outsourcing of jobs as exploitation and oppression

Global Outsourcing

When jobs are outsourced from the West — or sometimes even across borders — issues of worker rights, fairness, and racism often arise. We cover how workers worldwide handle outsourced work, where exploitation occurs, and what’s being done about it.

Refugees help power machine learning advances at Microsoft, Facebook, and Amazon

“for them you’re not a human being”: meet the migrants answering phones for big tech, colombia’s technology minister talks outsourced jobs and the fourth industrial revolution, tech contractors are organizing and facing violent threats in the philippines, training self-driving cars for $1 an hour, as cases of covid-19 surged, facebook sent its content moderators in india back to work, “the despair and darkness of people will get to you”, the everyday racism of offshore call centers, indian entrepreneurs are returning from silicon valley to invest in bengaluru, young, deported, and learning to code, witty captions, $5.

Crash Course Criticism

Your Best Crash Course in Economics

Episode #16 – Globalization and Trade and Poverty

Crash Course’s episode this week is very timely with Donald Trump’s campaign’s consistent talking point about China taking US jobs , Bernie Sanders’ championing of the poor, and the general buzz about how low wages can rise.  This post might get lengthy, but stay with me.  Let’s dive in:

The Big Difference-Maker in Reducing Poverty

The greatest contributor [to reducing extreme poverty] is globalization and trade.  The world’s economies and cultures have become more interconnected and free trade has driven the growth of many developing economies.

Crash Course attributes global trade as the leading contributor to reducing poverty.  This is consistent with general economic principles, namely that trade  necessarily makes both parties better off.

However, Crash Course also states:

Better access to education, humanitarian aid, and the policies of international organizations like the UN have made a difference.

This is up for debate, depending on which examples  you cite.  Foreign aid may help, but it also may do a lot of damage by disrupting the local economy and creating a prize for political factions to fight over.  Additionally, The UN makes hundreds of policies that impact international trade; some help and some do not.  The UN is not solely a global trade organization, and sometimes their other goals conflict with their goal to increase free trade.

Opponents of Global Trade

While Crash Course does  come down in favor of global trade, they don’t do a very good job at rebutting the arguments against global trade.

But not everyone agrees. Opponents of globalization called outsourcing of jobs “exploitation and oppression”, a form of economic colonialism that put profits before people.  A few call for protectionist policies like higher tariffs and limitations on outsourcing.  

Crash Course never responds to this objection to global trade or the argument’s proposed solution.  If someone is worried about “exploitation and oppression,” (i.e. low wages and poor working conditions), higher tariffs and limitations on outsourcing  do not help these workers at all .  These policies protect domestic businesses from international competition, but it does not improve the working conditions or the pay of foreign workers.  Furthermore, an economist would argue that by reducing the demand for these foreign products (through tariffs or limits on outsourcing), you are reducing the revenues of these businesses and reducing the value that these workers provide.  This puts  downward pressure on their wages.

Improvement in wages and working conditions come from economic prosperity and competition for labor; growing businesses that need employees will have to compete for workers, and those businesses that provide either improved conditions or wages will attract the most workers from other sectors of the economy.

But others focus on the foreign workers themselves by demanding they receive higher wages and more protections.  The root of many arguments against globalization is that companies don’t have to follow the same rules they do in developed countries. Some developing countries have no minimum wage laws. They don’t have regulations that provide safe working conditions, or protect the environment. And although nearly every country bans child labor, those laws are not always enforced.

The implementation of laws that prohibit certain working conditions or wages does not necessarily benefit workers.  As this episode infers toward the end of the video, if we implemented the laws on wages and working conditions of developed countries onto developing countries, it would not benefit these countries as it would eliminate most of the jobs.  Employers could not afford to abide by the laws and remain profitable, and the result would be fewer businesses and fewer people employed.

As for the debate on child labor, OxFam research suggests that prohibiting child labor results in many children turning to black market activities such as prostitution in order to sustain themselves.  Child labor does seem terrible, but child prostitution seems much worse.  Please check out that OxFam report linked above, but be prepared that it’s some grim stuff.

Also, while many developing countries don’t have a minimum wage, neither do many developed countries .  Norway, Singapore, and Switzerland aren’t “exploiting” their workers more than Andorra and Saudi Arabia (where there are minimum wage laws), so we can dismiss the implied assertion that minimum wage laws are a requirement of developed countries.

Instead of rebutting these arguments against global trade head on as we just did, Crash Course instead mentions that workers might not be mistreated, even without laws.

First, public awareness is growing, along with pressure from the international community  to take steps to protect workers. For example, the U.S. produces an annual publication called  “The List of Goods Produced by Child Labor or Forced Labor”. If a company is buying products  from that list, they’re likely to get blasted by officials and the media. So awareness is the first step to improvement.

Okay, that doesn’t sound very comforting.  What else you got?

The second step comes from those that support  globalization. The pro-globalization set argued that as developing economies grow there are  more opportunities for workers, which leads to more competition for labor, and higher wages.

This is Crash Course gold.  I wish they had fleshed it out and used it to directly rebut the arguments against global trade, but I guess you can’t ask for everything.

The Environment, Pollution, and Climate Change

Perhaps the strongest argument against globalization is its lack of sustainability.   Many experts don’t think the planet can sustain a growing global economy. Deforestation, pollution,  and climate change aren’t gonna fix themselves […]   Globalization has helped millions of people get out of extreme poverty, but the challenge  of the future is to lift up the poor while at the same time keeping the planet livable.

This argument is presented pretty vaguely, and it’s hard to argue against it.  After all, pollution is bad (for multiple reasons), and if our planet becomes unlivable, then the global economic output will become zero.  All of this is true.

The problem is that there are no specifics in this argument.  Given that Climate Change is caused by man-made CO2 activity (which invites a completely different argument), how much do developing countries contribute to total CO2 omissions?  How do governments of developing countries enforce property rights in relation to pollution?

By arguing vaguely, you basically ensure that any global trade advocate will agree with you, and by doing that you can start talking about what the government should do to resolve these problems.  However, the conversation of “What should the government do about pollution?” and “How can developing countries get out of poverty?” are two very different topics and require very distinct discussions.  This is almost a Red Herring.

Microcredit

Crash Course talks a good bit about Microcredit, which they tout as a success, even though a fair amount  of research suggests that it is not effective at helping people get out of poverty.  In fact, if you google “Microcredit Helps Poverty,” there are more articles talking about why it doesn’t work than why it might.

In economic theory, it makes sense why microcredit would be   successful: In developing countries, banks do not have the capital to fund riskier small businesses that do not have much capital.  Instead, foreign lenders (who are in fact, just regular Joes in developed countries) lend their money to a small business abroad, watch it flourish, and get paid back.  The average Joe feels good (and may collect some interest on the loan) and a small business is expanded in a developing country.  Everyone wins.

However, in practice, these loans don’t always go into the small business, and when they do, it does not have a noticeable impact on the business owner’s standard of living.  Some journalists have highlighted the rare successes of Microcredit, but they are generally the exceptions.  In the end, these Microcredit transactions will likely help those who receive it, but it is not the Cure for Poverty (or anywhere close) that it was theorized to be a decade ago when the idea gained traction.

I am very surprised that Crash Course declares Microlending to be a great success at helping people out of poverty.  The evidence suggests otherwise.

Crash Course ends this episode on a bit of a sour note:

Many of the people who emerged  from extreme poverty in the last 25 years have jobs, wages, and working conditions that  would be unthinkable in the developed world.   Economists say that’s okay, it’s progress, but it’s progress that’s awfully hard to stomach.

It’s difficult to remove our 21st-century-developed-world lenses to see the great decline in extreme poverty throughout the world, since those who are out of extreme poverty still have it bad compared to the developed world.  It  is  hard to stomach if you compare the developing world to the developed world, instead of comparing the developing world to the developing world 25 years ago.  It might also be hard to imagine the wages and working conditions of Americans one-hundred years ago, even though they were among the richest in the world at the time.

Although it may be hard to stomach, you should always ask “compared to what?”  Would the developing countries be better off or worse off today if they had implemented wage controls and regulations on working conditions 25 years ago?  Economic theory suggests they would be much  worse off, even though it might make you  feel better that these rules are in place.

Crash Course Criticism will be on a schedule from here on out, releasing posts every Wednesday, but possibly more frequently.  Thanks for the support!

Like what I wrote?  Hate it?  Drop some feedback in the comments.

One thought on “Episode #16 – Globalization and Trade and Poverty”

Really good post. It’s weird indeed what CC said about microcredit.

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3 Outsourcing Politics

• Published: March 2017
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This chapter explores the political representations of outsourcing, principally by way of presidential campaign discourse in the United States. The accusation of “shipping jobs overseas” has established the frame through which the practice of outsourcing is (negatively) judged. In 2004, the uproar created by the Bush Administration’s stumble into the outsourcing question turned this into something approaching a third-rail issue in U.S. politics, setting the tone and the terms for a succession of often cynical and ultimately inconclusive debates over the scale, causes, and consequences of outsourcing. As partial and skewed as they have been, these debates around the “threat” of offshore outsourcing call attention to an apparently visceral connection to underlying sources of economic uncertainty across the working and voting public at large, as well as to what has become a prolonged condition of bipartisan detachment from the fundamental policy issues of trade and employment.

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Please note you do not have access to teaching notes, moral considerations in outsourcing to foreign labor.

International Journal of Social Economics

ISSN : 0306-8293

Article publication date: 1 May 2004

This paper argues that the principles of capitalism do not condone the widespread practice of labor exploitation occurring across the globe. Instead, they demand that some countermeasure be enacted to mitigate the structural oppression of laborers in less developed economies. Through heavy use of two scholars, Horace Fairlamb and Robert Goodin, the author concludes that corporations outsourcing their labor to such workers must pay a “sustainable living wage”. Fairlamb's analysis of Adam Smith reveals the potential undervaluation of labor in free markets, and Goodin's ethical theory produces a principle of group responsibility that the author applies to corporations, who are in the best position to remedy the situation.

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Pierlott, M.F. (2004), "Moral considerations in outsourcing to foreign labor", International Journal of Social Economics , Vol. 31 No. 5/6, pp. 582-592. https://doi.org/10.1108/03068290410529407

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Outsourcing, technology, globalization and jobs

Jonathan eaton.

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Globalization, Outsourcing, and Wage Inequality

There is considerable debate over whether international trade has contributed to the declining economic fortunes of less skilled workers. One issue that has become lost in the current discussion is how firms respond to import competition and how these responses, in turn, are transmitted to the labor market. In previous work, we have argued that outsourcing, by which we mean the import of intermediate inputs by domestic firms, has contributed to an increase in the relative demand for skilled labor in the United States. If firms respond to import competition from low-wage countries by moving non- skill-intensive activities abroad, then trade will shift employment towards skilled workers within industries. In this paper, we extend our previous work by combining new import data from the revised NBER trade database with disaggregated data on input purchases from the Census of Manufactures. We construct industry-by-industry estimates of outsourcing for the period 1972-1990 and reexamine whether outsourcing has contributed to an increase in relative demand for skilled labor. Our main finding is that outsourcing can account for 31-51% of the increase in the relative demand for skilled labor that occurred in U.S. manufacturing industries during the 1980s, compared to our previous estimate of 15-33%.

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Feds crack down on labor exploitation amid national worry over fair treatment

A traveling carnival business owner in Texas is the latest to be accused of labor exploitation amid a surge in calls for worker protection reforms and child labor violations across the nation.

Angel Reyes Isidro, 41, allegedly operated a carnival business in Houston with unauthorized workers, according to an indictment. In 2019, Reyes falsified temporary employment applications to obtain H-2B visas for 24 unnamed foreign seasonal workers, the indictment alleges.

The H-2B program allows employers to temporarily hire foreign nationals to work temporary nonagricultural jobs in the United States, according to the U.S. Department of Labor. Under the program, the department said employers are required to prove that they will offer wages that "equals or exceeds the highest of the prevailing wage" or is applicable to minimum wage standards.

But after the 24 workers entered the United States between June and August 2019, the indictment alleges Reyes charged them illegal visa fees, paid them below the minimum pay required, and made threats of deportation and loss of future employment opportunities. Reyes profited from the scheme and was paid to illegally transfer four workers to another employer.

The case underscores how employers across the country have benefited from the labor of exploited workers.

"Recent immigrants, both documented and undocumented, are among the most exploited workers in the country, enduring wage theft, dangerous working conditions, discrimination, and even physical assaults," according to the non-profit organization Green America .

Federal authorities have also increasingly called attention to labor violations after the Labor Department reported last year that child labor violations have risen 69% since 2018 . The rise in child labor cases in the United States coincides with the arrival of hundreds of thousands of unaccompanied minors in recent years.

Immigration and child advocates have noted that migrant children are vulnerable to labor exploitation and human trafficking in the country. Many migrant children have been found working in dangerous industries, such as meatpacking and poultry, construction, and major label food factories, according to the American Immigration Council’s Immigration Impact project .

Carnival business workers put in poor working, living conditions

The U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Texas said Reyes continued operating his carnival business with unauthorized workers from 2022 to the time of his arrest on April 28.

Reyes "placed the workers in cramped and crowded conditions where workers had to take turns sleeping on the floor because there was not enough bed space," the indictment states. Testimony during a federal court hearing further alleged that Reyes threatened workers with a firearm and sexually harassed female workers, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office.

Prosecutors also said Reyes, who is a Mexican national living in the United States, "poses a serious flight risk, risk of obstructing justice and is a danger to the community." He has been charged with fraud in foreign labor contracting, false statements, and mail fraud, among other crimes, according to the indictment. 

Reyes faces up to 20 years in federal prison for mail fraud and a maximum of 10 years for visa fraud, the U.S. Attorney's Office said in a news release. The other counts carry a five-year maximum term of imprisonment.

'Jobs they should never have been near': Tennessee company fined nearly $650K for illegally hiring minors to clean slaughterhouses

Federal authorities take steps to strengthen labor protections

In 2023, the Labor Department announced new actions to protect workers against employer exploitation, including migrants and children. The new efforts to strengthen protections for workers were part of the Biden administration’s "approach to ensuring our most vulnerable workers know their rights, are protected from abuse at the hands of their employers and can advocate for themselves at work," the department said.

The H-2B program is one of many temporary work visa programs in the United States, according to an Economic Policy Institute report in 2022. The program is commonly used for jobs in landscaping, construction, forestry, seafood and meat processing, traveling carnivals, restaurants, and hospitality. 

The report noted that as the H-2B program continues to grow, migrants with H-2B visas are being “employed in industries in which there is extensive wage theft and lawbreaking by employers.” 

Citing data from the Labor Department, the report said nearly $1.8 billion in wages were stolen from workers between 2000 and 2021. During those years, more than 225,000 cases across seven major H-2B industries were investigated by the Labor Department with violations discovered in over 180,000 cases, according to the report.

"The H-2B program has been plagued by worker exploitation for too long," Acting Secretary of Labor Julie Su said in a statement last October . "The Biden-Harris administration is committed to protecting H2-B workers from abuse and with this report, we’re taking a whole-of-government approach to protecting these vulnerable workers, which will also help ensure they are not used to undercut labor standards for domestic workers."

Uptick in child labor across the U.S.

Last year, the Labor Department denounced the uptick in child labor nationwide. Since then, federal authorities have issued penalties to numerous employers in violation of child labor laws, many including meat and poultry processing facilities.

During the fiscal year of 2023, the department said its investigators found that more than 5,800 children had been employed in violation of federal child labor laws — an 88% increase since 2019. In total, 955 federal investigations found child labor violations, which resulted in more than $8 million in penalties, according to the department.

The largest case of that year revealed at least 102 children , between the ages of 13 to 17, worked overnight shifts at 13 meat processing facilities in eight states. 

A federal investigation found that Packers Sanitation Services Inc. LTD (PSSI), which is based in Wisconsin and one of the nation’s largest food safety sanitation services providers, employed children in hazardous jobs to clean dangerous powered equipment, including brisket saws and "head splitters" used to kill animals.

The Labor Department said in its lawsuit that most of the children who worked at some of the facilities were not fluent English speakers and had to be interviewed in Spanish. NBC News reported in March 2023 that the Department of Homeland Security and Justice Department were investigating whether a human smuggling scheme brought migrant children to work at the facilities.

“Our investigation found Packers Sanitation Services’ systems flagged some young workers as minors, but the company ignored the flags. When the Wage and Hour Division arrived with warrants, the adults – who had recruited, hired and supervised these children – tried to derail our efforts to investigate their employment practices,” Labor Department Wage and Hour Regional Administrator Michael Lazzeri said in a statement last February .

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Globalization, greed, and exploitation. How to break the baleful path?

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• Published: 26 August 2014
• Volume 84 , pages 1211–1235, ( 2014 )

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• Albrecht Söllner 1  

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During the last decades, a globalized and free market economy has become the worldwide accepted paradigm for organizing economic affairs. Indeed many positive effects of globalization have materialized and improved the wellbeing of humans, particularly in the poorer parts of the world. However, there is a dark side to globalization—negative external effects, e.g. the exploitation and destruction of natural resources—that is causing growing discontent (e.g. Stiglitz, Globalization and its discontents. Penguin, London, 2002 ). Different initiatives have been taken in order to deal with the deficits of globalization but have not yet resulted in a resounding success. This paper deals with the downsides of globalization and is not telling a “success story”. For this reason, it is a scholarly article and an essay at the same time, dealing with its subject sometimes from a personal point of view. After presenting some examples for negative side effects of our current economic system, it is argued that capitalism is not only promoting growth through innovation, but that it follows a path of greed and exploitation. Building on path dependence theory, self-reinforcing mechanisms are identified that lead into a lock-in of the current path and make it hard to alter its course. Against this background, three suggestions to tackle the deficits of globalization are presented and critically discussed—the Principles for Responsible Education (PRME), the attempt to restrict globalization (e.g. Steingart), and the implementation of a global governance system (e.g. Homann). Finally, a careful conclusion is drawn: A sequenced approach of education, sanction, and institution building might be the best solution to fasten up the slow moving process of fixing the shortcomings of globalization. It has to be clearly understood that this is not a contribution aimed against globalization and global competition. However, the issues raised in this article urgently need to be addressed. It logically follows that further research is needed in time.

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Treasury sanctions nicaragua-based russian institution and gold companies.

WASHINGTON — Today, the Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) is targeting the Ortega-Murillo regime’s repression of the Nicaraguan people and its ability to manipulate the gold sector and profit from corrupt operations. Treasury is imposing sanctions on three Nicaragua-based entities, the Training Center of the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs in Managua ( RTC ); Compania Minera Internacional, Sociedad Anónima (COMINTSA) ; and Capital Mining Investment Nicaragua , Sociedad Anónima (Capital Mining) ,   pursuant to Executive Order (E.O.) 13851, as amended.

The RTC is a Nicaragua-based subdivision of the Government of the Russian Federation’s (GOR) Ministry of Internal Affairs, which trains those under the Ortega-Murillo regime’s command under the Russian authoritarian government’s playbook of oppression. It is a key actor in the Nicaraguan regime’s repression of civil society and unjust detention and imprisonment of individuals for expressing dissent, or otherwise peacefully exercising their human rights and fundamental freedoms.

The designations of COMINTSA and Capital Mining target government-affiliated gold companies generating revenue for the Ortega-Murillo regime. Gold is Nicaragua’s top commodity export, and this action aims to degrade the ability of the Ortega-Murillo regime to manipulate the sector and profit from the corrupt operations of COMINTSA and Capital Mining.

“By leveraging the training it receives from the Russia-backed RTC and the revenue it generates from exploiting the gold sector, the Ortega-Murillo regime has continued its anti-democratic campaign of repression against its citizens,” said Under Secretary of the Treasury for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence, Brian E. Nelson. “The United States remains committed to using our tools to support the Nicaraguan people, including by constraining the Ortega-Murillo regime’s ability to fund its oppressive and destabilizing activities.”

These actions are being taken these in response to the Ortega-Murillo regime’s continued repression of the people of Nicaragua and continued exploitation of vulnerable migrants, including via the facilitation and profiting off of irregular migration to the United States. 

The Training Center of the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs in Managua

Nicaragua is one of Russia’s main partners in Central America, as evidenced by a series of high-level visits to Managua by representatives of the GOR. Russia’s Ministry of Internal Affairs established a training center in Managua to provide specialized courses for the  Nicaraguan National Police (NNP) and law enforcement of other Latin American countries. OFAC designated the NNP, the primary law enforcement entity in Nicaragua, on March 5, 2020, pursuant to E.O. 13851 for being responsible for or complicit in, or having directly or indirectly engaged in, serious human rights abuse in Nicaragua. The NNP was also designated pursuant to the Nicaraguan Human Rights and Anticorruption Act of 2018 for being responsible for or complicit in, or responsible for ordering, controlling, or otherwise directing, or having knowingly participated in, directly or indirectly, significant acts of violence or conduct that constitutes a serious abuse or violation of human rights against persons associated with the protests in Nicaragua in April 2018. 

Since its opening in Managua in October 2017, the RTC has been operating in Managua, training members of the NNP as part of a bilateral engagement between Nicaragua and Russia, Russian law enforcement officials at the RTC have trained members of the NNP, which has enabled the regime’s brutal repressive tactics, training the NNP to conduct repression and tyrannical persecution in support of persecutions of the Nicaraguan people. The NNP is a central actor in the Ortega-Murillo regime’s violent oppression of the Nicaraguan people. The RTC’s support of the NNP helps maintain the cycle of violent oppression in Nicaragua. The NNP is a repressive state apparatus, carrying out extrajudicial killings, using live ammunition against peaceful protests, and even participating in death squads. The RTC in Nicaragua, by admission of President Ortega himself, trains Nicaraguan law enforcement officers to better confront “coup plotters,” referring to those citizens who dare to publicly voice their opposition to the regime. 

The RTC is being designated pursuant to E.O. 13851, as amended, for having materially assisted, sponsored, or provided financial, material, or technological support for, or goods or services in support of, the NNP.

Compania Minera Internacional, Sociedad Anónima (COMINTSA)

COMINTSA is a Nicaraguan mining company and one of several regime-aligned companies that operate or have operated in Nicaragua’s gold sector. Having revoked the license for operations from another artisanal mining company, the General Directorate of Mines granted COMINTSA concession areas for exploration and extraction of gold in the in the Autonomous Region of the North Caribbean Coast of Nicaragua in 2023. COMINTSA is reportedly owned and led by  Salvador Mansell Castrillo (Mansell Castrillo), who is under OFAC sanctions.

On November 15, 2021, OFAC designated Mansell Castrillo pursuant to E.O. 13851 for having served as an official of the Government of Nicaragua at any time on or after January 10, 2007. Subsequently, on October 24, 2022, OFAC designated the  General Directorate of Mines  pursuant to E.O. 13851 for being owned or controlled by or having acted or purported to act for or on behalf of, directly or indirectly, Mansell Castrillo. 

COMINTSA is being designated pursuant to E.O. 13851, as amended, for operating or having operated in the gold sector of the Nicaraguan economy.

Capital Mining Investment Nicaragua, Sociedad Anónima

Capital Mining is a Nicaraguan mining company and one of several regime-aligned companies that operate in Nicaragua’s gold sector. Capital Mining is an intermediary in the gold sector controlled by  Laureano Ortega Murillo (Ortega Murillo), the son of President Ortega and Vice President Murillo, and Mansell Castrillo that is known to charge some gold mining companies to do business in Nicaragua. On April 17, 2019, OFAC designated Ortega Murillo pursuant to E.O. 13851 for being an official of the Government of Nicaragua or having served as an official of the Government of Nicaragua at any time on or after January 10, 2007. 

Capital Mining   is being designated pursuant to E.O. 13851, as amended, for operating or having operated in the gold sector of the Nicaraguan economy.

Travel Industry Advisory

In addition to the sanctions issued by OFAC today, the United States Department of State is issuing over 250 visa restrictions for Nicaraguan officials, and the Departments of State, Treasury, and Homeland Security are jointly releasing an advisory to alert the travel industry of the ways in which smugglers are facilitating illegal migration to the United States and remind the industry of key steps that they should take to avoid complicity in the exploitation of migrants. 

This action reflects U.S. efforts to promote responsible practices in the industry, prevent and disrupt illicit activity, and enhance compliance with lawful immigration and migration pathways. 

SANCTIONS IMPLICATIONS

As a result of today’s action, all property and interests in property of the designated persons described above that are in the United States or in the possession or control of U.S. persons are blocked and must be reported to OFAC. In addition, any entities that are owned, directly or indirectly, individually or in the aggregate, 50 percent or more by one or more blocked persons are also blocked.  Unless authorized by a general or specific license issued by OFAC, or exempt, OFAC’s regulations generally prohibit all transactions by U.S. persons or within (or transiting) the United States that involve any property or interests in property of designated or otherwise blocked persons. 

In addition, financial institutions and other persons that engage in certain transactions or activities with the sanctioned entities and individuals may expose themselves to sanctions or be subject to an enforcement action. The prohibitions include the making of any contribution or provision of funds, goods, or services by, to, or for the benefit of any designated person, or the receipt of any contribution or provision of funds, goods, or services from any such person. 

The power and integrity of OFAC sanctions derive not only from OFAC’s ability to designate and add persons to the SDN List, but also from its willingness to remove persons from the SDN List consistent with the law. The ultimate goal of sanctions is not to punish, but to bring about a positive change in behavior. For information concerning the process for seeking removal from an OFAC list, including the SDN List, please refer to OFAC’s Frequently Asked Question 897 .  For detailed information on the process to submit a request for removal from an OFAC sanctions list .

Click here for more information on the entities designated today.

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Savvino-storozhevsky monastery and museum.

Zvenigorod's most famous sight is the Savvino-Storozhevsky Monastery, which was founded in 1398 by the monk Savva from the Troitse-Sergieva Lavra, at the invitation and with the support of Prince Yury Dmitrievich of Zvenigorod. Savva was later canonised as St Sabbas (Savva) of Storozhev. The monastery late flourished under the reign of Tsar Alexis, who chose the monastery as his family church and often went on pilgrimage there and made lots of donations to it. Most of the monastery’s buildings date from this time. The monastery is heavily fortified with thick walls and six towers, the most impressive of which is the Krasny Tower which also serves as the eastern entrance. The monastery was closed in 1918 and only reopened in 1995. In 1998 Patriarch Alexius II took part in a service to return the relics of St Sabbas to the monastery. Today the monastery has the status of a stauropegic monastery, which is second in status to a lavra. In addition to being a working monastery, it also holds the Zvenigorod Historical, Architectural and Art Museum.

Belfry and Neighbouring Churches

Located near the main entrance is the monastery's belfry which is perhaps the calling card of the monastery due to its uniqueness. It was built in the 1650s and the St Sergius of Radonezh’s Church was opened on the middle tier in the mid-17th century, although it was originally dedicated to the Trinity. The belfry's 35-tonne Great Bladgovestny Bell fell in 1941 and was only restored and returned in 2003. Attached to the belfry is a large refectory and the Transfiguration Church, both of which were built on the orders of Tsar Alexis in the 1650s.  

To the left of the belfry is another, smaller, refectory which is attached to the Trinity Gate-Church, which was also constructed in the 1650s on the orders of Tsar Alexis who made it his own family church. The church is elaborately decorated with colourful trims and underneath the archway is a beautiful 19th century fresco.

Nativity of Virgin Mary Cathedral

The Nativity of Virgin Mary Cathedral is the oldest building in the monastery and among the oldest buildings in the Moscow Region. It was built between 1404 and 1405 during the lifetime of St Sabbas and using the funds of Prince Yury of Zvenigorod. The white-stone cathedral is a standard four-pillar design with a single golden dome. After the death of St Sabbas he was interred in the cathedral and a new altar dedicated to him was added.

Under the reign of Tsar Alexis the cathedral was decorated with frescoes by Stepan Ryazanets, some of which remain today. Tsar Alexis also presented the cathedral with a five-tier iconostasis, the top row of icons have been preserved.

Tsaritsa's Chambers

The Nativity of Virgin Mary Cathedral is located between the Tsaritsa's Chambers of the left and the Palace of Tsar Alexis on the right. The Tsaritsa's Chambers were built in the mid-17th century for the wife of Tsar Alexey - Tsaritsa Maria Ilinichna Miloskavskaya. The design of the building is influenced by the ancient Russian architectural style. Is prettier than the Tsar's chambers opposite, being red in colour with elaborately decorated window frames and entrance.

At present the Tsaritsa's Chambers houses the Zvenigorod Historical, Architectural and Art Museum. Among its displays is an accurate recreation of the interior of a noble lady's chambers including furniture, decorations and a decorated tiled oven, and an exhibition on the history of Zvenigorod and the monastery.

Palace of Tsar Alexis

The Palace of Tsar Alexis was built in the 1650s and is now one of the best surviving examples of non-religious architecture of that era. It was built especially for Tsar Alexis who often visited the monastery on religious pilgrimages. Its most striking feature is its pretty row of nine chimney spouts which resemble towers.

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Gagarin Cup Preview: Atlant vs. Salavat Yulaev

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Gagarin cup (khl) finals:  atlant moscow oblast vs. salavat yulaev ufa.

Much like the Elitserien Finals, we have a bit of an offense vs. defense match-up in this league Final.  While Ufa let their star top line of Alexander Radulov, Patrick Thoresen and Igor Grigorenko loose on the KHL's Western Conference, Mytischi played a more conservative style, relying on veterans such as former NHLers Jan Bulis, Oleg Petrov, and Jaroslav Obsut.  Just reaching the Finals is a testament to Atlant's disciplined style of play, as they had to knock off much more high profile teams from Yaroslavl and St. Petersburg to do so.  But while they did finish 8th in the league in points, they haven't seen the likes of Ufa, who finished 2nd. 

This series will be a challenge for the underdog, because unlike some of the other KHL teams, Ufa's top players are generally younger and in their prime.  Only Proshkin amongst regular blueliners is over 30, with the work being shared by Kirill Koltsov (28), Andrei Kuteikin (26), Miroslav Blatak (28), Maxim Kondratiev (28) and Dmitri Kalinin (30).  Oleg Tverdovsky hasn't played a lot in the playoffs to date.  Up front, while led by a fairly young top line (24-27), Ufa does have a lot of veterans in support roles:  Vyacheslav Kozlov , Viktor Kozlov , Vladimir Antipov, Sergei Zinovyev and Petr Schastlivy are all over 30.  In fact, the names of all their forwards are familiar to international and NHL fans:  Robert Nilsson , Alexander Svitov, Oleg Saprykin and Jakub Klepis round out the group, all former NHL players.

For Atlant, their veteran roster, with only one of their top six D under the age of 30 (and no top forwards under 30, either), this might be their one shot at a championship.  The team has never won either a Russian Superleague title or the Gagarin Cup, and for players like former NHLer Oleg Petrov, this is probably the last shot at the KHL's top prize.  The team got three extra days rest by winning their Conference Final in six games, and they probably needed to use it.  Atlant does have younger regulars on their roster, but they generally only play a few shifts per game, if that. 

The low event style of game for Atlant probably suits them well, but I don't know how they can manage to keep up against Ufa's speed, skill, and depth.  There is no advantage to be seen in goal, with Erik Ersberg and Konstantin Barulin posting almost identical numbers, and even in terms of recent playoff experience Ufa has them beat.  Luckily for Atlant, Ufa isn't that far away from the Moscow region, so travel shouldn't play a major role. 

I'm predicting that Ufa, winners of the last Superleague title back in 2008, will become the second team to win the Gagarin Cup, and will prevail in five games.  They have a seriously well built team that would honestly compete in the NHL.  They represent the potential of the league, while Atlant represents closer to the reality, as a team full of players who played themselves out of the NHL. 

• Atlant @ Ufa, Friday Apr 8 (3:00 PM CET/10:00 PM EST)
• Atlant @ Ufa, Sunday Apr 10 (1:00 PM CET/8:00 AM EST)
• Ufa @ Atlant, Tuesday Apr 12 (5:30 PM CET/12:30 PM EST)
• Ufa @ Atlant, Thursday Apr 14 (5:30 PM CET/12:30 PM EST)

Games 5-7 are as yet unscheduled, but every second day is the KHL standard, so expect Game 5 to be on Saturday, like an early start. 

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Coordinates of elektrostal in degrees and decimal minutes, utm coordinates of elektrostal, geographic coordinate systems.

WGS 84 coordinate reference system is the latest revision of the World Geodetic System, which is used in mapping and navigation, including GPS satellite navigation system (the Global Positioning System).

Geographic coordinates (latitude and longitude) define a position on the Earth’s surface. Coordinates are angular units. The canonical form of latitude and longitude representation uses degrees (°), minutes (′), and seconds (″). GPS systems widely use coordinates in degrees and decimal minutes, or in decimal degrees.

Latitude varies from −90° to 90°. The latitude of the Equator is 0°; the latitude of the South Pole is −90°; the latitude of the North Pole is 90°. Positive latitude values correspond to the geographic locations north of the Equator (abbrev. N). Negative latitude values correspond to the geographic locations south of the Equator (abbrev. S).

Longitude is counted from the prime meridian ( IERS Reference Meridian for WGS 84) and varies from −180° to 180°. Positive longitude values correspond to the geographic locations east of the prime meridian (abbrev. E). Negative longitude values correspond to the geographic locations west of the prime meridian (abbrev. W).

UTM or Universal Transverse Mercator coordinate system divides the Earth’s surface into 60 longitudinal zones. The coordinates of a location within each zone are defined as a planar coordinate pair related to the intersection of the equator and the zone’s central meridian, and measured in meters.

Elevation above sea level is a measure of a geographic location’s height. We are using the global digital elevation model GTOPO30 .

Elektrostal , Moscow Oblast, Russia