was in part caused by what he called the "alt-left." President Trump's comment were widely decried. Former Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney wrote on Twitter, "No, not the same. One side is racist, bigoted, Nazi. The other opposes racism and bigotry. Morally different universes." We look at one of the groups who confronted the white supremacists in the streets: the antifascists known as antifa. We speak to Mark Bray, author of the new book, Antifa: The Anti-Fascist Handbook. TRANSCRIPT AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. I'm Amy Goodman, with Juan González. JUAN GONZÁLEZ: President Trump is facing widespread criticism for his latest comments on the deadly white supremacist protest in Charlottesville, Virginia. Speaking at Trump Tower Tuesday, Trump said the violence was in part caused by what he called the "alt-left." > PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: OK, what about the "alt-left" that came > charging at -- excuse me. What about the "alt-left"? They came > charging at the, as you say, the alt-right? Do they have any > semblance of guilt? What -- let me ask you this: What about the fact > they came charging -- that they came charging with clubs in their > hands, swinging clubs? Do they have any problem? I think they do. > So, you know, as far as I'm concerned, that was a horrible, horrible > day. Wait a minute, I'm not finished. I'm not finished, fake news. > That was a horrible day. > REPORTER: Mr. President, are you putting what you're calling the > "alt-left" and white supremacists on the same moral plane? > PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I'm not putting anybody on a moral plane. > What I'm saying is this: You had a group on one side, and you had a > group on the other, and they came at each other with clubs, and it > was vicious, and it was horrible, and it was a horrible thing to > watch. But there is another side. There was a group on this side -- > you can call them the left, you've just called them the left -- that > came violently attacking the other group. So you can say what you > want, but that's the way it is. AMY GOODMAN: President Trump's comments were widely decried. Former Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney tweeted, "No, not the same. One side is racist, bigoted, Nazi. The other opposes racism and bigotry. Morally different universes," unquote. Earlier this week, Cornel West appeared on Democracy Now!. He painted a very different picture of Charlottesville than President Trump, saying anarchists and antifascists saved his life. > CORNEL WEST: Absolutely. You had a number of the courageous > students, of all colors, at the University of Virginia who were > protesting against the neofascists themselves. The neofascists had > their own ammunition. And this is very important to keep in mind, > because the police, for the most part, pulled back. The next day, > for example, those 20 of us who were standing, many of them clergy, > we would have been crushed like cockroaches if it were not for the > anarchists and the antifascists who approached, over 300, 350 > antifascists. We just had 20. And we're singing "This Little light > of Mine," you know what I mean? So that the -- > AMY GOODMAN: "Antifa" meaning antifascist. > CORNEL WEST: The antifascists, and then, crucial, the anarchists, > because they saved our lives, actually. We would have been > completely crushed, and I'll never forget that. AMY GOODMAN: To look more at the antifascist movement, known as antifa, we're joined by Mark Bray, lecturer at Dartmouth College. His new book, Antifa: The Anti-Fascist Handbook. First, pronounce it for us, Mark, and then talk about antifa. MARK BRAY: Yes, well, it's pronounced _on'-tee-fah_. The emphasis is on the first syllable, and it's pronounced more on than an, so _on'-tee-fah_. It's commonly mispronounced. But antifa, of course, is short for antifascist. And, you know, President Trump's comments that the alt -- quote-unquote, "alt-left" and alt-right are equivalent moral forces is really historically misinformed and morally bankrupt. The antifascist movement has a global history that stretches back over -- about a century. You can trace them to Italian opposition to Mussolini's Blackshirts, German opposition to Hitler's Brownshirts, antifascists from around the world who had traveled to Spain to fight in the Spanish Civil War. More recently, modern antifa can largely trace its roots to the antifascist movement in Britain in the '70s, and the postwar period more generally, that was responding to a xenophobic backlash against predominantly Caribbean and South Asian migration, also to the German autonomous movement of the '80s, which, really, after the fall of the Berlin Wall, had to respond to a really unprecedented neo-Nazi wave -- unprecedented in the postwar period, of course. And then, in the United States, we can look at anti-racist action in the 1980s, 1990s and the early 2000s, which took some of these methods of confronting neo-Nazis and fascists wherever they assemble, shutting down their organizing and, as they said, going where they go. Today, in an article I wrote for The Washington Post called "Who are the antifa?" I explain this and show how today's antifa in the United States are really picking up the tradition where these groups left off. And their movement has really accelerated with the unfortunate ascendance of the alt-right following President Trump. The other minor note I want to make before we continue is that antifa is really only one faction of a larger movement against white supremacy that dates back centuries and includes a whole number -- there are a whole number of groups that fight against similar foes, sometimes using the same methods, that aren't necessarily antifascists. So, it's important not to subsume the entire anti-racist movement within this sort of one category. JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Mark Bray, in your book -- and I want to quote a few lines from it -- you say, "Most people have an 'all-or-nothing' understanding of fascism that prevents them from taking fascists seriously until they seize power. ... Very few really believe that there is any serious chance of a fascistic regime ever materializing in America." And I'm wondering about that and the importance of understanding that concept of yours, for those who are looking at what's happening today in America. MARK BRAY: Right. So, the way people understand fascism, or the way they've been taught about it, is generally exclusively in terms of regimes. So, the thought goes, as long as we have parliamentary government, we're safe. But we can look back to the historical examples of Italy and Germany and see that, unfortunately, parliamentary government was insufficient to prevent the stop -- to prevent the rise of fascism and Nazism, and actually provided a red carpet to their advance. So, because of that reason, people think of fascism in terms of all or nothing, regime or nothing. But we can see in Charlottesville that any amount of neo-Nazi organizing, any amount of a fascist presence, is potentially fatal. And, unfortunately, Heather Heyer paid the price for that. So that's partly why antifascists argue that fascism must be nipped in the bud from the beginning, that any kind of organizing needs to be confronted and responded to. Even if, you know, people are spending most of their time on Twitter making jokes, it's still very serious and needs to be confronted. AMY GOODMAN: Can you -- can you talk about -- I mean, very interesting, during the South Carolina protests against the white supremacists, there were flags of Republicans in Spain fighting Franco. MARK BRAY: Right. So, one of the most iconic moments in antifascist history is the Spanish Civil War, and, from an international perspective, the role of the International Brigades, brave antifascists who came from dozens of countries around the world to stand up to Franco's forces. Franco had the institutional support of Nazi Germany and Mussolini's Italy, whereas the Republican side really only had support of the Soviet Union, which, as I discuss in my book, had a lot of problematic aspects to it. So, if we look at the role of the International Brigades, we can see that antifascists view their struggle as transnational and transhistorical. And so, today, if you go to an antifascist demonstration in Spain, for example, the flag of the International Brigades, the flag of the Spanish Republic is ubiquitous. And these symbols, even the double flags of antifascism that people will frequently see at demonstrations, often one being red, one being black, was originally developed as a German symbol, which, in its earliest incarnation, dates back to the 1930s. So, it's important to look at antifa not just as sort of a random thought experiment that some crazy kids came up with to respond to the far right, but rather a tradition that dates back a century. JUAN GONZÁLEZ: You also talk, in your examples, of other countries, not only the period of the 1930s and '40s, but more recent periods, in England in the '80s, and in Greece, as well, even more recently, and the importance of direct action by antifascists to nip in the bud or to beat back the rise of fascist movements. MARK BRAY: Right. So, part of what I try to do with my book, Antifa, is draw certain historical lessons from the early period of antifascist struggle that can be applied to the struggle today. One of them is that it doesn't take a lot of organized fascists to sometimes develop a really powerful movement. We can see that recently with the rise of Golden Dawn, the fascist party in Greece, which, prior to the financial crisis, was really a tiny micro-party and considered a joke by most. Subsequently, they became a major party in Greek politics and a major threat, a violent, deadly threat, to migrants and leftists and people of all stripes across Greek society. This was also true back in the early part of the 20th century, when Mussolini's initial fascist nucleus was a hundred people. When Hiller first attended his first meeting of the German Workers' Party, which he later transformed into the Nazi Party, they had 54 members. So, we need to see that there's always a potential for small movements to become large. And one of the other lessons of the beginning of the 20th century is that people did not take fascism and Nazism seriously until it was too late. That mistake will never be made again by antifascists, who will recognize that any manifestation of these politics is dangerous and needs to be confronted as if it could be the nucleus of some sort of deadly movement or regime of the future. AMY GOODMAN: I wanted you to talk, Mark Bray, about the presence of Stephen Bannon and Sebastian Gorka and Stephen Miller in the White House and what that means to antifa, to the antifascist movement. MARK BRAY: Right. Well, the other side of it is it's not just about how many people are part of fascist or neo-Nazi groups. It's also about the fact that far-right politics have the ability to infiltrate and influence and direct mainstream politics. And we can see that with the alt-right. The alt-right is not really actually a lot of people in terms of numbers, but they've had a disproportionate influence on the Trump administration and certain aspects of public discourse. So, the presence of Bannon and Gorka and Miller in the White House really just gives some sort of a hint as to why it is that Trump yesterday basically said there are good people on both sides of this conflict, that Friday night, when there were neo-Nazis wielding torches in Nazi style and they attacked nonviolent UVA student protesters, that he said, "Oh, well, you know, these are good people." So, part of it is the organized street presence, but, as we saw, by confronting the organized street presence in Charlottesville, this created the question of just how bad these people are, because -- you played earlier, Mitt Romney condemned the fact that there could be blame ascribed to both sides. Well, prior to Charlottesville, that was the dominant media narrative. Most mainstream media was saying, "Oh, well, we have, quote-unquote, 'violence' on both sides. Hands up. Who's to say who's right or wrong?" But by confronting this, by putting it in the spotlight, by shining a light on what these people really think, it's shifted the public discourse and pushed back the ability of some of these alt-right figures to try and cloak their fascism. JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And what do you say, for instance, to those who maybe are opposed to the viewpoints of the white nationalists and white supremacists, but also attempt to condemn any attempts to shut them -- shut them down or not allow them to speak? Or -- and, obviously, the American Civil Liberties Union fought for the right of the Charlottesville -- the white nationalists to have their rally in Charlottesville. MARK BRAY: Right. Well, the question of how to combat fascism, I think, always needs to come back to discussions of the 1930s and 1940s. So, clearly, we can see that rational discourse and debate was insufficient. Clearly, we can see that the mechanisms of parliamentary government were insufficient. We need to be able to come up with a way to say, "How can we make sure never again?" By any means necessary, this can never happen again. And the people back there who witnessed these atrocities committed themselves to that. So the question is: OK, if you don't think that it's appropriate to physically confront and to stand in front of neo-Nazis who are trying to organize for another genocide now, do you do it after someone has died, as they just did? Do you do it after a dozen people have died? Do you do it once they're at the footsteps of power? At what point? At what point do you say, "Enough is enough," and give up on the liberal notion that what we need to do is essentially create some sort of a regime of rights that allow neo-Nazis and their victims to coexist, quote-unquote, "peacefully," and recognize that the neo-Nazis don't want that and that also the antifascists are right in not looking at it through that liberal lens, but rather seeing fascism not as an opinion that needs to be responded to respectfully, but as an enemy to humanity that needs to be stopped by any means necessary? AMY GOODMAN: This is Part 1 of our conversation, Mark Bray. We'll do Part 2 and post it online at democracynow.org. Mark Bray is the author of a book that is coming out in the next few weeks called_ Antifa: The Anti-Fascist Handbook_. He is a lecturer at Dartmouth College.
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… £15 million yacht on the Greek Island of Mykonos. He and … for smashing, which is a Greek tradition at the end of … sandy beaches on the sweltering Greek island. Sir Philip Green parties …
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Editors note: This post originally ran in 2011 and has been updated. You can read the previous post here. Bay Ridge is an old town, settled by the ...
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In 2014, under then–Home Secretary Theresa May, the British government expanded its power to revoke the citizenship of naturalized citizens ...
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The parish's annual summer fest brings GREEK dancing, fireworks and a revered big-ticket raffle in which the top five prizes are luxury vehicles or cash ...
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The celebration highlights the people, culture, and spirit of Alaska's GREEK community. There will be activities for the whole family including dancing, ...
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No casualties were reported in Turkey, while at least two people were killed and scores were injured on the nearby GREEK island of Kos. Kos and ...
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The 19th annual GREEK Festival will come to town this weekend. From Friday to Sunday Archangel Michael GREEK Orthodox Church in Colorado ...
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In fact, ancient GREEK religious art connects in very significant ways with Genesis. While Genesis describes the early events and people in humanity's ...
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In GREECE, Germany, Turkey, Hungary, France, Italy and Spain, more people had confidence in the Russian president than in his U.S. counterpart "to ...
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... basketball player Ramon Harris has exited the NBA's developmental league, now called the G League, and signed a deal to play in GREECE. Harris ...
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Greg's story began when he took a trip to Mytiline, GREECE and met the love of his life Maria (Koukouta) Mellekas. They were married on April 14, 1991.
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Even as a steady influx of undocumented migrants continues to arrive on Greek islands in the eastern Aegean from neighboring Turkey, in western ...
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In a visit to Aghia Kyriaki, a village in eastern Attica, Tsipras declared that GREECE had “avoided the worst” but that “we have to be alert.” He also noted ...
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In the latest exchange of acrimony between Athens and Ankara, GREECE dismissed claims Wednesday by Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu ...
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Sam Hunt and Maren Morris are undoubtedly two of the hottest young-and-rising stars on country radio today. Each artist only has one major label album to his or her credit – Hunt released “Montevallo” in 2014 and Morris put out “Hero” in 2016 ...
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The story sees Farrell as a doctor whose family falls victim to a case of supernatural revenge perpetrated by a creepy teenage boy (Keoghan) with whom he shares ties to a former patient. Check out the first trailer above Lanthimos co-scripted with regular ...
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[janet yellen] Most Federal Reserve officials supported a move towards unwinding the Fed's massive balance sheet at "an upcoming meeting," according to minutes of its July policy meeting released Wednesday. The Fed's next meeting is scheduled for September 19-20. At the July meeting, the Federal Open Markets Committee voted to leave interest rates unchanged, as expected. It also indicated that it planned to start work on shrinking its $4.5 trillion balance sheet "relatively soon." Details on that could emerge as soon as September. The Fed had bought Treasuries and other fixed-income securities after the financial crisis to keep borrowing costs low. In June, the Fed said that to unwind its balance sheet, it planned to gradually allow a fixed amount of its assets to roll off without reinvestment, and raise the caps on these amounts every three months. For now, investors are focusing on how the Fed is thinking about inflation. Fed Chair Janet Yellen attributed the recent slowdown to "idiosyncratic" or peculiar factors like cheaper wireless service. The slowdown in inflation has stoked the Fed's critics who argue that it should dial back its intention to continue raising rates. According to the minutes, Fed participants saw inflation picking up towards its 2% objective "over the next couple of years." Here are the minutes: Staff Review of the Economic Situation The information reviewed for the July 25-26 meeting showed that labor market conditions continued to strengthen in June and that real gross domestic product (GDP) likely expanded at a faster pace in the second quarter than in the first quarter. The 12-month change in overall consumer prices, as measured by the price index for personal consumption expenditures (PCE), slowed again in May; both total consumer price inflation and core inflation, which excludes consumer food and energy prices, were running below 2 percent. Data from the consumer and producer price indexes for June suggested that both total and core PCE price inflation (on a 12-month change basis) remained at a pace similar to that seen in the previous month. Survey‑based measures of longer-run inflation expectations were little changed on balance. Total nonfarm payroll employment expanded solidly in June, and the average monthly pace of private-sector job gains over the first half of the year was essentially the same as last year. The unemployment rate edged up to 4.4 percent in June; the unemployment rates for African Americans and for Hispanics declined slightly but remained above the unemployment rates for Asians and for whites. In addition, the median length of time that unemployed African Americans had been out of work exceeded the comparable figures for whites and for Hispanics, a pattern that has prevailed for at least the past two decades. The overall labor force participation rate edged up in June, and the share of workers employed part time for economic reasons rose a bit. The rate of private-sector job openings decreased in May after having risen for a couple of months, while the quits rate and the hiring rate both increased. The four-week moving average of initial claims for unemployment insurance benefits remained at a very low level through mid‑July. Average hourly earnings for all employees increased 2-1/2 percent over the 12 months ending in June, about the same as over the comparable period a year earlier but a little slower than the rate of increase in late 2016. Total industrial production rose moderately, on balance, in May and June, as an increase in the output of mines and utilities more than offset a net decline in manufacturing production. Automakers' assembly schedules indicated that motor vehicle production would edge down again in the third quarter, likely reflecting a somewhat elevated level of dealers' inventories and a slowing in the pace of vehicle sales last quarter. However, broader indicators of manufacturing production, such as the new orders indexes from national and regional manufacturing surveys, pointed to moderate gains in factory output over the near term. Real PCE appeared to have rebounded in the second quarter after increasing only modestly in the first quarter. Much of the rebound looked to have been concentrated in spending on energy services and energy goods, which was held down by unseasonably warm weather earlier in the year. The components of the nominal retail sales data used by the Bureau of Economic Analysis to construct its estimate of PCE declined in June but rose, on net, in the second quarter. Light motor vehicle sales edged down further in June. However, recent readings on key factors that influence consumer spending--including continued gains in employment, real disposable personal income, and households' net worth--pointed to solid growth in total real PCE in the near term. Consumer sentiment, as measured by the University of Michigan Surveys of Consumers, remained upbeat despite having moved down in early July. Residential investment seemed to have declined in the second quarter. Starts of both new single-family homes and multifamily units rose in June but still decreased for the second quarter as a whole. The issuance of building permits for both types of housing was lower in the second quarter than in the first quarter. Sales of existing homes decreased, on net, in May and June, and new home sales in May partly reversed the previous month's decline. Real private expenditures for business equipment and intellectual property appeared to have increased moderately in the second quarter after a solid gain in the first quarter. Nominal shipments of nondefense capital goods excluding aircraft rose again in May, and new orders of these goods continued to exceed shipments, pointing to further gains in shipments in the near term. In addition, indicators of business sentiment remained upbeat. Investment in nonresidential structures appeared to have risen at a markedly slower pace in the second quarter than in the first. Firms' nominal spending for nonresidential structures excluding drilling and mining declined further in May, and the number of oil and gas rigs in operation, an indicator of spending for structures in the drilling and mining sector, leveled out in recent weeks after increasing steadily for the past year. Nominal outlays for defense through June pointed to an increase in real federal government purchases in the second quarter. However, real purchases by state and local governments appeared to have declined. Payrolls for state and local governments expanded during the second quarter, but nominal construction spending by these governments decreased, on net, in April and May. The nominal U.S. international trade deficit narrowed in May, with an increase in exports and a small decline in imports. Export growth was led by consumer goods, automotive products, and services. The import decline was driven by consumer goods and automotive products. The available data suggested that net exports were a slight drag on real GDP growth in the second quarter. Total U.S. consumer prices, as measured by the PCE price index, increased 1-1/2 percent over the 12 months ending in May. Core PCE price inflation was also 1-1/2 percent over that same period. Over the 12 months ending in June, the consumer price index (CPI) rose 1-1/2 percent, while core CPI inflation was 1-3/4 percent. The median of inflation expectations over the next 5 to 10 years from the Michigan survey edged up both in June and in the preliminary reading for July. Other measures of longer‑run inflation expectations were generally little changed, on balance, in recent months, although those from the Desk's Survey of Primary Dealers and Survey of Market Participants had ticked down recently. Incoming data suggested that economic growth continued to firm abroad, especially among advanced foreign economies (AFEs). The pickup in advanced-economy demand also contributed to relatively strong growth in China and emerging Asia, but growth in Latin America remained relatively weak, partly reflecting tight monetary and fiscal policies. Despite the stronger momentum of economic activity in the AFEs, headline inflation declined sharply in the second quarter, largely reflecting lower retail energy prices, and core inflation stayed subdued in many AFEs. Although inflation was also low in most emerging market economies (EMEs), it remained elevated in Mexico because of rising food inflation and earlier peso depreciation. Staff Review of the Financial Situation Domestic financial market conditions remained generally accommodative over the intermeeting period. U.S. equity prices rose, longer-term Treasury yields increased slightly, and the dollar depreciated. The Committee's decision to raise the target range for the federal funds rate to 1 to 1-1/4 percent at the June meeting was widely anticipated in financial markets, and market participants reportedly viewed FOMC communications as largely in line with expectations. Financing conditions for nonfinancial businesses and households generally remained supportive of growth in spending. FOMC communications over the intermeeting period were viewed as broadly in line with investors' expectations that the Committee would continue to remove policy accommodation at a gradual pace. Market participants generally interpreted the information on reinvestment policy provided in June in the Committee's postmeeting statement and its Addendum to the Policy Normalization Principles and Plans as consistent with their expectation that a change to reinvestment policy was likely to occur this year. Market participants also took note of the summary in the June minutes of the Committee's discussion of the progress toward the Committee's 2 percent longer-run inflation objective and the extent to which recent softness in price data reflected idiosyncratic factors. Overnight index swap rates pointed to little change in the expected path of the federal funds rate on net. Yields on intermediate- and longer-term nominal Treasury securities increased slightly over the intermeeting period. Although yields fell following the publication of lower-than-expected CPI data, yields were boosted by comments from foreign central bank officials that investors read as pointing to less accommodative monetary policies abroad than previously expected. Measures of inflation compensation based on Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities ticked up since the June FOMC meeting. Despite their intermeeting period gains, longer-term real and nominal Treasury yields remained very low by historical standards, apparently weighed down by accommodative monetary policies abroad and possibly by declines in the long-term neutral real interest rate over recent years. Broad U.S. equity price indexes rose. One‑month-ahead option-implied volatility of the S&P 500 index--the VIX--remained at historically low levels. Spreads of yields on investment- and speculative-grade nonfinancial corporate bonds over comparable-maturity Treasury securities narrowed a bit on net. Conditions in short-term funding markets were stable over the intermeeting period. Reflecting the FOMC's policy action in June, yields on a broad set of money market instruments moved about 25 basis points higher. However, over much of the period, the net increase in rates on shorter-dated Treasury bills was smaller, reportedly reflecting a reduction in Treasury bill supply. Financing for large nonfinancial firms remained readily available, although debt issuance moderated. Gross issuance of corporate bonds stepped down in June from a strong pace in May, while issuance of institutional leveraged loans continued to be robust. Commercial and industrial lending by banks remained quite weak in the second quarter. Responses from the July Senior Loan Officer Opinion Survey on Bank Lending Practices (SLOOS) indicated that depressed demand was largely responsible, and that banks' lending standards were little changed in recent months. The most cited reason for the lackluster loan demand was subdued investment spending by nonfinancial businesses, but banks also reported that some borrowers had shifted to other sources of external financing or to internally generated funds. Financing conditions for commercial real estate (CRE) remained accommodative, although the growth of CRE loans on banks' books slowed somewhat. Respondents to the July SLOOS reported tightening credit standards for these loans. SLOOS respondents also reported that standards on CRE loans were tight relative to their historical range, and that, on net, demand for CRE loans weakened in recent months. The pace of issuance of commercial mortgage-backed securities (CMBS) through the first half of the year was similar to that seen last year. Delinquency rates on loans in CMBS pools originated before the financial crisis continued to increase. Financing conditions in the residential mortgage market were little changed, and flows of new credit continued at a moderate pace. However, growth of mortgage loans on banks' books slowed somewhat in the first half of this year. SLOOS respondents, on net, reported that standards on most residential mortgage loan categories eased slightly. Consumer credit continued to grow on a year-over-year basis, but the expansion of credit card and auto loan balances appeared to slow from the rapid pace that was evident through the end of last year. In the July SLOOS, banks reported having tightened standards and widened spreads for credit card and auto loans on net. Standards for the subprime segments of these loan types were particularly tight compared with their historical ranges. Reflecting in part continued tightening of lending standards, consumer loan growth at banks moderated further in the second quarter; however, that weakness was partially offset by more robust lending by credit unions. Since the June FOMC meeting, the broad dollar depreciated 2 percent, weakening more against AFE currencies than against EME currencies. The dollar's depreciation was driven in part by policy communications from the central banks of several AFEs that market participants viewed as less accommodative than expected as well as by weaker-than-expected CPI data in the United States. The Bank of Canada raised its policy rate in July. Sovereign yields increased notably in Canada, Germany, and the United Kingdom. Changes in foreign equity indexes were mixed over the intermeeting period: European equities edged lower, Japanese equities were little changed, and EME equities increased. European peripheral sovereign bond spreads narrowed over the period, reflecting in part positive sentiment related to the outcomes of the French parliamentary election, Greek debt negotiations, and bank resolutions in Italy. EME sovereign spreads were little changed on net. The staff provided its latest report on potential risks to financial stability, indicating that it continued to judge the vulnerabilities of the U.S financial system as moderate on balance. This overall assessment incorporated the staff's judgment that, since the April assessment, vulnerabilities associated with asset valuation pressures had edged up from notable to elevated, as asset prices remained high or climbed further, risk spreads narrowed, and expected and actual volatility remained muted in a range of financial markets. However, the staff continued to view vulnerabilities stemming from financial leverage as well as maturity and liquidity transformation as low, and vulnerabilities from leverage in the nonfinancial sector appeared to remain moderate. Staff Economic Outlook The U.S. economic projection prepared by the staff for the July FOMC meeting was broadly similar to the previous forecast. In particular, real GDP growth, which was modest in the first quarter, was still expected to have stepped up to a solid pace in the second quarter and to maintain roughly the same rate of increase in the second half of the year. In this projection, the staff scaled back its assumptions regarding the magnitude and duration of fiscal policy expansion in the coming years. However, the effect of this change on the projection for real GDP over the next couple of years was largely offset by lower assumed paths for the exchange value of the dollar and for longer-term interest rates. Thus, as in the June projection, the staff projected that real GDP would expand at a modestly faster pace than potential output in 2017 through 2019. The unemployment rate was projected to decline gradually over the next couple of years and to continue running below the staff's estimate of its longer-run natural rate over this period. The staff's forecast for consumer price inflation, as measured by the change in the PCE price index, was revised down slightly for 2017 in response to weaker-than-expected incoming data for inflation. As a result, inflation this year was expected to be similar in magnitude to last year, with an upturn in the prices for food and non-energy imports offset by a slower increase in core PCE prices and weaker energy prices. Beyond 2017, the forecast was little revised from the previous projection, as the recent weakness in inflation was viewed as transitory. The staff continued to project that inflation would increase in the next couple of years and that it would be close to the Committee's longer-run objective in 2018 and at 2 percent in 2019. The staff viewed the uncertainty around its projections for real GDP growth, the unemployment rate, and inflation as similar to the average of the past 20 years. On the one hand, many financial market indicators of uncertainty remained subdued, and the uncertainty associated with the foreign outlook still appeared to be less than late last year; on the other hand, uncertainty about the direction of some economic policies was judged to have remained elevated. The staff saw the risks to the forecasts for real GDP growth and the unemployment rate as balanced. The risks to the projection for inflation also were seen as balanced. Downside risks included the possibilities that longer-term inflation expectations may have edged down, that the dollar could appreciate substantially, or that the recent run of soft inflation readings could prove to be more persistent than the staff expected. These downside risks were seen as essentially counterbalanced by the upside risk that inflation could increase more than expected in an economy that was projected to continue operating above its longer-run potential. Participants' Views on Current Conditions and the Economic Outlook In their discussion of the economic situation and the outlook, meeting participants agreed that information received over the intermeeting period indicated that the labor market had continued to strengthen and that economic activity had been rising moderately so far this year. Job gains had been solid, on average, since the beginning of the year, and the unemployment rate had declined, on net, over the same period. Household spending and business fixed investment had continued to expand. On a 12‑month basis, both overall inflation and the measure excluding food and energy prices had declined and were running below 2 percent. Market-based measures of inflation compensation remained low; survey-based measures of longer-term inflation expectations were little changed on balance. Participants generally saw the incoming information on spending and labor market indicators as consistent, overall, with their expectations and indicated that their views of the outlook for economic growth and the labor market were little changed, on balance, since the June FOMC meeting. Participants continued to expect that, with gradual adjustments in the stance of monetary policy, economic activity would expand at a moderate pace and labor market conditions would strengthen somewhat further. In light of continued low recent readings on inflation, participants expected that inflation on a 12-month basis would remain somewhat below 2 percent in the near term. However, most participants judged that inflation would stabilize around the Committee's 2 percent objective over the medium term. Data received over the intermeeting period reinforced earlier indications that real GDP growth had turned up after having been slow in the first quarter of this year. As anticipated, growth in household spending appeared to have been stronger in the second quarter after its first-quarter weakness. Reports from District contacts on consumer spending were generally positive. However, sales of motor vehicles had softened, and automakers were reportedly adjusting production and assessing whether the underlying demand for automobiles had declined. Participants noted that the fundamentals underpinning consumption growth, including increases in payrolls, remained solid. However, the weakness in retail sales in June offered a note of caution. Reports from District contacts on both manufacturing and services were also generally consistent with moderate growth in economic activity overall. Construction-sector contacts were generally upbeat. Reports on the energy sector indicated that activity was continuing to expand, albeit more slowly than previously; survey evidence suggested that oil drilling remained profitable in some locations at current oil prices. The agricultural sector remained weak, and some regions were experiencing drought conditions. A couple of participants had received indications from contacts that business investment spending in their Districts might strengthen. Nevertheless, several participants noted that uncertainty about the course of federal government policy, including in the areas of fiscal policy, trade, and health care, was tending to weigh down firms' spending and hiring plans. In addition, a few participants suggested that the likelihood of near-term enactment of a fiscal stimulus program had declined further or that the fiscal stimulus likely would be smaller than they previously expected. It was also observed that the budgets of some state and local governments were under strain, limiting growth in their expenditures. In contrast, the prospects for U.S. exports had been boosted by a brighter international economic outlook. Participants noted that labor market conditions had strengthened further over the intermeeting period. The unemployment rate rose slightly to 4.4 percent in June but remained low by historical standards. Payroll gains picked up substantially in June. In addition, the employment-to-population ratio increased. Participants observed that the unemployment rate was likely close to or below its longer-run normal rate and could decline further if, as expected, growth in output remained somewhat in excess of the potential growth rate. A few participants expressed concerns about the possibility of substantially overshooting full employment, with one citing past difficulties in achieving a soft landing. District contacts confirmed tightness in the labor market but relayed little evidence of wage pressures, although some firms were reportedly attempting to attract workers with a variety of nonwage benefits. The absence of sizable wage pressures also seemed to be confirmed by most aggregate wage measures. However, a few participants suggested that, in a tight labor market, measured aggregate wage growth was being held down by compositional changes in employment associated with the hiring of less experienced workers at lower wages than those of established workers. In addition, a number of participants suggested that the rate of increase in nominal wages was not low in relation to the rate of productivity growth and the modest rate of inflation. Participants discussed the softness in inflation in recent months. Many participants noted that much of the recent decline in inflation had probably reflected idiosyncratic factors. Nonetheless, PCE price inflation on a 12‑month basis would likely continue to be held down over the second half of the year by the effects of those factors, and the monthly readings might be depressed by possible residual seasonality in measured PCE inflation. Still, most participants indicated that they expected inflation to pick up over the next couple of years from its current low level and to stabilize around the Committee's 2 percent objective over the medium term. Many participants, however, saw some likelihood that inflation might remain below 2 percent for longer than they currently expected, and several indicated that the risks to the inflation outlook could be tilted to the downside. Participants agreed that a fall in longer-term inflation expectations would be undesirable, but they differed in their assessments of whether inflation expectations were well anchored. One participant pointed to the stability of a number of measures of inflation expectations in recent months, but a few others suggested that continuing low inflation expectations may have been a factor putting downward pressure on inflation or that inflation expectations might need to be bolstered in order to ensure their consistency with the Committee's longer-term inflation objective. A number of participants noted that much of the analysis of inflation used in policymaking rested on a framework in which, for a given rate of expected inflation, the degree of upward pressures on prices and wages rose as aggregate demand for goods and services and employment of resources increased above long-run sustainable levels. A few participants cited evidence suggesting that this framework was not particularly useful in forecasting inflation. However, most participants thought that the framework remained valid, notwithstanding the recent absence of a pickup in inflation in the face of a tightening labor market and real GDP growth in excess of their estimates of its potential rate. Participants discussed possible reasons for the coexistence of low inflation and low unemployment. These included a diminished responsiveness of prices to resource pressures, a lower natural rate of unemployment, the possibility that slack may be better measured by labor market indicators other than unemployment, lags in the reaction of nominal wage growth and inflation to labor market tightening, and restraints on pricing power from global developments and from innovations to business models spurred by advances in technology. A couple of participants argued that the response of inflation to resource utilization could become stronger if output and employment appreciably overshot their full employment levels, although other participants pointed out that this hypothesized nonlinear response had little empirical support. In assessing recent developments in financial market conditions, participants referred to the continued low level of longer-term interest rates, in particular those on U.S Treasury securities. The level of such yields appeared to reflect both low expected future short-term interest rates and depressed term premiums. Asset purchases by foreign central banks and the Federal Reserve's securities holdings were also likely contributing to currently low term premiums, although the exact size of these contributions was uncertain. A number of participants pointed to potential concerns about low longer-term interest rates, including the possibility that inflation expectations were too low, that yields could rise abruptly, or that low yields were inducing investors to take on excessive risk in a search for higher returns. Several participants noted that the further increases in equity prices, together with continued low longer-term interest rates, had led to an easing of financial conditions. However, different assessments were expressed about the implications of this development for the outlook for aggregate demand and, consequently, appropriate monetary policy. According to one view, the easing of financial conditions meant that the economic effects of the Committee's actions in gradually removing policy accommodation had been largely offset by other factors influencing financial markets, and that a tighter monetary policy than otherwise was warranted. According to another view, recent rises in equity prices might be part of a broad-based adjustment of asset prices to changes in longer-term financial conditions, importantly including a lower neutral real interest rate, and, therefore, the recent equity price increases might not provide much additional impetus to aggregate spending on goods and services. Participants also considered equity valuations in their discussion of financial stability. A couple of participants noted that favorable macroeconomic factors provided backing for current equity valuations; in addition, as recent equity price increases did not seem to stem importantly from greater use of leverage by investors, these increases might not pose appreciable risks to financial stability. Several participants observed that the banking system was well capitalized and had ample liquidity, reducing the risk of financial instability. It was noted that financial stability assessments were based on current capital levels within the banking sector, and that such assessments would likely be adjusted should these measures of loss-absorbing capacity change. Participants underscored the need to monitor financial institutions for shifts in behavior--such as an erosion of lending standards or increased reliance on unstable sources of funding--that could lead to subsequent problems. In addition, participants judged that it was important to look for signs that either declining market volatility or heavy concentration by investors in particular assets might create financial imbalances. A couple of participants expressed concern that smaller banks could be assuming significant risks in efforts to expand their CRE lending. Furthermore, a couple of participants saw, as possible sources of financial instability, the pace of increase in real estate prices in the multifamily segment and the pattern of the lending and borrowing activities of certain government-sponsored enterprises. Participants agreed that the regulatory and supervisory tools developed since the financial crisis had played an important role in fostering financial stability. Changes in regulation had likely helped in making the banking system more resilient to major shocks, in promoting more prudent balance sheet management strategies on the part of nonbank financial institutions, and in reducing the degree to which variations in lending to the private sector intensify cycles in output and in asset prices. Participants agreed that it would not be desirable for the current regulatory framework to be changed in ways that allowed a reemergence of the types of risky practices that contributed to the crisis. In their discussion of monetary policy, participants reaffirmed their view that a gradual approach to removing policy accommodation was likely to remain appropriate to promote the Committee's objectives of maximum employment and 2 percent inflation. Participants commented on a number of factors that would influence their ongoing assessments of the appropriate path for the federal funds rate. Most saw the outlook for economic activity and the labor market as little changed from their earlier projections and continued to anticipate that inflation would stabilize around the Committee's 2 percent objective over the medium term. However, some participants expressed concern about the recent decline in inflation, which had occurred even as resource utilization had tightened, and noted their increased uncertainty about the outlook for inflation. They observed that the Committee could afford to be patient under current circumstances in deciding when to increase the federal funds rate further and argued against additional adjustments until incoming information confirmed that the recent low readings on inflation were not likely to persist and that inflation was more clearly on a path toward the Committee's symmetric 2 percent objective over the medium term. In contrast, some other participants were more worried about risks arising from a labor market that had already reached full employment and was projected to tighten further or from the easing in financial conditions that had developed since the Committee's policy normalization process was initiated in December 2015. They cautioned that a delay in gradually removing policy accommodation could result in an overshooting of the Committee's inflation objective that would likely be costly to reverse, or that a delay could lead to an intensification of financial stability risks or to other imbalances that might prove difficult to unwind. One participant stressed that the risks both to the Committee's inflation objective and to financial stability would require careful monitoring. This participant expressed the view that a gradual approach to removing policy accommodation would likely strike the appropriate balance between promoting the Committee's inflation and full employment objectives and mitigating financial stability concerns. A number of participants also commented that the appropriate pace of normalization of the federal funds rate would depend on how financial conditions evolved and on the implications of those developments for the pace of economic activity. Among the considerations mentioned were the extent of current downward pressure on longer-term yields arising from the Federal Reserve's asset holdings and how this pressure would diminish over time as balance sheet normalization proceeded, the strength and degree of persistence of other domestic and global factors that had contributed to the easing of financial conditions and elevated asset prices, and whether and how much the neutral rate of interest would rise as the economy continued to expand. Participants also discussed the appropriate time to implement the plan for reducing the Federal Reserve's securities holdings that was announced in June in the Committee's postmeeting statement and its Addendum to the Policy Normalization Principles and Plans. Participants generally agreed that, in light of their current assessment of economic conditions and the outlook, it was appropriate to signal that implementation of the program likely would begin relatively soon, absent significant adverse developments in the economy or in financial markets. Many noted that the program was expected to contribute only modestly to the reduction in policy accommodation. Several reiterated that, once the program was under way, further adjustments to the stance of monetary policy in response to economic developments would be centered on changes in the target range for the federal funds rate. Although several participants were prepared to announce a starting date for the program at the current meeting, most preferred to defer that decision until an upcoming meeting while accumulating additional information on the economic outlook and developments potentially affecting financial markets. Committee Policy Action In their discussion of monetary policy for the period ahead, members judged that information received since the Committee met in June indicated that the labor market had continued to strengthen and that economic activity had been rising moderately so far this year. Job gains had been solid, on average, since the beginning of the year, and the unemployment rate had declined. Household spending and business fixed investment had continued to expand. On a 12‑month basis, overall inflation and the measure excluding food and energy prices had declined and were running below 2 percent. Market-based measures of inflation compensation remained low; survey-based measures of longer-term inflation expectations were little changed on balance. With respect to the economic outlook and its implications for monetary policy, members continued to expect that, with gradual adjustments in the stance of monetary policy, economic activity would expand at a moderate pace, and labor market conditions would strengthen somewhat further. Inflation on a 12‑month basis was expected to remain somewhat below 2 percent in the near term but to stabilize around the Committee's 2 percent objective over the medium term. Members saw the near-term risks to the economic outlook as roughly balanced, but, in light of their concern about the recent slowing in inflation, they agreed to continue to monitor inflation developments closely. After assessing current conditions and the outlook for economic activity, the labor market, and inflation, members decided to maintain the target range for the federal funds rate at 1 to 1-1/4 percent. They noted that the stance of monetary policy remained accommodative, thereby supporting some further strengthening in labor market conditions and a sustained return to 2 percent inflation. Members agreed that the timing and size of future adjustments to the target range for the federal funds rate would depend on their assessment of realized and expected economic conditions relative to the Committee's objectives of maximum employment and 2 percent inflation. They expected that economic conditions would evolve in a manner that would warrant gradual increases in the federal funds rate, and that the federal funds rate was likely to remain, for some time, below levels that are expected to prevail in the longer run. They also again stated that the actual path of the federal funds rate would depend on the economic outlook as informed by incoming data. In particular, they reaffirmed that they would carefully monitor actual and expected inflation developments relative to the Committee's symmetric inflation goal. Some members stressed the importance of underscoring the Committee's commitment to its inflation objective. These members emphasized that, in considering the timing of further adjustments in the federal funds rate, they would be evaluating incoming information to assess the likelihood that recent low readings on inflation were transitory and that inflation was again on a trajectory consistent with achieving the Committee's 2 percent objective over the medium term. Members agreed that, at this meeting, the Committee should further clarify the time at which it expected to begin its program for reducing its securities holdings in a gradual and predictable manner. They updated the postmeeting statement to indicate that while the Committee was, for the time being, maintaining its existing reinvestment policy, it intended to begin implementing the balance sheet normalization program relatively soon, provided that the economy evolved broadly as anticipated. Several members observed that, in part because of the Committee's various communications regarding the change, any reaction in financial markets to such a change would likely be limited. At the conclusion of the discussion, the Committee voted to authorize and direct the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, until it was instructed otherwise, to execute transactions in the SOMA in accordance with the following domestic policy directive, to be released at 2:00 p.m.: "Effective July 27, 2017, the Federal Open Market Committee directs the Desk to undertake open market operations as necessary to maintain the federal funds rate in a target range of 1 to 1-1/4 percent, including overnight reverse repurchase operations (and reverse repurchase operations with maturities of more than one day when necessary to accommodate weekend, holiday, or similar trading conventions) at an offering rate of 1.00 percent, in amounts limited only by the value of Treasury securities held outright in the System Open Market Account that are available for such operations and by a per-counterparty limit of $30 billion per day. The Committee directs the Desk to continue rolling over maturing Treasury securities at auction and to continue reinvesting principal payments on all agency debt and agency mortgage-backed securities in agency mortgage-backed securities. The Committee also directs the Desk to engage in dollar roll and coupon swap transactions as necessary to facilitate settlement of the Federal Reserve's agency mortgage-backed securities transactions." The vote also encompassed approval of the statement below to be released at 2:00 p.m.: "Information received since the Federal Open Market Committee met in June indicates that the labor market has continued to strengthen and that economic activity has been rising moderately so far this year. Job gains have been solid, on average, since the beginning of the year, and the unemployment rate has declined. Household spending and business fixed investment have continued to expand. On a 12‑month basis, overall inflation and the measure excluding food and energy prices have declined and are running below 2 percent. Market-based measures of inflation compensation remain low; survey-based measures of longer-term inflation expectations are little changed, on balance. Consistent with its statutory mandate, the Committee seeks to foster maximum employment and price stability. The Committee continues to expect that, with gradual adjustments in the stance of monetary policy, economic activity will expand at a moderate pace, and labor market conditions will strengthen somewhat further. Inflation on a 12‑month basis is expected to remain somewhat below 2 percent in the near term but to stabilize around the Committee's 2 percent objective over the medium term. Near-term risks to the economic outlook appear roughly balanced, but the Committee is monitoring inflation developments closely. In view of realized and expected labor market conditions and inflation, the Committee decided to maintain the target range for the federal funds rate at 1 to 1-1/4 percent. The stance of monetary policy remains accommodative, thereby supporting some further strengthening in labor market conditions and a sustained return to 2 percent inflation. In determining the timing and size of future adjustments to the target range for the federal funds rate, the Committee will assess realized and expected economic conditions relative to its objectives of maximum employment and 2 percent inflation. This assessment will take into account a wide range of information, including measures of labor market conditions, indicators of inflation pressures and inflation expectations, and readings on financial and international developments. The Committee will carefully monitor actual and expected inflation developments relative to its symmetric inflation goal. The Committee expects that economic conditions will evolve in a manner that will warrant gradual increases in the federal funds rate; the federal funds rate is likely to remain, for some time, below levels that are expected to prevail in the longer run. However, the actual path of the federal funds rate will depend on the economic outlook as informed by incoming data. For the time being, the Committee is maintaining its existing policy of reinvesting principal payments from its holdings of agency debt and agency mortgage-backed securities in agency mortgage-backed securities and of rolling over maturing Treasury securities at auction. The Committee expects to begin implementing its balance sheet normalization program relatively soon, provided that the economy evolves broadly as anticipated; this program is described in the June 2017 Addendum to the Committee's Policy Normalization Principles and Plans." Voting for this action: Janet L. Yellen, William C. Dudley, Lael Brainard, Charles L. Evans, Stanley Fischer, Patrick Harker, Robert S. Kaplan, Neel Kashkari, and Jerome H. Powell. Voting against this action: None. Consistent with the Committee's decision to leave the target range for the federal funds rate unchanged, the Board of Governors voted unanimously to leave the interest rates on required and excess reserve balances unchanged at 1-1/4 percent and voted unanimously to approve establishment of the primary credit rate (discount rate) at the existing level of 1-3/4 percent.4 It was agreed that the next meeting of the Committee would be held on Tuesday-Wednesday, September 19-20, 2017. The meeting adjourned at 10:00 a.m. on July 26, 2017. Notation Vote By notation vote completed on July 3, 2017, the Committee unanimously approved the minutes of the Committee meeting held on June 13-14, 2017. SEE ALSO: SEVERAL CEOS ARE VOICING THE SAME COMPLAINT ABOUT ONE OF TRUMP'S BIGGEST BRAGS Join the conversation about this story » NOW WATCH: THE BOTTOM LINE: New record highs for stocks and a deep dive into Apple's iPhone
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Tom Chandler (Eric Dane) will not be without a love interest in the upcoming season of "The Last Ship," but will he still choose to be with Sasha Cooper (Bridget Regan)? Fans of the series are expecting the pair to fall back into each other's arms in the ...
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A tragedy occurred in Rethymnon in the north of the island of Crete. A father and a mother were drowned when they attempted to pull two of their four children out of the rough sea. The tragedy occurred on Tuesday evening at the beach of Geropotamos. It was short after 8 o’ clock in the … The post Parents drowned in Crete as they try to rescue their children swimming in rough sea appeared first on Keep Talking Greece.
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... leadership and compassion as he continued his holidays whilst wildfires were raging in Attica, Zakynthos, Peloponnese and elsewhere in GREECE.
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Bulgaria has applied for 39 million euro in additional financing, while GREECE is seeking 12 million euro, Trend said quoting Teodora Georgieva, ...
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The checks that Greek regional officials have to conduct on businesses' paperwork before they can be uploaded on the General Electronic ...
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ATHENS, GREECE — The Latest on the summer wildfires in Europe (all times local):. 4:10 p.m.. Giant clouds of gray smoke are cloaking the horizon in ...
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NEW YORK – Maria Menounos is back to work, this time to help raise funds for the battle against brain cancer. The 39-year-old TV personality […] The post Greek-American Maria Menounos Raises Funds Against Cancer appeared first on The National Herald.
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SERVICE: Seemingly unsupervised, servers range from overly familiar to professional to disengaged AMBIENCE: Bare-bones, diner-style with nautical touches ESSENTIALS: Open Monday to Thursday 11 a.m. to 9 p.m., Friday and Saturday 11 a.m. to 10 p.m., Sunday ...
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Greek food hasn’t changed much over the years. Lemon juice, eggplant, chickpeas, feta cheese, pita bread, lamb and light fish make up a bulk of the food found in the restaurants of Las Vegas. Here, nine restaurants every lover of Greek food should try.
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[chess]Let’s try you. Read the title above once, then cover it and write down word for word what you remember. Having difficulties? How well you do may be down to which country you live in. That’s according to a new study, published in Psychological Science, involving an impressive 200,000 women and men from 27 countries across five continents. It revealed that women from more conservative countries performed worse on memory tests than those from more egalitarian countries. Demographics expert Eric Bonsang and his colleagues analyzed national survey data from individuals above the age of 50. They used existing data on cognitive performance tests measuring episodic memory (memory of autobiographical events). These involved recalling as many of ten words read out by a researcher as possible in one minute either immediately or after a short delay. The team rated each country’s level of gender equality by looking at the proportion of people agreeing with the statement: “When jobs are scarce, men should have more right to a job than women.” Women outperformed men on memory in gender-egalitarian countries such as Sweden, Denmark, The Netherlands, the US and most European countries. However, in Ghana, India, China, South Africa and some more gender-traditional European countries (such as Russia, Portugal, Greece and Spain) the pattern reversed. Women in these countries performed worse than men – which was exactly what the researchers had predicted. Interestingly, men in egalitarian countries also scored better than men in conservative countries (but not by as much). The findings did not depend on world region or the countries’ economic development (gross domestic product per capita in 2010). A factor that may be at play, however, is that modern countries (such as many of the gender-equal ones above) have better health benefits. Older adults may simply be healthier. But that doesn’t necessary explain the observed gender differences – the study after all found that the effect was stronger for women than for men. The authors instead argue that a society’s attitudes to gender roles determine which behaviors and characteristics are deemed appropriate for men and women. In turn, these social expectations influence women’s (and men’s) life goals, occupational choices and experiences. As a result, women in more gender-traditional countries may have less exposure to cognitively stimulating activities such as those involved in education and work. Participation in education and work indeed explained 30% of the findings. DAMAGING STEREOTYPES [indian women]Vivek Prakash/ReutersWhile the study provides some evidence that attitudes based on stereotypes do shape our abilities, a full test of this theory would require a study of aptitudes which are stereotypically considered feminine – such as social sensitivity or linguistic ability. For example, would men in gender-traditional nations underperform on tests measuring social sensitivity, compared to women? A study conducted on American students showed just that. It may indeed be that this effect is even larger in more conservative countries. The results of this study were explained in terms of “stereotype threat”, a fear of doing something that would confirm or reinforce the negative traits typically associated with members of stigmatized groups. Say you are a woman sitting a maths test. The common perception that women are not good at maths may play on your mind and your score may suffer as you struggle to concentrate. The fear takes away our cognitive resources and leads to underperformance on tasks deemed challenging for the stereotyped group. This effect is very powerful and has been shown in a wealth of studies. When reminded of negative stereotypes, women have been shown to underperform on maths tests, or African Americans on tests measuring intellectual ability. Indeed the new study could be interpreted in terms of stereotype threat theory. We’ve even seen the neurological underpinnings of this effect. Our new study, published in Frontiers’ Aging Neuroscience, asked a group of older participants to read an article about memory fading with age (age stereotype). We showed that, as a result, their reaction times in a cognitive task were delayed. What’s more, brain wave activity in these individuals indicated that their thoughts about themselves were more negative. This was seen in data from electroencephalography (EEG), which uses electrodes to track and record brainwave patterns. Our study shows that short-term exposure to negative stereotypes has detrimental effects on cognitive functioning. Similar processes may have taken place in women continually exposed to negative gender and age stereotypes in gender-conservative countries – explaining their underperformance on the memory test. WHAT MAKES A COUNTRY SEXIST? [RTR1UPBK]Bazuki Muhammad/ReutersAnother consideration which future studies should take into account is the countries’ wider political system – not just the gender attitudes themselves. One theory suggests modernization leads progressively to democratization and liberalization – including that of attitudes to gender roles. The society’s heritage, whether political or religious, influences the society’s values. Indeed, our studies on cross-cultural attitudes to women and men show that they are more liberal in longstanding democracies such as the UK than in countries transitioning to democracy (such as Poland and South Africa). We found that gender attitudes were also affected by the preceding political systems: they were more conservative in the post-apartheid South Africa and less conservative in a post-communist Poland. So national histories of institutionalized inequality (apartheid) vs forced emancipation (communism) have left a long lasting impact on national levels of sexism. Perhaps not coincidentally, some of the longest standing democracies in the new study happen to be the ones which are more gender-egalitarian. As my research suggests, both democratization and the reduction of stereotype threat – especially through the mass media, such as advertising involving non-traditional gender roles – are important. These efforts should be our focus in bringing greater equality across a range of skills for women and men across the globe.
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[A firefighting helicopter makes water drop as a wildfire burns near the village of Metochi, north of Athens, Greece. REUTERS/Giorgos Moutafis]Thomson Reuters ATHENS (Reuters) - Firefighters on Wednesday contained a wildfire burning for nearly four days near Athens after it destroyed thousands of hectares of pine forest and dozens of homes. The fire broke out on Sunday in Kalamos, a coastal holiday spot some 45 km (30 miles) northeast of the capital, and spread quickly to three more towns, stoked by strong and changing winds. By Wednesday afternoon, the blaze had decreased in intensity and the perimeter contained by firefighters was expanding, Fire Service Spokeswoman Stavroula Maliri said. Rugged terrain dotted with small communities had made the fire-fighting in the towns near Athens difficult, with winds rekindling the blaze at many spots. Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, who visited the scene on Wednesday, said Greece had "avoided the worst ... and we have to be alert." Greece withdrew its request for help from its European partners after conditions in Athens improved, but authorities were on alert for new outbreaks. Late July and August often see forest and brush fires in Greece, where high temperatures help create dangerous conditions. [Firefighters try to extinguish a fire in a house as a wildfire burns near the village of Kalamos, north of Athens, Greece, August 13, 2017. REUTERS/Costas Baltas]Thomson Reuters Across Greece, firefighters were battling more than 33 forest fires, an outbreak fed by dry winds and hot weather that fanned blazes in the Peloponnese and on the Ionian islands of Zakynthos and Kefalonia. Wildfires raging on the island of Zakynthos for six days were "improving," Maliri said. In the Peloponnese region of Ilia - the site of Greece's worst fires in 2007 when more than 70 people died - blazes that broke out in three areas on Monday had been tamed. "Today and tomorrow, the prevailing (weather) conditions favor the onset and development of forest fires in several regions across Greece," Maliri added. (Additional reporting and writing by Karolina Tagaris; Editing by Ken Ferris) NOW WATCH: We may have been wrong about ‘good’ cholesterol all this time
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[Screen Shot 2017 08 16 at 11.53.37 AM]A24 It’s hard to imagine a more purposely uptight and knowingly gunshy film synopsis than the ones bestowed on Yorgos Lanthimos’ deeply original oeuvre of films. His “Dogtooth” was about “three teenagers [who] live isolated, without leaving their house, because their over-protective parents say they can only leave when their dogtooth falls out.” Later, his 2015 arthouse hit “The Lobster” concerned “a dystopian society, [where] single people must find a mate within 45 days or be transformed into an animal of their choice.” Now, his next offering, “The Killing of a Sacred Deer,” into the so-called genre of Greek Weird Wave continues the trend. Per the film’s official synopsis, “Steven, a charismatic surgeon, is forced to make an unthinkable sacrifice after his life starts to fall apart, when the behaviour of a teenage boy he has taken under his wing turns sinister.” Farrell is playing the surgeon, while Nicole Kidman plays his wife and Alicia Silverstone is on board as the young boy’s mother. The cast also includes Raffey Cassidy, Bill Camp, Barry Keoghan and Sunny Suljic. But as the film’s first trailer (and, honestly, all of Lanthimos’ filmography so far) lets on, this isn’t just another drama about people thrown together in the midst of a terrible tragedy. It’s going to be characteristically funny, weird, off-kilter, and oddly revelatory. Also, prepare yourself for the most unsettling use of an Ellie Goulding song like, ever. Burn indeed. Lanthimos is directing from a screenplay he co-wrote with Efthymis Filippou, who has penned the Greek director’s last three feature films, including the 2011 Academy Award Best Foreign-Language nominee “Dogtooth” and “The Lobster.” “The Killing of a Sacred Deer” was shot last summer in Cincinnati and debuted at Cannes earlier this year, where it bowed in Competition. Check out the first trailer for the film below. Youtube Embed: http://www.youtube.com/embed/CQFdGfwChtw Width: 560px Height: 315px NOW WATCH: Here's everyone left on Arya Stark's kill list on 'Game of Thrones'
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The former Mexico manager says he could've coached a European national team in 2015 but the time wasn't right to make the jump across the pond Club America coach Miguel Herrera would like to coach in Europe one day but said the opportunity he did have in ...
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The opera singer has been working with El Sistema Greece on workshops with refugee children from countries including Afghanistan and Syria: ‘El Sistema is building a cultural revolution here, through music education.’ Joyce DiDonato is one of the world ...
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Matthew Richardson has been named director of Greek Life at West Virginia University, effective August 28. Richardson is currently the coordinator of Fraternity and Sorority Life at the University of Pittsburgh. As the director of Greek Life, he will ...
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| READ THE ORIGINAL POST AT wvutoday.wvu.edu |
This hilarious video shows American youngsters trying famous Greek dishes for the first time. They are made to taste papoutsakia, dolmades, lentil soup and salads and asked for their responses. They are finally asked to rate each individual dish.
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| READ THE ORIGINAL POST AT www.tornosnews.gr |
Justina Huddleston is an editor and the head writer for TDmonthly Magazine. She has been a freelance writer for several years, though her real passion is cooking. You can see the recipes she creates on her vegan food blog, A Life of Litt...
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| READ THE ORIGINAL POST AT www.sheknows.com |
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- Soon coming to Victory Boulevard is "How Greek It Is, Too." And, as the name would suggest, the Greek eatery is a sister location to "How Greek It Is!" in Grant City. "Catchy name right?" said an upbeat Sophia Georgiopoulos.
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| READ THE ORIGINAL POST AT www.silive.com |
West Virginia University has hired Dr. Matthew Richardson as the new Director of Greek Life. Richardson, who is currently the coordinator of Fraternity and Sorority Life at the University of Pittsburgh, will begin his duties August 28. He will also work ...
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| READ THE ORIGINAL POST AT www.thedaonline.com |
Dimitria was a faithful member of the Annunciation GREEK Orthodox Church, where she served as past president for the Philoptocos Society and ...
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| READ THE ORIGINAL POST AT lancasteronline.com |
ATHENS, Greece (AP) -- Greece's fire department says it's close to containing a wildfire that is burning north of Athens for a fourth day.
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| READ THE ORIGINAL POST AT www.dtnpf.com |
A total of 334 migrants coming from Turkey landed on various GREEK Eastern Aegean islands on Monday, according to data released by the Ministry of ...
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| READ THE ORIGINAL POST AT greece.greekreporter.com |
An ABC presenter has created an awkward television moment by telling a senator of Greek heritage he had a 'foreign name'. Lateline host Emma Alberici was winding up a 10-minute interview when she deadpanned with an observation about Nick Xenophon.
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| READ THE ORIGINAL POST AT www.dailymail.co.uk |
Greece’s Fire Service said on Wednesday it was close to containing a wildfire that is burning north-east of Athens for a fourth day as well as the wildfires on the island of Zakynthos and Ilia in South Peloponnese. According to a statement issued 2:30 pm on !6. August, the Fire Service said that The fire … The post Wildfires rage “in decreasing intensity” in Athens North, Zakynthos and Peloponnese appeared first on Keep Talking Greece.
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| READ THE ORIGINAL POST AT www.keeptalkinggreece.com |