It doesn't work like that. I can't buy from a store in my neighborhood just because they're in my neighborhood. It's good to support local business, I agree but the recession is affecting everybody. If there's an online store that gives me a better offer I'll take it.

I'm a digital marketer and I've helped stores in neighborhood create online presence. I educate them on the advantages of taking their business online. I see this as my own way of helping businesses in my neighborhood. Some actually want to put their business online but don't know how to while some just don't want to (for various reasons). I will be doing more educating this year too and I think that's what we should do. It's a digital world and if you want to stay alive as a business you have to move with the current.

Recession will still hurt but I certainly believe the internet will help. People in countries like America that have a strong labour market are already looking for more jobs. This will help. It is easier to have side hustles with the help of the internet these days. So people can have 2-4 jobs that won't be as stressful as it used to because it can be a remote job. Even if it's not a remote job, it's easier to find jobs online.

When the big economies suffer, economies in Africa suffer the most. This is because they are so reliant on the big economies. The import almost everything from them, so every negative that affects those big economies also affects them and that's a problem.

As much as I am all in on paying taxes, a 30% tax on crypto is inconsiderate. I made a topic recently about the government making favorable policies. This is not favorable at all, at least not to exchanges, traders, and investors. This just seems like a move to discourage people from using crypto. taxes can be imposed on crypto but they should be reasonable.

I can't blame people for finding alternatives in these situations. It's tax avoidance, which is not illegal. They've not done anything wrong by using foreign exchanges. It becomes illegal when its tax evasion.

According to a report in 2019, half of the employers in the US have a non-compete agreement, so a lot of industries would be affected by this. From an employee's point of view, it's unfair and even from a neutral perspective, it's unfair. One of the reasons for a non-compete is that employees don't use the knowledge gotten to start a business and compete with the employer. It doesn't make sense. This is just a way to keep people from going higher.


I'm really excited about this too. I am starting up a digital marketing agency right now and I read somewhere that one way to have a successful agency is to work for a digital marketing agency for a while first and gain some knowledge first (I don't totally agree though). Now imagine I work for an agency that I would have to sign a non-compete. It would only complicate things for me.

It would have been better if they were not colonized at all. The pre-colonial African states were doing way better before the Europeans took over the continent. Western history has painted pre-colonial Africa as savages who needed saving. They had their own economic, political and social structure and it worked. They had very rich cities that were trade centers. The Europeans ruined that. Don't get me wrong, I'm not one of those that blame the underdevelopment in Africa on Europe (not like they don't play their part in it) but I believe Africa would be better than it is today if the Europeans never colonized it. The Europeans never went to Africa to save it, they went there to exploit it, and oh boy, they did not disappoint.  

Some of these companies purposely make their terms and conditions so long so that it will be too much for people to read.
They also put these terms and conditions in ways that people that read them don't understand.
In the past, I don't read the terms and conditions of a site or app until a couple of years ago. Now I take my time to read it from beginning to end. I learned my lesson the hard way in the first place I worked immediately after college and I vowed it would never happen again.

These are instances where policies have led to the growth of foreign direct investments.

Unlike other Asian countries, Hong Kong and Singapore realized a long time ago that foreign direct investments would help their economy grow. They became one of the easiest places for foreigners to do business.

In today's economy, we've seen how much the US and China benefit from FDI, primarily inward FDI. We know that favorable policies are not the only factor that promotes FDI but we can't deny the fact that it's a factor and a very important one. In 2021, the US inward foreign direct investment increased by $506 billion, that's an 11.3% increase.

Money is not the only thing FDI adds to an economy. Technology, new business practices Employment, and knowledge are also a few things FDI adds to an economy.
Obviously, companies coming into a country should be regulated but the regulation should be a little less strict so these companies would be motivated to come and do business.

Every investment has its advantages and demerits, that's why it's an investment, a risk must be involved. Some of these disadvantages include;

• Exposing countries to foreign political influence, especially developing countries.
• It can also influence exchange rates and interest rates.
• It can limit the growth of domestic involvement if they are not able to face the competition.

But if you use the risk/reward concept, the merits of FDI greatly overshadow the demerits.

So, for me, I believe governments of countries should regulate foreign companies and businesses in their country and also regulate their activities. Still, the regulations should not be too strict and unfavorable to the companies if you want to invite foreign business in.

Vietnam has been pretty impressive with the their export. They export a lot of telephones, mobile phones, and parts. This makes up 21% of their total export. Textile makes up 12%. They also have a very good trade relationship with the U.S. and China which happen to be major markets for these products. In 2020 they were the only country in their region (South-East Asia) to make a double-digit percentage in E-commerce. It increased by 18%.
They're also the world's second highest exporters of coffee, second to Brazil. They've been really impressive.


The U.S. and Germany have relatively larger economies than Vietnam but with what resources they have they've been able to achieve this. There are other countries with the same size of economy as Vietnam but they could not achieve this.

Personally, I don't think this year is going to economically better that year, in fact I believe it might be worst, especially for developing countries. The inflation doesn't seem to be going down anytime soon. Funny thing, it doesn't affect everything the same time but after a three month period at least a dollar has been added to the price of almost everything.
And in developing countries, the price of petrol has a domino effect on the price of almost everything.

Actually I don't think you are overexaggerating it. Its quite scary when you think about it to be honest. We don't know what might happen to the crypto world this year, we're only hoping whatever happens is positive because if we encounter another 2022 this year then we're in a whole lot of trouble.

Few months ago the world bank warned that a chances of a global recession has gotten higher because central banks across the world have hiked their interest rates to combat inflation. They did this based on the fact that the dollar keeps getting higher against other currencies because of the inflation rate in the U.S. Now while developed countries may recover from this, it doesn't look good for developing countries. Not to mention the fact that we don't know when and how the war between Russia and Ukraine will end

In the climate change fronts, its still not looking good. A lot of countries don't even take this seriously. World leaders talk and talk but no real action is taken. Funny enough some developing countries don't even see it as a problem. Some people do not even see it as a problem.
Happy new year to you too.

As much as people are free to do whatever they want with their life, this would not be a smart move. A third party company having all your data is all shades of wrong. Its difficult enough as it is to have complete privacy online. Willingly giving permission for a company to know and everything you do online is a whole new level. I'm even tempted to say its laughable but then, not everybody cares about their privacy. And for $5 to $20 a month? c'mon!!

The concept of these state debt is something I don't fully grasps.
Does it work like normal debt? Take for instance, I take a loan of $500 and after a year I pay back $300, that means I owe a debt worth $200. So if I take another loan of $1000, I'll be $1200 in debt. So if I pay of $500, my debt would be $700. Is this how state debt works?

I'm asking this because every single country I've seen, their state debt just keeps increasing. Like they don't pay it off or something?  Why does it just keeps increasing at an alarming rate?
For example, U.S debt was $16.05 trillion at the end of 2012, now we're talking  $31.4 trillion in 2023. How exactly does it work?

I don't think they have enough hotels and apartment to contain everybody coming into the country during the world cup. Many guest stayed in Dubai, Kuwait and I think Saudi Arabia too. Some even stayed on big cruisers because the accommodation capacity was not enough to contain everybody. Then there is the fact that FIFA has booked hotels for players, guest and officials.

The amount Qatar spent is what's a shocker. Prior to the 2022 world cup no country has ever spent up to $20m to host the world cup. I've seen different report the highest I've seen in any of them is $19 billion by Brazil in 2014. So going all the way to over $200 billion is questionable even for Qatar.

Qatar spent over $200 billion preparing to host the FIFA 2022 world cup. They spent that money on constructing roads, airports, public spaces, stadiums, gas stations, and more. They constructed seven new stadiums and renovated one to make it eight stadiums for the world cup. The cost of building these stadiums has been estimated to be $6.5 billion. They spent $36 billion to construct the Doha metro, and for the Pearl accommodation complex, they spent $15 billion.
While FIFA takes home most of the profit generated from TV rights, ticket sales, and sponsorship deals, it is estimated that FIFA will make $17 billion from the tournament.

There will most likely be an oversupply of some of the infrastructure, especially in real estate. It won't be the first time though. The Maracanã stadium in Brazil was abandoned after the 2014 world cup.

1.5 million people were in Qatar for the tournament but as stated earlier, 100% of the ticket sales go straight to FIFA’s coffer. About $4.6 billion was made from broadcasting and marketing rights and all of that goes to FIFA. During the tournament, FIFA covers most of the cost of running the world Cup but they pay about $1.7 billion to Qatar, the prize for teams that participated in the tournament is included in this money which is $440 million.

Since there were 1.5 million visitors in the Gulf country for the tournament, there will be a positive cash flow in tourism sales for hotels and restaurants and an increase in the sales of souvenirs and other consumption in general. The increase in investment and consumption should increase the taxes in the Qatar state budget but with the enormous tax breaks agreed with FIFA and its sponsors Qatar will not make much from that either. The exact loss on tax revenue is impossible to ascertain.

From November 1 till the end of the world cup, people without a match ticket were not allowed into Qatar, which means non-world cup tourists did not contribute to the GDP of Qatar through consumption. Other decisions were made that did not contribute to the cash flow. For example, from November 10th to December 23 the bus and metro access was free of charge for people with a Hayya card. This is a fan ID that allows ticket holders entry into Qatar and the stadiums.

Putting these into perspective, we can say that the FIFA 2022 world cup is not profitable to Qatar. In the short term, where most of the cash flow goes to FIFA, it does not make financial sense for Qatar to host the world cup.

On the other hand, for a country like Qatar, getting money from the world cup was never a goal for hosting the world cup, for obvious reasons. They're a small country with an abundance of money. They did all these based on the national vision 2030 plan. The plan includes improving the country's standard of living and its international relations

Not only does the vision 2030 plan include hosting the world cup and improving the standard of living while also improving international relations, but Qatar also plans to attract future sporting and cultural events. This is evident in the fact that Doha has been chosen as the host city of the 2030 Asian games. With the infrastructure they now have, they are in a pole position to bid to host other sporting competitions.
Five out of the eight stadiums constructed for the world cup will either be dismantled or converted for alternative purposes.

While for FIFA, short-term profit is a goal, the same cannot be said for about a country like Qatar.
They can afford to shoulder the losses incurred from hosting a world cup.
The fact that Qatar is not making financial profit from hosting the world cup, doesn't mean they have nothing to gain from it
Qatar's public debt will decline by 6.8% over the next four years. The infrastructural project will lead to positive cash flow in tourism, investment, consumption, employment, etc. The aim of all these is to reduce the over-dependency of Qatar on oil and gas. This will create new opportunities in other industries.

According to experts, Qatar's GDP will rise by 4.1% by the end of 2022. And will increase by 3.2% from 2022 to 2030.
Qatar's stock exchange (QSE) also increased up to 24% from the beginning of the year til mid-2022.

Aside from the fact that Qatar spent an absurd $229 billion in preparation for the world cup, none of these is a big surprise. For a host country, a world cup is not solely about making money and profit but about pride, honor, and publicity, and Qatar has achieved that, especially publicity because they just hosted what is arguably the best world cup ever.

I hope nothing happens to binance too and I believe nothing will happen but it's better safe than sorry. I don't know why people don't learn. People always have the "it won't happen to me" attitude till it happens.
If anything happens to binance the whole industry will feel it and  will be worst than the FTX saga.

People all have their reasons for doing whatever they do. You can't tell somebody that makes so little and has a family to take care of to abandon his family and take a risk in an investment and expect him to just jump right into it.
For someone to invest, especially someone with lots of responsibilities, they have to have money to take care of their responsibilities first.
From my experience in life, I'm very skeptical of anything that comes freely or things that are too good to be true. When you're easily enticed be these things you'll easily run into scams.

Believe system of people is also a hindrance. So if you want to persuade someone to take financial risk, the believe of that person has to change. This does not only apply to poor people.

Poverty on its own is relative. There are people that do not share the same ambition as you. They're okay where they are, even if they can go further. Money may mean to world to you but to others, not so much, not because they have an abundance of it but because they see life differently, and that's okay.

This is easier said than done. It also depends on where you live. The cost of living of where you are may be high, but if it's relatively low and $3k after tax, that should be a lot. Still, you'll still need a lot of discipline to save. The more money you make, the more responsibilities. It all depends on a lot of things really.

I got on the forum before I knew about signature campaign and merit system. As much as I want my merit to increase, I came here to learn about bitcoin. I didn't know what the forum entails before I joined, I thought it's just a place to learn and talk about bitcoin. It was after I joined and I started reading and that's when I got to understand the forum. As a matter of fact I'm still getting to know about the whole forum. So I'll say my "immune booster " is first my curiosity before the things you mentioned because it was out of curiosity I registered to this forum.

I really can't picture how this war is going to end and when but it needs to end soon. It has gone on long enough. It's unfair to the soldiers and civilians. Before the war, Putin said there will be no winners in this war. They all know there will be no winners but they keep on fighting. It's insane. I'm not an expert in international politics but if they way to resolve an issue is by killing thousands and tens of thousands then there is definitely a better way. It's just not right at all.