America’s Food Inequality, IMF Safety Net, U.K. Debt: Eco Day

(Bloomberg) -- Happy Friday, Americas. Here’s the latest news and analysis from Bloomberg Economics to help get you through to the weekend:

• Access to food has been unequal in America long before the onset of the coronavirus. But the pandemic has deepened the problem, with images of snaking lines at food banks bringing the harsh reality to light
• Raphael Bostic, the first Black Fed president in the central bank’s 106-year history, has rarely talked about race in the three years he’s run the Atlanta Fed. But recent events changed that. He says policy makers must speak out against racism in an economic crisis that disproportionately hurts minorities and the poor
• The International Monetary Fund has extended its safety net under some of Latin America’s biggest economies as the global pandemic hits the region particularly hard
• U.K. government debt rose above 100% of gross domestic product in May for the first time since 1963, reflecting a precipitous drop in economic output and a surge in spending. Meanwhile, the central bank is increasingly worried that British job losses will turn out worse than expected and threaten the recovery
• European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde warned national leaders that the recent calm in financial markets is in part because investors have priced in action from governments. German Chancellor Angela Merkel also cautioned that the European Union is facing its deepest recession since World War II
• There’s a new shape in the lexicon economists use to describe the economic recovery from coronavirus: Bird wing
• Japan’s key inflation gauge continued to fall in May as coronavirus shutdowns froze economic activity and collapsing oil prices stoked concern over the return of deflation
• For emerging markets, the virus recession starts with a pandemic most are ill-equipped to deal with, then layers on the worst elements of the 2008 global demand shock, the 2014 collapse in commodity prices, and the 2018 capital flight episode. Read more in the latest research by Bloomberg Economics

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