Profits of corporate America have been rising at an impressive clip.
But sales have not risen nearly as rapidly.
As a result, profit margins for companies in the Standard & Poor’s index of 500 stocks are now higher than they were before the recession began.
When second-quarter earnings results began to be reported in early July, the higher numbers seemed to reassure investors,
President Lee Myung-bak of South Korea has proposed a special tax to finance the enormous cost of reuniting with North Korea,
as concerns have deepened here over the North’s future after the eventual death of its ailing leader.
The proposal broached a delicate issue, and analysts said it could provoke an angry response from the North, which may see it as an aggressive move by the South.
Although all previous South Korean leaders have advocated rejoining the North,
In an apparent bid to extend its control over the Internet and cash in on the rapid growth of mobile devices,
China plans to create its own government-controlled search engine.
The new venture would be fresh competition for Baidu.com, a private company that runs China’s dominant search engine.
Baidu has seen its market share grow since Google retreated from the mainland earlier this year.
Inside the drab district hospital, where dogs patter down the corridors, sniffing for food,
Ratan Bhuria’s children are curled together in the malnutrition ward, hovering at the edge of starvation.
His daughter, Nani, is 4 and weighs 20 pounds. His son, Jogdiya, is 2 and weighs only eight.
Landless and illiterate, drowned by debt, Mr. Bhuria and his ailing children have staggered into the hospital ward
after falling through India’s social safety net.
25 August 2010. By David Caploe PhD, Chief Political Economist, EconomyWatch.com
One of our constant themes here at EconomyWatch is the importance of co-operation,
both in general, and between emerging economic powers like, say, China and India.
We believe this both in principle AND because we think it’s the only way
the new economic giants can avoid the disasters that afflicted the US
American consumer spending and personal incomes were flat in June and factory orders declined,
according to government statistics released earlier this month,
the latest indication that the economy would continue to struggle in the second half of the year.
The Commerce Department figures, which were seasonally adjusted, showed that personal income was steady in June, compared with a slight 0.3 percent rise in May.
23 August 2010.
After years of being known for inefficiency, corruption and instability,
Indonesia is emerging from the global financial crisis with a surprising new reputation —
economic golden child.
The country’s economy, the largest in Southeast Asia,
grew at an annual rate of 6.2 percent in the second quarter of this year,
data released earlier this month showed.
As the nation with the world’s largest number of Muslims, Indonesia every year sends the most pilgrims to Mecca by far.
About one out of 10 believers who performed the hajj last year were Indonesian.
Some 1.2 million of the faithful are now on a government waiting list to go to Mecca,
filling this country’s annual quota through the next six years.
As long-term unemployment in US hits record levels,
top execs in the American financial sector were being rewarded at a pace even the Federal government –
which has otherwise given the big banks just about everything they want – finds unacceptable.
Of course, it’s not going to actually DO anything, but, hey, it’s still Cheney / Bush America, whoever may sit in the White House.
With the financial system on the verge of collapse in Black September 2008,
In the US, unemployment has typically been a relatively brief affair.
The vast majority of people who lost jobs soon found new work.
That is not the way it has been in many other developed countries.
In Europe and Japan, long-term unemployment is far more common.
At any given time, most of the unemployed people in many European countries have been out of work for more than six months.
Now the United States appears to be becoming similar to Europe.
