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2. What Goes into a Medal: Women's Inclusion and Success at the Olympic Games
- Author:
- Marcus Noland and Kevin Stahler
- Publication Date:
- 10-2014
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Peterson Institute for International Economics
- Abstract:
- This paper examines determinants of women's participation and performance in the Olympics. Female inclusion and success are not merely functions of size, wealth, and host advantage, but a more complex process involving the socio-economic status of women and, more weakly, broad societal attitudes on gender issues. Female labor force participation and educational attainment in particular are tightly correlated with both participation and outcomes, even controlling for per capita income. Female educational attainment is strongly correlated with both the breadth of participation across sporting events and success in those events. Host countries and socialist states also are associated with unusually high levels of participation and medaling by female athletes. Medal performance is affected by large-scale boycotts. Opening competition to professionals may have leveled the playing field for poorer countries. But the historical record for women's medal achievement is utterly distorted by the doping program in the former East Germany, which specifically targeted women. At its peak in the 1970s and 1980s, the program was responsible for 17 percent of the medals awarded to women, equivalent to the medal hauls of the Soviet or American team in 1972, the last Olympics not marred by widespread abuse of performance-enhancing drugs.
- Topic:
- Education, Gender Issues, Human Rights, and Labor Issues
- Political Geography:
- America and Germany
3. How Can Trade Policy Help America Compete?
- Author:
- Robert Z. Lawrence
- Publication Date:
- 10-2012
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Peterson Institute for International Economics
- Abstract:
- America deserves credit for not having succumbed to the global financial crisis by repeating the protectionist mistakes of the 1930s. Nonetheless, since 2007, although lip service has been paid to boosting US exports, its trade policy accomplishments have been modest. This is unfortunate because active trade policies can promote American living standards and facilitate America's return to full employment and sustained growth. These policies can also help to create a global trade order that advances American interests. This policy brief argues that the United States needs new initiatives that discipline foreign practices, increase access to foreign markets, revitalize the World Trade Organization (WTO), improve the administrative and regulatory environment for trade, and assist workers and communities adversely affected by change.
- Topic:
- Economics, Globalization, International Trade and Finance, Markets, Global Recession, Monetary Policy, and Financial Crisis
- Political Geography:
- United States and America
4. Combating Widespread Currency Manipulation
- Author:
- Joseph E. Gagnon Gagnon
- Publication Date:
- 07-2012
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Peterson Institute for International Economics
- Abstract:
- Widespread currency manipulation, mainly in developing and newly industrialized economies, is the most important development of the past decade in international financial markets. In an attempt to hold down the values of their currencies, governments are distorting capital flows by around $1.5 trillion per year. The result is a net drain on aggregate demand in the United States and the euro area by an amount roughly equal to the large output gaps in the United States and the euro area. In other words, millions more Americans and Europeans would be employed if other countries did not manipulate their currencies and instead achieved sustainable growth through higher domestic demand.
- Topic:
- Economics, International Trade and Finance, Markets, and Monetary Policy
- Political Geography:
- United States, America, and Europe
5. The Trans-Pacific Partnership and Asia-Pacific Integration: Policy Implications
- Author:
- Peter A. Petri
- Publication Date:
- 06-2012
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Peterson Institute for International Economics
- Abstract:
- The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), currently at an advanced stage of negotiation, began as a small agreement but now has big implications. The TPP would strengthen ties between Asia and the Americas, create a new template for the conduct of international trade and investment, and potentially lead to a comprehensive free trade area (FTA) in the Asia-Pacific. It could generate large benefits—greater than those expected from the World Trade Organization's (WTO) global Doha Development Agenda. This Policy Brief reports on our ongoing quantitative assessment (with FanZhai) of the TPP and other Asia-Pacific integration efforts.
- Topic:
- Economics, Emerging Markets, International Trade and Finance, and Treaties and Agreements
- Political Geography:
- America, Europe, Israel, Asia, and Australia/Pacific
6. US Tire Tariffs: Saving Few Jobs at High Cost
- Author:
- Gary Clyde Hufbauer and Sean Lowry
- Publication Date:
- 04-2012
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Peterson Institute for International Economics
- Abstract:
- 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 as a plank in his larger platform of insourcing jobs to America.
- Topic:
- Economics, Industrial Policy, International Trade and Finance, and Governance
- Political Geography:
- United States, China, and America
7. Delivering on US Climate Finance Commitments
- Author:
- Trevor Houser and Jason Selfe
- Publication Date:
- 11-2011
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Peterson Institute for International Economics
- Abstract:
- At the United Nations climate change conference in Copenhagen in 2009 and Cancun in 2010, the United States joined other developed countries in pledging to mobilize $100 billion in public and private sector funding to help developing countries reduce greenhouse gas emissions and adapt to a warmer world. With a challenging US fiscal outlook and the failure of cap-and-trade legislation in the US Congress, America's ability to meet this pledge is increasingly in doubt. This paper identifies, quantifies, and assesses the politics of a range of potential US sources of climate finance. It finds that raising new public funds for climate finance will be extremely challenging in the current fiscal environment and that many of the politically attractive alternatives are not realistically available absent a domestic cap-and-trade program or other regime for pricing carbon. Washington's best hope is to use limited public funds to leverage private sector investment through bilateral credit agencies and multilateral development banks.
- Topic:
- Climate Change, Development, Economics, Energy Policy, Politics, and Foreign Direct Investment
- Political Geography:
- United States, America, Washington, and United Nations
8. Too Big to Fail: The Transatlantic Debate
- Author:
- Morris Goldstein and Nicolas Véron
- Publication Date:
- 01-2011
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Peterson Institute for International Economics
- Abstract:
- Although the United States and the European Union were both seriously impacted by the financial crisis of 2007, resulting policy debates and regulatory responses have differed considerably on the two sides of the Atlantic. In this paper the authors examine the debates on the problem posed by "too big to fail" financial institutions. They identify variations in historical experiences, financial system structures, and political institutions that help one understand the differences of approaches between the United States, EU member states, and the EU institutions in addressing this problem. The authors then turn to possible remedies and how they may be differentially implemented in America and Europe. They conclude on which policy developments are likely in the near future.
- Topic:
- Economics and Financial Crisis
- Political Geography:
- United States, America, and Europe
9. America's Energy Security Options
- Author:
- Trevor Houser
- Publication Date:
- 06-2011
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Peterson Institute for International Economics
- Abstract:
- Like clock-work, as US gasoline prices approached $4 a gallon in spring 2011, energy security moved to the forefront of the American political debate. Global oil prices have recovered from their collapse during the financial crisis more quickly than expected due to resilient developing-country demand and political instability throughout the Middle East and North Africa. As with past oil price spikes, politicians have been quick to offer silver bullet solutions to lower gas prices and make America more energy secure. But given the complexity of the US energy system and global energy markets, it is difficult for even informed observers to evaluate how far current proposals go in solving the country's energy security challenge.
- Topic:
- Energy Policy, Oil, Natural Resources, and Biofuels
- Political Geography:
- United States, America, Middle East, and North Africa
10. US Tax Discrimination Against Large Corporations Should Be Discarded
- Author:
- Gary Clyde Hufbauer and Martin Vieiro
- Publication Date:
- 10-2011
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Peterson Institute for International Economics
- Abstract:
- The United States holds contradictory views about large corporations. When Americans speak of breakthroughs in research and engineering, they are justly proud of large firms that pioneered railroads and steam engines in the 19th century, automobiles, electric power, and oil exploration in the 20th century, and computers, software, and biotechnology in the 21st century. Yet when talk turns to paying taxes, 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. Despite common sense and the teachings of economics, tax discrimination is alive and well.
- Topic:
- Economics, Globalization, International Trade and Finance, Markets, and Financial Crisis
- Political Geography:
- United States and America
11. Hobbling Exports and Destroying Jobs
- Author:
- Gary Clyde Hufbauer and Theodore H. Moran
- Publication Date:
- 06-2010
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Peterson Institute for International Economics
- Abstract:
- The US House of Representatives has just passed the American Jobs and Closing Tax Loopholes Act (HR 4213). This bill will hurt American workers, reduce American exports, and make American companies less competitive in the international marketplace. Since the US Senate has already passed companion legislation, the American Workers, State, and Business Relief Act (S 3336), these ill-considered bills could soon be reconciled in conference and become the law of the land. If so, American firms and workers will pay the price.
- Topic:
- Economics, International Trade and Finance, Markets, and Labor Issues
- Political Geography:
- United States and America
12. The Alien Tort Statute of 1789: Time for a Fresh Look
- Author:
- Gary Clyde Hufbauer
- Publication Date:
- 05-2009
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Peterson Institute for International Economics
- Abstract:
- In 2007 the Second Circuit Court of Appeals held that US companies that had done business with apartheid South Africa could be found liable for monetary damages under the Alien Tort Statute (ATS) of 1789 (Khulumani v. Barclay Nat. Bank Ltd., 504 F.3d 254 [2d Cir. 2007]). Liability arises, the Second Circuit declared, from their possible connections with human rights violations committed by South Africa during the apartheid era. Firms named in the suit include Bank of America, IBM, Coca-Cola, and General Motors. The governments of the United Kingdom, Germany, and Switzerland all opposed the lawsuit, as did the government of South Africa, which argued that the suit ran counter to its policy of reconciliation. The Bush administration also opposed the suit, but the Second Circuit rejected the argument that the cases could be dismissed for foreign policy reasons.
- Topic:
- Apartheid, Human Rights, International Law, and International Trade and Finance
- Political Geography:
- Africa, United States, United Kingdom, America, South Africa, and Germany
13. China's Changing Outbound Foreign Direct Investment Profile: Drivers and Policy Implications
- Author:
- Daniel H. Rosen and Thilo Hanemann
- Publication Date:
- 06-2009
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Peterson Institute for International Economics
- Abstract:
- In 1967 Jean-Jacques Servan-Schreiber published Le defi americain, a call to beware of American multinationals buying up the world. In the 1980s and 1990s it was Japan's turn, spawning books like Clyde Prestowitz's 1993 Trading Places: How We Are Giving Our Future to Japan. Today it is China's outbound foreign direct investment (OFDI) that elicits the most anxiety China's OFDI has reached commercially and geoeconomically significant levels and begun to challenge international investment norms and affect international relations.
- Topic:
- International Relations, Economics, International Trade and Finance, and Foreign Direct Investment
- Political Geography:
- China, America, and Asia
14. American Multinationals and American Economic Interests: New Dimensions to an Old Debate
- Author:
- Theodore H. Moran
- Publication Date:
- 07-2009
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Peterson Institute for International Economics
- Abstract:
- The 2008 election rekindled debate about whether US multinationals shift technology across borders and relocate production in ways that might harm workers and communities at home. President Obama now pledges to end tax breaks for corporations that ship jobs overseas. The preoccupation about the behavior of American multinationals takes three forms: (1) that US-based multinational corporations may follow a strategy that leads them to abandon the home economy, leaving the workers and communities to cope on their own with few appealing alternatives after the multinationals have left; (2) worse, that US-based multinational corporations may not just abandon home sites but drain off capital, substitute production abroad for exports, and “hollow out” the domestic economy in a zero-sum process that damages those left behind; and (3) worst, that US-based multinational corporations may deploy a rent-gathering apparatus that switches from sharing supranormal profits and externalities with US workers and communities to extracting rents from the United States. Each of these concerns contains a hypothetical outcome that can be compared with contemporary evidence from the United States and other home countries.
- Topic:
- Economics, International Political Economy, International Trade and Finance, Markets, and Financial Crisis
- Political Geography:
- United States and America
15. American Trade Politics in 2007: Building Bipartisan Compromise
- Author:
- I.M. Destler
- Publication Date:
- 05-2007
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Peterson Institute for International Economics
- Abstract:
- As Democrats took over the United States Congress in January 2007, many trade advocates trembled. Over the past decade, votes on trade liberalization had broken increasingly along partisan lines. Trade promotion authority (TPA)—indispensable for negotiating new trade agreements—passed by just one House vote in December 2001, with just 21 out of 210 Democrats in favor. In July 2006 the Central American Free Trade Agreement—Dominican Republic (CAFTA-DR) won by just two votes, with a minuscule 15 of 202 Democrats voting “aye.” By one accounting, voters in November 2006 had replaced 16 trade-friendly House Republicans (and five similar Senate Republicans) with tradeskeptical Democrats. No seats in either house moved in the free trade direction (Evenett and Meier 2006).
- Topic:
- Development, Government, International Trade and Finance, and Politics
- Political Geography:
- America
16. Toward a Free Trade Area of the Asia Pacific
- Author:
- C. Fred Bergsten
- Publication Date:
- 11-2004
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Peterson Institute for International Economics
- Abstract:
- The APEC Business Advisory Council (ABAC) has proposed that the APEC Leaders at Santiago on November 20-21 “agree to further examine the feasibility and potential scope and features of a Free Trade Area of the Asia Pacific (FTAAP).” President Ricardo Lagos of Chile, the host of the APEC summit, has endorsed the concept. I believe that APEC should actively pursue the FTAAP idea. It offers the best prospects of any available strategy for catalyzing a successful outcome of the Doha Round and thus revitalizing the World Trade Organization (WTO). By forging a new transpacific initiative, it can counter the very real risk of disintegration of the Asia-Pacific region that is evident in the progress of Asia-only cooperation on one side of the ocean and a Free Trade Area of the Americas on the other side. It is the best possible device to reenergize APEC's progress toward its own signature trade liberalization goals and thus those of APEC as an institution. It offers a unique win-win-win opportunity that should be seized, beginning at Santiago and then at Pusan a year from now.
- Topic:
- Economics, International Trade and Finance, Politics, and World Trade Organization
- Political Geography:
- America and Asia
17. Doubling the Global Work Force: The Challenge of Integrating China, India, and the Former Soviet Bloc into the World Economy
- Author:
- Richard B. Freeman
- Publication Date:
- 11-2004
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Peterson Institute for International Economics
- Abstract:
- In 1985, the global economic world (N. America, S. America, Western Europe, Japan, Asian Tigers, Africa) consisted of 2.5 billion people. In 2000 as a result of the collapse of communism, India's turn from autarky, China's shift to market capitalism, global economy encompassed 6 billion people. Had China, India, and the former Soviet empire stayed outside, global economy would have had 3.3 billion.
- Topic:
- International Relations, Economics, and Government
- Political Geography:
- Africa, Japan, China, America, India, Asia, and Western Europe
18. Steel Policy: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
- Author:
- Gary C. Hufbauer and Ben Goodrich
- Publication Date:
- 01-2003
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Peterson Institute for International Economics
- Abstract:
- While the US steel industry has been in distress for decades, the “steel crisis” of 1999-2001 was particularly acute. More than 30 steel producing and steel processing firms fell into bankruptcy between 1997 and 2001, and most of the failures occurred after President Bush took office. During his presidential campaign, Bush promised steelworkers that he would not neglect them. As the crisis worsened, the steel industry and the United Steel Workers of America (USWA) pressed the Bush administration to make good on its campaign promise.
- Topic:
- Government, Industrial Policy, and International Trade and Finance
- Political Geography:
- United States and America
19. Economic Policy Following the Terrorist Attacks
- Author:
- Martin Neil Baily
- Publication Date:
- 10-2001
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Peterson Institute for International Economics
- Abstract:
- 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.
- Topic:
- Government, Political Economy, and Terrorism
- Political Geography:
- America