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When maxi/taxi fares go up, eveybody vex snd complain it making ting hard. Then when workers hadda put out more to achieve the same tings. Then they complain to the boss , boss give them a bligh, but boss not absorbing that , he putting thst In the prices for his goods and services .mero wrote:Business owners not paying their fair dues for their companies and staff, exploiting local and foreign labor, cooking their books and farmers who squatting, paying 0 rent but planting big field is considered average Joe to you? Multiply this by the 100s and 1000s what u get?sMASH wrote:Ent it have a revenue collection agency ? Let them go and tackle the peole bodi and punkin .mero wrote:Perfect time for all these shady unregistered business men and farmers who raking in $$$$ by exploiting local and Spanish labor off the books and not paying their NISsMASH wrote:Perfect time for govt to honor their contracts.. Never held them back from av drilling or entertainment budgetsmero wrote:Perfect time for Kamla to go on the podium and promise $4000 to pensioners
Spend 10's thousands in collection officers salaries to go and monitor his much bodi a man planting and selling .
Pnm people easily fooled. Pretending to be 'on the ball' by clamping hard on the average Joe , rather than going after reall cirminals
Then again your unemployed arse eh contribute anything to the system for the last 10 years or so, so ofc it's easy for u to make these statements.
paid_influencer wrote:farmers who squatting making efficient use of the land tho
capitalists who sit on the land and do nothing with it but hope for a big pay day or unearned rents aren't productive
we figured this out long ago and is why communal ownership of the means of production is a better system
Is this part of the reason why agriculture is the black sheep of our economy and only given a lousy million ever budget allocation?The_Honourable wrote:paid_influencer wrote:farmers who squatting making efficient use of the land tho
capitalists who sit on the land and do nothing with it but hope for a big pay day or unearned rents aren't productive
we figured this out long ago and is why communal ownership of the means of production is a better system
Everything is not about capitalism
Mero has a point. While there are some "big businesses" who take advantage of the system, the "small man" also doing the same thing. Our problem is enforcement of laws that are already in the books. When enforcement does take place, it's usually the "small man" that get shaft first.
When it comes to farmers who are squatting:
- Don't own the land
- Have no authorization to be on the land
- Don't pay any taxes
- All profits to themselves
- Compete with legit farmers who own land or have licenses/leases to occupy
- Poor farming methods such as slash and burn, tampering with water sources, dumping in water courses
- Beg the government when they flood out
- Blame everybody else when they are removed and bawl "how dey could do ah farmer dat? we feedin d nashon"
hover11 wrote:Is this part of the reason why agriculture is the black sheep of our economy and only given a lousy million ever budget allocation?The_Honourable wrote:paid_influencer wrote:farmers who squatting making efficient use of the land tho
capitalists who sit on the land and do nothing with it but hope for a big pay day or unearned rents aren't productive
we figured this out long ago and is why communal ownership of the means of production is a better system
Everything is not about capitalism
Mero has a point. While there are some "big businesses" who take advantage of the system, the "small man" also doing the same thing. Our problem is enforcement of laws that are already in the books. When enforcement does take place, it's usually the "small man" that get shaft first.
When it comes to farmers who are squatting:
- Don't own the land
- Have no authorization to be on the land
- Don't pay any taxes
- All profits to themselves
- Compete with legit farmers who own land or have licenses/leases to occupy
- Poor farming methods such as slash and burn, tampering with water sources, dumping in water courses
- Beg the government when they flood out
- Blame everybody else when they are removed and bawl "how dey could do ah farmer dat? we feedin d nashon"
The_Honourable wrote:Our problem is enforcement of laws that are already in the books.
Every year Agriculture receives a billion+ budget. This is probably the largest for any Ministry not dealing with health, education, nat sec and welfare.hover11 wrote:Is this part of the reason why agriculture is the black sheep of our economy and only given a lousy million ever budget allocation?The_Honourable wrote:paid_influencer wrote:farmers who squatting making efficient use of the land tho
capitalists who sit on the land and do nothing with it but hope for a big pay day or unearned rents aren't productive
we figured this out long ago and is why communal ownership of the means of production is a better system
Everything is not about capitalism
Mero has a point. While there are some "big businesses" who take advantage of the system, the "small man" also doing the same thing. Our problem is enforcement of laws that are already in the books. When enforcement does take place, it's usually the "small man" that get shaft first.
When it comes to farmers who are squatting:
- Don't own the land
- Have no authorization to be on the land
- Don't pay any taxes
- All profits to themselves
- Compete with legit farmers who own land or have licenses/leases to occupy
- Poor farming methods such as slash and burn, tampering with water sources, dumping in water courses
- Beg the government when they flood out
- Blame everybody else when they are removed and bawl "how dey could do ah farmer dat? we feedin d nashon"
My bad one lousy billion, it still remains the black sheep of the economy, what is achieved from that 1 billion from 2015 to now. Please elaborate because I can't understand, we pumping all this money in agriculture annually yet our import bill continues to rise annually. Another kick the can initiative courtesy of the PNMDizzy28 wrote:Every year Agriculture receives a billion+ budget. This is probably the largest for any Ministry not dealing with health, education, nat sec and welfare.hover11 wrote:Is this part of the reason why agriculture is the black sheep of our economy and only given a lousy million ever budget allocation?The_Honourable wrote:paid_influencer wrote:farmers who squatting making efficient use of the land tho
capitalists who sit on the land and do nothing with it but hope for a big pay day or unearned rents aren't productive
we figured this out long ago and is why communal ownership of the means of production is a better system
Everything is not about capitalism
Mero has a point. While there are some "big businesses" who take advantage of the system, the "small man" also doing the same thing. Our problem is enforcement of laws that are already in the books. When enforcement does take place, it's usually the "small man" that get shaft first.
When it comes to farmers who are squatting:
- Don't own the land
- Have no authorization to be on the land
- Don't pay any taxes
- All profits to themselves
- Compete with legit farmers who own land or have licenses/leases to occupy
- Poor farming methods such as slash and burn, tampering with water sources, dumping in water courses
- Beg the government when they flood out
- Blame everybody else when they are removed and bawl "how dey could do ah farmer dat? we feedin d nashon"
hover11 wrote:Is this part of the reason why agriculture is the black sheep of our economy and only given a lousy million ever budget allocation?The_Honourable wrote:paid_influencer wrote:farmers who squatting making efficient use of the land tho
capitalists who sit on the land and do nothing with it but hope for a big pay day or unearned rents aren't productive
we figured this out long ago and is why communal ownership of the means of production is a better system
Everything is not about capitalism
Mero has a point. While there are some "big businesses" who take advantage of the system, the "small man" also doing the same thing. Our problem is enforcement of laws that are already in the books. When enforcement does take place, it's usually the "small man" that get shaft first.
When it comes to farmers who are squatting:
- Don't own the land
- Have no authorization to be on the land
- Don't pay any taxes
- All profits to themselves
- Compete with legit farmers who own land or have licenses/leases to occupy
- Poor farming methods such as slash and burn, tampering with water sources, dumping in water courses
- Beg the government when they flood out
- Blame everybody else when they are removed and bawl "how dey could do ah farmer dat? we feedin d nashon"
88sins wrote:hover boi
Even farmers who've owned the land for generations still DON'T see a black cent from the budgetary allocation for agriculture.
The majority of that money usually goes to certain people to start projects they can't finish
When the big shot making millions extra , that parking up in an account or flying out Miami , new york, London or Dubai .The_Honourable wrote:paid_influencer wrote:farmers who squatting making efficient use of the land tho
capitalists who sit on the land and do nothing with it but hope for a big pay day or unearned rents aren't productive
we figured this out long ago and is why communal ownership of the means of production is a better system
Everything is not about capitalism
Mero has a point. While there are some "big businesses" who take advantage of the system, the "small man" also doing the same thing. Our problem is enforcement of laws that are already in the books. When enforcement does take place, it's usually the "small man" that get shaft first.
When it comes to farmers who are squatting:
- Don't own the land
- Have no authorization to be on the land
- Don't pay any taxes
- All profits to themselves
- Compete with legit farmers who own land or have licenses/leases to occupy
- Poor farming methods such as slash and burn, tampering with water sources, dumping in water courses
- Beg the government when they flood out
- Blame everybody else when they are removed and bawl "how dey could do ah farmer dat? we feedin d nashon"
sMASH wrote:When the big shot making millions extra , that parking up in an account or flying out Miami , new york, London or Dubai .The_Honourable wrote:paid_influencer wrote:farmers who squatting making efficient use of the land tho
capitalists who sit on the land and do nothing with it but hope for a big pay day or unearned rents aren't productive
we figured this out long ago and is why communal ownership of the means of production is a better system
Everything is not about capitalism
Mero has a point. While there are some "big businesses" who take advantage of the system, the "small man" also doing the same thing. Our problem is enforcement of laws that are already in the books. When enforcement does take place, it's usually the "small man" that get shaft first.
When it comes to farmers who are squatting:
- Don't own the land
- Have no authorization to be on the land
- Don't pay any taxes
- All profits to themselves
- Compete with legit farmers who own land or have licenses/leases to occupy
- Poor farming methods such as slash and burn, tampering with water sources, dumping in water courses
- Beg the government when they flood out
- Blame everybody else when they are removed and bawl "how dey could do ah farmer dat? we feedin d nashon"
When the small man making extra , that spending right here on rum, burgers , car parts, music, house fittings.
Small people getting extra money keeps the lower levels operating ... Big shot getting extra money is capital flight risk
zoom rader wrote:PNM pay scale IMG-20241124-WA0102.jpg
All animals are equal except some are more equal than others. It really is truezoom rader wrote:PNM pay scale
That chart misses the allowances. The CMO has a 25000/month technical allowance or so.Mmoney607 wrote:zoom rader wrote:PNM pay scale IMG-20241124-WA0102.jpg
CMO only making 30,000....... I don't want to get the website in trouble
Correct graph is very deceptive as it only includes BASE salariesDizzy28 wrote:That chart misses the allowances. The CMO has a 25000/month technical allowance or so.Mmoney607 wrote:zoom rader wrote:PNM pay scale IMG-20241124-WA0102.jpg
CMO only making 30,000....... I don't want to get the website in trouble
Economist on inflation: Still a problem
The local economy is not performing well and inflation remains a problem, contrary to what the Government is saying, The University of the West Indies economist Dr Daren Conrad has said.
In a phone interview with the Express last week, Conrad -a senior lecturer in the Department of Economics at The UWI, also believes that in about six months, when the Donald Trump administration in the United States settles in, this country will begin to grapple with “a falling apart of agreements” that could be disastrous for T&T’s economy.
He said the country is not moving forward.
“The economy is not in good stead. It is at the weakest level it has probably been, but when they are reporting the numbers to us, they are picking and choosing which numbers to report and how they report it to make it look good. So I guess this is done not to create a sense of panic, but if we understand the truth, we will be able to make better decisions,” Conrad said.
He noted that a number of companies have reported a decline in profits, “so there is a problem, and it means demand is falling, and if demand is falling, then inflation will be low because people don’t have money to spend. But is this how we want to achieve low inflation? By people not having money to spend? No, that is not how we want to report inflation. The economy is not doing well, but we have to acknowledge this, and the people in charge should acknowledge that we have a problem and let us know what we can do on the ground. How they are choosing to report on inflation is not solving anything.
There has been no real growth in the country, Conrad argued.
“We are not seeing any major construction taking place, and those are the things that tell you that things are moving forward. We are seeing a lot of road repairs, which is what administrations do during election time when certain roads in certain constituencies will be paved. I don’t think that is a logical approach to anything. We should not be looking the way we look.
“If you walk through any of the malls, you will see inflation is low because people aren’t spending a lot of money. But the can is being kicked down the road until the time reaches to tell us the truth, and we all know when that time is. If you go to the supermarket, you know that what is being reported is not a true depiction of inflation,” he explained.
Price information from the Central Bank comes from the distributors, Conrad said.
“The distributors have not experienced an increase in the prices. What we are paying at the point of sale, (authorities) don’t collect as prices, so it’s how they collect the information to tell the story that they want to tell to citizens. But if there weren’t an issue, especially with (foreign exchange), we would not have all the banks cutting forex spending on all of the credit cards, and they are selling it to the point that you are only able to get this much in a billing cycle, so much so that you have to plan months ahead for a trip to the US,” he observed.
He continued, “Small and medium enterprises are suffering to the point that they are closing because of the lack of forex, but the larger corporations don’t have that problem because they are in the line for forex. The conglomerates get forex. How else will we have all of these brand new vehicles coming in unless they have forex available to these companies to bring in all those cars? So in their eyes, forex is not a problem because the major corporations that have the major stakes in the country’s economy have access to forex. The small and medium enterprises are the ones that don’t have access to forex.”
Conrad said other Caricom countries aren’t experiencing foreign exchange issues like this country.
“From where they sit, they look at the import cover, and the threshold is six months, so once it’s more than six months, we are good. But do you have access to forex? People are hoarding forex; they are buying it from their friends and family coming into the country so that they could have some foreign exchange. If we compare ourselves to countries like Jamaica, Grenada and Guyana, they could walk in the bank and buy US (dollars). In Guyana, you can walk into the bank and buy US$1,000. But our problem is that we don’t admit that we have a problem, and it’s not a problem until it reaches crisis levels,” Conrad said.
Manufacturing and labour issues
Conrad said manufacturing and the labour force are at their lowest in the country right now.
“How can we generate foreign exchange when medium and small enterprises don’t have access to the forex that they very well need to purchase the intermediate goods to engage in manufacturing? We need to engage our labour force fully because it is the lowest in the region at 11%. We need to engage the labour force because we have the capacity to expand labour production and export, but companies don’t have the forex to do so. We also have to work on improving productivity,” he said.
Conrad believes Trump’s policies will impact this country.
“Biden buying natural gas from Trinidad goes out the window from January. And then the US won’t need to import anything from us, so what do we do? In six months the full effects of everything will be felt when the new Trump administration settles in and all of the agreements fall apart,” he opined.
Conrad said citizens have a role to play in the country moving forward.
“We lack discipline and then the unions are demanding increases without an increase in productivity which is so unfortunate,” he concluded.
Inflation at 0.2%
Last week the Central Statistical Office (CSO) released its Consumer Price Index for the month of October 2024.
It noted then: “The inflation rate for October 2024, which measures the percentage change in the All Items Index for the month of October 2024 over October 2023, was 0.2%. This represents a decrease from the previous period (September 2024/September 2023) of 0.4%. The inflation rate for the comparative period (October 2023/October 2022) was 1.3%.”
The All Items Index calculated from the prices collected for the month of October 2024 was 124.4, representing an increase of 0.3 points of 0.2% above the All Items Index for September 2024.
The CSO observed that the Index for Food and Non-Alcoholic Beverages increased from 150.2 in September 2024 to 150.8 in October 2024, reflecting an increase of 0.4%.
“Contributing significantly to this increase was the general upward movement in the prices of fresh whole chicken, tomatoes, green sweet peppers, parboiled rice, table margarine, fresh carite, fresh kingfish, fresh salmon, melon and other chilled or frozen chicken,” the CSO stated. However, the full impact of these price increases “was offset by the general decreases in the prices of Irish potatoes, cucumber, carrots, eddoes, ochroes, chive, plantains, garlic, onions and oranges”, it added.
Why worry? In just over a year, Kamla will fix it. She'll restart the refinery and open up the jubilee oil field. Our friend has reported nothing that isn't already widely known, what he hasn't offered is a solution, which is what most of them do with the exemption of Mariano Brown. That Indira sagewan has also taken to repeat verbatim the same talking points as her political directorate.paid_influencer wrote:Economist on inflation: Still a problem
The local economy is not performing well and inflation remains a problem, contrary to what the Government is saying, The University of the West Indies economist Dr Daren Conrad has said.
In a phone interview with the Express last week, Conrad -a senior lecturer in the Department of Economics at The UWI, also believes that in about six months, when the Donald Trump administration in the United States settles in, this country will begin to grapple with “a falling apart of agreements” that could be disastrous for T&T’s economy.
He said the country is not moving forward.
“The economy is not in good stead. It is at the weakest level it has probably been, but when they are reporting the numbers to us, they are picking and choosing which numbers to report and how they report it to make it look good. So I guess this is done not to create a sense of panic, but if we understand the truth, we will be able to make better decisions,” Conrad said.
He noted that a number of companies have reported a decline in profits, “so there is a problem, and it means demand is falling, and if demand is falling, then inflation will be low because people don’t have money to spend. But is this how we want to achieve low inflation? By people not having money to spend? No, that is not how we want to report inflation. The economy is not doing well, but we have to acknowledge this, and the people in charge should acknowledge that we have a problem and let us know what we can do on the ground. How they are choosing to report on inflation is not solving anything.
There has been no real growth in the country, Conrad argued.
“We are not seeing any major construction taking place, and those are the things that tell you that things are moving forward. We are seeing a lot of road repairs, which is what administrations do during election time when certain roads in certain constituencies will be paved. I don’t think that is a logical approach to anything. We should not be looking the way we look.
“If you walk through any of the malls, you will see inflation is low because people aren’t spending a lot of money. But the can is being kicked down the road until the time reaches to tell us the truth, and we all know when that time is. If you go to the supermarket, you know that what is being reported is not a true depiction of inflation,” he explained.
Price information from the Central Bank comes from the distributors, Conrad said.
“The distributors have not experienced an increase in the prices. What we are paying at the point of sale, (authorities) don’t collect as prices, so it’s how they collect the information to tell the story that they want to tell to citizens. But if there weren’t an issue, especially with (foreign exchange), we would not have all the banks cutting forex spending on all of the credit cards, and they are selling it to the point that you are only able to get this much in a billing cycle, so much so that you have to plan months ahead for a trip to the US,” he observed.
He continued, “Small and medium enterprises are suffering to the point that they are closing because of the lack of forex, but the larger corporations don’t have that problem because they are in the line for forex. The conglomerates get forex. How else will we have all of these brand new vehicles coming in unless they have forex available to these companies to bring in all those cars? So in their eyes, forex is not a problem because the major corporations that have the major stakes in the country’s economy have access to forex. The small and medium enterprises are the ones that don’t have access to forex.”
Conrad said other Caricom countries aren’t experiencing foreign exchange issues like this country.
“From where they sit, they look at the import cover, and the threshold is six months, so once it’s more than six months, we are good. But do you have access to forex? People are hoarding forex; they are buying it from their friends and family coming into the country so that they could have some foreign exchange. If we compare ourselves to countries like Jamaica, Grenada and Guyana, they could walk in the bank and buy US (dollars). In Guyana, you can walk into the bank and buy US$1,000. But our problem is that we don’t admit that we have a problem, and it’s not a problem until it reaches crisis levels,” Conrad said.
Manufacturing and labour issues
Conrad said manufacturing and the labour force are at their lowest in the country right now.
“How can we generate foreign exchange when medium and small enterprises don’t have access to the forex that they very well need to purchase the intermediate goods to engage in manufacturing? We need to engage our labour force fully because it is the lowest in the region at 11%. We need to engage the labour force because we have the capacity to expand labour production and export, but companies don’t have the forex to do so. We also have to work on improving productivity,” he said.
Conrad believes Trump’s policies will impact this country.
“Biden buying natural gas from Trinidad goes out the window from January. And then the US won’t need to import anything from us, so what do we do? In six months the full effects of everything will be felt when the new Trump administration settles in and all of the agreements fall apart,” he opined.
Conrad said citizens have a role to play in the country moving forward.
“We lack discipline and then the unions are demanding increases without an increase in productivity which is so unfortunate,” he concluded.
Inflation at 0.2%
Last week the Central Statistical Office (CSO) released its Consumer Price Index for the month of October 2024.
It noted then: “The inflation rate for October 2024, which measures the percentage change in the All Items Index for the month of October 2024 over October 2023, was 0.2%. This represents a decrease from the previous period (September 2024/September 2023) of 0.4%. The inflation rate for the comparative period (October 2023/October 2022) was 1.3%.”
The All Items Index calculated from the prices collected for the month of October 2024 was 124.4, representing an increase of 0.3 points of 0.2% above the All Items Index for September 2024.
The CSO observed that the Index for Food and Non-Alcoholic Beverages increased from 150.2 in September 2024 to 150.8 in October 2024, reflecting an increase of 0.4%.
“Contributing significantly to this increase was the general upward movement in the prices of fresh whole chicken, tomatoes, green sweet peppers, parboiled rice, table margarine, fresh carite, fresh kingfish, fresh salmon, melon and other chilled or frozen chicken,” the CSO stated. However, the full impact of these price increases “was offset by the general decreases in the prices of Irish potatoes, cucumber, carrots, eddoes, ochroes, chive, plantains, garlic, onions and oranges”, it added.
https://trinidadexpress.com/news/local/ ... dd9cc.html
Photo included because I know some ah allyuh does check the last name or picture for any hint of indianness
Why was the refinery closed to begin with thoughwing wrote:Why worry? In just over a year, Kamla will fix it. She'll restart the refinery and open up the jubilee oil field. Our friend has reported nothing that isn't already widely known, what he hasn't offered is a solution, which is what most of them do with the exemption of Mariano Brown. That Indira sagewan has also taken to repeat verbatim the same talking points as her political directorate.paid_influencer wrote:Economist on inflation: Still a problem
The local economy is not performing well and inflation remains a problem, contrary to what the Government is saying, The University of the West Indies economist Dr Daren Conrad has said.
In a phone interview with the Express last week, Conrad -a senior lecturer in the Department of Economics at The UWI, also believes that in about six months, when the Donald Trump administration in the United States settles in, this country will begin to grapple with “a falling apart of agreements” that could be disastrous for T&T’s economy.
He said the country is not moving forward.
“The economy is not in good stead. It is at the weakest level it has probably been, but when they are reporting the numbers to us, they are picking and choosing which numbers to report and how they report it to make it look good. So I guess this is done not to create a sense of panic, but if we understand the truth, we will be able to make better decisions,” Conrad said.
He noted that a number of companies have reported a decline in profits, “so there is a problem, and it means demand is falling, and if demand is falling, then inflation will be low because people don’t have money to spend. But is this how we want to achieve low inflation? By people not having money to spend? No, that is not how we want to report inflation. The economy is not doing well, but we have to acknowledge this, and the people in charge should acknowledge that we have a problem and let us know what we can do on the ground. How they are choosing to report on inflation is not solving anything.
There has been no real growth in the country, Conrad argued.
“We are not seeing any major construction taking place, and those are the things that tell you that things are moving forward. We are seeing a lot of road repairs, which is what administrations do during election time when certain roads in certain constituencies will be paved. I don’t think that is a logical approach to anything. We should not be looking the way we look.
“If you walk through any of the malls, you will see inflation is low because people aren’t spending a lot of money. But the can is being kicked down the road until the time reaches to tell us the truth, and we all know when that time is. If you go to the supermarket, you know that what is being reported is not a true depiction of inflation,” he explained.
Price information from the Central Bank comes from the distributors, Conrad said.
“The distributors have not experienced an increase in the prices. What we are paying at the point of sale, (authorities) don’t collect as prices, so it’s how they collect the information to tell the story that they want to tell to citizens. But if there weren’t an issue, especially with (foreign exchange), we would not have all the banks cutting forex spending on all of the credit cards, and they are selling it to the point that you are only able to get this much in a billing cycle, so much so that you have to plan months ahead for a trip to the US,” he observed.
He continued, “Small and medium enterprises are suffering to the point that they are closing because of the lack of forex, but the larger corporations don’t have that problem because they are in the line for forex. The conglomerates get forex. How else will we have all of these brand new vehicles coming in unless they have forex available to these companies to bring in all those cars? So in their eyes, forex is not a problem because the major corporations that have the major stakes in the country’s economy have access to forex. The small and medium enterprises are the ones that don’t have access to forex.”
Conrad said other Caricom countries aren’t experiencing foreign exchange issues like this country.
“From where they sit, they look at the import cover, and the threshold is six months, so once it’s more than six months, we are good. But do you have access to forex? People are hoarding forex; they are buying it from their friends and family coming into the country so that they could have some foreign exchange. If we compare ourselves to countries like Jamaica, Grenada and Guyana, they could walk in the bank and buy US (dollars). In Guyana, you can walk into the bank and buy US$1,000. But our problem is that we don’t admit that we have a problem, and it’s not a problem until it reaches crisis levels,” Conrad said.
Manufacturing and labour issues
Conrad said manufacturing and the labour force are at their lowest in the country right now.
“How can we generate foreign exchange when medium and small enterprises don’t have access to the forex that they very well need to purchase the intermediate goods to engage in manufacturing? We need to engage our labour force fully because it is the lowest in the region at 11%. We need to engage the labour force because we have the capacity to expand labour production and export, but companies don’t have the forex to do so. We also have to work on improving productivity,” he said.
Conrad believes Trump’s policies will impact this country.
“Biden buying natural gas from Trinidad goes out the window from January. And then the US won’t need to import anything from us, so what do we do? In six months the full effects of everything will be felt when the new Trump administration settles in and all of the agreements fall apart,” he opined.
Conrad said citizens have a role to play in the country moving forward.
“We lack discipline and then the unions are demanding increases without an increase in productivity which is so unfortunate,” he concluded.
Inflation at 0.2%
Last week the Central Statistical Office (CSO) released its Consumer Price Index for the month of October 2024.
It noted then: “The inflation rate for October 2024, which measures the percentage change in the All Items Index for the month of October 2024 over October 2023, was 0.2%. This represents a decrease from the previous period (September 2024/September 2023) of 0.4%. The inflation rate for the comparative period (October 2023/October 2022) was 1.3%.”
The All Items Index calculated from the prices collected for the month of October 2024 was 124.4, representing an increase of 0.3 points of 0.2% above the All Items Index for September 2024.
The CSO observed that the Index for Food and Non-Alcoholic Beverages increased from 150.2 in September 2024 to 150.8 in October 2024, reflecting an increase of 0.4%.
“Contributing significantly to this increase was the general upward movement in the prices of fresh whole chicken, tomatoes, green sweet peppers, parboiled rice, table margarine, fresh carite, fresh kingfish, fresh salmon, melon and other chilled or frozen chicken,” the CSO stated. However, the full impact of these price increases “was offset by the general decreases in the prices of Irish potatoes, cucumber, carrots, eddoes, ochroes, chive, plantains, garlic, onions and oranges”, it added.
https://trinidadexpress.com/news/local/ ... dd9cc.html
Photo included because I know some ah allyuh does check the last name or picture for any hint of indianness
Same reason as the public service. Poor productivity, politically inclined to the PNM, asking for increases but no improvement in service.hover11 wrote:Why was the refinery closed to begin with thoughwing wrote:Why worry? In just over a year, Kamla will fix it. She'll restart the refinery and open up the jubilee oil field. Our friend has reported nothing that isn't already widely known, what he hasn't offered is a solution, which is what most of them do with the exemption of Mariano Brown. That Indira sagewan has also taken to repeat verbatim the same talking points as her political directorate.paid_influencer wrote:Economist on inflation: Still a problem
The local economy is not performing well and inflation remains a problem, contrary to what the Government is saying, The University of the West Indies economist Dr Daren Conrad has said.
In a phone interview with the Express last week, Conrad -a senior lecturer in the Department of Economics at The UWI, also believes that in about six months, when the Donald Trump administration in the United States settles in, this country will begin to grapple with “a falling apart of agreements” that could be disastrous for T&T’s economy.
He said the country is not moving forward.
“The economy is not in good stead. It is at the weakest level it has probably been, but when they are reporting the numbers to us, they are picking and choosing which numbers to report and how they report it to make it look good. So I guess this is done not to create a sense of panic, but if we understand the truth, we will be able to make better decisions,” Conrad said.
He noted that a number of companies have reported a decline in profits, “so there is a problem, and it means demand is falling, and if demand is falling, then inflation will be low because people don’t have money to spend. But is this how we want to achieve low inflation? By people not having money to spend? No, that is not how we want to report inflation. The economy is not doing well, but we have to acknowledge this, and the people in charge should acknowledge that we have a problem and let us know what we can do on the ground. How they are choosing to report on inflation is not solving anything.
There has been no real growth in the country, Conrad argued.
“We are not seeing any major construction taking place, and those are the things that tell you that things are moving forward. We are seeing a lot of road repairs, which is what administrations do during election time when certain roads in certain constituencies will be paved. I don’t think that is a logical approach to anything. We should not be looking the way we look.
“If you walk through any of the malls, you will see inflation is low because people aren’t spending a lot of money. But the can is being kicked down the road until the time reaches to tell us the truth, and we all know when that time is. If you go to the supermarket, you know that what is being reported is not a true depiction of inflation,” he explained.
Price information from the Central Bank comes from the distributors, Conrad said.
“The distributors have not experienced an increase in the prices. What we are paying at the point of sale, (authorities) don’t collect as prices, so it’s how they collect the information to tell the story that they want to tell to citizens. But if there weren’t an issue, especially with (foreign exchange), we would not have all the banks cutting forex spending on all of the credit cards, and they are selling it to the point that you are only able to get this much in a billing cycle, so much so that you have to plan months ahead for a trip to the US,” he observed.
He continued, “Small and medium enterprises are suffering to the point that they are closing because of the lack of forex, but the larger corporations don’t have that problem because they are in the line for forex. The conglomerates get forex. How else will we have all of these brand new vehicles coming in unless they have forex available to these companies to bring in all those cars? So in their eyes, forex is not a problem because the major corporations that have the major stakes in the country’s economy have access to forex. The small and medium enterprises are the ones that don’t have access to forex.”
Conrad said other Caricom countries aren’t experiencing foreign exchange issues like this country.
“From where they sit, they look at the import cover, and the threshold is six months, so once it’s more than six months, we are good. But do you have access to forex? People are hoarding forex; they are buying it from their friends and family coming into the country so that they could have some foreign exchange. If we compare ourselves to countries like Jamaica, Grenada and Guyana, they could walk in the bank and buy US (dollars). In Guyana, you can walk into the bank and buy US$1,000. But our problem is that we don’t admit that we have a problem, and it’s not a problem until it reaches crisis levels,” Conrad said.
Manufacturing and labour issues
Conrad said manufacturing and the labour force are at their lowest in the country right now.
“How can we generate foreign exchange when medium and small enterprises don’t have access to the forex that they very well need to purchase the intermediate goods to engage in manufacturing? We need to engage our labour force fully because it is the lowest in the region at 11%. We need to engage the labour force because we have the capacity to expand labour production and export, but companies don’t have the forex to do so. We also have to work on improving productivity,” he said.
Conrad believes Trump’s policies will impact this country.
“Biden buying natural gas from Trinidad goes out the window from January. And then the US won’t need to import anything from us, so what do we do? In six months the full effects of everything will be felt when the new Trump administration settles in and all of the agreements fall apart,” he opined.
Conrad said citizens have a role to play in the country moving forward.
“We lack discipline and then the unions are demanding increases without an increase in productivity which is so unfortunate,” he concluded.
Inflation at 0.2%
Last week the Central Statistical Office (CSO) released its Consumer Price Index for the month of October 2024.
It noted then: “The inflation rate for October 2024, which measures the percentage change in the All Items Index for the month of October 2024 over October 2023, was 0.2%. This represents a decrease from the previous period (September 2024/September 2023) of 0.4%. The inflation rate for the comparative period (October 2023/October 2022) was 1.3%.”
The All Items Index calculated from the prices collected for the month of October 2024 was 124.4, representing an increase of 0.3 points of 0.2% above the All Items Index for September 2024.
The CSO observed that the Index for Food and Non-Alcoholic Beverages increased from 150.2 in September 2024 to 150.8 in October 2024, reflecting an increase of 0.4%.
“Contributing significantly to this increase was the general upward movement in the prices of fresh whole chicken, tomatoes, green sweet peppers, parboiled rice, table margarine, fresh carite, fresh kingfish, fresh salmon, melon and other chilled or frozen chicken,” the CSO stated. However, the full impact of these price increases “was offset by the general decreases in the prices of Irish potatoes, cucumber, carrots, eddoes, ochroes, chive, plantains, garlic, onions and oranges”, it added.
https://trinidadexpress.com/news/local/ ... dd9cc.html
Photo included because I know some ah allyuh does check the last name or picture for any hint of indianness
What if the talking points are reflecting the reality and not just pro one side and anti the other side?wing wrote:Same reason as the public service. Poor productivity, politically inclined to the PNM, asking for increases but no improvement in service.hover11 wrote:Why was the refinery closed to begin with thoughwing wrote:Why worry? In just over a year, Kamla will fix it. She'll restart the refinery and open up the jubilee oil field. Our friend has reported nothing that isn't already widely known, what he hasn't offered is a solution, which is what most of them do with the exemption of Mariano Brown. That Indira sagewan has also taken to repeat verbatim the same talking points as her political directorate.paid_influencer wrote:Economist on inflation: Still a problem
The local economy is not performing well and inflation remains a problem, contrary to what the Government is saying, The University of the West Indies economist Dr Daren Conrad has said.
In a phone interview with the Express last week, Conrad -a senior lecturer in the Department of Economics at The UWI, also believes that in about six months, when the Donald Trump administration in the United States settles in, this country will begin to grapple with “a falling apart of agreements” that could be disastrous for T&T’s economy.
He said the country is not moving forward.
“The economy is not in good stead. It is at the weakest level it has probably been, but when they are reporting the numbers to us, they are picking and choosing which numbers to report and how they report it to make it look good. So I guess this is done not to create a sense of panic, but if we understand the truth, we will be able to make better decisions,” Conrad said.
He noted that a number of companies have reported a decline in profits, “so there is a problem, and it means demand is falling, and if demand is falling, then inflation will be low because people don’t have money to spend. But is this how we want to achieve low inflation? By people not having money to spend? No, that is not how we want to report inflation. The economy is not doing well, but we have to acknowledge this, and the people in charge should acknowledge that we have a problem and let us know what we can do on the ground. How they are choosing to report on inflation is not solving anything.
There has been no real growth in the country, Conrad argued.
“We are not seeing any major construction taking place, and those are the things that tell you that things are moving forward. We are seeing a lot of road repairs, which is what administrations do during election time when certain roads in certain constituencies will be paved. I don’t think that is a logical approach to anything. We should not be looking the way we look.
“If you walk through any of the malls, you will see inflation is low because people aren’t spending a lot of money. But the can is being kicked down the road until the time reaches to tell us the truth, and we all know when that time is. If you go to the supermarket, you know that what is being reported is not a true depiction of inflation,” he explained.
Price information from the Central Bank comes from the distributors, Conrad said.
“The distributors have not experienced an increase in the prices. What we are paying at the point of sale, (authorities) don’t collect as prices, so it’s how they collect the information to tell the story that they want to tell to citizens. But if there weren’t an issue, especially with (foreign exchange), we would not have all the banks cutting forex spending on all of the credit cards, and they are selling it to the point that you are only able to get this much in a billing cycle, so much so that you have to plan months ahead for a trip to the US,” he observed.
He continued, “Small and medium enterprises are suffering to the point that they are closing because of the lack of forex, but the larger corporations don’t have that problem because they are in the line for forex. The conglomerates get forex. How else will we have all of these brand new vehicles coming in unless they have forex available to these companies to bring in all those cars? So in their eyes, forex is not a problem because the major corporations that have the major stakes in the country’s economy have access to forex. The small and medium enterprises are the ones that don’t have access to forex.”
Conrad said other Caricom countries aren’t experiencing foreign exchange issues like this country.
“From where they sit, they look at the import cover, and the threshold is six months, so once it’s more than six months, we are good. But do you have access to forex? People are hoarding forex; they are buying it from their friends and family coming into the country so that they could have some foreign exchange. If we compare ourselves to countries like Jamaica, Grenada and Guyana, they could walk in the bank and buy US (dollars). In Guyana, you can walk into the bank and buy US$1,000. But our problem is that we don’t admit that we have a problem, and it’s not a problem until it reaches crisis levels,” Conrad said.
Manufacturing and labour issues
Conrad said manufacturing and the labour force are at their lowest in the country right now.
“How can we generate foreign exchange when medium and small enterprises don’t have access to the forex that they very well need to purchase the intermediate goods to engage in manufacturing? We need to engage our labour force fully because it is the lowest in the region at 11%. We need to engage the labour force because we have the capacity to expand labour production and export, but companies don’t have the forex to do so. We also have to work on improving productivity,” he said.
Conrad believes Trump’s policies will impact this country.
“Biden buying natural gas from Trinidad goes out the window from January. And then the US won’t need to import anything from us, so what do we do? In six months the full effects of everything will be felt when the new Trump administration settles in and all of the agreements fall apart,” he opined.
Conrad said citizens have a role to play in the country moving forward.
“We lack discipline and then the unions are demanding increases without an increase in productivity which is so unfortunate,” he concluded.
Inflation at 0.2%
Last week the Central Statistical Office (CSO) released its Consumer Price Index for the month of October 2024.
It noted then: “The inflation rate for October 2024, which measures the percentage change in the All Items Index for the month of October 2024 over October 2023, was 0.2%. This represents a decrease from the previous period (September 2024/September 2023) of 0.4%. The inflation rate for the comparative period (October 2023/October 2022) was 1.3%.”
The All Items Index calculated from the prices collected for the month of October 2024 was 124.4, representing an increase of 0.3 points of 0.2% above the All Items Index for September 2024.
The CSO observed that the Index for Food and Non-Alcoholic Beverages increased from 150.2 in September 2024 to 150.8 in October 2024, reflecting an increase of 0.4%.
“Contributing significantly to this increase was the general upward movement in the prices of fresh whole chicken, tomatoes, green sweet peppers, parboiled rice, table margarine, fresh carite, fresh kingfish, fresh salmon, melon and other chilled or frozen chicken,” the CSO stated. However, the full impact of these price increases “was offset by the general decreases in the prices of Irish potatoes, cucumber, carrots, eddoes, ochroes, chive, plantains, garlic, onions and oranges”, it added.
https://trinidadexpress.com/news/local/ ... dd9cc.html
Photo included because I know some ah allyuh does check the last name or picture for any hint of indianness
mero wrote:sMASH wrote:Closing down the refinery was a wise move or a dumb move ?
Post figures of petrotrin vs heritage and I'll make a fair assessment. You guys smart so those figures easily accessible off the top
Weird how the same ppl who want to privatize the port, privatize WASA and privatize T&TEC and other mismanaged state run companies , welcoming the IMF but crying over Petrotrin as if Petrotrin wasn't gonna be the first to go. Make up allyuh mind and sob story nah.
Dont get distracted and forget to post the figures ok, know allyuh attention span low
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