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The New York Times (October 23)

2013/ 10/ 24 by jd in Global News

While other countries make “progress from generation to generation,” the U.S. is falling behind in terms of literacy, numeracy and problem solving skills. “In literacy, for example, about 12 percent of American adults scored at the highest levels, a smaller proportion than in Finland and Japan (about 22 percent). In addition, one in six Americans scored near the bottom in literacy, compared with 1 in 20 adults who scored at that level in Japan.” Other nations realized the knowledge economy would offer very “few jobs for workers with mediocre skills…. Those countries, most notably Finland, broadened access to education, improved teacher training and took other steps as well.” The U.S. has yet to act with any sense of urgency.While other countries make “progress from generation to generation,” the U.S. is falling behind in terms of literacy, numeracy and problem solving skills. “In literacy, for example, about 12 percent of American adults scored at the highest levels, a smaller proportion than in Finland and Japan (about 22 percent). In addition, one in six Americans scored near the bottom in literacy, compared with 1 in 20 adults who scored at that level in Japan.” Other nations realized the knowledge economy would offer very “few jobs for workers with mediocre skills…. Those countries, most notably Finland, broadened access to education, improved teacher training and took other steps as well.” The U.S. has yet to act with any sense of urgency.

 

Institutional Investor (October Issue)

2013/ 10/ 23 by jd in Global News

“Atsushi Saito has reinvigorated the Japanese exchange world with a merger and a technology overhaul. Now comes the hard part: winning back market share in Asia.” Following the merger of the Tokyo and Osaka exchanges, the Japan Exchange Group ranks third behind only the NYSE Euronext and Nasdaq OMX. “JPX now controls more than 90 percent of all equity-and derivatives-trading volume in Japan.” Yet, “despite its lead in listed companies, JPX trails in foreign listings. It’s also weak in terms of options, futures contracts and exchange-traded funds (ETFs), compared with the big U.S. exchanges”

 

New Yorker (October 21)

2013/ 10/ 22 by jd in Global News

“In 1965, C.E.O.s at big companies earned, on average, about twenty times as much as their typical employee. These days, C.E.O.s earn about two hundred and seventy times as much.” Two close that gap, the Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) will require “companies to disclose the ratio of the C.E.O.’s pay to that of the median worker.” This is unlikely to help. “Even as companies are disclosing more and more, executive pay keeps going up and up. This isn’t a coincidence: the drive for transparency has actually helped fuel the spiraling salaries…. It gives executives a good idea of how much they can get away with.”

 

The Financial Times (October 19)

2013/ 10/ 21 by jd in Global News

“The debt drama in Washington stirred a jumble of emotions in Europe. Cold fear that a US default could tip the world back into a slump jostled with schadenfreude as Europeans recalled the stern American lectures on their handling of the euro crisis. The eurozone may be dysfunctional, but so too is the US.”

 

The Economist (October 19)

2013/ 10/ 20 by jd in Global News

“A deal that allows Iran to enrich uranium with strict limits would be better than no deal at all…. Allowing Iran to go on enriching uranium is not ideal. But the choices available are not between the good and the bad, but between the bad and the less bad.”

 

Euromoney (October Issue)

2013/ 10/ 19 by jd in Global News

“Today, Luxembourg’s streets are filling with Chinese bankers. They see the Grand Duchy as a hub for their European operations—not least for trading and settlement of the renminbi. Are London, Frankfurt and Paris in danger of being left behind?”

 

Washington Post (October 17)

2013/ 10/ 18 by jd in Global News

“At almost literally the eleventh hour, Congress has approved legislation that will end a costly 16-day partial government shutdown and avert the potentially greater disaster of a default on federal obligations.” Unfortunately, the deal “buys only a short interval of peace.” When that period expires early next year, “it is all too possible that Congress will fail to agree and will deliver the country to the brink of another shutdown or default.”

 

Chicago Tribune (October 16)

2013/ 10/ 17 by jd in Global News

“Raising the debt limit neither authorizes new spending nor increases our national debt by a single dime…. It simply allows us to pay the bills Congress has already racked up.” As such, the debt ceiling should be repealed. “All it does is make the markets jittery and provide an opportunity for contemptible, hypocritical grandstanding that distracts from serious negotiations about taxes and spending. At worst it crashes the economy. No president, Democrat or Republican, should ever again have to negotiate with Congress with such a threat over his or her head.”

 

Washington Post (October 15)

2013/ 10/ 16 by jd in Global News

“A reopening, for now, of government, a postponement for a few months of a possible default on federal debts, a promise to negotiate again over fiscal disagreements — in a rational, functional world, these meager accomplishments would not be cause for celebration. In today’s Washington, they would count as achievements.”“A reopening, for now, of government, a postponement for a few months of a possible default on federal debts, a promise to negotiate again over fiscal disagreements — in a rational, functional world, these meager accomplishments would not be cause for celebration. In today’s Washington, they would count as achievements.”

 

New York Times (October 14)

2013/ 10/ 15 by jd in Global News

Malaria “kills some 600,000 people a year, mostly children under the age of 5” and there is now “hope for a malaria vaccine” based on trials sponsored by GlaxoSmithKline and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. “If the results hold up after further follow-up, the vaccine will be the first ever shown to be effective on a large scale against a disease-causing parasite, an organism that is much harder to neutralize than viruses or bacteria.”

 

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