thing to get used to heavier down pause travelers on the metro had to contend with flooded stations. material phones reported that one months worth of rain fell in the space of an hour of scotch, the back window and the sky also opened in london with parts of the u. k. capital experiencing flush flooding. thunderstorms are expected in england and wales and with the dry soil, almost impenetrable. in areas people are being want to watch out for further flooding. the d baba al jazeera ah, this is al jazeera, these, you top stories. 3 major u. s. pharmacy chains have been ordered to pay $650000000.00 to to counties in the state of ohio. a court found pharmacies run by c vs walmart. walgreens. help crazy public nissans by every supplying addictive pain pills. austin, jordan is,

has more the 3 retailers while we're sued by the counties of our lake and trumbull, that's east of our co of cleveland, the largest city in ohio. and a jury back in november are almost 9 months ago, found the 3 retailers guilty of basically dumping opioid medicines in those 2 counties. i came out during the trial that between 20122016, some 1400000000 pills were sold through those 3 retailers. that's $400.00 pills per person. israel and tack here, restoring full diplomatic ties on to years of strain relations and countries will be re appointing ambassadors at sac. his foreign minister said it would not abandon its support. palestinians. the un human rights chief says it's not safe. the hundreds of thousands of her anger refugees to return to myanmar and shall bash les

has been missing were hanging bangladesh for the government has been growing impatient about hosting refugees. as, as a people large in tina are demonstrating against the rising cost of living trade unions of demanding high wages as well as unemployment and pulpits. he benefits. argentina is one of the world's highest inflation rates. several people have been killed in a powerful explosion at a sunny mosque in northern couple blast happened during the evening. prayers on wednesday. police haven't confirmed the number of casualties, but say that the mom of the mosque was among those killed. kenny as president elect to william brito, has held a media conference calling for unity following this week. selection results kenny's electoral commission gave rito 50.4 percent of the vote, but his opponent ronald dingo is disputing the outcome saying he will challenge it in court. those a headlights, these continues and now to say are up to counting the cost the world companies

coming to counter in just 3 months. as the main event gets closer, we hear every step of the way hello. i'm janet ezra with updates from teams and plans for growth seems can express some strong support here in customer with the spotlight. no one, europe can france claim back to about world cup victory or will portugal christiana, rinaldo finally get his had a trophy to well, can't count on al jazeera. ah, i hello there, i am the start the at hey, and this is counting the cost on al jazeera. you are look at the wild a business and economics this week. oil and gas majors are raking in their outings on the backs of the poorest. people says that the united nations, it's urging

a windfall tax on their profits to support households and the most vulnerable will governments. he'd the call also this week, the races on for semi conductance and the u. s. and spending billions of dollars to boost domestic manufacturing. well, keeping an eye on china. can america rival asians, marcus plus the sales of video game giants have dropped in the 2nd quarter of this year. all game is spending less time playing and is it's game over for the pandemic . boom. ah. now the new study found the oil and gas industry has produced almost $3000000000.00 a day and profits the last 50 years. it's now caching and even more money as the war and ukraine has driven up energy prices. do. and secretary general has criticized these sky high earnings as grotesque, agreed at a time when millions of people around the world are feeling in a pinch of the rising cost of living. and tony gutierrez is urged governments to

tax the profits of fossil fuel giants to help those in need. it's use immortal for oil and gas companies to be making records profits from these energy crisis on the beck of the buddhist people in the communities. and that the massive cost to the climates, the combined profits of the largest energy companies in the 1st quarter of these year, are close to $100000000000.00 us dollars. i urge all governments to tax these excessive profits and use the funds to support the most vulnerable people through these difficult times. well that her call comes as energy giant recorded i was offering figures for the 2nd quarter of the m. b, p reported a profitable missed $9000000000.00. that's the biggest win for 14 years. american energy, exxon mobil pocket, it around $18000000000.00. the net income is the company's largest ever quarterly profit. europe largest, well company show has broken the record for

a 2nd quarter in a row with profit of more than $11000000000.00. those 3 major companies put together with the us from chevron and francis. total energy is made $55000000000.00 this past quarter. and it's not just oil and gas blend call the wild largest coal ship are also made record profits and plans to pay an additional $4500000000.00 and dividends and buybacks to shareholders out while companies are reaping the benefits households are struggling to pay high energy bills, food prices of also such they've risen around 50 percent since 2019. the u. n says more than 50000000 people across 45 countries are now on the brink of famine. well joining us now from london as adi. i'm sure of it. she is a senior research fellow, the oxford institute for energy studies, and also author of the book, trading and price discovery for crude oils. thanks so much for joining us on counting the cost audio cell by asking you what you make as good terrorist a suggestion because i know many economists would argue that taxing profits at

a time the short supply could backfire in the long term. it would definitely back fire. i think taxing profits is a terrible idea on a number of levels. the 1st reason why it's a bad idea is that it essentially, it basically penalizes the companies that are actually supposed to be investing into energy. exactly at the time when we need it most. secondly, also it, it sort of picks and chooses winners. why are we, why are we taxing energy companies? a lot of other companies had win win for profits as well. why not tax, google and facebook? why not tax law law firms, lot of companies that it's time to time and windfall profits for whatever reasons. and those profits are usually an incentive for them to actually invest into the resources. ready that are badly needed, so if we tax them, we're going going to get those resources in the long run. well, we have a number of case studies here. the u. k. in india for instance,

have impose these windfall taxes. what do you make of their success? you know, it's too early to say, we've only just had them. in fact, from the energy point or industry point of view, probably that one have a terribly big negative effect. it will have a negative effect, but not, not particularly big because it happened at the time where we have univision, russian invasion on ukraine, and a lot of energy companies basically managed to make quite a bit of money out of out of their resources that they're having the north fee or elsewhere in terms of oil and gas production. but we are really not passing the right message. asia is, i'll give you an example. let's say century car is producing a lot of gas in the u. k. having a when full tax is just going to pot, send a message to everyone. well, if you invest more into the u. k, and you can gas product gas production, which we need really, really badly. well,

and you make money, we're going to tax you. the same thing applies to e d, f, for example e d f is making a lot of money out of their nuclear power plants because the, as we know, just the prices are quite high. well, now producing clean electricity, green electricity, nuclear, christie, and why should they be touched? i mean, basically the messages, well don't invest into these green resources because you're, we're going to tax you as soon as you make some money. well, i notice that the u. s. s. are avoided attacks like this, but i believe the white house hasn't actually rule that out. now, given that biden has had such stern words, well, companies and refiners, what do you make of, of the state of play there now? well, the united states and obviously is lot more market oriented. and i think also in mind of the consumers, it's a lot easier to do these taxes in, in europe, and the u. k. where we are used to having a 90 state in the united states. it's

a lot less so, so, you know, i think it's very important to go to the consumer and actually explain that gas prices are international prices. oil prices are international prices, gas prices went up tenfold. so when something goes out, tenfold will surely is going to be at home. and well, just like the price of coffee, you know, there's not much you can, you can government can do about the prices that you pick out meant and all that governments can do. and should be doing is helping those really ah, shit, badly who i need. and they should be given cash, not, not subsidies. because what happens is, as you said, for example, when you subsidize gas prices, if they are right now in the u. k. and there's a lot of talk about price raises, terrible, terrible idea. come back to that in a 2nd. what happens? you actually subsidizing the rich more than anyone else. people in, in, in big mansions are people driving because and so on. so you're suggesting public

cash transfers and to the most vulnerable absolutely. give those in need cash, giving us a subsidizing or, or freezing even because there was some cause in some quarters. leave them at parties suggested that freezes terrible idea. 19 seventies lessons from 19 seventies. we haven't learn nixon administration impulse rise freezes, and what happened there will shortages of, of energy. what happens is that if, if the energy companies have to pay this price and give them that price, they'll say, well, we're not going to invest any more in order to do this because we're losing money. you have a really good case in france, e d f now being are being a nationalized. why? because that the government basically are imposed very harsh. are price caps on, on, on energy and, and companies in germany. the other one unit per ah, we're basically went bankrupt. then when the government's thing, they have

a free lunch, then eventually in the long run, will they end up doing is actually, you know, nationalizing these companies and spending billions and billions of dollars or any you suggested that tax as like the win for tax. i've been talking about discourage investment, said n is all of this, then really just part of the pain that we need to go through in order to get to a green transition. absolutely, well, you know, the, all those who are calling for her were energy subsidies, for example, gas to have to remember, look at outside. i mean, we, you know, we have climate change that happening now. it's not happening in future and you want to subsidize. also fuels is that will be one to do. no, god, no, we shouldn't be doing that. we, what we do need to do is help. and, and the reason growing are a fraction of the population that need help, that helps should be given in terms of cash to those in need. every one else should pay the full price or the fossil fuels. and that would also be an incentive to move

much quicker to on shore when, for example, offshore wind and other green sources of energy that we need really, really badly. and we need them now rather than pay, give money to put him very anxious gone id. i'm sure that the senior research fellow at the oxford institute energy studies, thanks so much for sharing results from counting cost. you're welcome. thank you. now thailand, like many countries, is facing shop increases in the cost of food and fuel. and central bank is following in the steps of many others hiking rates to try to tame inflation. but in a society where the gap between rich and poor is one of the was in the wild type, say the government's efforts will bring little relief. tony chang reports nestled between embassies and gleaming high rises in the center of thank cox, a community on the other side of the wealth again and the shadow of a new apartment complex when he still lives with her 3 children. he says her income

barely covers the family cost full repayments of loans. she's been forced to take the money. i want to have a better life, but i can't. i just have to accept my fate because i was born in this condition and i have to take what is available. i just spend my life day to day trying to get enough to eat and it's not. so during the pandemic, many people lost jobs and incomes dropped. and now the cost of living is rising sharply. they're not getting any help that a man, man from nailer hole, we barely get any help from the government. we don't get anything. they only get help from foundations and cherishes, so we reach out to them. thailand's often cited as a success story when it comes to reducing poverty, but the wealth hair has not been evenly distributed. and in this credit suisse global wealth reported 2018 tyler was listed as one of the most unequal places in the world. in the years since then, life has been even harder for lower income communities. by the side of

a busy expressway, some of the most vulnerable struggling to survive. this is a community for the deaf and hard of hearing, often cast out by their families. form takes us under the bridge where she, her husband and several other families have made homes from refuse and scrap. she explains their disability allowance of $20.00 a month. barely lasts a few days. the strain is enormous. they trying to salvage what they can from the waist. others throw away with the roar of the traffic overhead. life goes on while their complaints going on. since tony chang al jazeera banker, i while fossil fuels power, the globe, semi conductors drive the digital economy, the tiny computer chips, so seen as the oil of the 21st century. they run everything from smartphones to

missile defense systems. after a global shortage hit hard, many countries are racing to secure uninterrupted supplies. now, among them is the united states, which is just approved a multi $1000000000.00 bill to boost domestic production. the bipartisan bill includes more than $52000000000.00 and subsidies. the u. s. companies producing computer chips as well as billions one tax credits the in charge investment and research in the industry. the u. s. falls behind asia and ship manufacturing with a global share of at least 10 percent compared to almost 40 percent just a few decades ago. but it does lead in cutting edge chip design. well, that's what president joe biden had to say when he signed that bill and law. it's crystal clear. we need the semiconductor not only for those javelle and missiles, but also for weapons. this is the future that are going to be even more reliant on advanced chips. unfortunately, we produce 0 present. these advanced chips now in china is trying to move away ahead of us, the manufacturer,

the sophisticated chips as well. it's no wonder the chinese communist party actively lobbied us business against this bill. the united states must lead the world the production of these advanced ships. this law will do exactly that on china has criticized that bill as a threat to trade and an attack on chinese businesses. the nation imports more than $300000000000.00 worth of semiconductors annually, but aims to produce 70 percent of its own ships by 2025. around 90 percent of the world's most advanced chips though are made in taiwan. the rest come from south korea. european legislatures also plan multi $1000000000.00 investments in the industry over the coming years. plan joining us now from singapore as alex capri. he is a research fellow at the hendrick foundation and also a lecture at the national university and singapore business school. and alex and we thing the emergence of a new semi conductor cold war here. what we're seeing is a re shuffling a restructuring, a paradigm shift if you will,

around global value chains, global supply chains when it comes to strategic goods. and at the top of that list are semiconductors. how much then do you think this bill will actually help the u. s. in particular, try to regain its leading role and in semiconductor production. it's important to, to step back and take a look at the state of the semiconductor industry as a whole. so u. s. companies still dominate the technology, they still dominate the i p, the manufacturing equipment, the tooling. but what has happened over the last 30 years is us, chip makers have offshored manufacturing. so we have these pure play type scenarios where a company like ts m, c and taiwan. as a contract manufacturer is manufacturing on behalf of it. it's making the chips for big companies like call com, for example. and so what the u. s. wants to do now, given this strategic rivalry with china,

given the sensitivity of global supply chains because of the pandemic and so forth . is it wants to bring that manufacturing back to the united states and that's what the chips act is all about. i see that the companies that would benefit from this bill there then actually not allowed to increase their production, particularly advanced chips in china. just how attractive is that from the big hitters. well is, this is been the game that the semiconductor companies have been playing in china a so called in china for china strategy. and that is, continue to sell mature older generation technology in china in the chinese market, make a lot of money, use that money and wow, that back into innovation and research. but don't sell because of export controls. and sanctions, for example, don't sell leading edge technology to the chinese. now what's going to probably happen in the coming months and years is the u. s. is going to crack down and

choke off even that older mature technology that's going into china and that is fueling china's growth in the trailing edge section of semiconductors. and that means that we're going to see further bifurcation in the markets. we're going to see further decoupling if you will, and it's going to be more difficult for china to try and become self sufficient when it comes to semiconductors. when you've been talking about this strategic rivalry, and as you alluded to, the industry leader we're talking about here is taiwanese, do you think that the tensions we've seen escalate recently or the taiwan could that affects the supply chain? putting too much dependence on one country and this is taiwan. this is for manufacturing. again, we have to be very clear. we're talking about manufacturing and ships ah, in, in particular. so clearly the move, not just in the united states, but in europe, in japan, in south korea,

is all about diversifying and avoiding a single source supply chain situation. ah, with a single point of failure, for example, which would be taiwan. so we're going to see how we're going to see re shoring are all over the world, and it's also going to involve taiwanese company. so t s m c is investing in the united states. it's investing in europe. we could see india emerging to a certain extent as a place where that, you know, the big taiwanese companies and others will invest. well, let me ask you then about the rare earths shortage that we've seen around the world . now given that china's been very focused on the supply and those materials that you need to produce semiconductors. and what does that mean for other countries like the u. s. or indian? well, it's part of the decoupling process that we're seeing and we have the united states, australia, canada, for example, re opening. for example, the, the mountain pass mine in california,

which used to be the world's largest extractor and processor of rare earth before that was all offshore to china. so in this decoupling process from china in this re shoring ring fencing process that we're seeing, we're going to see our friend shoring. in other words, we're going to see strategic partners such as the united states, u. k. japan, australia working together to, to re open and to and to reassure these supply chains. and that's exactly what's happening with rarer as well. so dear then theme broader political implications for the future of semiconductors. here, a bifurcated wild then. absolutely. so, you know, a semiconductor is not just a hyper strategic good for weaponry. and for sophisticated electronics, it is a public good. it is every bit as important to a nation as energy, water or food security. so we're going to see a increased emphasis on self reliance,

or at least on strategic alliances around supply chains involving semiconductors. alex capri, there from the henry foundation, speaking customer, think of 4, thanks so much for your time and sharing. your thoughts with us or gaming has outgrown the earnings of some of the biggest entertainment companies in the past decade, becoming even bigger than movies. and the music industry combined pandemic locked downs and stay home restrictions. so a growth and uses as more people reached for their consoles. last year, the industry wrapped up almost $180000000000.00 in revenue. but with holiday travel taken off again. the gaming industry has taken a hit video game, johns 15 millions of dollars of losses and revenue and recent weeks. in the 3 months that ended in june, microsoft, sony and nintendo each reported a fall in sales. american spent more than $12000000000.00 on games and the 2nd quarter according to market research from n p d, that's down 13 percent year on year china video game revenues in the 1st half of

2022 fell for the 1st time since days became available and 2008. joining us now from london is really led on better. he is a professor of economic sociology and digital social research at the oxford internet institute. that's part of the university of oxford. so really what's gone wrong for video game companies? i imagine the semiconductor shortage we've just been talking about hasn't helped diva. that's right. so 11 problem has been the supply chain crisis because of manufacturers are not getting their all their products from the consumers. but also the war rush us innovation of ukraine has led some game publishers to pull out from russia. and this is obviously had a negative impact on their revenues. and then a further reason is apple has since last year started limiting the data, it gives out to app developers on, on players. and this has led to basically

a decrease in revenues from ad supported games, as well as an increase in acquisition costs for game publishers because advertising is now less targeted. and it's also further sort of entrenched the centrality of apple's own app store as a gateway between app developers and consumers. and all of these things are eating a little bit into the game industries. revenues, how much of a difference as a panoramic made? because intuitively you kind of think everyone stuck at home. surely some of them are playing video games. yes. so actually during 20202021. the games industry grew a lot. so there was something like a 25 percent spurt in the size of the market. this is massive growth. and so if there is a little bit of a correction now that's almost to be expected as people are, are going out again and may be playing some of those games that they bought during

the lockdown. do you think that we could potentially see an uptick in the industry when people have gotten bored of going out and want to be back at home? yes, certainly the, the industry overall looks looks very healthy. so i don't think game playing or the games industry is going anywhere and suddenly there, i would expect them to find new sources of growth in due course. we'll speaking of sources of birth, i think chinese game is in particular are hitting the polar button. why is that? obviously one thing in china is that the government last year started massive crackdowns on the games industry. so limiting the amount of time the miners are permitted to spend on games, as well as suspending new licenses for 4 games publishes and publishes in china, need a license to publish any game. and the regulator has as suspended and still to some extent is suspending and new licenses. and this has had

a big impact on chinese publishers ability to introduce new titles to the market. and this is obviously having an impact on, on their revenues as well. so that would be certainly one reason. well, let me ask you then broadly about the future of the industry. i think companies like netflix, for instance, are also now investing in video games. where do you see all of this going well for netflix, the way their executives speak about it? it sounds like it's still a bit of an experiment. they're trying to figure out what, what to do with games. but if you, if you look at what tv shows they have some, their shows were actually based on games already before netflix started been turning some shows into games. and so, turning media franchises into these multi media franchises is of course a very old strategy in the media business, and these different media can support each other. so suddenly i would expect to,

to continue to see that where games are not just games, that they are also films. they're also animations. they're also merchandise and other things as we're talking about the future. i think also in the games industry as well as everywhere in the tech industry, the power and sensuality of these tech giants like apple and google and microsoft. i think it's going to be, it's going to continue to be an increasing trend and even more investment despite the industry downtown at the moment. the lead on that from the oxford internet institute. thanks for joining us on counting the cost. thank you very much. well, that's our show for this week. do you get in touch with us by treating me out and installs the k and do use the hash tag h t t c. when you do or talk with an email, counting the cost at al serra dot net is our address. there is also move you online at al serra dot com slash ctc. that'll take you straight to the page,

which has individual report links and tie episodes for you to catch up on. that's it for this edition of counting the cost. i'm to start the attend from the whole team here. thanks for joining us. the news on al jazeera is the does the count on the people will come 2022 approaches. every continent is turning its eyes to keta. we have a feeling great to sporting events in the world won't be the only thing capturing everyone's attention beyond football. immerse yourself in internationally renowned entertainment. art of culture catcher has everything you'd want in the destination . in fact, it's the obvious choice for the 5th. a woke up 2022. so why go anywhere else? our reporters retreat in a brutal civil war. if the commodore hadn't been there, the israel invasion would not have been so well reported. the commodore had become

journalistic center. you could be in the safe enclave and then you went out into civil war. i started off leaving this while the grand suite at the commodore hotel . the next room i was in was underground, the tiny prison. so as a hostage, a route the commodore war hotels on al jazeera, ah 3 major u. s. pharmacy chains that order to pay $650000000.00 in damages to 2 counties in ohio, or to low seats over opioid distribution. ah, i money inside the salad is there a life there are coming up taking israel resume relations after you.