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Boeing’s fatal decision-making processes, India’s strategically bloated budget and Apple’s impact on the Chinese economy. Here’s the latest:
Behind the Lion Air crash
In 2010, Airbus announced it would introduce a more fuel-efficient version of its popular A320 jetliner. Within months, Boeing announced plans to upgrade its own 737 jets.
In designing the new 737 Max, Boeing tried to avoid a complete overhaul of its systems so that it could persuade the U.S. regulator, the Federal Aviation Administration, that there would be no need for expensive, time-consuming retraining for pilots.
That decision appears to have left the crew of the Lion Air jet that crashed in October, killing 189 people, without a full understanding of how to respond when faulty data led the flight control system to repeatedly push the plane’s nose down.
How we know: Our journalists interviewed engineers, former Boeing employees, pilots, regulators and congressional aides to understand some of the choices Boeing made as it developed the 737 Max.
The central problem: The Max’s enlarged engines had to be mounted differently, which had a destabilizing effect. A new, automatic flight control system was created to counter the possibility of stalls. It’s likely the Lion Air pilots weren’t made of aware of the system — or how to handle it in an emergency.
The takeaway: Safety on modern jetliners is shaped by a complex combination of factors, including fierce industry competition, technological advances and pilot training. In the rare instances when things go awry, the interplay of those factors can create unintended and potentially fatal consequences.
India’s budget is packed with handouts
A new pension plan for rickshaw pullers. Tax breaks for the middle class. Cash handouts for struggling farmers.
These are some of the financial gifts for voters in the government’s new budget, released just a few months before elections that could unseat Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Analysis: Most analysts believe neither Mr. Modi’s party, the Bharatiya Janata Party, nor the Indian National Congress Party will win an outright majority. That means regional and caste-based parties will probably become the kingmakers, and the farmers who make up the bulk of their voters will be major beneficiaries of the new budget. There are also some sweeteners for rickshaw pullers, tea sellers and others in the informal sector that makes up another large chunk of India’s economy.
Background: Mr. Modi was elected in 2014 on a campaign pledge to provide more employment opportunities, but he and his ministers are under fire, accused of trying to bury an official jobs report that showed unemployment at a 45-year high.
In other India news: The country lodged a formal complaint with the American government after an undercover operation to expose immigration fraud led to the arrest of several Indian students in January.
Apple’s slowdown hits Chinese workers
China’s factories, the manufacturers for the world, now meet domestic demand, too. And so they’re more vulnerable to the country’s weakening consumer demand and broader economic slowdown, made worse by China’s trade war with the U.S.
We looked closely at Huojiancun, an area at the edge of glittering Shanghai where factory workers assemble Apple iPhones. Their dwindling paychecks aren’t just weakening their prospects but also the economic microcosm that emerged around them — a bustling night market and food stands.
Impact: The cycle is worsening China’s economic slowdown, which has posed a major challenge for Beijing and could put it at a disadvantage in the trade war with President Trump.
Housework holds back Japanese women’s careers
In January, at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe boasted that 67 percent of women in Japan were working, an all-time high.
But many are stuck in limited roles in the workplace, unable to advance in part because of rigid gender expectations that shoulder them with most of the domestic work.
By the numbers: Women who work more than 49 hours a week do 25 hours of housework a week, according to an analysis of government numbers. Their husbands put in an average of less than five hours at home — among the lowest rates in the developed world. As a result, almost half of the country’s working women are employed part time, and more than half are on temporary contracts.
Why it matters: Mr. Abe has prioritized what he calls “womenomics” to help boost Japan’s slowing economy, and analysts say that helping women reach higher-level jobs would help the country’s severe labor shortage. But cultural norms stand in the way.
Here’s what else is happening
State of the Union: President Trump will deliver his yearly address to Congress on Tuesday night in Washington. Immigration, a topic that has led to weeks of political impasse, will be a main theme, the White House said.
In the Oval Office: In an interview with our reporters last week, Mr. Trump said he had all but given up negotiating over his border wall and would most likely take action on his own. The Times’s publisher, A. G. Sulzberger, took the lead in questioning the president about his attacks on the press, noting that foreign leaders were increasingly using the term “fake news” to justify suppressing independent scrutiny.
Australia: The government said the last remaining refugee children on the Pacific island of Nauru would be resettled in the U.S. — a milestone victory for lawyers, doctors and migrant advocates who have been raising the alarm about Australia’s offshore detention centers.
Pope Francis: The pope arrived in the United Arab Emirates for a three-day visit, becoming the first pontiff of the Roman Catholic Church to visit the Arabian Peninsula. Here’s why his trip matters.
Blackwater’s founder: A company owned by Erik Prince, who created the security contracting firm Blackwater, announced that it had struck a deal to build a training camp in the Chinese region of Xinjiang. Asked about the deal, Mr. Prince said he had “no knowledge” of it, and the announcement was removed from the company’s website.
Deutsche Bank: In 2016, the German bank rejected a loan request from Donald Trump, which he had sought for work on his golf property in Scotland, judging that his divisive presidential campaign made him much too risky a client.
El Chapo: Two days before jurors were set to begin deliberations in the trial of the drug lord Joaquín Guzmán Loera, prosecutors unsealed secret documents in which an associate said Mr. Guzmán routinely raped girls as young as 13 years old, sometimes by drugging them.
Philippines: Five soldiers and three members of Abu Sayyaf, an Islamic State-affiliated militant group, were killed in a gunfight on the southern island of Jolo, six days after a church bombing linked to the same group.
South Korea: A court in Seoul sentenced a former presidential candidate, Ahn Hee-jung, to three and a half years in prison for sexual assault, making him among the best known public figures to be felled by the country’s growing #MeToo movement.
Britain: A woman in London was found guilty of the genital mutilation of her 3-year-old daughter. She is the first person to be convicted since the practice was banned in the country in 1985.
Antarctica: Scientists discovered a gaping cavity in a vast glacier, caused by warming waters, that could speed up its decay. This glacier is already responsible for about 4 percent of the world’s rising sea levels.
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Back Story
February is Black History Month in the U.S., and The Times has put together a special presentation of its Overlooked series, featuring 13 prominent black men and women whose deaths were not previously noted in our report.
Its editor, Amisha Padnani, described what she discovered through the stories of figures like Scott Joplin, the ragtime master; Gladys Bentley, a gender-bending blues singer; and Major Taylor, the first black world champion in cycling.
“Many of them were a generation removed from slavery,” she wrote. “To carve a name for themselves, they sometimes had to make myth out of a painful history, misrepresenting their past to gain a better footing in their future.”
“They were ambitious and creative, becoming painters and composers, filmmakers and actors,” she added. “Others used their imaginations to invent and innovate. Often they felt an unspoken greater mission to break the constraints society placed on their race.”
The project was created in partnership with Past Tense, a new team at The Times that is delving into our archives to bring to life compelling stories from our past. Use this form to nominate a candidate for future Overlooked obits.
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Source : Nytimes
