This week the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) charged China-located affiliates of the big five U.S. accounting firms with breaking securities laws by failing to provide documents from their audits of nine U.S.-listed Chinese firms under scrutiny. The SEC and the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB) are demanding that the accounting companies, BDO […]
Some of the provisions in 2011 Budget Control Act, meaning the failure of the 2011 “supercommittee” to find $1.2 trillion in cuts, are sweeping the media back into a fury of preemptive Armageddon terror. The rapidly approaching sequestration (a procedure by which automatic spending cuts are implemented)–which will hit both defense and non-defense spending if Congress […]
By Jim Wynn Unemployment is currently a burning issue in this country as it is across the globe. Discussions about how best to create jobs feed our headline news fuel fierce political debate and will be a key factor in determining the outcome of our presidential election in November. Although unemployment in the US has fallen […]
One of the primary responsibilities of any government is the management of the public purse: the government budget and the national debt. As developments in Europe demonstrate, bad management of government expenditures could lead to financial collapse and government default. Although the U.S. is in a much better fiscal footing then most European countries, dealing […]
One thing history has consistently taught us is that paradigms shift and new eras are born in a repeating cycle that’s as old as hills. One thing history has also taught us is that some shifts are far more epochal than others; some have the capacity to distort the pathway of history and others not. […]
Borderline: North Korea from Emphas.is on Vimeo. Tomas Van Houtryve, an award-winning documentary photographer, is creating a book of photographs made in the shadow of North Korea. Van Houtryve’s book, due out this year, has been a long-term, painstaking project. Writes philosopher Tzvetan Todorov in the book’s foreword: Over the course of seven years, award-winning […]
A decoupling of emerging markets from the struggling developed world is a myth, as we saw in 2011 when euro and US shocks caused a sell-off in EM currencies, including in Latin America. Next year could be rough as global growth slows. Countries from Brazil to China are rushing to reverse their earlier policy tightening. […]
Africa’s economic prospects have always been a topic of great consternations for local governments and international analysts and commentators. A continent rich in commodities (oil, diamonds, minerals), with a favorable demographic trends, and the potential for economic growth, has historically been ‘stuck in the muck’. Yet, things are turning around, and the past decade has […]
As the Arab Spring is turning to its second (and harder) phase of conducting elections and forming legitimate transitional government, the need for an economic strategy is becoming painfully apparent. The people, who marched on the streets demanding political freedom, were also demonstrating for economic freedom and the general improvement of their future economic prospects. […]
A huge topic in academia at the moment is the changing global economic and political landscape. The “Reshaping Power, Shifting Boundaries” theme of the 2012 International Political Science Association conference being held in Madrid in July is a testament of this. Academics from around the world will gather to discuss how power is being reconfigured […]
As developments unfolded in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) during the past 8 months, one thing has become abundantly clear: the political transformation will not survive without an economic transformation. As many analyst have pointed out, an overwhelming motivation of the people who took to the streets with the ‘Arab Spring’ was the […]
It is almost impossible to watch this documentary and not be moved to tears. It is a story about a Jewish woman, Arna Mer-Khamis, who created a children’s home and art center in the Palestinian refugee camp of Jenin. Even in her advanced age, Arna was a firebrand who railed against the occupation by Israelis. […]
Last month Secretary of State Hillary Clinton proclaimed, in an article for the Foreign Policy Magazine, ‘America’s Pacific Century’! This week, President Obama will be laying the foundation through a series of multilateral meetings involving Pacific Rim countries. He will start with the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) meeting in Hawaii (Nov 12th-13th), and continue at […]
Global economic developments this year, along with the impact of safe-haven investment flows have led to the appreciation of the dollar in global markets, contributed to the high level of unemployment in the U.S. and increased the chances for a double-dip recession in America. All these developments have further highlighted the international tensions over exchange […]
An interesting find and a valuable place to look at images–BagNews features some provocative and informative photographers and their work. For example, an image they posted of the Japanese “sumimasen” (apology without end) in action: (photo: AFP/Getty. caption: Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) president Masataka Shimizu (C) and company executives bow to evacuees to apologise […]