No industry save financial services has been harder hit by the current recession than the automobile industry. Employment in the US auto industry dropped 9 percent between 2007 and 2008, while auto sales fell 18 percent over the same period. The credit freeze has only added to the distress,...

The Doha Round is not the first multilateral negotiation to collapse under the weight of substantive disputes and tactical blunders, but revival this time requires a greater miracle than in the darkest days of the Tokyo or Uruguay Rounds. After near-death moments, those talks concluded with a...

On January 28, 2009, the US House of Representatives passed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. Out of the bill's 700 text pages, a small half-page section attracted enormous media attention: the section requiring that all public projects funded by the stimulus plan must use only...

Trade ministers from member countries of the World Trade Organization (WTO) convened in Hong Kong in December 2005 to jump-start the flagging Doha Round of multilateral trade negotiations. The ministerial accomplished more in spirit than in substance and placed more emphasis on negotiating...

Following the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon, President Bush prepared the country for a "war on terrorism". As outlined in his speech before the joint session of Congress on September 20, the war on terrorism will be fought on many fronts: diplomatic, intelligence,...

Services trade continues to be the most dynamic part of world trade, and service sectors have long been the largest destination of foreign direct investment flows. Countries can reap huge potential gains through greater liberalization of services trade and investment, including increased job...

In his 2012 State of the Union address, President Obama claimed that "over a thousand Americans are working today because we stopped a surge in Chinese tires." The tire tariff case, decided by the president in September 2009, exemplifies his efforts to get China to "play by the rules" and serves...

Public opinion holds that large corporations should pay a higher statutory tax rate than other business firms, and enjoy fewer deductions in computing their taxable income. Americans and their representatives in Congress have long entertained the notion that a corporate check paid to the US...

Legislation to reform Japan Post is again gathering steam in Tokyo. A new postal bill is taking shape, in the form of amendments to the existing Postal Privatization Law dating from the Koizumi era—all put forward under the larger banner of post-earthquake reconstruction finance and the...

Together, US federal and state governments impose almost the highest corporate tax rate found among advanced countries, 39 percent. Only Japan is fractionally higher. The high US rate has adverse consequences—lost investment, lost jobs, and less innovation—and goes a long way to explain...