Wednesday, September 04, 2024
Mexico's bank card
Mexico's bank card - American Thinker https://t.co/rpaVFQi1QJ
— Silvio Canto. Jr. (@silvio_canto) September 4, 2024
We have posted in the past about remittances going from the U.S. to Mexico. Much of it is family oriented, such as someone sending his mom or wife a weekly transfer. I recall when it was delivered by hand by people who would literally carry the cash down. They call these people “mulas” [mules] and they were like money agents.
Now they usually put the money in a bank card up here or wire the money. It’s a big business and a huge part of the Mexican welfare system.
Let’s check the latest numbers:
Despite July’s decline, the total value of remittance income in the first seven months of 2024 totaled 36.94 billion dollars, representing a 2.9 percent annual increase from the same period in 2023.
Additionally, BBVA Mexico’s economic studies department projected that remittances for the year will reach 66.5 billion dollars, constituting 3.7 percent of the national GDP and supporting more than 1.7 million households and 6.1 million people.
That’s six million people, or larger than many U.S. states or several Central American countries.
The argument is that these people work here, make the money, and decide to help their relatives. And that’s true. How is this helping Mexico? It appears to me that they are creating a massive dependency on relatives in the U.S. and not much more.
A few years ago, I remember an economist in Mexico saying that this money should be used to encourage business creation or other steps to break up the dependency. At the same time, what politician is going to make that point? You are not going to hear it from President Andres Lopez-Obrador, who obviously sees dollar signs in the human traffic flow.
What can we do? I don’t know because we don’t tax bank transfers in the U.S. and such a policy could violate the trade agreement.
So another month and more mothers have a little helper in the U.S.
P.S. Check out my blog for posts, podcasts and videos. (American Thinker)
Labor Day weekend 1998: Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa and home runs!
Sammy Sosa's big smile and Mark McGwire's powerful swing were a wonderful distraction from the real world in the summer of '98.
It was so much fun keeping track of home runs and the countdown to pass Roger Maris's 61 from 1961 and Babe Ruth's legendary 60 from 1927.
We grew up in a baseball world where 50 was a super season.
The great Harmon Killebrew hit 49 in one season.
The amazing Hank Aaron hit 47.
Triple crown winner Mickey Mantle did hit 56 and 54 in the 1950's.
The Phillies' Mike Schmitdt topped at 48.
The great Willie Mays hit 52 twice in his career.
The A's Reggie Jackson hit 47 in '69 and led the AL with 32 in '73 and 36 in '75.
In the 1970s, there were only a few guys who hit 40!
In other words, 50 home runs was a huge number.
It was so rare that only Willie Mays (52 in '65), George Foster (52 in '77) and Cecil Fielder (50 in '90) did it over a 25 year span!
In other words, only 3 players hit 50 home runs from 1965 to 1990!
Beyond that, two guys hitting 60 home runs in the same season was beyond my imagination.
This is what made the summer of 1998 so exciting.
In 1998, McGuire hit # 62 and hugged the Maris family in a national telecast following Labor Day.
Sosa followed him daily. It went on for the whole month of September. It was wonderful.
On the last day of the season, McGuire hit the unthinkable # 69 and # 70.
It was incredible to watch McGuire and Sosa connect with the fans and bring baseball back from the unpleasant strike of '94.
We needed all of those home runs because the 1998 was a horrible except for baseball.
On the local scene, we had one of the warmest summers ever. We had daily 100 plus temperatures for 29 days. At one point, we reached 108. Even the old timers could not remember such a hot summer.
On the national scene, it was the summer of Monica Lewinski and Bill Clinton. By Labor Day, most of us were hearing about about "oral sex" and White House interns. I did not appreciate that. President Clinton's incredibly reckless behavior led to his impeachment in December!
On the global scene, two US embassies were blown up in Africa. Osama Bin Laden said that it was another battle in the war against the US.
So much for the theory that the terrorists got violent because the US invaded Iraq!
Over at the UN, Saddam Hussein kicked out the inspectors. Pres. Clinton went to the UN Security Council and demanded a reaction. VP Gore called Iraq a "virulent threat".
Nothing happened and Saddam got away with giving the world the finger again.
By the end of '98, Saddam was hitting 12 for 12 (perfect 1.000 batting average) in his defiance and rejection of UN resolutions!
So much for the theory that the UN was ever serious about the matter!
Over in Iraq, Saddam was shooting at US planes enforcing UN resolutions.
So much for the theory that Saddam never attacked the US.
Most of us were very happy that Sosa and McGwire were hitting titanic homeruns. It was a pleasant distraction form the rest of the news.
Sadly, we learned later that Sosa and McGwire were allegedly involved in the steroids controversy and ended up answering questions from a congressional committee. What a shame. It was a great baseball summer.
1983: Remembering the day that the USSR shot down a Korean plane full of civilians
"On September 1, 1983, Korean Airlines (KAL) flight 007 was on the last leg of a flight from New York City to Seoul, with a stopover in Anchorage, Alaska.
As it approached its final destination, the plane began to veer far off its normal course.
In just a short time, the plane flew into Russian airspace and crossed over the Kamchatka Peninsula, where some top-secret Soviet military installations were known to be located.
The Soviets sent two fighters to intercept the plane.
According to tapes of the conversations between the fighter pilots and Soviet ground control, the fighters quickly located the KAL flight and tried to make contact with the passenger jet. Failing to receive a response, one of the fighters fired a heat-seeking missile.
KAL 007 was hit and plummeted into the Sea of Japan. All 269 people on board were killed."
The KAL 007 incident was a brutal attack. It may have also been the beginning of the collapse of the USSR. Gorbachev came in 2 years later and realized quickly that the USSR needed a lot more than "perestroika".
1951: President Truman and the first national televised speech
On this day in 1951, President Harry S. Truman’s opening speech before a conference in San Francisco is broadcast across the nation, marking the first time a television program was broadcast from coast to coast.At the time, Truman was facing challenges in the Korea War as well as domestic issues.
The speech focused on Truman’s acceptance of a treaty that officially ended America’s post-World War II occupation of Japan.
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