| | | | | | | Presented By Amazon | | | | Axios AM | | By Mike Allen ·Sep 13, 2021 | | Good Monday morning. Smart Brevity™ count: 1,121 words ... 4 minutes. Edited by Zachary Basu. 💻 Please join Axios' Courtenay Brown and Hope King tomorrow at 12:30 p.m. ET for a virtual event on the economic recovery of Black-owned businesses. Guests include Congressional Black Caucus Chair Joyce Beatty, and president and CEO of the U.S. Black Chambers Ron Busby. Sign up here. | | | | | | 1 big thing: China's rush to vax the world |  | | | Illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios | | | | The U.S. and its drug companies likely won't get the poor, unvaccinated parts of the world out of the pandemic — but China might, Axios' Bob Herman reports. - China has ramped up exports of its Sinopharm, Sinovac and CanSino vaccines, which can be stored at normal refrigerator temperatures, leading some to believe China will be the global savior.
Incredible stat: Nine months after the global COVID vaccination campaign began, 58% of the world's population has yet to receive even one dose. State of play: Wealthier nations have more vaccines than citizens who want them, while poorer countries are facing bleaker timelines for when they can administer first doses. - The U.S. and other Western countries could vaccinate teenagers and provide boosters to everyone, and still have 1.2 billion doses to send elsewhere this year, according to a report from analytics firm Airfinity.
- The global COVAX consortium now anticipates receiving 25% fewer doses than expected due to production problems with the vaccines made by Johnson & Johnson, AstraZeneca and Novavax, as well as export restrictions from a major supplier in India.
Between the lines: Vaccines by Moderna and Pfizer/BioNTech have proven to be life-saving and reliably produced. But the companies choose to sell mostly to high-income countries, where they make more money. - Moderna expects to make up to 1 billion doses by year's end. But hardly any of the doses are going to Africa, Asia and the Middle East.
Pfizer told Axios the company could deliver as many as 3 billion doses by the end of 2021, with 1 billion going to low- and middle-income countries. Reality check: Scaling up vaccine production was understandably slow at first. - Creating the mRNA vaccines is complex, with several steps that require materials like small plastic tubes, lipids and molecules called "caps" that were in limited supply and had very few vendors.
Share this story. |     | | | | | | 2. Dems' tax-hike menu |  | | | Illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios | | | | House Democrats are considering $2.9 trillion in tax hikes for the next 10 years — mostly on the extremely wealthy and corporate America — as they scramble to pay for President Biden's $3.5 trillion infrastructure and social-spending plan, Axios' Hans Nichols and Jonathan Swan report. - Why it matters: A draft proposal from the Ways and Means Committee previews epic fall fights between Democrats and some of the best-armed lobbies in America.
The summary, first reported by The Washington Post, includes a top personal rate of 39.6%, up from 37%, which would raise $170 billion over 10 years. - The top capital gains rate would increase to 25% from 20% — raising some $123 billion.
- Changes to what qualifies as investment income, some of which is already subject to 3.8% Obamacare tax, would make the effective capital gains rate 28.3%, raising $252 billion.
- Accelerating the end of the $24 million estate tax exemption would bring in another $50 billion.
- Imposing an additional 3% tax on Americans who make more than $5 million would raise $127 billion.
- Expanded restrictions on "carried interest," impacting how private equity firms compensate employees, could bring in another $14 billion.
- The pharmaceutical industry could be forced to foot $700 billion of new spending by negotiating rates directly with Medicare.
Share this story. | | | | | | | | 3.🍴 Restaurants scale back indoor dining | | Spotted on the Upper West Side. Photo: Timothy A. Clary/AFP via Getty Images Some restaurants are re-closing their dining rooms because of Delta fears, The Wall Street Journal's Heather Haddon reports (subscription): - "Sales that had steadily grown earlier in the summer have fallen in the past five weeks."
- McDonald's and Chick-fil-A are slowing dining-room re-openings, and stocks of casual-dining chains are sagging.
📉 It's a close-to-home aspect of wider fears about the economy. A front-page Financial Times story today is headlined, "Business sentiment darkens as Delta surge tilts forecasts lower" (subscription): - "Revenues have fallen at a quarter of US small businesses in each of the past three weeks while just 8 per cent saw revenue growth, according to an Economic Innovation Group study."
| | | | | | | | A message from Amazon | | Wednesday is Amazon Career Day 2021 | | |  | | | | This Career Day, Amazon is hiring for: - Over 40,000 corporate and tech roles across 220+ U.S. locations.
- Tens of thousands of hourly positions within the company's operations network.
The takeaway: Amazon Career Day is open to all, regardless of experience or professional background. | | | | | | 4. Pic du jour | | Photo: Siegfried Modola/Getty Images In Paris, workers wrap the Arc De Triomphe in 25,000 square meters of silver-blue fabric — an art project that will be on view until Oct. 3 - "L' Arc de Triomphe, Wrapped" posthumously fulfills a 60-year dream by the artist Christo, who died last year. (The Guardian)
| | | | | | | | 5. How social media makes us mad |  | | | Illustration: Shoshana Gordon/Axios | | | | Social media companies didn't cause America's massive political divide, but they've widened it and pushed it towards violence, Axios' Margaret Harding McGill writes from an NYU report out today. - Why it matters: Congress, the Biden administration and governments around the world are moving on from blame-apportioning to choosing penalties and remedies for online platforms.
Paul Barrett, deputy director of NYU's Stern Center for Business and Human Rights, said: "Social media is the mechanism for spreading the kind of mis- and disinformation that fuels ... political polarization." - The report recommends that platforms hide "like" and share counts to stop rewarding polarizing content.
Share this story. | | | | | | | | 6. 📚 Michael Wolff: Stalk of the town | | Michael Wolff — author of a No. 1 seller about Donald Trump, "Fire and Fury" — steps onstage in Philly in 2018. Photo: Jessica Kourkounis/Getty Images New York Times media columnist Ben Smith takes on Michael Wolff, who thinks beat reporters miss the bigger story with their "bill of particulars" approach. - Ben writes that Wolff, 68, who styles himself a writer rather than a reporter, specializes in "big, bad men ... louche power players."
- "The litany is astounding," Ben writes, adding his own bill of particulars: Roger Ailes, Harvey Weinstein, Boris Johnson, Steve Bannon, Donald Trump.
- All appear in a Wolff book out Oct. 19, "Too Famous: The Rich, the Powerful, the Wishful, the Notorious, the Damned."
The column, "Why Our Monsters Talk to Michael Wolff," opens with Steve Bannon media-training Jeffrey Epstein. (You read that right.) - "[Y]ou don't look at all creepy," the Trump alumnus assures the pedophile.
- Ben says the transcripts show Epstein appears to believe he's doing practice interviews. Bannon tells Ben they were actually for a "previously unannounced eight- to 10-hour documentary."
Keep reading (subscription). | | | | | | | | 7. 🧠 The algorithm knows | | From my push alerts this morning: | | | | | | | | 8. 🏈 Tailgate America, 2021 |  | | | Fans during Buffalo Bills vs. Pittsburgh Steelers in Orchard Park, N.Y., yesterday. Photo: Adrian Kraus/AP | | | | Tailgating, face-painted fans returned around the country as the NFL opened at full capacity for the first time since the pandemic, AP reports. - The Seattle Seahawks, Las Vegas Raiders and New Orleans Saints are the only teams requiring fans to provide proof of vaccination to enter.
- 15 teams were set to host a total of more than 1 million in Week 1.
In Buffalo, the private lots around the stadium were already filling up by 8 a.m. for a 1 p.m. kickoff. - Patriots linebackers coach Steve Belichick, the head coach's son, said: "Last year, it felt like a Massachusetts high school football game."
| | | | | | | | A message from Amazon | | LinkedIn named Amazon No. 1 company where Americans want to work | | |  | | | | LinkedIn recognizes Amazon as the most desirable workplace in the U.S. for 2021 based on the company's ability to attract, develop and retain talent. Next steps: On September 15th, Amazon will host Career Day 2021, where the company will be hiring for more than 40,000 corporate and tech roles. | | | | 📬 Invite your friends to sign up for Axios AM and Axios PM. |  | | It'll help you deliver employee communications more effectively. | | | |
No comments:
Post a Comment