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Most recently posted material.

North Korea: Witness to Transformation Is China Subsidizing the DPRK: The Pricing of North Korean Exports
Stephan Haggard and Euijin Jung — June 19, 2013
In two previous posts, we asked whether China appeared to be subsidizing or providing aid to North Korea through the pricing of food and fuel. Our method was simple: to track the unit prices of Ch ...

Peterson Perspectives Interview Stormy Weather After US-China Summit
Nicholas Borst — June 18, 2013
Nicholas Borst explains that pledges between Presidents Obama and Xi to cooperate have been undercut by recriminations over cyber espionage.

RealTime Economic Issues Watch Goldman Sachs Concedes Existence of Too Big To Fail
Simon Johnson — June 18, 2013
Global megabanks and their friends are pushing back hard against the idea that additional reforms are needed—beyond what is supposed to be implemented as part of the Dodd-Frank 2010 financial legislation. The latest salvo comes from Goldman Sachs which, in a recent report, Measuring the ...

Op-ed Getting Germany Past Internal Devaluation
Adam S. Posen — June 17, 2013
Cheap labor is no basis on which a rich country should compete. Yet, that has been the basis of the lion's share of Germany's export success in the last dozen years—and exports have been the sole consistent source of economic growth for Germany over the same period. For too long, the idea that trade surpluses somehow prove a nation's economic worth has persisted in Germany.

RealTime Economic Issues Watch The TTIP Logic in Obama's Trip to Berlin
Jacob Funk Kirkegaard — June 17, 2013
Second term presidents have unfinished business, so it is no surprise that President Obama plans to speak later this month in Berlin at Brandenburg Gate, where Germany asked that he not speak in 2008. Aside from the occasion of the 50th anniversary of John F. Kennedy's famous "Ich bin ein Berline ...

China Economic Watch Why China Does Not Need to Worry About Japanese QE
Ryan Rutkowski — June 17, 2013
Recently there has been a growing concern among some inside and outside of China about the impact of the Japanese quantitative easing program on the Chinese economy. In the Financial ...

RealTime Economic Issues Watch Saving Abenomics: No Time for Cold Feet on QE
Joseph E. Gagnon — June 14, 2013
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe captured the attention of economists, pundits, and global markets with his bold plans to boost growth and inflation in Japan. Stock prices soared, real bond yields plummeted, and the yen dropped sharply. These trends boded well for Abe's success. More recently, marke ...

Op-ed Where Europe Works
Anders Aslund — June 14, 2013
With Swedish cities roiled for weeks now by rioting by unemployed immigrants, many observers see a failure of the country's economic model. They are wrong.

RealTime Economic Issues Watch Solar Panels: When Trade, the Environment, and Geopolitics Collide
Caroline Freund — June 12, 2013
What happens when policy goals in one area collide with goals in another? This occurred when US and European manufacturers of solar panels squared off with environmental and geopolitical interests over cheap Chinese products. In the United States, domestic producers of solar panels succeeded i ...

Working Paper 13-5 Peers and Tiers and US High-Tech Export Controls: A New Approach to Estimating Export Shortfalls [pdf]
Asha Sundaram and J. David Richardson — June 12, 2013
Sundaram and Richardson employ a new approach to quantifying the trade impact of high-technology export controls imposed because of national security concerns.

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Arvind Subramanian argues that the open global economic system that has served the world—and especially China—can be preserved provided the rising power (China) and declining power (the United States) adopt the right perspective and take the right actions.
Policy Brief 13-16 | View June 11 webcast info
See related op-ed: China and America Should Strike a Grand Bargain.

The Annenberg summit between US President Barack Obama and Chinese President Xi Jinping could define the strategic relationship between the two most powerful countries in the world for years to come, writes Robert B. Zoellick.

In this semiannual update, William R. Cline presents new estimates of fundamental equilibrium exchange rates (FEERs). Policy Brief 13-15 [pdf].

Simon Johnson testifies that continuing uncertainty around the US federal budget in general, and the debt ceiling in particular, may prove destabilizing both at home and around the world. Listen to related interview: Lingering Prospects for US Financial Reform

Shadow deposits in China have emerged as a potential source of financial stability. Nicholas Borst suggests that US experience in regulating shadow deposits offers useful lessons for China to guide its own financial development in a healthier direction. Policy Brief 13-14.

David G. Blanchflower and Andrew J. Oswald explore the hypothesis that high home-ownership damages the labor market. Working Paper 13-3. See also related op-ed: Be Warned George Osborne: More Home Owners Just Really Means Higher Unemployment

Reform of American national-security export controls would seem to have only modest effects on the level of US high-tech exports. Policy Brief 13-13 by J. David Richardson and Asha Sundaram. See also Working Paper 13-5: Peers and Tiers and US High-Tech Export Controls: A New Approach to Estimating Export Shortfalls

Theodore H. Moran outlines a multilateral nondiscriminatory approach to dealing with cybersecurity threats posed by globalized information technology suppliers. Policy Brief 13-11.

Miles Kahler writes that the rapid economic rise of China, India, and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) could have several effects on regional peace and global security. Working Paper 13-4.

Peterson Perspectives Interviews

 New Dangers of a Debt Ceiling Confrontation

with Simon Johnson

 Lingering Prospects for US Financial Reform

with Simon Johnson

 Market Volatility in Japan: A Verdict on Abenomics?

with Adam S. Posen

 A New US-China Relationship?

Part I | Part II

with Nicholas R. Lardy

 Are Tax Avoidance 'Havens' a Bad Thing?

Part I | Part II

with Nicolas Véron

No large company in the world has been as spectacularly mismanaged as Russia’s state-dominated natural gas corporation, Gazprom, writes Anders Åslund.

Although India's growth rates have been second only to China in recent years, on a convergence-adjusted basis, its performance has been worse than the simple numbers suggest, argues Arvind Subramanian.

Aaditya Mattoo and Arvind Subramanian propose four changes to trade rules needed to address climate change. Policy Brief 13-10. See also related op-ed: Four Changes to Trade Rules to Facilitate Climate Change Action

The latest court rulings in New York that try to make Argentina pay its debts cannot compel the country to pay. Instead, they threaten collateral damage to other countries and parts of the financial system, warns Anna Gelpern. Policy Brief 13-12.

The claim that there was a clear tipping point for the ratio of government debt to GDP past which an economy's walls caved in never made any sense, writes Adam S. Posen, in response to the recent reevaluation of the data underlying Carmen Reinhart and Kenneth Rogoff's 2010 paper on the subject. Arvind Subramanian argues that the incident exposes a flaw in the marketplace for ideas and research where superstars are involved. Listen to related interview.

Adam S. Posen testifies before the Joint Economic Committee hearing on "The Fed at 100: Can Monetary Policy Close the Growth Gap and Promote a Sound Dollar?" [pdf]

Ratifying seven pending WTO agreements could boost global exports by more than $2 trillion [pdf], say Gary Clyde Hufbauer, Jeffrey J. Schott, Cathleen Cimino, and Julia Muir in a new paper. Trade with emerging economies has been assigned a villainous role that far exceeds its impact, write Robert Z. Lawrence and Lawrence Edwards. See also Rising Tide: Is Growth in Emerging Economies Good for the United States?

US corporate tax reform would make US multinational corporations stronger competitors in markets abroad and enable them to expand and invest more at home. Policy Brief 13-9 by Gary Clyde Hufbauer and Martin Vieiro.

The members of the WTO need to face up to the key trade policy questions of the day and embark on a substantive selection process when electing a new director-general, writes Robert B. Zoellick.

The golden age of global economic growth—in which a growing number of developing countries have caught up with the advanced economies—has mostly survived recent global economic crises, writes Arvind Subramanian.

Anders Åslund argues that the International Monetary Fund (IMF) is departing from its traditional focus on financial stability and is instead helping opponents of fiscal reform.

Japan’s inclusion on the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) ensures that the US liquefied natural gas (LNG) industry can lead the world to a cleaner, more efficient, and more affordable energy future, writes Gary Clyde Hufbauer. See also Liquefied Natural Gas Exports: An Opportunity for America.

New Books on TPP

 Understanding the Trans-Pacific Partnership

by Jeffrey J. Schott, Barbara Kotschwar, and Julia Muir

 The Trans-Pacific Partnership and Asia-Pacific Integration:

A Quantitative Assessment

by Peter A. Petri, Michael G. Plummer, and Fan Zhai

 See also the book release event.

New Book: Private Rights and Public Problems: The Global Economics of Intellectual Property in the 21st Century
by Keith E. Maskus