Building back fairer from the Covid-19 pandemic in South Africa: Some first step reforms in an era of fiscal constraints

Building back fairer from the Covid-19 pandemic in South Africa: Some first step reforms in an era of fiscal constraints PDF Author: Arndt, Channing
Publisher: Intl Food Policy Res Inst
ISBN:
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 34

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Book Description
Prior to the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, South Africa confronted an unfolding economic crisis. Today, the economic situation has worsened in essentially every dimension. If there is a silver lining to this terrible pandemic from the perspective of the South African economy, it could be found in an enhanced willingness to implement reform measures designed to rekindle growth, improve equity, and drive sustainable development whilst recognizing significant fiscal constraints. To this end, this paper focuses on three areas: skills; food systems, nutrition, and health; and urban structure. In each area, we first briefly consider long run perspectives and then turn attention to high return positive steps that can be implemented in the very near term and are consistent with the realization of a positive long run vision. We find that much greater openness to immigration of highly skilled and experienced workers (and their families) stands out as a rapidly implementable policy that offers strong potential to stimulate growth, create jobs, and reduce inequality at low costs to government and with low risk. With respect to food systems, nutrition, and health, we point to a solid basis for optimism about growth and employment prospects in the long term. We also highlight the potential benefits of holistic perspectives that include implications for nutrition and health. Turning to the very near term, we underline the need to reduce the policy uncertainty associated with land reform. In this optic, we recommend consideration of a focus of reform in the near term on favorable dryland areas that can be equipped with supplemental irrigation, with the goal of permitting these areas to specialize in higher value products. Judicious water resource use planning must accompany this policy. Turning to urban structure, we note the persistence of the spatial inequities entrenched by the apartheid era. With tight fiscal constraints on government investment that are likely to extend to the medium term, we seek to refocus policy on measures designed to increase efficiency and equity outcomes derived from existing infrastructure. The analyses of these three areas complement the growth agenda released by the National Treasury in August 2019 and the policy discussions contained in a series of policy papers published by Economic Research South Africa (ERSA) over 2021.

Building back fairer from the Covid-19 pandemic in South Africa: Some first step reforms in an era of fiscal constraints

Building back fairer from the Covid-19 pandemic in South Africa: Some first step reforms in an era of fiscal constraints PDF Author: Arndt, Channing
Publisher: Intl Food Policy Res Inst
ISBN:
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 34

Get Book Here

Book Description
Prior to the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, South Africa confronted an unfolding economic crisis. Today, the economic situation has worsened in essentially every dimension. If there is a silver lining to this terrible pandemic from the perspective of the South African economy, it could be found in an enhanced willingness to implement reform measures designed to rekindle growth, improve equity, and drive sustainable development whilst recognizing significant fiscal constraints. To this end, this paper focuses on three areas: skills; food systems, nutrition, and health; and urban structure. In each area, we first briefly consider long run perspectives and then turn attention to high return positive steps that can be implemented in the very near term and are consistent with the realization of a positive long run vision. We find that much greater openness to immigration of highly skilled and experienced workers (and their families) stands out as a rapidly implementable policy that offers strong potential to stimulate growth, create jobs, and reduce inequality at low costs to government and with low risk. With respect to food systems, nutrition, and health, we point to a solid basis for optimism about growth and employment prospects in the long term. We also highlight the potential benefits of holistic perspectives that include implications for nutrition and health. Turning to the very near term, we underline the need to reduce the policy uncertainty associated with land reform. In this optic, we recommend consideration of a focus of reform in the near term on favorable dryland areas that can be equipped with supplemental irrigation, with the goal of permitting these areas to specialize in higher value products. Judicious water resource use planning must accompany this policy. Turning to urban structure, we note the persistence of the spatial inequities entrenched by the apartheid era. With tight fiscal constraints on government investment that are likely to extend to the medium term, we seek to refocus policy on measures designed to increase efficiency and equity outcomes derived from existing infrastructure. The analyses of these three areas complement the growth agenda released by the National Treasury in August 2019 and the policy discussions contained in a series of policy papers published by Economic Research South Africa (ERSA) over 2021.

Global Trends 2040

Global Trends 2040 PDF Author: National Intelligence Council
Publisher: Cosimo Reports
ISBN: 9781646794973
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 158

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Book Description
"The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic marks the most significant, singular global disruption since World War II, with health, economic, political, and security implications that will ripple for years to come." -Global Trends 2040 (2021) Global Trends 2040-A More Contested World (2021), released by the US National Intelligence Council, is the latest report in its series of reports starting in 1997 about megatrends and the world's future. This report, strongly influenced by the COVID-19 pandemic, paints a bleak picture of the future and describes a contested, fragmented and turbulent world. It specifically discusses the four main trends that will shape tomorrow's world: - Demographics-by 2040, 1.4 billion people will be added mostly in Africa and South Asia. - Economics-increased government debt and concentrated economic power will escalate problems for the poor and middleclass. - Climate-a hotter world will increase water, food, and health insecurity. - Technology-the emergence of new technologies could both solve and cause problems for human life. Students of trends, policymakers, entrepreneurs, academics, journalists and anyone eager for a glimpse into the next decades, will find this report, with colored graphs, essential reading.

Fair Society, Healthy Lives

Fair Society, Healthy Lives PDF Author: Michael Marmot
Publisher: Olschki
ISBN: 9788822262516
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 74

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Book Description


Communities in Action

Communities in Action PDF Author: National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309452961
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 583

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Book Description
In the United States, some populations suffer from far greater disparities in health than others. Those disparities are caused not only by fundamental differences in health status across segments of the population, but also because of inequities in factors that impact health status, so-called determinants of health. Only part of an individual's health status depends on his or her behavior and choice; community-wide problems like poverty, unemployment, poor education, inadequate housing, poor public transportation, interpersonal violence, and decaying neighborhoods also contribute to health inequities, as well as the historic and ongoing interplay of structures, policies, and norms that shape lives. When these factors are not optimal in a community, it does not mean they are intractable: such inequities can be mitigated by social policies that can shape health in powerful ways. Communities in Action: Pathways to Health Equity seeks to delineate the causes of and the solutions to health inequities in the United States. This report focuses on what communities can do to promote health equity, what actions are needed by the many and varied stakeholders that are part of communities or support them, as well as the root causes and structural barriers that need to be overcome.

International Monetary Fund Annual Report 2021

International Monetary Fund Annual Report 2021 PDF Author: International Monetary Fund. Secretary's Department
Publisher: International Monetary Fund
ISBN: 1513568817
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 74

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Book Description
A recovery is underway, but the economic fallout from the global pandemic could be with us for years to come. With the crisis exacerbating prepandemic vulnerabilities, country prospects are diverging. Nearly half of emerging market and developing economies and some middle-income countries are now at risk of falling further behind, undoing much of the progress made toward achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals.

The Financial Crisis Inquiry Report

The Financial Crisis Inquiry Report PDF Author: Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission
Publisher: Cosimo, Inc.
ISBN: 1616405414
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 692

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Book Description
The Financial Crisis Inquiry Report, published by the U.S. Government and the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission in early 2011, is the official government report on the United States financial collapse and the review of major financial institutions that bankrupted and failed, or would have without help from the government. The commission and the report were implemented after Congress passed an act in 2009 to review and prevent fraudulent activity. The report details, among other things, the periods before, during, and after the crisis, what led up to it, and analyses of subprime mortgage lending, credit expansion and banking policies, the collapse of companies like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and the federal bailouts of Lehman and AIG. It also discusses the aftermath of the fallout and our current state. This report should be of interest to anyone concerned about the financial situation in the U.S. and around the world.THE FINANCIAL CRISIS INQUIRY COMMISSION is an independent, bi-partisan, government-appointed panel of 10 people that was created to "examine the causes, domestic and global, of the current financial and economic crisis in the United States." It was established as part of the Fraud Enforcement and Recovery Act of 2009. The commission consisted of private citizens with expertise in economics and finance, banking, housing, market regulation, and consumer protection. They examined and reported on "the collapse of major financial institutions that failed or would have failed if not for exceptional assistance from the government."News Dissector DANNY SCHECHTER is a journalist, blogger and filmmaker. He has been reporting on economic crises since the 1980's when he was with ABC News. His film In Debt We Trust warned of the economic meltdown in 2006. He has since written three books on the subject including Plunder: Investigating Our Economic Calamity (Cosimo Books, 2008), and The Crime Of Our Time: Why Wall Street Is Not Too Big to Jail (Disinfo Books, 2011), a companion to his latest film Plunder The Crime Of Our Time. He can be reached online at www.newsdissector.com.

The Federal Reserve System Purposes and Functions

The Federal Reserve System Purposes and Functions PDF Author: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780894991967
Category : Banks and Banking
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Provides an in-depth overview of the Federal Reserve System, including information about monetary policy and the economy, the Federal Reserve in the international sphere, supervision and regulation, consumer and community affairs and services offered by Reserve Banks. Contains several appendixes, including a brief explanation of Federal Reserve regulations, a glossary of terms, and a list of additional publications.

Pain Management and the Opioid Epidemic

Pain Management and the Opioid Epidemic PDF Author: National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309459575
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 483

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Book Description
Drug overdose, driven largely by overdose related to the use of opioids, is now the leading cause of unintentional injury death in the United States. The ongoing opioid crisis lies at the intersection of two public health challenges: reducing the burden of suffering from pain and containing the rising toll of the harms that can arise from the use of opioid medications. Chronic pain and opioid use disorder both represent complex human conditions affecting millions of Americans and causing untold disability and loss of function. In the context of the growing opioid problem, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) launched an Opioids Action Plan in early 2016. As part of this plan, the FDA asked the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine to convene a committee to update the state of the science on pain research, care, and education and to identify actions the FDA and others can take to respond to the opioid epidemic, with a particular focus on informing FDA's development of a formal method for incorporating individual and societal considerations into its risk-benefit framework for opioid approval and monitoring.

Promoting the Educational Success of Children and Youth Learning English

Promoting the Educational Success of Children and Youth Learning English PDF Author: National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309455405
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 529

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Book Description
Educating dual language learners (DLLs) and English learners (ELs) effectively is a national challenge with consequences both for individuals and for American society. Despite their linguistic, cognitive, and social potential, many ELsâ€"who account for more than 9 percent of enrollment in grades K-12 in U.S. schoolsâ€"are struggling to meet the requirements for academic success, and their prospects for success in postsecondary education and in the workforce are jeopardized as a result. Promoting the Educational Success of Children and Youth Learning English: Promising Futures examines how evidence based on research relevant to the development of DLLs/ELs from birth to age 21 can inform education and health policies and related practices that can result in better educational outcomes. This report makes recommendations for policy, practice, and research and data collection focused on addressing the challenges in caring for and educating DLLs/ELs from birth to grade 12.

Global Economic Prospects, June 2021

Global Economic Prospects, June 2021 PDF Author: World Bank
Publisher: World Bank Publications
ISBN: 1464816662
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 339

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Book Description
The world economy is experiencing a very strong but uneven recovery, with many emerging market and developing economies facing obstacles to vaccination. The global outlook remains uncertain, with major risks around the path of the pandemic and the possibility of financial stress amid large debt loads. Policy makers face a difficult balancing act as they seek to nurture the recovery while safeguarding price stability and fiscal sustainability. A comprehensive set of policies will be required to promote a strong recovery that mitigates inequality and enhances environmental sustainability, ultimately putting economies on a path of green, resilient, and inclusive development. Prominent among the necessary policies are efforts to lower trade costs so that trade can once again become a robust engine of growth. This year marks the 30th anniversary of the Global Economic Prospects. The Global Economic Prospects is a World Bank Group Flagship Report that examines global economic developments and prospects, with a special focus on emerging market and developing economies, on a semiannual basis (in January and June). Each edition includes analytical pieces on topical policy challenges faced by these economies.