The Fed’s decision to start printing money has generated no shortage of debate. On one hand, devaluing the US dollar to try to inflate asset prices in hopes of kick-starting spending, investment and job creation seems like a cheap trick that’s bound to go badly — after all, as critics point out, it seems to […]
Automakers received an unexpected boost in August, when Asian sales surged thanks to variations on the American “cash for clunkers” scheme to encourage consumers to turn in old gas guzzlers and buy new, cleaner models. The US plan, you may recall, was designed in part to help rescue the American auto industry, but ended up […]
The World Cup has everyone in South Africa excited, the New York Times reports, even people with little to be excited about: The World Cup begins here on Friday with excitement at so elevated a level that even many of the unhappy are happy. Tshepo Makwala, a laborer, has no job, no prospects, and, worst […]
With the US-led crisis just behind us and another unfolding in Europe, one could be forgiven for becoming pessimistic about our prospects. But at the World Economic Forum’s Global Redesign Summit in Doha last week participants were asked to cast their gaze back over the last 60 years and ask, “How are we doing?” The […]
