I Hope That Hurricane Melissa Isn’t Jamaica’s Katrina:
Hurricane Melissa was on track to make a direct hit on Jamaica on Tuesday, as the nation’s prime minister warned that no country in the Caribbean could withstand a storm this powerful.
The Category 5 storm — the strongest in the Atlantic Ocean this year — is threatening catastrophic damage with 175 m.p.h. winds and enough moisture to drop nearly three feet of rain. The National Hurricane Center said later on Monday that the winds in Melissa’s eyewall are so strong that they could cause “total structural failure,” and widespread power and communication outages. Some parts of Jamaica were already cut off by Monday afternoon.
Oh, man…
Amazon To Cut 30,000 Employees. Thanks to AI, they’re considered superfluous:
SAN FRANCISCO, Oct 27 (Reuters) – Amazon (AMZN.O) is planning to cut as many as 30,000 corporate jobs beginning on Tuesday, as the company pares expenses and compensates for overhiring during the peak demand of the pandemic, according to three people familiar with the matter.
The figure represents a small percentage of Amazon’s 1.55 million total employees, but nearly 10% of its roughly 350,000 corporate employees. This would mark Amazon’s largest job cut since late 2022, when it started to eliminate around 27,000 positions.
Amazon CEO Andy Jassy is undertaking an initiative to reduce what he has described as an excess of bureaucracy, including by reducing the number of managers. He installed an anonymous complaint line for identifying inefficiencies that has elicited some 1,500 responses and over 450 process changes, he said earlier this year.
Jassy said in June that the increased use of artificial intelligence tools would likely lead to further job cuts, particularly through automating repetitive and routine tasks.
“This latest move signals that Amazon is likely realizing enough AI-driven productivity gains within corporate teams to support a substantial reduction in force,” said Sky Canaves, an eMarketer analyst. “Amazon has also been under pressure in the short-term to offset the long-term investments in building out its AI infrastructure.”
US Debt Set To Skyrocket Due To ‘Big Beautiful Bill’:
Donald Trump is on course to push US debt levels above those of Italy and Greece by the end of the decade after wide-ranging tax cuts and increased defence spending, according to International Monetary Fund (IMF) forecasts.
Illustrating the rising debt levels in Washington and efforts made by Rome and Athens to bring spending under control after the 2008 financial crash and Covid-19 pandemic, the IMF predicts the US will see its debts climb from 125% to 143% of annual income by 2030, while Italy’s will flatline at about 137%.
Amid tax cuts for high earners, the US is expected to run annual budget deficits of more than 7% over the next five years, while Italy is due to cut its spending shortfall this year to 2.9%, allowing it to meet a 3% limit set by Brussels a year early, in analysis first reported in the Financial Times.
Trump increased US government spending and cut federal taxes in the “big, beautiful bill”, passed by Congress in the summer, forcing the White House to rely more heavily on borrowing to fund annual spending.
The US president reversed efforts under the previous Biden administration to limit the size of the US deficit, offering tax cuts that will benefit mostly middle and high income groups. He has also pledged to build a “golden dome” defence shield, which could cost almost $1tn.
Spending increases could push the budget deficit higher by $7tn a year by the time Trump is due to leave office in January 2029.
Guess who’ll have to clean up after the elephants?
Hope For Improvement Along The Route 9 Corridor:
Stretching from Rogers Road to Memorial Drive, the Route 9 corridor near New Castle is home to roughly 16,500 residents spread across a dozen neighborhoods that line both the east and west sides of the highway. On any given day, a large number of tractor-trailers, many heading to or from the Port of Wilmington, rumble past modest homes, churches, corner stores and clusters of children waiting for school buses near the edge of the road.
The corridor has long been described as a place full of pride and history — a haven for Black families displaced from Wilmington in the 1960s who sought stability, first homes and opportunity. Yet, decades of industrial zoning, flooding and disinvestment have left visible scars.
For more than a decade, the Route 9 Community Development Corporation, once known as the New Castle Prevention Coalition, has been working to improve the quality of life across 12 neighborhoods along the corridor.
This year, the CDC sought to gather more detailed information about the corridor’s challenges and opportunities. Partnering with the University of Delaware’s Coastal Resilience Design Studio, they released a 147-slide report titled “Neighborhoods of Nice Green Connections Framework.”
The report identified several key areas for focus — including the Rosegate community, Tri-Parks, Simons Garden Park, the Rose Hill Community Center, the Route 9 Library parcel and Holloway Terrace Park — where environmental challenges, flooding and disconnection were most severe.
The research explored the corridor through four key lenses — transportation, land cover and vegetation, flooding and storm water, and community character — highlighting how decades of underinvestment and industrial development have shaped life along Route 9.
We’ve now got plans, it’s long past time for action. C’mon, Governor, make this the kind of priority that never would have entered John Carney’s green eyeshade of a brain.
FOIA-Exempt Board Bribes Corteva To Stay In Delaware. With taxpayer money. I thought Matt Meyer was gonna put a stop to this:
A state board approved a $1 million grant in taxpayer funds on Monday to retain about 200 high-paying administrative positions for Corteva AgriScience, a spin-off company from the former DowDuPont merger.
The decision over spending public funds to keep jobs that were likely to cover the assistance comes amid heightened scrutiny and concern over revenue in the state. Last week, Delaware’s independent financial advisers predicted that the state could see a reduction of $150 million in next year’s budget due primarily to drops in corporate income taxes on the back of federal tax reforms.
Corteva’s lease at the DuPont Chestnut Run campus west of Wilmington was set to expire at the end of the year, and the company had been exploring options for a new office when it settled on the Brandywine Building, a high-rise office building in downtown Wilmington owned by Buccini/Pollin Group.
Corteva, whose employees live around the region, had also reportedly been exploring office options in the Philadelphia suburbs. (As in, we’d hate to leave Delaware, but, you know…)
The company will move all 205 employees to two floors in the Brandywine Building by early next year, spending about $4.3 million to lease and outfit the space. It has reportedly signed a 10-year lease with BPG.
Read the entire article. Corteva is hardly a corporate powerhouse that Delaware cannot afford to do without. Just more sickening Delaware Way business as usual. Paid for by you.
What do you want to talk about?