Apart from the problems stemming from the 2008 financial crisis, the U.S. economy is now also being weighed down by little monopolies, or quasi-monopolies, which reduce economic efficiency, slow economic growth, and reduce the average income of every U.S. household. Can the U.S. government once again unleash the “curse” of competition on businesses, in order to revitalise the economy?
Several major Chinese banks have pulled from annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank to be held in Tokyo next week, claimed a report by the Wall Street Journal on Tuesday, with the territorial dispute between China and Japan now threatening to spill onto the global arena.
The head of an Italian tax collection agency, along with four other employees, have been arrested for using nearly 100 million euros ($129.35 million) of taxpayers’ money to organise private parties and other extravagant luxuries, reported Reuters on Wednesday.
The International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) Chief Economist Oliver Blanchard has warned that the fiscal problems in the U.S. stemming from the 2008 Financial Crisis remains unresolved till today; and said that it will take “at least a decade” for the global economy to recover from the crisis.
European Union nations may have to spend up to 25 billion euros upgrading their nuclear reactors to meet new safety standards imposed after the Fukushima disaster, said a report by Bloomberg on Wednesday, with 134 reactors presently in operation across the region.
The global economy must create an additional 600 million new jobs between 2005 and 2020 in order to absorb a growing number of youth – mainly from Africa and Asia – entering the work force, said the World Bank in its latest report on Monday.
According to the World Development Report 2013 , around 200 million people around the world are now unemployed – of which 40 percent are under the age of 25.
Chinese and Indian consumers are expected to spend nearly $64 trillion between 2010 and 2020, said a new study by global research and advisory firm Boston Consulting Group (BCG) on Tuesday, urging Western companies to in order to “capitalise on this opportunity.”
The need to address America’s fiscal situation has just been magnified by a warning from Moody’s that the US could lose its top credit rating if Congress fails to make progress on medium-term fiscal reforms. But why didn’t the imposition of a “fiscal cliff” in 2011 succeed in focusing US politicians’ minds?
NEWPORT BEACH – It sounded like a really clever idea: Use a very public and sizeable threat to get bickering politicians to collaborate and compromise. Well, it has not worked so far, and the already-sizeable stakes just got bigger.
The 2008 Financial Crisis will cost an estimated $15 trillion in losses to the global economy through to 2018, said Standard & Poor’s former chief credit officer Mark Adelson to the Wall Street Journal on Monday, who also blamed high leverage and strong risk appetites among the major financial firms as the “immediate causes of the crisis”.
According to a report by the OECD, the U.S. spends more on healthcare than any other country in the world. Yet the country also only has the eighth-lowest life expectancy in the OECD, while Japan who spends about $2,878 per person — about $5,000 less than the U.S. — has the highest life expectancy among developed nations.
