Monday, December 21, 2009
Sunday, December 13, 2009
COPENHAGEN: Population and climate change are intertwined but the population issue has remained a blind spot when countries discuss ways to mitigate climate change and slow down global warming, according to Zhao Baige, vice-minister of National Population and Family Planning Commission of China (NPFPC) .
"Dealing with climate change is not simply an issue of CO2 emission reduction but a comprehensive challenge involving political, economic, social, cultural and ecological issues, and the population concern fits right into the picture," said Zhao, who is a member of the Chinese government delegation.
Many studies link population growth with emissions and the effect of climate change.
"Calculations of the contribution of population growth to emissions growth globally produce a consistent finding that most of past population growth has been responsible for between 40 per cent and 60 percent of emissions growth," so stated by the 2009 State of World Population, released earlier by the UN Population Fund.
Although China's family planning policy has received criticism over the past three decades, Zhao said that China's population program has made a great historic contribution to the well-being of society.
As a result of the family planning policy, China has seen 400 million fewer births, which has resulted in 18 million fewer tons of CO2 emissions a year, Zhao said.
The UN report projected that if the global population would remain 8 billion by the year 2050 instead of a little more than 9 billion according to medium-growth scenario, "it might result in 1 billion to 2 billion fewer tons of carbon emissions".
Meanwhile, she said studies have also shown that family planning programs are more efficient in helping cut emissions, citing research by Thomas Wire of London School of Economics that states: "Each $7 spent on basic family planning would reduce CO2 emissions by more than one ton" whereas it would cost $13 for reduced deforestation, $24 to use wind technology, $51 for solar power, $93 for introducing hybrid cars and $131 electric vehicles.
She admitted that China's population program is not without consequences, as the country is entering the aging society fast and facing the problem of gender imbalance.
"I'm not saying that what we have done is 100 percent right, but I'm sure we are going in the right direction and now 1.3 billion people have benefited," she said.
She said some 85 percent of the Chinese women in reproductive age use contraceptives, the highest rate in the world. This has been achieved largely through education and improvement of people's lives, she said.
This holistic approach that integrates policy on population and development, a strategy promoting sustainable development of population, resources and environment should serve as a model for integrating population programs into the framework of climate change adaptation, she said.
Saturday, December 12, 2009
WASHINGTON, Dec 11 (Reuters) - U.S. healthcare spending would rise by about $234 billion over the next decade under the Senate Democrats' overhaul bill and some of the proposed savings might never be achieved, a U.S. agency said in a report released on Friday.
It was the latest in a series of reports issued by the agency that oversees Medicare that cast doubt on some of the savings claims made by Democrats about one of President Barack Obama's top domestic priorities.
Republican opponents on Friday seized on the report to underscore their message the sweeping healthcare reform will raise costs and hurt Medicare benefits.
"This report confirms what we've long known -- the Democrat plan will increase costs, raise premiums, and slash Medicare," said Republican Leader Mitch McConnell. "That's not reform. This analysis speaks for itself. This bill is a sham."
But Democrats said many of the potential cost savings in the bill were hard to estimate and that the bill would extend the financial life of the Medicare health program for the elderly and result in lower premiums and out-of-pocket expenses.
"The report shows that health reform will ensure both the federal government and the American people spend less on health care than if this bill doesn't pass, helping get a hold of America's debt and keep more money in people's pockets," said Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, who helped write the legislation.
The report, written by Richard Foster, the chief actuary at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, said the increase in healthcare spending reflected the impact of millions of newly covered people seeking medical care.
"Although several provisions would help to reduce healthcare cost growth, their impact would be more than offset through 2019 by the higher health expenditures resulting from the coverage expansions," the report said.
Foster acknowledged his analysis of the sweeping reform had a "greater degree of uncertainty than is usually the case with more routine health care proposals."
SOME COST-SAVING PROPOSALS 'MAY BE UNREALISTIC'
The healthcare revamp seeks to rein in soaring costs and provide medical coverage to millions of uninsured people. The report said about 57 million people would be without health insurance in 2019 under current laws. The number would be reduced by 24 million if the Senate bill is enacted, it said.
The report, similar to one issued by the agency on the healthcare bill passed by the House of Representatives in November, went on to say the added demand for health services at first may be difficult to meet and could lead to price increases and a reluctance by providers to treat patients with low-reimbursement health coverage.
Medicare has significantly lower reimbursement rates than private insurers. Doctors, clinics and hospitals that rely heavily on Medicare patients for business "could find it difficult to remain profitable and, absent legislative intervention, might end their participation in the program," the report said.
Congress would probably find that politically unacceptable and the report concluded some of the Medicare cost saving proposals "may be unrealistic."
Democrats argued the $2.5 trillion U.S. healthcare system is fraught with wasteful spending and the savings from wellness programs and payment system reforms that would reward quality rather than quantity of treatments and services would be greater than estimated.
"There is a very significant cost savings target that can be achieved," Democratic Senator Sheldon Whitehouse said in a telephone conference with reporters.
"You could get a number down if you just went in and cut benefits," he said. "The problem (in the system) is not that benefits are too high, the problem is that it is managed poorly, it has enormous waste and duplication and error and resolving those things are just plain harder to cost by its nature." (Reporting by Donna Smith; Editing by Peter Cooney)
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A new Internal Revenue Service unit set up to catch rich tax cheats hiding their wealth in complex business entities is rapidly taking shape with the hiring of hundreds of employees.
The IRS high wealth unit, part of a broader effort to combat international tax evasion, is focusing on "the entire web of business entities controlled by a high wealth individual," IRS Commissioner Doug Shulman told a tax conference this week.
Another IRS official told Reuters "hundreds" of people have already been hired to staff the new unit, including some from within the agency.
"We have drawn top talent within the IRS that have expertise involving wealthy individuals as well as examination of their related entities," said Mae Lew, an IRS special counsel.
The high-wealth unit is focusing on trusts, real estate investments, privately held companies and other business entities controlled by rich individuals.
While use of sophisticated legal structures can be legal, in other instances they "mask aggressive tax strategies," Shulman said.
Tax authorities in Japan, Germany and the UK have also created similar units.
The U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday approved a $387 million boost for the IRS for the fiscal year that started October 1, in part to fund the high-wealth unit. The Senate is expected to vote on the measure on Sunday.
NEW GLOBAL FOCUS, JOINT CORPORATE AUDITS
The IRS is also opening new criminal offices in Beijing, Panama City and Sydney to focus on funds flowing out of Europe and into Asia, in part because of a heightened focus on international enforcement in Europe.
The goal is to get those up and running during this fiscal year, which ends September 30, according to Barry Shott, IRS deputy commissioner for international issues for large and midsized business.
At the center of the agency's offshore effort is its legal cases against Swiss banking giant UBS AG. UBS agreed to turn over nearly 5,000 names of individual American clients and paid $780 million to settle a criminal case for aiding tax evasion.
The IRS has also begun initial steps to join forces with other governments to scrutinize corporate tax filings to prevent "tax arbitrage" by companies seeking the best regime.
President Barack Obama has proposed tightening tax rules for U.S. multinationals, including one in which companies delay paying taxes on income earned offshore, a legal practice known as deferral that officials say is abused.
Some tax practitioners expressed worry about such coordination.
"With any new thing, you never want to be the guinea pig," Mary Lou Fahey, general counsel for the Tax Executive Institute, comprised of business executives, said.
Shott said a likely scenario will likely be two countries getting together and decide to examine a narrow issue. In the beginning it will operate like a pilot program where the corporation examined would agree to take part.
"With rare exception ... the taxpayer will absolutely know they are subject to a simultaneous examination," Shott said.
Still, he said there could be cases where the audit needs to be kept quiet, such as when a criminal probe is ongoing.
Initial partners would likely include Canada, the UK and Australia, Shott said.
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Senate is poised to clear away a Republican filibuster of a huge end-of-year spending bill rewarding most federal agencies with generous budget boosts.
The $1.1 trillion measure combines much of the year's unfinished budget work - only a $626 billion Pentagon spending measure would remain - into a 1,000-plus-page catchall spending bill that would give Cabinet departments such as Education, Health and Human Services and State increases far exceeding inflation.
After a 60-36 test vote on Friday in which Democrats and a handful of Republicans helped the measure clear another GOP obstacle, the bill was expected to win on Saturday the 60 Senate votes necessary to guarantee passage. A final vote is expected Sunday.
The measure provides spending increases averaging about 10 percent to programs under immediate control of Congress, blending increases for veterans' programs, NASA and the FBI with a pay raise for federal workers and help for car dealers.
It bundles six of the 12 annual spending bills, capping a dysfunctional appropriations process in which House leaders blocked Republicans from debating key issues while Senate Republicans dragged out debates.
Just the $626 billion defense bill would remain. That's being held back to serve as a vehicle to advance must-pass legislation such as the debt increase.
Saturday's bill would offer an improved binding arbitration process to challenge General Motors' and Chrysler's decisions to close more than 2,000 dealerships, which often anchor fading small town business districts. It also renewed for two more years a federal loan guarantee program for steel companies.
The bill also caps a heated debate over Obama's order to close the military-run prison for terrorist suspects at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. It would permit detainees held there to be transferred to the United States to stand trial but not to be released.
The bill would also void a long-standing ban on the funding of abortion by the District of Columbia government and overturns a ban on federal money for needle exchange programs in the city. It also phases out a D.C. school voucher program favored by Republicans and opens the door for the city to permit medical marijuana.
It would also lift a nationwide ban on the use of federal funds for needle-exchange programs.
Federal workers would receive pay increases averaging 2 percent, with people in areas with higher living costs receiving slightly higher increases.
Once the bill clears the Senate, it would advance to President Barack Obama's desk.
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