Multiple Indias have always existed in Gandhi’s land of 700,000 villages, but never perhaps in such proximity or with such access to one another, a rising class of conspicuous consumers hoisted through a decade of now faltering growth hard by villages where unemployed men dim boredom with alcohol. Read Here – New York Times
A series of elections in India last week has exposed a major diplomatic problem for the U.S. State Department: The man expected to lead the world’s largest democracy in 2014 is not legally allowed to enter the United States. Read Here – Foreign Policy
China’s growing assertiveness with Japan and the U.S. is helping bring a level of attention to Southeast Asia unseen since the Vietnam War, ushering billions of dollars of investment, wider access to trade and stepped-up military assistance. Read Here – Bloomberg
Britain is a rich country accruing many of the stereotypical bad habits of a developing country. Read Here – The Guardian
Those who would turn the French economy certainly have their job cut out for them. Apart from the occasional rays of sunshine, France, since before the global financial crisis of 2008-09, has suffered a steady decline in worker productivity and business profitability. Read Here – National Interest
Historical subjugation by foreign powers make Chinese fear the future even after it has emerged as a global power and become the world’s second-biggest economy. Read Here – TeaLeafNation
The U.S. unemployment rate fell to 7 percent in November, the lowest since November 2008, raising questions about how much longer the Fed will keep fueling the economy with monetary stimulus. Read Here – Businessweek Let It Ride – The Economist
On Dec 1, 1943, China, the United States and Britain jointly issued the Cairo Declaration, which explicitly states “that Japan shall be stripped of all the islands in the Pacific which she has seized or occupied since the beginning of the First World War in 1914, and that all the territories Japan has stolen from […]
Between 2008 and 2012, several of the developed world‘s most fiscally challenged nations (including the United Kingdom, Ireland and Spain) increased top personal income tax rates by an average of 8%. In the United States, the expiration of the Bush tax cuts pushed the highest federal income tax bracket to 39.6% from 35%. Read Here […]
The Chinese Communist Party’s Third Plenum released its plan for reforms, including moving toward the free market in allocating resources, abolishing prison reeducation, easing the one-child restriction for some families and eliminating local control over the judiciary. Despite such guidance on reforms, though, the plan is also designed to strengthen the party’s control, writes journalist […]
looking beyond borders 