America has shown its best side in recent weeks in the efforts to help the victims of September 11. And it is showing its strength as it moves to strike back and tighten security at home. Dealing with the economic impact of these horrendous crimes has, appropriately, not been the first priority.

Seattle will be remembered as the city where street demonstrations stopped global trade talks cold. But the Seattle protesters don't deserve such notoriety. The meeting actually fell victim to serious substantive disagreements among the member countries of the World Trade Organization (WTO) over...

In the months after it took office, the Obuchi government adopted many of the measures necessary to reverse the mistakes of the previous administration. These included large scale fiscal stimulus, a great share of which is in housing tax cuts, and funding of much of the additional public debt by...

The Middle East is a demographic time bomb. According to the United Nations Development Program's (UNDP) Arab Human Development Report 2002, the population of the Arab region is expected to increase by around 25 percent between 2000 and 2010 and by 50 to 60 percent by 2020--or by perhaps 150...

Some trade disputes--like long Russian novels--never seem to end. The United States, Europe, and other trading nations have disputed the taxation of export earnings since the 1970s. To understand why the Foreign Sales Corporation (FSC) dispute is so hard to resolve, we must start with a...

Japan's economic tumult during March 2001 has prompted renewed fear of an impending crisis. Mixed macroeconomic data of the past months indicate that at least a brief recession is likely. To add to the panic, Japanese Finance Minister Kiichi Miyazawa announced on 8 March that Japanese government...

Almost a decade ago, as the last nuclear crisis with North Korea was reaching a peak, I concluded the following about the potential utility of economic sanctions: The debate over US policy toward North Korea boils down to one deceptively simple question: what does Kim Il-sung want? No one can be...

The US Export-Import (Ex-Im) Bank is again at the center of controversy, as Congress debates the terms for its charter renewal. This policy brief critiques provisions of the House and Senate versions of the reauthorization bill and summarizes three justifications for Congress giving adequate...

One of the most bizarre bills making its way through Congress is the Visclosky steel quota bill (H.R. 975). H.R. 975 passed the House on 17 March, with 289 yeas and 141 nays. It is scheduled for a Senate vote on 22 June. If enacted, H.R. 975 would limit steel imports in a heavy-handed way that...

In May 2004, ten countries are due to join the European Union. They are therefore obliged to join the European Monetary Union (EMU) and adopt the euro as their national currency. Most of them, moreover, have been eager to do that. None of them sought an opt-out of the sort that Britain and...