Recently added articles from The American (Washington, DC):
From the editor.(financial crises)(Editorial)
Nov 01, 2008; ... Dear Reader: The turmoil that has forever changed American financial markets has triggered an avalanche of Monday morning quarterbacking about what went wrong and why. But as Thomas Healey and Matthew Scogin show us in their article on page 28, many of the problems with which we ...
Healthy choice: allowing consumers to buy health insurance across state lines would help expand coverage.(THE AMERICAN SCENE)
Nov 01, 2008 ... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] We went to press before Election Day, so we don't know whether to congratulate President-elect McCain or President-elect Obama. But we do know that the next administration, Republican or Democratic, will seek to reduce the number of Americans without ...
The global middle gets bigger: despite all the gloomy economic news, the world's middle class is expanding rapidly and global inequality is falling.(THE AMERICAN SCENE)(Brief article)
Nov 01, 2008 ... Amid severe financial turmoil and fears of a global recession, it is easy to lose sight of the more encouraging international economic trends, such as a rapidly expanding middle class and falling inequality. As a Goldman Sachs study points out, "we are in the middle of an unprecedented ...
Closing the happiness gap: are Americans happier today than they were in the 1970s and 1980s?(THE AMERICAN SCENE)(Brief article)
Nov 01, 2008; ... Since the early 1970s, the General Social Survey has offered an annual update on America's gross national happiness. In a new paper, Wharton economists Betsey Stevenson and Justin Wolfers note some interesting trends. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] "We find that, on average, ...
Jumping on the 'change' bandwagon: slashing corporate taxes is one type of change that has proved remarkably popular across the world. When will the United States start catching up?(THE AMERICAN SCENE)
Nov 01, 2008 ... A few months ago, we noted that countries around the world were slashing corporate income taxes at a furious pace. Since then, the turmoil on Wall Street has worsened--which makes the case for cutting U.S. business taxes even stronger. In its latest "Corporate and Indirect Tax ...
The human capital factor: economists Jaison R. Abel and Todd M. Gabe confirm that 'educational attainment has a positive effect on GDP per capita in urban America.'.(THE AMERICAN SCENE)(Brief article)
Nov 01, 2008 ... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] In an interesting report, economists Jaison R. Abel of the New York Fed and Todd M. Gabe of the University of Maine examine the linkage between human capital and economic activity in American cities. They conclude that "differences in the amount of human ...
Measuring American generosity: why traditional foreign aid statistics are misleading.(THE AMERICAN SCENE)
Nov 01, 2008 ... Official development assistance (ODA) is the traditional yardstick for measuring foreign aid. As a percentage of its GDP, America's ODA is relatively low. But as former White House aide and State Department official Don Eberly notes in his new book, The Rise of Global Civil Society, the ...
Ranking the presidents: presidential scholar Alvin Felzenberg offers a fascinating and provocative new list of America's best and worst chief executives.(THE AMERICAN SCENE)
Nov 01, 2008 ... What criteria should we employ to rank American presidents? In a fascinating new book, presidential scholar Alvin Felzenberg lays out six: "character," "vision," "competence," "economic policy," "preserving and extending liberty," and "defense, national security, and foreign policy." ...
Immigrants and innovation: what is the connection between skilled immigration and U.S. patenting?(THE AMERICAN SCENE)(Brief article)
Nov 01, 2008 ... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] According to economists Jennifer Hunt of McGill University and Marjolaine Gauthier-Loiselle of Princeton, skilled immigrants have had a substantial effect on the number of patents per capita in the United States. "We find that a college graduate immigrant ...
A closer look at middle-class 'stagnation': the data are more complicated than you've been told.(THE AMERICAN SCENE)
Nov 01, 2008 ... Has the American middle class been stagnating? It's a claim we heard nearly every day during the 2008 election campaign. Writing in Fedgazette, a publication of the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, editor Ronald A. Wirtz and Minneapolis Fed senior economist Terry J. Fitzgerald show ...
What you don't hear about CEO pay: before increasing regulations on corporate America, U.S. lawmakers should get the full story on executive compensation.(THE AMERICAN SCENE)
Nov 01, 2008 ... A recent study by Watson Wyatt Worldwide consultants Ira T. Kay and Steven Van Putten should be mandatory reading for all U.S. lawmakers eager to slap new federal regulations on CEO pay. Amid much howling about boardroom cronyism and corporate greed, Kay and Van Putten help put ...
Why gasoline is still king: electric roadsters are the darlings of the press, but Ralph Kinney Bennett predicts that gasoline will dominate personal transportation for years to come.(AUTOMOBILITY)
Nov 01, 2008; ... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. --Arthur C. Clarke's "Third Law" A little respect, please. For gasoline. Yes, we know it contributes to pollution, and yes, it is ...
Give thanks for academic sleuths: Thomas J. Healey and Matthew A. Scogin on the intellectuals who sounded the alarm on Fannie, Freddie, the subprime mortgage market, and other dangers, and who are making financial markets safer and better for investors.(FINANCE)
Nov 01, 2008; ... Academic researchers typically work in obscurity, but in a growing number of celebrated cases their relentless sleuthing is prying the lid off industry-wide financial fraud and improprieties that manage to elude the watchful eye of regulators. By detecting and interpreting ...
Moore's curse and the great energy delusion: from the venture capital firms of Silicon Valley to the halls of Congress, hopes are high that a new energy economy is dawning. Vaclav Smil explains why our transition away from fossil fuels will take decades--if it happens at all.(ENERGY)
Nov 01, 2008; ... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] During the early 1970s we were told by the promoters of nuclear energy that by the year 2000 America's coal-based electricity generation plants would be relics of the past and that all electricity would come from nuclear fission. What's more, we were told ...
Charlotte's moment: Chip Jones discovers how a city's leaders turned an old textile town into a major economic power. As the dust settles on Wall Street, this Tar Heel city may emerge stronger than ever.(BEYOND BANKING)(Charlotte, North Carolina)
Nov 01, 2008; ... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] The plaza of Bank of America in Charlotte was pulsing with music one unseasonably cool day in mid-August. A line of curly-haired schoolgirls danced as part of an Asian-American appreciation day that promoted a new park named for Mahatma Gandhi. ...
Engineering the climate: what if it's not possible to cut greenhouse gas emissions enough to thwart global warming? Samuel Thernstrom is investigating a potential solution--geoengineering.(QUESTION & ANSWER)
Nov 01, 2008; ... Q What is geoengineering? A Many scientists and policymakers have become increasingly pessimistic about the prospects in the near future of sharply reducing global greenhouse gas emissions, so scholars have begun to consider whether there might be other ways to counteract global ...
Sundown for California: millions once moved to California for its boundless promise, but time has not been kind to the Golden State. Joel Kotkin describes its decline and future decay.(OUTLOOK)(Cover story)
Nov 01, 2008; ... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Twenty-five years ago, along with another young journalist, I coauthored a book called California, Inc. about our adopted home state. The book described "California's rise to economic, political, and cultural ascendancy." As relative newcomers ...
How's business? Americans believe Wall Street's contributions to the economy are essential, but its leaders rank poorly.(DATAPOINTS)(Statistical table)(Survey)
Nov 01, 2008; ... RATING WALL STREET'S AGENTS [GRAPHICS OMITTED] Even before the market's recent troubles, confidence in the people running Wall Street was not robust--our first figure (see previous page) shows that in early 2008 only 11 percent of Americans had a great deal of ...
The venturesome consumer: why is the United States a great home for innovators? Columbia University's Amar Bhide points to America's entrepreneurial consumers--customers willing to take big risks and try new products in the face of enormous uncertainty.(INNOVATION)
Nov 01, 2008; ... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] The customer is king, right? Most of us who came from India, Taiwan, or China to the U.S. have been much more successful than if we had stayed at home, because we are close to the market here. We understand the market problem: l would understand what Bank ...
For the greater goods: the benefits of modern marketing and advertising are little understood and rarely appreciated. John A. Quelch and Katherine E. Jocz of Harvard Business School on a remarkable American success that has helped the entire world.(MARKETING)
Nov 01, 2008; ... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Marketing is one of the singular American success stories. No country on Earth is better at building brands and creating new consumers than the United States. The latest Interbrand listing of the most valuable global brands reveals 8 American brands in the ...