19 October 2010. By David Caploe PhD, Chief Political Economist, EconomyWatch.com
This site has frequently stressed India’s potential to become one of the key players of the 21st century,
not just in Asia, but the entire global political economy.
Its high-tech / higher-value added insourcing strategy and huge middle class may make it the first major “buy” economy in Asia –
19 October 2010.
In Asia, it’s a truism that, as Chairman Mao put it, “the wind comes from the East”,
at least as far as the world economy is concerned.
But what was so shocking about the most recent IMF meeting in Washington
was the extent to which Western leaders now openly acknowledge the same reality –
not just about the present, but well into the future as well.
As health care costs continue their relentless climb, companies are increasingly passing on higher premium costs to workers.
In contrast to past practices of absorbing higher prices, some companies chose this year to keep their costs the same
by passing the entire increase in premiums for family coverage onto their workers,
according to a survey released by the Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonprofit research group.
We’ve noted how crucial China is to the current export success of Germany, and hence its current economic strength.
But the strength of the Japanese yen is also playing a role in keeping the German export machine humming,
since the two countries tend to compete directly in many sectors,
7 October 2010.
Companies in China’s industrial heartland are toiling to reinvent their businesses,
fearing that the low-cost manufacturing that helped propel the nation’s economic ascent is fast becoming obsolete.
The TAL Group, which operates an immense garment-making plant in the coastal boom town of Dongguan, is moving beyond piecework
Having passed Germany (exports), Japan (gross domestic product) and the United States (auto sales) over the past year,
China is now poised to lead the world in yet another category: patent application filings.
A new study released this week by Thomson Reuters says that by 2011 China will likely pass the United States and Japan in new patent applications.
5 October 2010.
As the run-up to the Commonwealth Games made painfully clear,
India’s strength does NOT seem to be in engineering and construction.
Despite this nation’s rise as a technology titan with some of the world’s best engineering minds,
India’s full economic potential is stifled by potholed roadways, collapsing bridges, rickety railroads
Last month, Chile marked the bicentennial of its independence with pride in how far it has come in 200 years, but with a shadow over the celebration.
Unforgotten were 33 miners who have been trapped a half-mile underground by a shaft collapse for almost two months.
Copper mining has always helped to define Chile, and the country has united in its determination to save these men.
Recently, a federal district judge approved a deal to allow Barclays, the British bank, to pay a $298 million fine
for conducting transactions with Cuba, Iran, Libya, Myanmar and Sudan in violation of United States trade sanctions.
Barclays was discovered to have systematically disguised the movement of hundreds of millions of dollars through wire transfers
that were stripped of the critical information required by law that would have enabled the world to know that
28 September 2010. By David Caploe PhD, Chief Political Economist, EconomyWatch.com
At this point, only a fool would predict when the latest conflict between China and Japan is going to be over.
Most everyone thought it would be finished last Friday, September 24,
when Japan – as it should have done – returned the captain of the fishing trawler it had taken to China.
But then China decided to escalate, and with such rapidity that
