National / International News

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg recently announced the launch of FWD.us, an organization promoting immigration and education reform. But he's been politically active before, dining with politicians and donating millions to public education.

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North Korea's recent threats to test launch medium-range missiles and pursue its nuclear ambitions is alarming the U.S. and many other countries. Marketplace’s partner organization, the BBC, has reporters in a number of countries surrounding North Korea. We have their reports on the mood in three economically significant nearby locations: Beijing, China; Tokyo, Japan; and Seoul, South Korea.

Celia Hatton in Beijing
Chinese diplomats have their hands full dealing with rising tensions on the Korean Peninsula but so far, business people in China are carrying on as normal. The customs office in Dandong, the Chinese city that lies on the North Korean border, confirms trade is unaffected, except for the suspension of Chinese tourist visits to North Korea. Chinese businessmen were even invited to Pyongyang this week to celebrate the birthday of North Korea’s founder, Kim Il Sung.

Some believe Chinese leaders have already decided North Korea is becoming a strategic liability and they’re predicting a change to China’s North Korea policy but others are pressuring Beijing to maintain the status quo with Pyongyang.

North Korea accounts for just 1 percent of Chinese trade -- a drop in the bucket for China but a lifeline for people living in China’s poor Northeastern provinces along the North Korean border. They are hoping China’s leaders will continue to support the regime of Kim Jong Un.

Martin Patience in Tokyo
Japan is taking no chances. The government has placed Patriot missiles at three locations in the capital with orders to shoot down any North Korean missiles heading towards the country. Out at sea, Japanese warships have been rigged out with missile defense equipment.

Despite this, the mood in Tokyo is relaxed. There’s certainly no sense of panic. Japan has been in this situation before. Most believe that Japan and U.S. bases in the country will not be targeted but North Korea is an unpredictable regime and nobody is sure what it will do next.

As for Japan’s economy, there have been no jitters so far but that could well change if tensions escalate further. Most Japanese believe that this crisis will blow over, just as past crises have. Even so, the batteries of Patriot missiles stationed around Tokyo stand as a stark reminder of North Korea’s threats.

John Sudworth in Seoul, South Korea
So far, as with previous crises, there is no sign of panic in South Korea. Seoul is as busy and bustling as ever. People are going to work. Cafes, bars and restaurants are full. The stock exchange is also largely unaffected. It priced in the threat from North Korea long ago.

That threat is seen as minimal. North Korea, most believe, has no interest in starting a war it knows it would lose and lose and lose quickly.

There is a sense of watchfulness from the South Korean government and perhaps, an added frisson of uncertainty given that North Korea now has a young, inexperienced leader at the helm, who is an unknown quantity.

One commentator pondering the recent international news coverage of the situation observed: “the level of alarm grows greater the further from Korea you get.”

A written plea for cash help for farmers who lost livestock in the heavy snow is rejected by the Welsh government.

The BBC defends its decision not to play in full on Radio 1's Official Chart Show a song at the centre of an anti-Baroness Thatcher campaign.

As the start of Coachella this weekend reminds us, tis the season for outdoor music festivals. But great bands aren't the only things these massive, multiday gatherings can foster. Two recent studies document how such events can be breeding grounds for foodborne illnesses that rock your belly.

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The couple paid an effective tax rate of about 18 percent. Vice President Joe Biden and his wife made $385,000 and paid $87,851 in taxes.

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A few years ago, it cost Steve Jobs $100,000 to sequence his DNA; today you can get it done for less than $10,000.

This weekend marks the 10th anniversary of sequencing the first human genome, and the economics of DNA sequencing has shifted so dramatically that many say the next big thing in health care -- personalized medicine -- is already here.

Top-tier hospitals like the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, or CHOP, are quickly moving this technology out of the research lab into the doctor’s office as they race to get to in on the ground floor of what promises to be a billion dollar industry. You would think the new genetics lab at CHOP would look like some futuristic sci-fi movie set…with gleaming chrome tools and oversized computer screens.

Nope. Just a drab, gray room buried in a basement. Even the super, sophisticated $750,000 DNA sequencer looks dull.

“It really looks like a box,” says Dr. Nancy Spinner, who oversees this unremarkable-looking laboratory. But Spinner says what happens inside the box is magic.

“It is truly amazing. It has completely changed the kind of experiments we can do,” she says.

This DNA sequencer reads about 3 billion bits -- your genetic blueprint -- and creates a digital copy in 48 hours.

That’s what it did for Leta Moseley. The 15-year old is tiny, just 3 foot 8, 66 pounds. She can’t speak and she struggles with lung disease that can turn a simple cold into a life-threatening event. Since Leta was born, her parents Rick and Lainey and an army of doctors have searched for the cause of her condition. A few months ago they found it, thanks to that ‘box' in the basement.

Dr. Ian Krantz was able to identify the mutation that caused Leta’s rare disease. “The new paradigm is going to be these genome-wide tests where you can screen all of the genes or most of the genes in a single test. The possibilities are as much as we can imagine them,” says Krantz.

The diagnosis is a genuine breakthrough -- it’s not a cure for her daughter. Lainey Moseley says it’s a different kind of gift.

“I had always felt personally guilty that doubt, well did I do something wrong in my pregnancy. Did I cause this? And finding this diagnosis in some ways let me off the hook a little bit. It wasn’t my fault,” she says.

The sheer power of DNA sequencing has top hospitals falling over themselves investing tens of millions of dollars to get into this business. Dr. Robert Doms says his bosses at CHOP didn’t blink when he submitted his business plan to set up a DNA sequencing center.

“I think they cut one secretary, but otherwise, otherwise they gave me everything I ask for. Of course, now I have to be successful,” he says.

Success here in Philadelphia means that within a year, CHOP will have a genetics team of 50. The program will attract children with rare diseases and cancer from around the country for in-house testing, research work and genetic counseling.

But CHOP and others like Boston Children’s Hospital and Children’s Mercy in Kansas City and are betting those patients are just the beginning. There’s chatter in genomic circles that within a few years every fetus be sequenced.

“DNA sequencing testing is going to be a $20 billion industry within the next several years,” says Mary-Ellen Cortizas, who helps run the DNA sequencing business for Boston Children’s Hospital. Cortizas says hospitals are scrambling to develop the fastest, cheapest test out there.

“This is a race to who does this best, but what does best mean?” she asks. “Is it the cheapest sequencing, the fastest sequencing or the sequencing that is most useful for the patients?”

While the market for these tests is emerging, hospitals face challenges. Dr. Leonard Sender is the director of the Genomic Center at Children’s Hospital of Orange County. He says the tests aren’t much good if you don’t have the staff to help patients make sense of the results.

“Do we have enough genetic counselors? Do we have enough genetic-trained pediatricians?” asks Sender. “There is a tremendous problem in getting the education of this new field to the health care professional.”

And without that education, it’s easy to imagine doctor’s ordering tests that don’t lead to much, other than more costs. Dr. Eric Topol who oversees genetic work for Scripps Health in San Diego says that’ll never fly.

“Nothing is going to work and be accepted now, unless it not only improves patient outcomes, but also markedly reduce the cost of the care,” he says.

Topol says the potential to save money is there. Look at Leta’s case. Over the years, she underwent roughly $100,000 worth of genetic testing. The successful one was under $10,000. Leta’s mom, Lainey Moseley, says that’s not the only way to think about cost.

“There’s so much that falls apart in a normal family life because you are living a very medical life. So if other families didn’t have to go through that kind of medical odyssey, it would save a lot of people’s lives in a lot of ways,” she says.

Moseley says it’s unlikely the discovery of Leta’s condition will help her. But it’s clear the technology that solved her medical mystery has the power to provide answers that until now have been out of reach.

Scotland's largest council calls for an independent inquiry into the disposal of the ashes of dead babies without the knowledge of parents.

Ballabriggs, who won the Grand National in 2011, has been retired, the 12-year-old's trainer Donald McCain confirms.

Updated (9:30am EST): Friday morning, megabanks JPMorgan Chase and Wells Fargo reported positive earnings. Wells Fargo said its profits were up 23 percent last quarter, and at JPMorgan Chase, profits jumped 34 percent compared with a year ago.

Big banks have come a long way from when they and the entire financial system were on the verge of collapse. Major U.S. banks have largely had healthy balance sheets recently, with record profits. This leaves Americans to wonder whether it’s finally safe to let go of fears that they could again threaten to fail and drag the entire economy down with them.

“I definitely don’t think there’s nearly as much to worry about now as there was five or six years ago,” says Morningstar bank analyst Jim Sinegal. “Capital levels at all of the big banks have doubled, tripled or even more since the depths of the financial crisis.”

When there’s literally more money in the bank, there’s less worry about catastrophe. Banks are playing it safer in a number of ways, including much tighter lending standards. (Too strict, in the view of some small business owners, who are frustrated about not being able to get adequate loans for expansion.)

It’s nice to be healthy when the overall economy is recovering. And the big banks did survive the Fed’s latest simulated crisis -- but that’s not the real test.

“We will only find out whether the new situation now is a better one for the country, for the economy, for the consumer when the next crisis comes by,” reminds Mauro Guillen, director of the Lauder Institute at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School.

Click here to hear analysis from Nancy Bush, contribuing editor at SNL Financial.

Mark Garrison: With record profits on the books, life is certainly a lot better for the largest banks.

Jim Sinegal: I definitely don’t think there’s nearly as much to worry about now as there was five or six years ago.

Jim Sinegal is a Morningstar bank analyst. These companies are playing it safer in several ways. For one, there is literally more money in the banks.

Sinegal: Capital levels at all of the big banks have doubled, tripled or even more since the depths of the financial crisis. And that’s the biggest thing contributing to the safety of the financial system.

It’s one thing to be healthy when the economy is recovering. And the big banks did survive the Fed’s latest simulated crisis. But Mauro Guillen of the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School has a reminder.

Mauro Guillen: We will only find out whether the new situation now is a better one for the country, for the economy, for the consumer when the next crisis comes by.

It’ll take more than quarterly earnings reports to figure that out. In New York, I'm Mark Garrison, for Marketplace.

Infections with a new flu strain have increased, with three to five cases reported daily. The virus, carried by birds, doesn't appear to spread between people. Still, health officials in the U.S. are preparing to screen travelers and develop a vaccine.

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Infections with a new flu strain have increased, with three to five cases reported daily. The virus, carried by birds, doesn't appear to spread between people. Still, health officials in the U.S. are preparing to screen travelers and develop a vaccine.

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A 39-year-old woman who was charged with murdering her husband in Londonderry pleads guilty to his manslaughter.

This week was all about President Barack Obama's new budget, the continuing rise in the markets and also murmurs of a Bitcoin bubble.

"This budget is dead on arrival," Bloomberg Government's Nela Richardson said. And the chained CPI, which is a new way of calculating inflation that tells us how much our Social Security benefits are going to increase every year by allowing for substitution between goods, "would actually reduce benefits a bit. And it would be a step in entitlement reform, but not a very popular one, especially for seniors and Democrats...It's being used to be a compromise but it's not really going to work."

"I think Obama was trying to show that 'Look, I'm going to do this — I'm going to do the thing that makes my guys really angry; I'm going to minorly tweak Social Security so the benefit payments are a little lower,'" said John Carney of CNBC. "I think he was showing that he was really willing to make a change here, and I think the Republicans, almost irresponsibly, have completely shunned this thing."

Listen to the full audio above for more on the Bitcoin bubble and bank earnings on the Weekly Wrap.

#Longreads for your weekend

As always, our Weekly Wrappers provide their #longreads picks for the weekend.

Nela Richardson chose:

• As a mommy who works outside the home, this New York Times article is near and dear to my heart. It explains why having it all ain't cheap and how are tax code penalizes dual-income couples.
• On the heels of the final NCAA basketball tournament, this clever piece from Bgov tax economist Patrick Driessen shows how the federal government through the tax code affects the games.
• Things You Should Never Do For Your Kids — the article says you should never a) do their homework; b) speak for them (let kids speak for themselves when spoken to); and c) pick their friends.

John Carney picked:

• The Pension Fund That Ate California: on CalPERS's corruption and insider trading.
• A Vanderbilt study shows that women who graduate from elite universities are working much fewer hours than women who graduated from less selective schools.
• The New York Times Dealbook looks at how instead of relief, banks are shifting risky assets to other institution.

He rose to fame in the 1960s with frequent appearances on The Tonight Show and roles in such movies as It's A Mad Mad Mad Mad World. In the '80s, he was on TV's Mork & Mindy. Winters' comedy albums are considered to be classics. He was 87.

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US Secretary of State John Kerry, who is visiting Seoul, says it would be a "huge mistake" for North Korea to launch another missile.

It seems like Amazon sells everything these days -- baby clothes, power tools, lawn furniture, oh yeah, books. And it undercuts competitors with rock-bottom prices. Critics say that might be good for you and me, but it's lousy for Amazon shareholders because the company barely ekes out a profit, if any at all. Some accuse CEO Jeff Bezos of running the company like a "charity" for consumers. Now Bezos is pushing back, responding to his critics in a recent letter to shareholders. 

Look, he says, we’ve had the same strategy for years: Keep prices low, which does lead to lower profits, but builds customer loyalty. As he says in the letter: “Proactively delighting customers earns trust, which earns more business from those customers, even in new business arenas.”

Jeff Howe is a visiting scholar at MIT media lab. He says Amazon is onto something.   

“They think long-term instead of short-term," he explains. “They don’t get distracted with a shiny little object that’s going to please shareholders for two quarters.”

Still, shareholders do seem to be fairly pleased with Amazon, right now. The stock has more than doubled over the past five years. And there doesn’t seem to be any massive shareholder revolt.

“If people were really worried about Amazon’s future prospects, they wouldn’t  be buying the stock,” says Tim Carmody, who writes for the online magazine The Verge.

But, Carmody says, if Amazon revenue falls or the company falters in new markets, shareholders will flee. For now, Carmody says Amazon’s long-term focus on consumers is working.

Just look at customers like Andrew Wallace. He’s 23, from Brooklyn. He buys everything from books and music to nuts and frozen food on Amazon. He says, “Amazon is this great big and easy thing that keeps you coming back for more.”

But does Wallace love Amazon enough -- would he shop there even if found stuff cheaper somewhere else? Maybe not.

“It’s hard to feel loyalty to something so big," he says.  "You know what I mean?"

Are you listening, Jeff Bezos?

Things aren't getting any easier for pharmecutical salesmen. Drugmaker Eli Lilly announced it's sending pink slips to 30 percent of its U.S. sales force, which works out to about 1,000 people.  Patents are expiring on two of the company's marquee drugs, so competition from generic brands is about to put a big dent in Eli Lilly's bottom line.

The company loses the patent on its antidepressant Cymbalta in December. Next March the game is up for the osteoporosis drug Evista. "Our U.S. revenue with those two medicines makes up about one-fifth of our corporate revenue," says spokesman Scott MacGregor. "It's a pretty significant impact."

When patents expire, generic drug makers will swoop in and sell the product for much cheaper. MacGregor says Eli Lilly is ready to make up for some of the losses, expanding a different sales team to push a new diabetes drug.

But there's something else that's threatening the livelihood of pharmaceutical sales reps. Their relationships with doctors are more restricted after controversy erupted over lavish spending on gifts and expensive meals in exchange for business.

MacGregor blames new health care regulations that further restrict a doctor's time. "That inherently changes the nature of the way they want to interact with us," he says. "And certainly we continue to see access restrictions, particularly in big academic institutions." 

So what's a drug company to do? For one, go digital, says Perdue University College of Pharmacy Dean Craig Svensson. "Certainly there are ways of providing information that used to be only by the sales force that now you can provide it digitally," he says, "and it doesn't require that salesperson to interact with the physician or other health care provider face-to-face."

Svennson says using pop-up ads on websites targeted to doctors is becoming more common, along with social media. He says health care providers are also more distrustful of biased information. So a hospital might form an advisory board that makes recommendations on what drugs to perscribe, leaving the sales rep out of the equation.

What's the difference between a scientist and a magician?

The US government criticises Azerbaijan for acting against a Western-funded pro-democracy project called the Free Thought University.