In The News

Global Split Over Next IMF Chief

Peggy Hollinger, Barney Jopson, Alan Beattie, Robin Harding May 18, 2011
With 187 member nations and a staff of 2400, the International Monetary Fund promotes cooperation, exchange-rate stability and balanced growth of international trade, particularly during times of economic crisis. The agency of the United Nations has its own charter and finances, according to the IMF website, with members “represented through a quota system broadly based on their relative size in...

Financial Regulation: Facing a Global Challenge

André Lévy-Lang May 13, 2011
Without global interventions, the outcome of the recent global crisis could have been far worse. Finance is an essential tool for unlocking capital, economic development and innovation, and writing for ParisTech Review, André Lévy-Lang outlines features and weaknesses of modern finance and its assessment of risk. Capital requirements since the late 1980s led to incentives for banks to engage in...

Greece Considers Exit From Euro Zone

Christian Reiermann May 10, 2011
Countries immersed in debt squirm under the scrutiny of creditors and angry taxpayers. Spiegel Online reports that Greece, seeking relief, is considering abandoning the euro. The Greek government has denied the report. The story by Christian Reiermann reports that any such relief would be short-lived: Capital markets would sever ties. Banks would go insolvent. EU aid to Greece would stop....

Foreign Dollars for an American Dream

Coeli Carr May 6, 2011
To create jobs, governments typically invest in local businesses. But Ecuador looked beyond its borders and invested in Runa, a small New York–based firm that markets guayusa, a caffeinated drink. The investment tackles numerous policy goals: The drink is made from leaves of holly, native to the Amazon; developing a commercial product could preserve rainforest and aid indigenous communities. Napo...

Advanced Economies: Minutes to Midnight? Part II

Bruce Stokes May 2, 2011
To encourage growth, governments borrowed to finance infrastructure and current expenditures, and anticipated revenues to eventually cover the costs. Low interest rates led to surging debt, investment bubbles and unrealistic growth projections rather than a sustainable economy with jobs and tax revenues. This two-part series analyzes the impending crisis for advanced economies. Europe had hoped...

Advanced Economies: Minutes to Midnight? Part I

David Dapice April 28, 2011
Advanced economies face momentous decisions to sustain their prosperity and lifestyles. In a two-part series, YaleGlobal reviews the challenges faced by the US and the Eurozone. In 1917 the US Congress passed statutory limits, unusual by world standards, for issuing bonds, to avoid separate approval on every issue. The ceiling has been raised many times since to the current limit, $14.294...

Stop This Race to the Bottom on Corporate Tax

Jeffrey Sachs April 1, 2011
With the entry of China and Indian into global markets and greater international opportunities for corporations, the impact of globalization has forced down wages around the world and concentrated wealth in the hands of the rich, suggests Columbia University professor Jeffrey Sachs in an essay for Financial Times. At the same time, the US, the UK and other developed economies are facing gaping...