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Begin New Search Topic Economics Content Type Working Paper Publishing Institution Council on Foreign Relations Publication Year within 25 Years

11. U.S. Trade and Investment Policy

Author:
Matthew J. Slaughter, Edward Alden, Andrew H. Card, and Thomas A. Daschle
Publication Date:
09-2011
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Council on Foreign Relations
Abstract:
The growth of global trade and investment has brought significant benefits to the United States and to the rest of the world. Freer trade and investment, facilitated by rules the United States led in negotiating and implementing, have alleviated poverty, raised average standards of living, and discouraged conflict.
Topic:
Economics, International Trade and Finance, Markets, Labor Issues, and Financial Crisis
Political Geography:
United States

12. Saudi Arabia in the New Middle East

Author:
F. Gregory Gause III
Publication Date:
12-2011
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Council on Foreign Relations
Abstract:
There is arguably no more unlikely U.S. ally than Saudi Arabia: monarchical, deeply conservative socially, promoter of an austere and intolerant version of Islam, birthplace of Osama bin Laden and fifteen of the nineteen 9/11 hijackers. Consequently, there is no U.S. ally less well understood. Many U.S. policymakers assume that the Saudi regime is fragile, despite its remarkable record of domestic stability in the turbulent Middle East. “It is an unstable country in an unstable region,” one congressional staffer said in July 2011. Yet it is the Arab country least affected in its domestic politics by the Arab upheavals of 2011. Many who think it is unstable domestically also paradoxically attribute enormous power to it, to the extent that they depict it as leading a “counterrevolution” against those upheavals throughout the region. 2 One wonders just how “counterrevolutionary” the Saudis are when they have supported the NATO campaign against Muammar al-Qaddafi, successfully negotiated the transfer of power from Ali Abdullah Saleh in Yemen, and condemned the crackdown on protestors by Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, and how powerful they are when they could do little to help their ally Hosni Mubarak in Egypt.
Topic:
Security, Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, Economics, International Trade and Finance, Islam, Oil, and Bilateral Relations
Political Geography:
United States, Middle East, Arabia, and Saudi Arabia

13. Global Brazil and U.S.-Brazil Relations

Author:
Samuel W. Bodman, James D. Wolfensohn, and Julia E. Sweig
Publication Date:
07-2011
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Council on Foreign Relations
Abstract:
Brazil has transcended its status as the largest and most resource-rich country in Latin America to now be counted among the world's pivotal powers. Brazil is not a conventional military power, it does not rival China or India in population or economic size, and it cannot match the geopolitical history of Russia. Still, how Brazil defines and projects its interests, a still-evolving process, is critical to understanding the character of the new multipolar and unpredictable global order.
Topic:
Development, Economics, Globalization, and International Trade and Finance
Political Geography:
Russia, China, India, Brazil, and Latin America

14. Family Planning and U.S. Foreign Policy: Ensuring U.S. Leadership for Healthy Families and Communities and Prosperous, Stable Societies

Author:
Isobel Coleman and Gayle Tzemach Lemmon
Publication Date:
04-2011
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Council on Foreign Relations
Abstract:
Global demographic and health trends affect a wide range of vital U.S. foreign policy interests. These interests include the desire to promote healthy, productive families and communities, more prosperous and stable societies, resource and food security, and environmental sustainability. International family planning is one intervention that can advance all these interests in a cost-effective manner. Investments in international family planning can significantly improve maternal, infant, and child health and avert unintended pregnancies and abortions. Studies have shown that meeting the unmet need for family planning could reduce maternal deaths by approximately 35 percent, reduce abortion in developing countries by 70 percent, and reduce infant mortality by 10 to 20 percent.
Topic:
Security, Foreign Policy, Development, Economics, Environment, and Health
Political Geography:
United States

15. The Evolving Structure of the American Economy and the Employment Challenge

Author:
Michael Spence and Sandile Hlatshwayo
Publication Date:
03-2011
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Council on Foreign Relations
Abstract:
This paper examines the evolving structure of the American economy, specifically, the trends in employment, value added, and value added per employee from 1990 to 2008. These trends are closely connected with complementary trends in the size and structure of the global economy, particularly in the major emerging economies. Employing historical time series data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Bureau of Economic Analysis, U.S. industries are separated into internationally tradable and nontradable components, allowing for employment and value-added trends at both the industry and the aggregate level to be examined. Value added grew across the economy, but almost all of the incremental employment increase of 27.3 million jobs was on the nontradable side. On the nontradable side, government and health care are the largest employers and provided the largest increments (an additional 10.4 million jobs) over the past two decades. There are obvious questions about whether those trends can continue; without fast job creation in the nontradable sector, the United States would already have faced a major employment challenge.
Topic:
Economics, Markets, Labor Issues, and Financial Crisis
Political Geography:
United States and America

16. Regulation of Executive Compensation in Financial Services

Publication Date:
02-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Council on Foreign Relations
Abstract:
Many people argue that inappropriate compensation policies in financial companies contributed to the World Financial Crisis. Some say the overall level of pay was too high. Others criticize the structure of pay, claiming that contracts for CEOs, traders, and other key professionals induced them to pursue excessively risky and short-term strategies.
Topic:
Economics, Markets, Financial Crisis, and Governance

17. Prime Brokers and Derivatives Dealers

Publication Date:
04-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Council on Foreign Relations
Abstract:
Runs by prime-brokerage clients and derivatives counterparties were a central cause of the World Financial Crisis. Worried about potential losses, many hedge funds withdrew their assets from brokerage accounts at Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers in the weeks before these banks failed. Although Morgan Stanley did not fail, it also suffered from the withdrawal of prime brokerage assets. These runs, together with runs by short-term creditors, precipitated Bear Stearns' and Lehman's demise. Even if these firms would have failed anyway, the runs made their failures much more sudden and chaotic, and made coherent policy responses much harder.
Topic:
Economics, Markets, and Financial Crisis
Political Geography:
United States

18. The Russian Economic Crisis

Author:
Jeffrey Mankoff
Publication Date:
04-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Council on Foreign Relations
Abstract:
Like much of the world, Russia has been in the midst of a serious economic crisis since the late summer of 2008. Although the worst appears to be over, Russia will continue to feel its effects longer than many other industrialized countries, largely because of a rigid economy burdened with an overweening state role. The recognition that Russia faces serious long-term challenges has emboldened President Dmitry Medvedev and others to call for far-reaching economic restructuring. If successful, their economic policies could undermine the semi-authoritarian, state-capitalist model developed under Prime Minister and former president Vladimir Putin. Although concrete reforms have so far been limited, Medvedev's demands for change (seconded in some cases by Putin) have acquired increasing momentum in recent months. The speed of Russia's recovery and obstacles along the way will play a major role in determining both the success of Medvedev's call for modernization and the course of Russia's foreign policy since a quicker recovery would diminish the pressure for fundamental reform and lessen the need for caution internationally.
Topic:
International Relations, Foreign Policy, Economics, International Affairs, and Financial Crisis
Political Geography:
Russia

19. How Dangerous Is U.S. Government Debt? The Risks of a Sudden Spike in U.S. Interest Rates

Author:
Francis E. Warnock
Publication Date:
06-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Council on Foreign Relations
Abstract:
In 1961, the Belgian economist Robert Triffin described the dilemma faced by the country at the center of the international monetary system. To supply the world's risk-free asset, the center country must run a current account deficit and in doing so become ever more indebted to foreigners, until the risk-free asset that it issues ceases to be risk free. Precisely because the world is happy to have a dependable asset to hold as a store of value, it will buy so much of that asset that its issuer will become unsustainably burdened. The endgame to Triffin's paradox is a global, wholesale dumping of the center country's securities. No one knows in advance when the tipping point will be reached, but the damage brought about by higher interest rates and slower economic growth will be readily apparent afterward.
Topic:
Economics, Globalization, International Trade and Finance, and Markets

20. The Gloomy Prospects for World Growth

Author:
Steven Dunaway
Publication Date:
09-2009
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Council on Foreign Relations
Abstract:
The seeds of the current economic and financial crisis were sown by economic policies of the major countries that fostered the growth of global imbalances during the 2000s. Consequently, an essential element in any assessment of prospects for world economic recovery and the pace of future growth has to factor in exactly how these imbalances are likely to unwind—or fail to be resolved—in the period immediately ahead.
Topic:
Economics, Markets, and Financial Crisis
Political Geography:
United States