In The News

Seeds of a Modern Economic Empire

Nayan Chanda November 12, 2014
China is the world’s second largest economic power but lacks comparable voting power in the International Monetary Fund, which bases quotas mostly on GDP but also on openness, economic variability and international reserves. So China is throwing support behind another institution: The Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, or AIIB, could “place China at the hub of a gigantic trade and economic web...

Debate Rages on Quantitative Easing’s Effect on Inequality

Chris Giles October 28, 2014
Since the global debt crisis of 2008, central banks in the US, Japan and the UK have embraced policies of quantitative easing, designed to expand currency supplies and keep interest rates low to encourage economic and job growth. But conservatives in the US and liberals in the UK claim the policies have led to rising income inequality for the advanced economies, reports Chris Giles for Financial...

Currency Wars Evolve With Goal of Avoiding Deflation

David Goodman, Lucy Meakin and Ye Xie October 22, 2014
Countries once worried about inflation or rising prices now fret about deflation and adjust currencies accordingly, reducing costs of their exports relative to other economies. Trouble is, many nations are jumping in to this game, leading to stagnant wages and job growth. Global consumers anticipate price declines and delay spending. “Brazil Finance Minister Guido Mantega popularized the term ‘...

Is the United States In or Out on Globalization?

Edward J. Reilly August 28, 2014
US political leaders are fretting about the need for tax reform as US companies purchase partners in tax-friendly countries, relocating their headquarters and tax base. The latest example is Burger King’s proposal to purchase Tim Hortons restaurant chain, based in Canada. The United States may be ambivalent on globalization, but there is no turning back, argues strategic communications consultant...

Long-Term Answer to Border Crises: Empower Women

Marisol Ruiz August 19, 2014
Policy proposals to end the flow of children streaming across the southern border of the United States too often focus on enforcement, including increased military presence along the border or warehouse-like detention centers in Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras – the three nations that so many try to flee. Such proposals miss the major challenge behind many border crises, that is, minimal...

Theorist Eric Maskin: Globalization Is Increasing Inequality

July 15, 2014
Waves of trade and globalization can lift average incomes and reduce inequality, but that requires intervention to prevent rewards landing in only a few hands. Nobel Laureate Eric Maskin of Harvard University points to two types of inequality for World Bank News: In the more tolerable case, only select industries and their workers benefit from increased demand, and “In the ‘worse’ version, the...

Inequality and the Nature of Capital: A Reminder

Chandran Nair June 17, 2014
Complaints about inequality have taken the West by storm, and that accounts for the success of the book “Capital in the Twenty-First Century” by economist Thomas Piketty. Inequality is not a new topic for developing nations, notes author Chandran Nair. “Piketty, like every other economist, seeks to explain the world with reference to economic capital alone while ignoring the mother of all...