In The News

Will Services Provide Our Salvation?

Hamish McRae February 18, 2009
Some industries center on necessities and conventional wisdom might suggest that those companies might be less devastated by economic crisis. Even as auto manufacturers lay off workers, companies like Domino’s Pizza hire extra employees. Unfortunately, many of the new service jobs pay less than the old manufacturing positions, explains Hamish McRae in a column for the Independent, adding there is...

Hijacked Supertanker Underlines Our Energy Vulnerability

Michael G. Frodl February 17, 2009
Analysts once suggested that supertankers, a challenge to control, could not be taken by pirates. But pirates from desperate Somalia demonstrated that such pronouncements become just another challenge to be met, by managing to hijack a Saudi supertanker carrying 2 million barrels of crude oil. “Somalis turned the lack of an effective coast guard and police to their advantage to hijack ships and...

The Reverse Swing

Nayan Chanda February 16, 2009
Migration is a major force of globalization: Workers on the move seek opportunity and alleviate poverty in the process of dispersing and collecting new ideas. A harsh global economic recession has reduced opportunities for foreign and domestic labor alike, stirred protectionist instincts and prompted reverse migration around the globe. The most immediate impact, explains YaleGlobal editor Nayan...

For Russia's Migrants, Economic Despair Douses Flickers of Hope

Michael Schwirtz February 16, 2009
Russia has the second largest immigrant population the world, after the US, once inviting workers from former Soviet republics to construct luxury hotels, office buildings and homes amid a decade-long oil boom. A drop in world oil prices hit the emerging economy of Russia, striking its migrant workers particularly hard. Employers withhold wages, and the government sets quotas on jobs for...

Union in Crisis

Jonathan Fenby February 16, 2009
Europeans shrugged about a credit crisis in 2008, chalking it up to a lavish American lifestyle, dependent on debt, and assumed they were immune. But national economies are tightly connected, particularly those of the European Union, and crisis spread quickly. Compounding the financial crisis is seething anger over closed factories, long unemployment lines, banks that lost rather than protected...

Testing Times: Collapse of European Industry Worse than Expected

February 13, 2009
An onslaught of bad news continues to hit Europe, with protests about economic troubles on the rise. Some European leaders, like French President Nicolas Sarkozy, resort to nationalist and protectionist approaches. Meanwhile, the European Union’s current president, Czech Republic Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek, stresses the need for “adherence to the rules,”including continued trade among the EU...

Green Taxes Would Be Good for British Jobs

Irwin Stelzer February 13, 2009
Consumers don't like paying taxes, but pricing energy in a way that encourages conservation could help the British economy in the long run. The global economy depends on fossil fuels, but countries that lack energy often don't agree with policies of countries that control supplies. Subsidizing fossil fuels delays the development of alternatives. “All of this makes it even more urgent...