Things That Will and Will Not Happen in 2024

The Chinese economy will not collapse

Once again, Western opinion leaders are predicting a “China Crash” and once again they will be disappointed. The video explains better than I could why Western elites are utterly ignorant of how China works and ideologically blinded into believing that a “none liberal” society must, MUST implode. Even though China has proven them wrong now for decades.

The US will be an economic, social and political shit show

Its an election year with the main choices being a neoliberal Zionist who is a cultural “liberal”, a neoliberal Zionist who is a cultural “conservative” and a neoliberal Zionist who is culturally “liberal” but sees through the COVID utter incompetence and BS and has the last name of “Kennedy”. Will Biden be “suicided” or “die of natural causes” or be deemed unfit so that the sleazy slimy California Governor can take his place? Will Trump be allowed to make it across the finishing line not in prison shackles and not dead (“died of natural causes”)? Will Kennedy reject Zionism and become electable? If so will he be allowed across the finishing line? This all sounds too much like the narrator dialogue at the end of each episode of “Soap” in the 1970s; a good parallel for the crazy politics of 2024!

Then of course there is the little problem of a debt-driven economic implosion put off by the “blinking” of the Federal Reserve Governor and the “spend it like there’s no tomorrow” federal government through 2023. As well as the central government deficit exploding when the economy is still growing, credit card balances have exploded to new highs, car loans defaults are rising rapidly, banks are rapidly losing deposits to money market funds, and bank bond portfolios have massive losses due to higher interest rates. In 2024 we will see whether the Fed and the government can continue to cover up and offset the underlying economic dynamics; it may feel like a roller-coaster ride.

Ukraine will crumble

Ukraine is now scraping the bottom of the barrel for new “recruits” with the “recruits” going out of their way not to be recruited. The video below looks more like a visit to an old people’s home than a serenade to soldiers:

Targeting the young:

Even the BBC has to accept that many Ukrainian men don’t want to die for their oligarch overseers:

Ukraine is now no longer able to fully replace its losses at the front, even with much less capable and trained cannon fodder. With the loss-rate at 10:1 in Russia’s favour, the Ukrainian army will now be rapidly denuded of its soldiers. Ukraine is already drawing on tens of thousands of women for frontline service, numbers that can only increase. In addition, the tanks, mechanized vehicles, munitions and other supplies for the Summer Offensive are now mostly gone and new supplies only trickle in. The same for the tens of billions of dollars of financial aid needed to support the economy, the government may very soon have to cut payments to pensioners and workers because they don’t want to trigger an exchange rate crash and hyperinflation through money printing.

At the same time the Russian military goes from strength to strength, with increasing numbers, more and better equipment, and high morale. The Ukrainian front lines are now buckling as Russia slowly increases the pressure. The West is calling for a negotiated settlement to hide their failure, and give Ukraine once again time to rebuild and re-equip (as with the Minsk 1 and Minsk 2 Accords negotiated in bad faith). Putin has made it obvious that his minimum war aims may be unacceptable to the West; probably at least the four areas that have voted to join Russia (Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhya, Kherson) plus Mykolayiv, Odessa and Kharkov plus a demilitarization of the remaining Ukraine. Better for Russia to fight on during the election year, waiting for Ukraine’s collapse and extending the pain for the West.

Europe will crumble

The leaders of the US vassals that are most of the European nations now simply follow US foreign policy marching orders whether or not they are good for their countries; with the few exceptions of Hungary and now Slovakia. The German government, after the Constitutional Court ruling that they cannot use Euro 60 billion of COVID emergency funding for anything they want to, will need to slash expenses while increased military spending and Ukraine funding are protected. The first casualty has been the removal of all subsidies for EVs, and there will be many more within the government’s social spending and investment areas. These pro-cyclical expenditure cuts will only deepen the already started German recession.

The higher energy prices will continue to deindustrialize Europe, while its car companies (especially the German ones) lose a large chunk of their profits from China as their market share is eaten up by Chinese brands. Italy will continue its slow demographic and economic collapse, with the impacts of a declining population and fleeing youth intensifying within a highly-indebted nation.

In June, the European Parliamentary elections will return a very different parliament, one much more right-wing and much less ready to support the funding of the Ukrainian death wish while their own citizens get short shrift. There will also be a Portuguese election in March, a Belgian election in June and an Austrian election in the Autumn. It may also be touch and go whether the German government coalition lasts through to 2025. The mood in Europe and the UK is sour and certainly not supportive of the neoliberal authoritarian bureaucracy of the EU and paying for other people’s wars.

Europe will crumble, but the comprador elites will cling to their patron, following the US foreign policy interests blithely until forced out; a process that may take many years and much struggle. In the meantime, Europe will continue to shrink in its relative economic and geopolitical relevance.

US Foreign Policy Specialists Will Not Be Able to Handle the Truth

Where do I start? Well lets try this Foreign Policy article about the Ukraine War. In it we find the following drivel “‘The Ukrainians are heading for a tough winter, for obvious reasons,’ Swedish Defense Minister Pal Jonson said in an interview earlier this month. ‘But I think that the Ukrainian morale is much, much higher than the Russian morale. What is crucial right now, of course, is that we all will step up support.’” An utter reversal of reality as Ukrainian morale collapses and Russian morale increases.

As the Ukrainian defence line has started to buckle, with Russia making increasing gains, the author states “U.S. officials have seen movement across the nearly stagnant front lines slow considerably in recent weeks” and that “experts believe that Russia’s fragile logistics system—which was never designed for continuous military operations across Europe’s second-largest country—is a good target”. Utter wishful thinking.

Then some reality after all the hopium, “But Ukraine has been forced to cut military operations as aid has dried up … The Russian war chest is still heavily stocked”, but then back to the delusional with claims that Russian casualties have been between 300,000 and 400,000; wildly off from figures provided by groups that monitor Russian casualties. Then another reversal of the 10:1 kill ration in the Russians favour, and the throwing of cannon-fodder against the Russian military by the Ukrainians “‘They just keep pushing these guys into a meat grinder to convey the sense that they have endless resources,’ Hodges said. ‘They don’t have endless resources.’” 

Seems that the US foreign policy establishment (which Foreign Policy represents) simply can’t handle the truth, preferring a delusional world. The come down will be a hard one when reality destroys the delusions.

Western Elites Will Continue To Devour the State

The British Labour Party has once again shown what a neoliberal elite-serving party it has become post-Corbyn, as they published plans to let the capitalist elite complete their devouring of the NHS. In Europe, the UK, and the US, the capitalist class is continuing to devour the state in its desperate attempts to overcome profitability issues, which also include the implementation of internet toll roads (google and apple app store, amazon etc.) and more and more rentier monopolies and oligopolies on top of lowering rich people’s taxes and the removal of every government regulation possible.

A wonderful infomercial on why tax-paid public services are so much better than the alternative - the United States. But the elites want everyone to have the U.S. healthcare experience, as that’s the one where the most profits can be extracted.

All of 2024 will be 1.5 degrees above the 1880 benchmark

No more comment needed.

Robotaxis/Self-Driving Will Not Go Mainstream

Elon Musk has been promising “full self-driving” and “robotaxis” for many, many years now without any real delivery of anything approaching either.

In 2023 Tesla was forced to recall all the cars sold in the US to update its autopilot/FSD software to make sure that the driver knows that it is not in fact full self driving software and to have the car better monitor the driver when autoplot/FSD is engaged.

Self-driving outfit Cruse had its driverless vehicle license in California removed in October after one of its robotaxis dragged a pedestrian for 20 feet. In China it has become obvious that “the widespread commercialization of robotaxis remains a distant horizon” and a host of robotaxi companies are consolidating their operations and reducing their medium term aspirations.

So 2024 will not be the year of the robotaxi, instead it may be the year that reality hits robotaxi developers in the face like a wet fish. Robotaxis are a technology which is still in the “forever in a few years” mode as the problem space keeps expanding beyond the code base. Not good news for their overblown stock valuations, including the valuation of a Tesla which may not even be in the lead in FSD and robotaxi technology.

China Will Continue to Dominate in EVs

Due to the German constitutional court ruling that the German government could not use €60 billion in emergency borrowing from the COVID era to deal with budgetary struggles, the German government now has a big overspend requiring cuts. One of the first casualties of this is the German subsidies for EVs, which were to continue until the end of 2024 at a reduced level; instead they were immediately removed in mid-December. Germany is Europe’s largest car market, so the hit at the German level will also be felt at the European level.

This is on top of France’s (Europe’s third biggest car market), removal of EV subsidies completely for foreign-manufactured cars. This will not impact Tesla Model Y’s produced in Berlin, but will hit the Model Y’s and Model 3’s made in Shanghai; all Model 3’s sold in Europe are made in Shanghai. It will of course hit all the Chinese brands. EV subsidies will remain for cars manufactured in Europe, at between 5,000 and 7,000 Euros. As the Chinese-manufactured cars tended to be the most affordable, this will hold back increases in EV market share. In 2023, European sales of EVs grew about 20% to 3 million vehicles and about 23% (BEV and PHEV) of the market. Growth can be expected to decelerate in 2024, but may pick up in 2025 with new European EV regulations coming into force.

In the US, a number of EV models are losing their eligibility for the IRA EV subsidies, such as the Tesla Model 3, VW ID4, Nissan Leaf, the Tesla Cybertruck all-wheel drive and the Chevrolet Blazer. Altogether, the number of eligible models went down from 43 to 19. Together with the China tariffs, the IRA rules that exclude foreign built cars remove the lower-cost cars that China could provide and therefore restrain market growth. US BEV sales in 2023 grew about 50% to 1.2 million, with an 8% market share. Growth can be expected to decelerate in 2024, especially with the escalating bad debt problems in the US car market.

Notwithstanding the usual ignorant and propagandist calls for a Chinese “collapse” in 2024, it’s economy may well repeat the 5% growth of 2023 in which EV (BEV and PHEV) sales increased by 36% to 8 million and a 38% market share; with very limited incentives. In 2024 the Chinese EV market may become the fastest growing of the big 3 (China, US and Europe) perhaps achieving 10.5 million sales and a market share above 50%. The overwhelming beneficiaries of this growth will be the Chinese manufacturers, with Tesla hard-pressed to maintain its market share. The biggest losers will be the Japanese, Korean and European manufacturers who are extremely weak in EVs and will see their ICE sales eaten into by the increases in EV market share. It could be that over two thirds of all EVs sold globally will be sold in China in 2024. Chinese car exports will also continue to grow in 2024, allowing China to leap even further ahead of the US and Europe.

BYD has announced that it will be opening a manufacturing site for EVs in Hungary, to add to its electric bus site in that country.

The Israel/Gaza conflict, who knows how that will end?