With the exception of food, every other major retail business in this country is reporting that their sales are down 25 - 50 % since January. Just look at the gas stations. Gasoline is down to $3.50 and the attendants are sitting on the pumps most of the time sleeping. Go to places like BTC and BEC and the lines are short to none and even the banks are not crowded. Yes the Internet has put a serious dent in retail shopping, from clothing to electronics to automobiles. But the main problems are the cost of living is too high. Persons working full time are barely managing to buy food and pay their mortgage and utilities. Nothing is left. Then too many people have been unemployed and for too long: two, three, four years and even longer. The two thousand workers at Bah Mar are just a small part of the puzzle. A quart of mayonnaise cost almost $6.00, a loaf of bread is $5.00 and a gallon on milk is $9.00. How can the average working Joe or Jean ever afford a new car?

The US policy on this situation would be to return the immigrants to the country from which they entered the United States. Consequently many Haitians are sent back here when Haiti refuses them. It is a (security) risk to have these two Cubans stay here especially if they are not confined but allowed to roam freely among the population with most rights and privileges of a citizen What if Haiti was to start refusing its nationals. Would they be allowed to remain in the country and go free. Houston we do have a problem.

The government claims they snatched Bah Mar from the Izmirilin group and delivered it up to the Chinese in the interest of getting the property open in the quickest possible time. Yet the property sits there like an unopened can of corn beef. And like Izmirilian told the government, the Chinese are not negotiating with potential buyers in good faith or, seemingly, in the interest of getting the property completed and open. So what then is their motive? To keep Bah Mar under their control? At the expense of the entire Bshamian economy, having its credit downgraded even? this what i suggest: Give the Chinese another 90 days to find a buyer. Failing that the property will be returned to Zakis with a three year 'bankruptcy agreement'. Meaning Izmirilian will not be required to make any mortgage payments to China EXIM Bank for three years, which is the time the opening of the project has been stalled. Zarkis will then be given reasonable time to get the project completed and opened say a year, and will not have the Chinese breathing down his neck for another two years. Only the Chinese are benefitting from Bah Mar sitting idle.

Notice here that in an effort to cut costs the government is switching to cheaper priced drugs and generics. The government realizes the need to cut costs. YET they continue to pile on added costs on small and medium businesses in the form of new or increased taxes and added costs for government filing requirements. Labor costs for many labor intensive businesses have increased by 40% due to increased minimum wages and there is also a corresponding 8% increase in national insurance contributions. This is in light of the fact that many retailers are reporting that sales are down 25 - 45% under last year's sales. Business owners do not know how to adjust their prices anymore because the goal posts keep getting shifted and moved. Expect to see many businesses close, if only in faustration, and to cut losses over the next six months. Government seems insensitive or seems to care less that so many businesses have been stripped of their ability to make a profit.

I will guarantee anyone: if there is not a significant turn around in the economy and/ or the government of the Bahamas does not do anything to ease the tax burden on the Bahamian businesses and STOP piling more taxes on them, this country will experience the greatest amount of business failures in its history by June 3016. And government will collapse shortly after that because they will not have enough revenue to function.

A lot of employers will get the shock of their lives when they try to bring their National Insurance payments up to date. Because of the increase of the minimum wage (by 40%). NIB contributions have increased likewise. So a worker who was earning $150.00 a week was paying yearly contributions of $567 give or take (employer and employee combined). Now the contributions for that employee has increased to over $1,000 per year or by 40%. So if an employer has say 20 workers at minimum wage his labor cost and NIB payments has virtually doubled. Where does this additional revenue come from easpcially if the business was barely breaking even before the increases. In light of that many businesses are reporting that February 2016 is the worse one they had (in terms of sales and revenue) since 2008.

Make the two Cubans PM And Minister of Foreign Affairs respectively. Then they can determine their own fate (and ours)

These two again...wait for it...

Someone came on a radio station when the Chinese were constructing the stadium and said the government should never accepted this gift from the Chinese. "It's a curse I tell you." Who is P.A. Strachan?

He is saying it will take almost two years to open and complete a property that, at one point was 97% complete. Watch this man.