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Time of India
a day ago
- Business
- Time of India
Assessing Donald Trump's send-off for Elon Musk
President Donald Trump celebrated Elon Musk on Friday as the billionaire's tenure as the White House's chief cost-cutter was ending. The gathering, styled as a news conference in the Oval Office, signalled an end to a remarkable period of upheaval across the federal bureaucracy, supervised by Musk and the initiative he led, the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). "Elon has worked tirelessly, helping lead the most sweeping and consequential government reform program in generations," Trump said, omitting that Musk fell far short of an oft-stated goal of achieving $1 trillion in savings. Here's a fact-check of some of their claims. What was said Live Events "We'll remember you as we announce billions of dollars of extra waste, fraud and abuse." -- Trump Discover the stories of your interest Blockchain 5 Stories Cyber-safety 7 Stories Fintech 9 Stories E-comm 9 Stories ML 8 Stories Edtech 6 Stories This is exaggerated. In listing a litany of contracts and grants cancelled by the cost-cutting initiative, Trump misrepresented several of them and omitted context about others. He repeated the misleading claim that DOGE eliminated a payment of "$59 million to a hotel in New York City" to house migrants in the country illegally. The figure is the amount for a federal grant awarded to the city in the 2024 fiscal year, not the amount paid to one hotel. He cited $45 million for diversity, equity and inclusion scholarships in Burma, using the former name for Myanmar. That was a 2024 initiative the US Agency for International Development started after the 2021 military coup in the Southeast Asian country. The scholarships funded Burmese students studying at universities in the Philippines and online at the University of Arizona. Although the total award was $45 million over five years, about $17 million had been obligated when DOGE cancelled the program. Trump also mentioned "$42 million for social and behavioural change in Uganda," likely referring to a $38 million contract awarded to Johns Hopkins University in 2020 to improve health outcomes in the country. Behaviors listed in the award included the correct use of mosquito nets and medicines to treat HIV infections. When DOGE canceLled the contract in March, most of the money, about $36 million, had already been spent. The "$40 million for social and economic inclusion of sedentary migrants" Trump noted referred to a contract to help Venezuelans who migrated to Colombia. He again overstated the link between a $1.9 billion environmental grant and Stacey Abrams, the former Democratic candidate for governor in Georgia. A coalition of five groups received the grant, funded by the Inflation Reduction Act, to decarbonize houses in low-income neighbourhoods. Abrams served for one year as a senior adviser to one of the groups and did not lead the organization. Trump also again cited "$20 million for Arab Sesame Street in the Middle East," adding wrongly that "nobody knows what that's all about." The award to Sesame Workshop was not to create a program, but to tailor an existing children's show called "Ahlan Simsim" for local audiences, as well as to establish educational material for training and use in child care centres. Thousands of Iraqi children viewed the programming and participated in the training. And he again described a body of research grants as "$8 million for making mice transgender." In March, the White House published a list of about $8.3 million in research grants that aimed to study the efficacy of different medications on transgender people through experiments with mice receiving different hormones. None of the studies specifically sought to "make mice transgender." What was said "So, I think the judge just ruled against New York Times for their lies about the Russiagate hoax, and that they might have to give back that Pulitzer Prize." -- Musk False. Musk dismissed new reporting by the Times on his drug use and tumultuous personal life by incorrectly describing a legal proceeding and the circumstances of a lawsuit. The court in question did not, as Musk suggested, rule that the Times "lied" in its reporting about Russia. The Times is not a litigant in the lawsuit. In 2021, Trump demanded that the board that awards the Pulitzer Prizes revoke its awards to the Times and The Washington Post for their coverage of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election. When the board refused, Trump sued it for defamation. In 2024, a state judge in Florida rejected the board's move to dismiss the lawsuit. The board later tried to pause proceedings, arguing that because Trump was the president, the lawsuit could prompt a constitutional conflict. But a state court ruled this week that the lawsuit could proceed. What was said "It's an unbelievable bill. It cuts your deficits." -- Trump False. The Congressional Budget Office and a number of independent analysts have estimated that the Republican domestic policy bill, passed by the House this month, would balloon federal deficits by more than $1 trillion, even when economic growth is factored in. The CBO estimated an increase in the deficit of $3.8 trillion; the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget estimated $3.1 trillion, including interest; the Penn Wharton Budget Model estimated $2.8 trillion; and the Tax Foundation estimated $1.7 trillion when factoring in economic growth. "Quite the opposite, this would be an incredibly large deficit increaser, adding $3 trillion to our nation's borrowing and $5 trillion if the expiring policies are extended," said Maya MacGuineas, the president of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.
See - Sada Elbalad
2 days ago
- Business
- See - Sada Elbalad
Luxor Governor Receives US Senator Tim Sheehy to Discuss Strengthening Cooperation
Taarek Refaat Abdel Motaleb Amara, Governor of Luxor received Senator Tim Sheehy, a member of the US Congress, as part of his visit to Egypt and the accompanying high-level delegation. The meeting witnessed an open dialogue between the two sides, addressing ways to strengthen bilateral relations between the two countries. The Senator began his speech by expressing his happiness at being in Luxor for the second time after 22 years. He expressed his admiration for the positive changes taking place in the city and his amazement at ancient Egyptian civilization, emphasizing that Egypt is a country with a rich civilization dating back thousands of years. Sheehy added that Egypt is an important and ally in the Middle East region, and that it has a promising economic future over the next five years. He expressed his hope for strengthening American partnerships in Egypt and praised the country's ongoing comprehensive development efforts, particularly in infrastructure modernization and the renewable energy sector. On his part, the Governor of Luxor welcomed the US Senator and explained the governorate's economy, which is based on the cultural tourism sector, followed by agriculture and industry. He emphasized that tourist bookings have increased this year compared to last year, and that the booking rate for the upcoming tourist season is very promising and exceeds previous years, despite global events. The governor added that despite the hot June weather approaching, the continued growth of tourism in Luxor has not been affected. He attributed this to the stability and security Egypt enjoys thanks to the wisdom of President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi, who assumed the presidency 10 years ago. He also praised US support for the country. The US Ambassador to Cairo attended the inauguration of the new drinking water station in the village of El-Hanady, east of Esna, south of Luxor. This station will serve approximately 10 villages by 2024. The station was funded by the US Agency for International Development. At the end of the meeting, the US Senator wished Egypt continued prosperity and promised to visit Luxor again with his family. read more CBE: Deposits in Local Currency Hit EGP 5.25 Trillion Morocco Plans to Spend $1 Billion to Mitigate Drought Effect Gov't Approves Final Version of State Ownership Policy Document Egypt's Economy Expected to Grow 5% by the end of 2022/23- Minister Qatar Agrees to Supply Germany with LNG for 15 Years Business Oil Prices Descend amid Anticipation of Additional US Strategic Petroleum Reserves Business Suez Canal Records $704 Million, Historically Highest Monthly Revenue Business Egypt's Stock Exchange Earns EGP 4.9 Billion on Tuesday Business Wheat delivery season commences on April 15 News Ayat Khaddoura's Final Video Captures Bombardment of Beit Lahia News Australia Fines Telegram $600,000 Over Terrorism, Child Abuse Content Arts & Culture Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban's $4.7M LA Home Burglarized Sports Former Al Zamalek Player Ibrahim Shika Passes away after Long Battle with Cancer Sports Neymar Announced for Brazil's Preliminary List for 2026 FIFA World Cup Qualifiers News Prime Minister Moustafa Madbouly Inaugurates Two Indian Companies Arts & Culture New Archaeological Discovery from 26th Dynasty Uncovered in Karnak Temple Business Fear & Greed Index Plummets to Lowest Level Ever Recorded amid Global Trade War Arts & Culture Zahi Hawass: Claims of Columns Beneath the Pyramid of Khafre Are Lies News Flights suspended at Port Sudan Airport after Drone Attacks
The Herald Scotland
2 days ago
- Business
- The Herald Scotland
Trump gives Elon Musk an Oval Office send-off
Mr Trump credited Mr Musk with 'a colossal change in the old ways of doing business in Washington' and said some of his staff would remain in the administration. Mr Musk, who wore all black including a T-shirt that said 'The Dogefather', nodded along as the president listed contracts that had been cut under his watch. Elon Musk speaks during a news conference (Evan Vucci/AP) 'I think the Doge team is doing an incredible job,' Mr Musk said after accepting a ceremonial key from the president. 'They're going to continue to be doing an incredible job.' He left a searing mark on the federal bureaucracy, including thousands of employees who were fired or pushed out. Some government functions were eviscerated, such as the US Agency for International Development, which had provided a lifeline for impoverished people around the world. Boston University researchers estimate that hundreds of thousands of people have already died as a result of the USAID cuts. Despite the upheaval, Mr Musk also fell far short of his goals. After promising to cut one trillion or even two trillion dollars in federal spending, he lowered expectations to only 150 billion dollars in the current fiscal year. It is unclear whether that target has been hit. The Doge website tallies 175 billion dollars in savings, but its information has been riddled with errors and embellishments. Mr Trump said Mr Musk had led the 'most sweeping and consequential government reform effort in generations'. He suggested that Mr Musk is 'really not leaving' and 'he's going to be back and forth' to keep tabs on what is happening in the administration. Mr Musk, the world's richest person, recently said he would reduce his political donations. He was Mr Trump's top donor in last year's presidential campaign. Mr Trump appeared eager to end Mr Musk's service on a high note. 'This will be his last day, but not really, because he will, always, be with us, helping all the way,' Mr Trump wrote on social media on Thursday evening. 'Elon is terrific!' As a special government employee, Mr Musk's position was designed to be temporary. However, he had speculated about staying 'indefinitely', working part time for the administration, if Mr Trump still wanted his help. Mr Musk has brushed off questions about how Doge would continue without him, even suggesting it could 'gain momentum' in the future. 'Doge is a way of life,' he told reporters recently. 'Like Buddhism.'
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Commentary: Trump set Musk up for failure
There were times when even President Trump seemed surprised how fervent Elon Musk was about heading a government efficiency commission and slashing the size of the federal bureaucracy. He's a 'real patriot,' Trump said on March 9. 'This is something that's really not good for him, and yet he's doing it. He's opened a lot of eyes." Those were the glory days of DOGE, the volunteer commission that essentially shuttered the US Agency for International Development and put thousands of workers at other federal agencies out of work. For a couple of months, bureaucrats and their agency bosses feared and loathed Musk, whose chainsaw motif reflected not just the speed of his actions but also the brutality. Yet the bureaucracy is winning, still. Musk is leaving DOGE to return to Tesla (TSLA), SpaceX ( and his other companies, his hubris punctured and his visions of a lean government evaporating. Musk has criticized the big Republican bill in Congress that was supposed to formalize hundreds of billions of dollars in DOGE cuts, but will do no such thing — instead adding a few trillion dollars to the national debt. The chainsaw bravado is gone, with Musk now saying with what sounds like regret that he got too deeply involved in politics. A lot of people saw a Musk-Trump breakup coming, in part because both men have giant egos and are used to being in charge. But the Musk flameout also highlights Trump's habit of delegating thankless tasks to others and then stepping out of the way when the inevitable reckoning comes. Trump was happy to let Musk attack the bureaucracy, which fit with Trump's own conspiracy theory of a 'deep state' that ought to be dismantled. But Trump was never going to do the heavy lifting required to wrangle the legislation that would be necessary to downsize the government for real. Former Republican House Speaker Kevin McCarthy said recently that Trump has two guiding policy principles: Tariffs are good, and drug prices are too high. You could probably add to that Trump's innate preference for deregulation and low taxes. Bureaucratic reform has never been something Trump particularly cared about. The same with debt and deficits. The DOGE commission wasn't even Trump's idea. It was Musk's. So Trump let Musk run his own pet project without any serious pledge to do what it would take to see the work through. As many budget experts have repeatedly pointed out, an advisory commission such as DOGE has no legal authority to cut federal spending, close federal agencies, or cancel federal contracts. DOGE can make some recommendations that the president or appointed officials have the authority to carry out. But most spending or spending cuts require congressional legislation. So do most moves to create or eliminate government means Trump would have had to back the DOGE cuts and other actions by presenting Congress with legislation to legally enact them. That has been conspicuously missing from Trump's agenda. The budget and tax-cut bill the House of Representatives recently passed contained just $9.3 billion in cuts to agencies DOGE has targeted. Musk's original goal was $2 trillion in annual savings, downsized several times to the range of $500 billion. DOGE currently claims $175 billion in savings. But the House bill would formalize barely 5% of that. Those paltry cuts might not even pass the Senate, where there's considerable, if unspoken, discomfort with the DOGE cuts, especially USAID. "DOGE has been more bark than bite," budget analyst Jessica Riedl of the Manhattan Institute recently told Yahoo Finance. 'The actual [savings] figure is likely well short of $10 billion." The reality of politics has revealed DOGE to be what many of its critics claim: a sham cost-cutting effort that leaves the worst aspects of the federal budgeting process unmolested. Every member of Congress claims jurisdiction over some little agency in the executive branch, and they're not keen to have a vigilante like Musk swoop in to mess with their pet projects. Republicans included. The Trump budget and tax bill will make some modest cuts, but impose nothing like the fiscal discipline Musk seeks. Unfinanced tax cuts will likely add $3 trillion to $4 trillion to the national debt, at a time when markets are beginning to groan under unprecedented levels of American debt. This, Musk says, left him 'disappointed.' That's a diplomatic way of saying Trump duped him. Nobody, obviously, should feel sorry for Musk. Tesla shareholders have been begging the multibillionaire CEO to pay more attention to the business as sales flagged, the competition got better, and Musk's partisan involvement with the combative Trump began to turn car buyers worldwide against the brand. At their low point in March, Tesla shares were down 48% from the time Musk started working with Trump in January. That has since recovered to a smaller loss of 16%. Musk could have done more diligent homework and realized the difficulty of reforming the federal bureaucracy in a short period of time. There have been many efforts to do so, with modest success at best. The huge federal bureaucracy is especially resistant to the kind of emergency surgery Musk and others have managed to perform at privately owned companies where they operate as sole decision-makers. The government, by contrast, is known for having a "board of directors" with 535 members. Musk, to his credit, succeeds where other people fail. He built an electric car company after General Motors and others supposedly proved it couldn't be done. His rocket company, SpaceX, is pushing space travel forward by developing reusable rockets that sharply lower costs. So Musk may have figured he'd do better than all the other crusaders who thought they'd fix an unwieldy government. He won't do better. Musk says the spirit of DOGE will live on in the Trump administration because 'DOGE is a way of life.' Hardly anybody else seems to think so. Other top people Musk brought to DOGE seem to be leaving along with him, hardly surprising given that DOGE was Musk's baby, driven by Musk's own peculiar penchant for 'ultra hardcore' work habits. Musk does concede that whether DOGE continues its work is 'up to the president.' That answers the question. Trump only wanted DOGE as long as Musk was willing to be the pain sponge. Musk got tired of that, and if Musk can't do it, nobody can. Thank goodness. Rick Newman is a senior columnist for Yahoo Finance. Follow him on Bluesky and X: @rickjnewman. Click here for political news related to business and money policies that will shape tomorrow's stock prices. Sign in to access your portfolio
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Korea Herald
4 days ago
- Business
- Korea Herald
[Jeffrey Frankel] Foreign aid, now missed
'Don't it always seem to go, that you don't know what you've got 'til it's gone.' When Joni Mitchell sang that line in 1970, she was lamenting the destruction of the environment, but the sentiment applies to many issues. Today, we can add official development assistance to the list. For some 80 years, the United States spent more on humanitarian assistance, economic development programs and other types of foreign aid than any other government. In the 2023 fiscal year, the US government disbursed $72 billion, with much more coming from private NGOs and individual citizens. But the US does not spend the most as a share of its income: by that measure, the US contributes just 0.24 percent — a quarter of what northern European countries give — putting it in 24th place globally. Moreover, foreign aid accounts for just 1 percent of total US government spending — a far cry from the 25 percent many Americans believe the US allocates. Many Americans, including some prominent scholars, believe that foreign aid has a negligible impact, with some, such as Dambisa Moyo and William Easterly, arguing that it does more harm than good. Critics highlight examples of misguided aid programs falling prey to mismanagement, government overreach, or corruption, including Vietnam in the 1960s, Zaire in the 1980s and Afghanistan in the 2000s. While some economists, such as Paul Collier, insist that foreign aid is useful — especially when certain conditions are met — the dominant message seems to be that foreign aid is suspect. But now foreign aid is gone, or at least going fast. Soon after US President Donald Trump returned to the White House, his administration — and, in particular, his unelected billionaire crony Elon Musk — began frantically dismantling the US Agency for International Development. Almost immediately, reports began flooding in: what was being defunded were often life-saving, high-return projects. Since George W. Bush launched the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief in 2003, the program has saved millions of lives from HIV and AIDS, especially in Africa. The President's Malaria Initiative has prevented two billion cases of malaria over the last 20 years, and halved the mortality rate. Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, which receives US government support, has vaccinated more than a billion children against measles, diphtheria, tetanus, whooping cough and other potentially fatal diseases, preventing an estimated 19 million deaths. Polio has been eliminated in all but two countries, and smallpox has been eliminated everywhere. These efforts have contributed to a steep decline in child mortality globally: today, 4 percent of children die before their fifth birthday, compared to 40 percent a century ago. Foreign aid also enabled the development and diffusion of improved crop varieties, as well as synthetic fertilizers, new pesticides and modern irrigation, in the second half of the twentieth century. This so-called Green Revolution in agriculture doubled cereal crop yields in Asia; enabled many countries, such as India, to become self-sufficient in food; and raised incomes in many developing economies. This contributed to a reduction in infant mortality by 2-5 percentage points, from a baseline of 18 percent, in the developing world. The US Marshall Plan achieved spectacular success in helping European economies recover from World War II, and in laying the groundwork for 80 years of relative global peace and prosperity. More recently, foreign aid has played a pivotal role in enabling Ukraine to withstand the worst attack on a European country's sovereign territory in the postwar era. The US reaps massive benefits from the aid it provides. One need only recall the COVID-19 pandemic to see that participation in global health initiatives is not pure charity, especially when it comes to infectious diseases like Ebola, HIV/AIDS and Tuberculosis. More fundamentally, international assistance has been a pillar of US soft power. And that soft power has been at least as important as military might in sustaining US global leadership since the Cold War. But now the Trump administration is assiduously undermining it — to China's benefit, no doubt. The effect of foreign aid on economic growth is difficult to quantify because so many other causal factors are involved. Moreover, much of US aid is designed to advance political or military objectives. The top recipients of US foreign aid, after Ukraine, are Israel, Jordan and Egypt. Nonetheless, we know that reduced morbidity and mortality, and improved nutrition, can boost an economy's performance. It thus stands to reason that foreign aid is a contributor to development, even if not the most important one. The US undoubtedly benefits from having more developed, higher-performing trading and commercial partners. Why, then, has the pessimistic view of foreign aid dominated public discourse for so long? One explanation is that the pessimistic view of everything has prevailed for years. A 2018 survey showed that a substantial majority of people in rich countries believed that the child mortality rate in poor countries had either risen or stayed the same over the previous 20 years; in fact, child mortality had been halved. And a whopping 80 percent of people in rich countries believed that the share of people in extreme poverty had either plateaued or risen, even though it fell steeply from 1990 to 2013. If people are so wrong about these trends, how can they possibly know about the role foreign aid played in driving them? Of course, foreign aid has its flaws and limitations, including instances of inefficiency, mismanagement, or unintended side effects. But whatever the limitations of foreign aid in the past, it is clear that Trump's destructive approach is making things far worse. Jeffrey Frankel is a professor of capital formation and growth at Harvard University. The views expressed here are the writer's own. — Ed.
