Worldcrunch
? Hallo!* Welcome to Monday, where American and Taliban negotiators sat down for the first time since the U.S. withdrawal, Taiwan’s president pushes back on China threats and a couple is accused of selling nuclear submarine secrets. We also look at the migratory path of the international bubble tea craze. [*Norwegian] 7 THINGS TO […]
The current economic recovery is unlike any other in the labor market. For companies in the United States and Europe, recruitment is particularly tough. Resignations are exploding on both sides of the Atlantic and productivity is declining in places like France. These are all paradoxes confounding economists.
A new platform called Masterworks allows individuals to buy shares of specific artworks in $20 increments. The platform capitalizes on the democratization of online investing, but is also a variation on a model that dates back a century.
How have 16 years of Chancellor Angela Merkel changed Germany? The Chancellor accompanied the country’s rise to near economic superpower status — and then progress stalled. On technology and beyond, Germany needs real reforms under Merkel’s successor.
In a country plagued by economic crisis, women are entering professions usually reserved for men. Against societal expectations, they are striving for independence.
The pandemic has exacerbated tensions within the petroleum cartel, eroded Saudi Arabia’s hegemony, and led to shifting internal alliances. An era may be over.
The Northeast is the Chinese equivalent to Greece …
The Hass avocado, fast becoming one of Colombia’s big export earners, is threatening local ecosystems and causing water shortages.
Despite local opposition, Chinese investors are pumping billions into the Chancay project, a massive port complex north of Lima that will boost trade between China and Latin America as a whole.
In this era of plenty (even in the midst of a pandemic), humanity faces a key question: How can we cope with excess without sinking into decline?
A year after the world’s second most populous nation went into quarantine, a new study aims to calculate the cost in terms of mental health illness, suicide and inability to receive medical care.
A pandemic and a maritime accident teach us the same lessons: humility, fragility and ultimately human ingenuity. Risk is impossible to predict, except that we know it always exists.
As close as the two countries may appear, for Russia, Iran is simply a pawn in its chess game with the West.
Faced with an unprecedented health crisis, the López-Obrador administration has proven itself to be incompetent, overpoliticized and self-involved.
Uber launched with an excited bang in Egypt in 2014, promising work and new income for a country struggling with unemployment. But the castle of sand has disintegrated, leaving a trail of debt and frustration.
Consumers are convinced. Wall Street is buoyant. Demand around the world for app-based services is booming, with entire nations stuck at home during COVID-19 lockdowns and the prospect of goods and services at their door with just a click. As the so-called “Gig Economy” spreads alongside the pandemic, society has struggled to keep up. • […]
Countries like Argentina, Chile and Mexico have begun charging a value added tax (VAT) on digital purchases. But that may just be the tip of iceberg, especially if governments can reach a regional consensus.
COVID-19 shook up the world of work last spring. Since the virus (and lockdowns) returned this fall, the changes underway have only accelerated.
Lockdowns, travel restrictions and the shift toward remote working have combined to cut global demand for oil. Moscow hopes it’s all just a passing trend. But is that really the safest bet?
The leaders of the Islamic Republic say the economy will soon improve. But the numbers — the result of sanctions but also decades of economic mismanagament — paint a far more dismal picture.
Lebanese have long emigrated to Europe and elsewhere. But not like during this crisis: on clandestine boats, in a perilous trip toward the island of Cyprus.
From Brazil to Canada, Finland to Israel, and well beyond, the impact of the new uptick in coronavirus is being measured across virtually every aspect of society.
Viewed from the proverbial (and literal) 30,000 feet, the most stunning consequence of the coronavirus pandemic may have been the sudden closing of national borders. In an increasingly open world, the past six months of severe international travel restrictions continues to disrupt lives and hobble the global economy. Last week, the six-months-long closure of the […]
How is the Chinese economy doing these days? Start by asking Louis Vuitton, whose flagship Beijing boutique boasted record sales in August.
A recent speech by former ECB chief Mario Draghi hit close to home in his native country.
The European Union should explain why it is doggedly conciliatory with a regime in Iran that represents everything opposed to Europe’s liberal democratic values,
The ‘feminist free marketeer’ is an oxymoron, when the free market is a bastion of the socioeconomic inequalities feminism opposes.
Containing the COVID-19 outbreak came at a huge cost in terms of earnings and employment. And no one is taking a harder hit than China’s tens of millions of migrant workers.
-Analysis- LONDON — “We’re at the end of our rope,” is a phrase you may hear these days among lower-income Iranians struggling to survive in a country heaving under economic sanctions and the coronavirus pandemic. It’s also a statement recently issued by a national pensioners association, which has been seen as a “warning” to a […]
“The nation-state on its own has no future… ” Angela Merkel’s apparently ominous declaration in late May was actually part of what might be the strongest vote of confidence in recent memory to ensure the future of the European Union. After years of touting austerity and protecting national fiscal sovereignty, the German Chancellor has suddenly […]
Beijing imposed a national security law in Hong Kong on May 28 to counteract its secessionist tendencies. What is at stake here for the former British colony?
Chinese officials are realizing that the ‘soul’ of a city is key to strength and prosperity.
Compared to other EU member states, Poland was barely affected by the international financial crisis or the refugee crisis of 2015. Now, the country could emerge from the coronavirus pandemic in a stronger position than before.
-Essay- Among the many things that COVID-19 taught us, one is to not measure the world by latitude. Take the case of Milan, a shining example, we’re told, of northern Italian industriousness and efficiency that’s supposedly absent in the south. And yet this capital of the Lombardy region saw one of the world’s worst COVID-19 […]
By now, our regular readers know that Worldcrunch works hard at being of and for and about no one particular place or people or subject matter. Our beat and our audience are written in our name, and we work with journalists and newspapers everywhere to tell the stories (no matter how big or small) that […]
Germany has the resources to weather the storm, but not everyone in Europe is convinced that’s a good thing.
Colombia is a prime example of how overspending and indebtedness leave little room for error, and why it’s important to take a new approach moving forward.
Known as UBI, Universal Basic Income has been a dream of progressive economists. Now it is effectively written into many COVID-19 relief packages. But it may turn out to have staying power well beyond.
Not surprisingly, early indicators point to a less bleak future for Sweden’s still-open economy than for that of its European counterparts. A recent study by Swedbank shows that private consumption in Sweden shrank 17% between April 6 to April 19 compared to the same period last year, while revenue from hotel and restaurants was down […]