Donald Trump has thrown a hand grenade into the global economic architecture that was so painstakingly constructed in the years after the end of World War II. The attempted destruction of this rules-b ...More
EJ Insight2017-06-05
Emmanuel Macron’s election to the French presidency provides the European Union with an opportunity to move past the internal conflicts that have hastened its disintegration. Rather than standing excl ...More
EJ Insight2017-05-31
The world has no shortage of pressing issues. There are 1.6 billion people living in acute poverty; an estimated 780 million adults are illiterate. Serious problems are not confined to the developing ...More
EJ Insight2017-05-31
Donors like the World Bank and the World Health Organization often urge developing countries to invest in national health systems. But while rushing to construct clinics and other medical facilities i ...More
EJ Insight2017-05-29
The landslide re-election of Iran’s president, Hassan Rouhani, reflects the by now familiar pattern of continuity and change that has characterized Iran’s major elections over the past two decades. Fo ...More
EJ Insight2017-05-25
Two Chinese initiatives – “One Belt, One Road” (OBOR) and “International Production Cooperation” – encapsulate President Xi Jinping’s views on overseas investment. Both slogans are supported by develo ...More
EJ Insight2017-05-17
I have been out of the world of international finance and economic forecasting for more than four years, but much of what I learned during my 30 years working full-time in the field still influences h ...More
EJ Insight2017-05-17
For US President Donald Trump, the measure of a country’s economic strength is its current-account balance – its exports of goods and services minus its imports. This idea is of course the worst kind ...More
EJ Insight2017-05-12
In Ghana, a group of enterprising women and young people is building bicycles out of an unlikely material: bamboo. Ten farmers grow the bamboo, and 25 builders craft it into environmentally friendly b ...More
EJ Insight2017-05-04
In the two decades from 1979 to 1999, the number of manufacturing jobs in the United States drifted downward, from 19 million to 17 million. But over the next decade, between 1999 and 2009, the number ...More
EJ Insight2017-05-04
In American politics, the next election is all that matters. Despite the Republicans’ big win in November 2016, US President Donald Trump’s ability to pass legislation still depends on what congressio ...More
EJ Insight2017-05-02
The likely victory of Emmanuel Macron in the French presidential election has elicited a global sigh of relief. At least Europe is not going down the protectionist path that President Donald Trump is ...More
EJ Insight2017-05-02
Donald Trump’s rise to power in the United States involved more than a little China-bashing. Yet, with Chinese President Xi Jinping’s visit to Trump’s Florida estate earlier this month, it seems that ...More
EJ Insight2017-04-27
Brexit has set a hungry cat among the financial pigeons of the City of London. No one yet knows what kind of access to the European Union’s single financial market UK-based firms will have, and Prime ...More
EJ Insight2017-04-26
The rise of anti-globalization political movements and the threat of trade protectionism have led some people to wonder whether a stronger multilateral core for the world economy would reduce the risk ...More
EJ Insight2017-04-25
As the annual spring meetings of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund commence, the world's economic future appears brighter than it has in some time. The international financial institu ...More
EJ Insight2017-04-24
It has been said that statistics are people with the tears washed away. This is a message that attendees of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund spring meetings in Washington, DC, should bea ...More
EJ Insight2017-04-24
In his 1961 science fiction novel Stranger in a Strange Land, Robert A. Heinlein chose a Muslim linguist, "Dr. Mahmoud", to help the book’s Martian-raised protagonist make the transition to life in th ...More
EJ Insight2017-04-21
Nearly 100 days after US President Donald Trump took office, he and his commerce secretary, Wilbur Ross, continue to commit an economic fallacy that first-year economics students learn to avoid. They ...More
EJ Insight2017-04-21
On April 22, scientists from around the world will mark Earth Day by participating in an unprecedented "March for Science". The aim of the march will be to “celebrate and defend science at all levels ...More
EJ Insight2017-04-18
