The Political Divide

Where Americans stand on gun control measures

Gun control is clearly a major source of the political divide, but how big is the divide? A May 27, 2022, ABC News story reminded readers of a 2019 ABC News/Washington Post poll with the following results:

• 89% - Support requiring universal background checks
• 86% - Support “red flag” laws
• 60% - Support banning high-capacity magazines
• 56% - Support banning assault weapons sales
• 52% - Support mandatory assault weapons sales

Support for an assault weapons ban varied greatly along political lines, with 81% of Democrats, 55% of independents, and 33% of Republicans in favor. An April 2021 Quinnipiac University poll on gun laws similarly found “overwhelming support for requiring background checks for all gun buyers (89%). Support was similarly high among Republicans (84%).”

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Replacement theory’s cousin: Democrats will become a permanent majority

One of the conspiracy theories that contributes to the political divide is replacement theory, the idea that “a secret group of elites is using non-White immigrants and Black people to intermarry with and ‘outbreed’ White people until they no longer exist.” In a May 21, 2022, book review in CNN Politics, Yascha Mounk, author of "The Great Experiment: Why Diverse Democracies Fall Apart and How They Can Endure,” says there is a cousin of this conspiracy theory “that both Democrats and Republicans now agree on.” Mounk is talking about “the belief that Democrats will become a permanent political majority in coming years as people of color and non-White immigrants eventually outnumber white Americans.” He says it “promotes a dystopian future in which White Americans and people of color are reduced to members of ‘mutually hostile tribes.’” The result is that "politicians have little incentive to reach beyond their base and many Whites panic over the fear of being permanently sidelined.”

Climate Change

Financing is hard to find in scaling green solutions

In the May 31, 2022, edition of the CEO Report, Fortune CEO Alan Murray reports on the challenges of financing green tech products and on the First Movers Coalition, which, according to its website, is “a global initiative harnessing the purchasing power of companies to decarbonize seven “hard to abate” industrial sectors that currently account for 30% of global emissions: aluminum, aviation, chemicals, concrete, shipping, steel, and trucking; along with innovative carbon removal technologies.” Murray spent several hours at the recent Davos 2022 World Economic Forum with business and finance leaders who told him “about the difficulty of finding financing for large-scale green-tech projects in these 'hard-to-abate' sectors. They are too big to attract venture funding and too unproven to win bank financing.” The idea behind the First Mover Coalition is to get companies to commit in advance to buying specific amounts of green resources "so that companies, entrepreneurs, and financiers have the confidence to invest now to meet that future demand."

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Climatenomics: will the climate economic earthquake save our planet?

Bob Keefe, the executive director of Environmental Entrepreneurs (E2), has published a book called "Climatenomics: Washington, Wall Street and the Economic Battle To Save Our Planet." From the Amazon description: "The battle against climate change is no longer just an environmental or social issue. As shareholders demand corporations protect assets against climate change and the economic impact of environmental disasters suck billions of dollars out of the economy, capitalism itself has become an ally. The economic impact of climate change is rattling the foundation of our economy at its very core ... The good news about this economic earthquake is that it just might be the thing that saves our planet."

Future of Work / The Economy

Gasoline prices and oil industry profits both setting records

The meteoric rise in gasoline prices hasn't hurt the oil industry. First-quarter earnings from the major oil companies include:

• ExxonMobil - $5.5 billion, double the amount from the same time last year
• Shell – $9 billion, its strongest quarterly earnings ever
• Chevron - $6.3 billion, compared to $1.7 billion in 2021

According to a May 31, 2022, newsletter by former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich, “these companies brought in more than 300 percent more in profits than in the first quarter of 2021. That's a total of more than $35 billion in profits in just three months. In fact, according to a story in the Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank, on May 17, 2022, "the first-quarter profits of the five biggest oil companies are equivalent to almost 28 percent of what Americans spent to fill up their gas tanks in the same time period."

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Jamie Dimon: brace yourself for an economic hurricane and oil at $150/barrel

JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon has been reported in multiple news sites, including CNBC on June 1, 2022, as saying that he is preparing his firm "for an economic hurricane on the horizon and advised investors to do the same ... You'd better brace yourself … JPMorgan is bracing ourselves, and we're going to be very conservative with our balance sheet." Dimon's primary concerns are the Federal Reserve's signaling that it “will reverse its emergency bond-buying program and shrink its balance sheet.” The other concern is the Ukraine war and “its impact on commodities, including food and fuel.” He says oil 'almost has to go up in price' because of disruptions caused by the worst European conflict since World War II, potentially hitting $150 or $175 a barrel."