BoE governor King warns of euro risk to British recovery http://t.co/P0dUJBiFOf
24 minutes ago
Category Archive: Geostrategy
-
Doddling Forward
US Senator Christopher Dodd recently surprised some Congressional-watchers by declining to take over the chairmanship of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee following the death of his colleague, Senator Edward Kennedy, and instead remain head of the Banking Committee. As leader of the committee, Dodd has been under withering criticism for the lack of [...]
-
The Public Plan Is Not the Same Thing as Cost Control
Ezra Klein is worried that opposition to any health care reform plan that does not contain a public option will prevent legislation that is “a useful first step” from moving forward. He argues that the public plans that have been proposed would do very little to control costs, so giving them up is not much [...]
-
Will India Get Back to 9% Growth?
In September 2009, India’s economic advisory committee lowered its GDP growth forecast for 2007-2011 from 9.0% to 7.8%. The government now expects growth to slow to 6.3% in 2009, from an average 9.0% growth in the recent years, due to the global recession. But it expects growth to return to 8% and 9% in 2010 and 2011, respectively. However, less benign global factors going forward and slow domestic reforms will make it challenging to achieve these growth targets.
The Indian economy grew 6.1% in Q2 2009 after slowing to 5.8% in both Q4 2008 and Q1 2009. Clearly, Q1 2009 was the bottom for economic activity. Starting in Q2, both domestic and global conditions somewhat improved and policy measures began to show impact. However, several domestic and external factors could constrain growth in the short to medium term, potentially undermining a V-shaped recovery scenario. Short-term risks to growth include dismal agriculture sector performance, fading impact of policy stimulus while private demand is still weak, and a slowdown in the global risk appetite. Risks over the next two to three years include a sluggish recovery in global credit conditions and domestic structural problems such as high fiscal deficit and public debt, inflationary pressures, slow reforms, and supply-side bottlenecks.
-
New Rankings on Country Competitiveness: Singapore is Number 3!
The World Economic Forum released its Global Competitiveness Report for 133 countries. The top headline: US is out, Switzerland is in (number 1, that is); Singapore grabbed third place, pushing out Denmark. The chart illustrates the change in rankings across the top 30 competitive economies in 2009-2010. Countries below the dotted line increased their ranking [...]
-
The Lessons from History on Health Care Reform
With Congress returning from recess to consider health care legislation and the President set to deliver a major address on the subject to both houses of Congress tomorrow, a bit of history may be in order. An excellent starting place David Blumenthal’s and James Marone’s “The Heart of Power,” which I reviewed for the New [...]
-
Making the Sale on Health Care Reform
Matt Miller says the framing of health care reform is crucial: Lessons for Obama from Ted Kennedy’s noble flops, by Matt Miller, Commentary, Financial Times: …Senator Kennedy has rightly been hailed as a passionate voice for the voiceless and a master of the legislative process. But any assessment of his legacy is incomplete if it [...]
-
Keeping Us There
In a New York Times commentary, economist Alan S. Blinder questions why the impetus to clean up Wall Street has suddenly faded. After all we’ve been through, and with so much anger still directed at financial miscreants, the political indifference toward financial reform is somewhere between maddening and tragic. Blinder places much of the blame [...]
-
G-20 Agrees to Agree on Tougher Bank Capital Rules, Bonus Limits
While the G-20 agreement to move forward with a coordinated approach to bank capital rules and employee incentive payments is progress, it is important to recognize that what took place was effectively an apple pie and motherhood statement. The one stake in the ground was the commitment to make Tier 1 Capital a key metric. [...]
-
State and Local Employment and Spending Trends
In a recent Economix post, Casey Mulligan asserts that aid to the states and localities is unwarranted given that state and local government employment is doing just fine. His graph highlighting cumulative gains/losses ends in January 2009, to show what had transpired by the time the stimulus bill was being debated. How do things look [...]
-
The Wait for Financial Reform
Alan Blinder is worried that the will to reform the financial sector is fading: The Wait for Financial Reform, by Alan S. Blinder, Commentary, NY Times: …We are barely emerging from the greatest financial crisis since the 1930s. From last September to March, it was downright frightening. Yet by the time Congress left town for [...]
