In The News

Unions Kill Manufacturing? South China Morning Post

Zhou Zin September 16, 2019
Consumers gravitate toward low prices, and companies have sought low cost labor to compete. In the early 20th century, US companies relocated from union-dominated northern states to the South, and since the 1970s, manufacturing shifted toward China and other countries with low wages and standards. The Chinese owner of a car glass factory based in Ohio blames unions for a decline in US...

Financial Times: Vancouver Seizes Chance to Lure Silicon Valley Tech Talent

Leslie Hook February 21, 2017
Vancouver, a beautiful city with mild weather on the Pacific coast, is fast-growing technology hub in need of skilled workers. A US crackdown on immigration has made the job of recruiting skilled immigrant workers from Seattle, San Francisco and Silicon Valley much easier. Companies like Apple, Microsoft, Google and Facebook oppose an executive order banning travelers from seven nations...

Promises Trump Can’t Keep

Nayan Chanda November 28, 2016
US President-elect Donald Trump made big promises on trade and jobs that will be tough to keep without wrecking key industries along with the global economy. Essentially, he suggested that he could restore US manufacturing jobs by blocking new trade deals like the Tans-Pacific Partnership and walking back on old deals like the North Atlantic Free Trade Agreement. The plan has problems. Such trade...

Despite Fears, Mexico's Manufacturing Boom Lifts US Workers

Natalie Kitroeff September 2, 2016
Automation is transforming manufacturing, reducing jobs and need for skills. A Los Angeles Time article describes apprenticeships for young Mexicans working alongside robots in a BMW plant in Mexico. US presidential candidates question the benefits of the North American Free Trade Agreement, but many companies – including those from outside the US – are shifting operations from China to Mexico....

World's Mind Made Up on US Presidential Race

Bruce Stokes August 16, 2016
Managing global security in a tightly interconnected world requires global cooperation. Challenges like the spread of nuclear weapons, climate change or terrorism left unchecked in one place quickly become problems for the rest of the world. Global citizens anticipate US leadership. “Without a vote in the US presidential election, foreigners look on the American electoral process with a mixture...

American Capitalism’s Great Crisis

Rana Foroohar June 8, 2016
Young Americans no longer perceive benefits from capitalism, and such sentiments will influence the outcome of the US presidential election. The system of US market capitalism is broken, explains Rana Foroohar, author and Time magazine’s assistant managing editor for economics and business. Only about 15 percent of wealth from individual and corporate savings is invested in businesses for adding...

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...