Goons Raid PWC Offices in Moscow
Attempt to influence trial seen
By blackhedd Posted in Breaking News — Comments (5) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
I was shocked to see this story breaking this morning. Russian government investigators apparently raided the Moscow offices of PriceWaterhouseCoopers, the international audit firm, threw around some furniture, and questioned PWC's Moscow chief. Apparently, PWC is being accused of covering up massive tax evasion by audit client Yukos, the private oil and gas company that the Kremlin wants to take over. There's a big trial date tomorrow in the tax-evasion case against Yukos and its deposed and expropriated former CEO, Mikhail Khodorkovsky.
It's possible the Russians are trying to strong-arm Yukos' auditors into testifying against their clients. Dirty, dirty, dirty. More proof the Russians are seeing their bread buttered on a side other than the one relating to free enterprise and open foreign investment.
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The travails of Yukos have been going on for several years now. (A smattering of divergent views here and here.)
I hold no brief for Khodorkovsky, one of post-Soviet Russia's original robber-oligarchs. But I simply don't buy that the behavior of the Putin government is an on-the-level attempt to enforce law and order, shareholder rights, and all that good stuff.
It's hard to escape the suspicion that the Kremlin is looking to exert decisive control over Russia's oil and gas resources, which are all that this demographically doomed country has left.
When the Yukos saga started up a few years ago, it had an immediate chilling effect on foreign investment in Russia. Obviously enough, since all of a sudden no one knew if they could count on Russia's government to follow the rules. Investors don't like uncertainty. (They like risk just fine. Risk is something you can quantify and hedge. Uncertainty, you can't.)
The Russians are telling the world yet again that they have other ideas in mind than becoming open to international development. It's a sinister signal for them to be sending.
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Goons Raid PWC Offices in Moscow 5 Comments (0 topical, 5 editorial, 0 hidden) Post a comment »
I knew that this will be the result of the so-called reforms in Russia even 15 years ago. When the blatant and wide spread corruption and fraud surpassed the shady deals of communists in prior years.
sl
Why is this country demographically doomed, but China is a long-term danger?
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We are all heroes, you and Boo and I. Hamsters and rangers everywhere, rejoice!
Life expectancy among men is now below 60 years. They're at around 150 million people. I can't cite official figures (and I probably wouldn't believe them if you cited any) but I hear stories about rampant prostitution, which is a very bad demographic indicator, alcoholism and drug use, and multi-drug resistant TB. Not a place you want to be raising a family.
And having a government that has become an unfriendly investment partner means no development capital for Russia. But China is taking in an ungodly amount of direct investment, about $75 billion a year last time I checked.
China is just on the upswing in every measure except marriages among young men. I'm not enough of an expert to answer you on the issue of demographics in China, but I'm loath to bet against them.
On semantics: I don't rate China as a danger, and I think it's dangerous to think of them as such. They are a challenge and an opportunity. I think we can meet them, but not if we consider them to be unbeatable ten-foot-tall monsters. Unlike the former USSR and the Islamofascists, China is a competitive threat, not an existential one.
Worst case, if a demographic bomb goes off in China, then they may destabilize and we'll be facing some real dangers. But shouldn't that be happening right about now, Thomas? The one-child policy was enforced from maybe 1980 till about the mid-90s, no? So the first unmarriageable boys should be hitting troublemaking age right about now.
What's the average duration of a dynastic turn in China? The current regime has been in power for a bit less than 30 years, give or take. Mao (I can't say his name without wanting to curse) lasted 30 years if you count from when the Kuomintang stopped fighing, in 1946 or so.
And while we're comparing countries: I think India, which many people think is a rising superpower, is way overrated.
But Russia has always had a precarious population balance, alcoholism and other afflictions. You might have heard of the old Soviet "Hero Mother" program that rewarded mothers to large families. The current government is not to be trusted by big business but there are plenty of good small business opportunities and a rich pool of educated labor.
I see China the same way, and they're really not evangelistic about spreading communism worldwide. Most of their strategic thinking puts their own needs first, and our own energy policy needs to realize that Chinese (and Indian) energy demand will only rise.
I think you're right about India, too. They have millions of very skilled workers in the cities but also a much larger number of rural people who are pretty much useless as a labor force, and in a country where there are as many dialects as towns, full integration of Indian society remains many years away.
Without God, there can't be goodness of heart, and without goodness of heart, democracy and freedom don't last. That's the missing piece.