Another loss for BrexTWIT

EU and Mercosur agree huge trade deal after 20-year talks

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-48807161 .

Another Reason that America is NOT Great

Notes on Excessive Wealth Disorder: How not to repeat the mistakes of 2011.
1. Raw corruption. We like to imagine that simple bribery of politicians isn’t an important factor in America, but it’s almost surely a much bigger deal than we like to think.

2. Soft corruption. What I mean by this are the various ways short of direct bribery politicians, government officials, and people with policy influence of any kind stand to gain financially by promoting policies that serve the interests or prejudices of the wealthy. This includes the revolving door between public service and private-sector employment, think-tank fellowships, fees on the lecture circuit, and so on.
3. Campaign contributions. Yes, these matter.
4. Defining the agenda: Through a variety of channels — media ownership, think tanks, and the simple tendency to assume that being rich also means being wise — the 0.1 percent has an extraordinary ability to set the agenda for policy discussion, in ways that can be sharply at odds with both a reasonable assessment of priorities and public opinion more generally."

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/22/opinion/notes-on-excessive-wealth-disorder.html .

Bank-free payments

U.S. Banks Are Terrified of Chinese Payment Apps > .

If mobile payment apps became as popular in the U.S. as they are in China, banks would lose a projected $43 billion in revenue annually. Bloomberg QuickTake explains how cheap and easy payments by phone are threatening one of the banking industry's most profitable businesses.

In a nation that celebrates greed ...

According to the Federal Reserve, 40 percent of U.S. adults don’t have enough cash to meet a $400 emergency expense; a much larger number of Americans would be severely strained by the kinds of costs that routinely arise when, say, illness strikes, even for those who have health insurance.

So if you have an income high enough that you can easily afford health care and good housing, have plenty of liquid assets and find it hard to imagine ever needing food stamps, you’re part of a privileged minority.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/18/opinion/bernie-sanders-tax.html .