In The News

US Adds China’s Internet Controls to List of Trade Barriers

Paul Mozur April 8, 2016
The internet represents 6 percent of the US GDP, contributing to economic growth and jobs, more so than the construction or food-service sectors, reports a 2015 study for the Internet Association. Previous studies by McKinsey Global Institute suggest that most economic benefit, 75 percent, goes to companies in traditional industries. Such is the rationale for the Obama administration to add China...

Economic Ramifications of Remittances-for-Border Wall Proposal

Susanna Kim April 5, 2016
A US presidential candidate has proposed blocking workers from sending remittances to their families and canceling visas to force Mexico to build a wall along the shared border. Policy analysts quickly responded that a plan to block such money transfers would harm both economies and may violate laws. Aaron Klein, Brookings Institution fellow, in a report by Susanna Kim for ABC News, explained...

Debunking America’s Populist Narrative

J. Bradford DeLong April 5, 2016
As US voters worry stagnant wages, the availability of good jobs, and the nation’s ability to compete, economist J. Bradford DeLong suggests that candidates and voters may be going after the wrong targets. “The reason that incomes have stagnated is that American politicians have failed to implement policies to manage globalization’s effects,” he writes for Project Syndicate. US candidates have...

Nafta May Have Saved Many Autoworkers’ Jobs

Eduardo Porter March 30, 2016
The North American Free Trade Agreement, in effect for more than two decades, likely saved the US auto industry. “Even in the narrowest sense – to protect jobs in car assembly plants – a wall of tariffs against America’s southern neighbor would probably do more harm than good,” suggests Eduardo Porter for the New York Times based on research by Gordon Hanson, an economist at the University of...

The State of the United States

Richard N. Haass March 28, 2016
The mood of US electorate during the presidential primary season is described as anxious and angry over outsourcing and trade deals, a decline in good jobs, stagnant wages, inequality and polarized politics that prevents good governance. News media tend to focus on negative reports, and the members of public rely on programs and publications that reinforce opinions already held. “An America that...

Washington’s New Friends in Latin America

Patricio Navia March 24, 2016
Barack Obama is taking steps to improve relations with neighbors as the first sitting US president to travel to Cuba since Calvin Coolidge in 1928. “Obama’s visit to Cuba and Argentina this week underlines the United States government’s effort to make new friends and rebuild old relationships in Latin America,” writes Patricio Navia for the Buenos Aires Herald, adding that “as the US did not...

International Students Find Roles in US Presidential Campaign

Paul Elish and Susan Froetschel March 22, 2016
The percentage of international students enrolled at US colleges and universities has climbed over the past five years, due to rising applications from overseas and declining enrollment by US students. College administrators encourage civic engagement for all students, and international students are following the US presidential race. “The election will determine the roles for foreign nationals...