...Skip to Main Content USA TODAYMoney SubscribeMobileJoin USA TODAY Sign in | Become a member HomeNewsTravelMoneySportsLifeYour LifeTechWeatherMoney: Markets Markets HomeMutual FundsETFsMost Active StocksCommoditiesCurrenciesKey Interest RatesInternet 50Stock Market Answers: Ask MattWorld StocksFree Annual Reports| Economy Economy HomeEconomic CalendarOne on One: Maria BartiromoCompany NewsCompany CalendarsAnnual ReportsJobs| Personal Finance Personal Finance HomeMutual FundsETFsMortgage RatesCD and Savings RatesYour Money: Sandra BlockInvesting: John WaggonerYour PortfolioStock/Fund/ETF ScreenerCalculatorsFree Annual Reports| Stocks | Mutual Funds | ETFs| Cars Cars HomeDrive On community Test Drive: James R. HealeyVideo ReviewsResearch a CarBuy a CarSell a CarIncentivesRecallsOther Reviews| Real Estate Real Estate HomeFind a RealtorSell It YourselfHome ValueApartmentsMovingHome Improvement| Small Business Small Business HomeAsk an Expert: Steve StraussEntrepreneurial Tightrope: Gladys EdmundsStrategies: Rhonda AbramsFranchises U.S. stocks follow Europe lower as euro currency loses value By Greg Keller, Associated PressUpdated 4m ago Comments 8 NEW YORK – Stocks and the euro fell Wednesday as worries about Europe hang over financial markets. Energy companies fell hard as the price of crude oil plunged 4 percent. The dollar and Treasury prices rose as traders shifted money into lower-risk investments. By Richard Drew, AP James Sculli works...
Words: 1289 - Pages: 6
...Don’t blame geography for growth patterns There is a well-known economic growth debate whether geography affects growth patterns directly or merely through an indirect channel affecting the choice of economic policy and institutions. The view that geography is at the center of the story in shaping the rhythms of economic development dates back to Montesquieu and has been recently revived by Jared Diamond in his book “Guns, germs and steel: The fates of human societies.” This perspective was applied to explain long term patterns of economic growth by Jeffrey Sachs, who argues that growth is related to geographic variables like climate, disease ecology and distance from the coast (Sachs 2003). On the other hand, economists like Acemoglu, Johnson and Robinson, and Engerman and Sokoloff argue against simple geographic hypothesis and illustrate that geography can only affect patterns of growth through the choice of institutions that influence economic performance. Looking at the current situation, one can observe tremendous differences in living standards between developed and developing countries. There is a variety of explanations why economic performances have diverged so extremely. However, the two main candidates to explain the causes of the big divergence are geography and institutions. The geography hypothesis emphasizes nature forces and geography as the main factors determining economic performance. Acemoglu, Johnson and Robinson (2002), however refute this hypothesis...
Words: 1689 - Pages: 7
...International Economics The German Economy 10th of December 2015 Groupmembers: Con Brunissandre Baitzouroff Pawel Fedko Ha Pham Thai 1 Morenikeji Aina-Badejo Atiwat Hongupathamchai Table of Contents 1. Introduction………………………………………………………………………………..…….. 4 2. The Structure of German Economy…………………………………………………….. 5 2.1 Import, Export and Trading Partners…………………………………………………………….. 5 2.2 Germany’s Main Economic Sector – The Automotive Industry…………………….. 8 3. The Global Financial Crisis and its effects on Germany……………………….. 9 3.1 What are the origins of the 2008 financial crisis?............................................. 9 3.2 The financial crisis plunged Germany in an economic crisis………………………….11 3.3 Government’s Action to Combat Crisis ………………………………………………………. 16 4. Future Challenges and Outlook for Germany…………………………………...19 5. Conclusion……………………………………………………………………………………….21 6. References……………………………………………………………………………………….22 2 Executive Summary This report provides a concise summary of Germany’s main economic features. It starts off by describing the key sectors and trade patterns that make up German economy. From there, it will further examine how one of the strongest economy in the world was affected by the global financial crisis in 2009, and critically analyze the extensive use of policies used by the German government to counter the crisis. The report will conclude by looking at Germany’s long term key challenges and the prospect...
Words: 4926 - Pages: 20
...Mykolas Romeris University Faculty: Social Technologies Table of contents I. Introduction 1.1. Introduction to research problem. 1.2. Research question. 1.3. Relevance of study. 1.4. Structure of the research work. II. The economy. The creative sector and its spatiality: the case of UK 2.1. Defining Creative Industries 2.2. Characteristics of Creative Industries 2.3. Nature of Production and Provision of Goods and Services 2.4. Creative Industries Employment 2.5. Urban Environments and Creative Industries 2.6. The culture-economy nexus 2.7. The creative sector as a production system 2.8.1. Local production clusters for global distribution networks 2.8.2. High rate of new business creation 2.9. The spatial dimension of the cultural production 2.10.1. The concept of cluster 2.10.2. Types of cluster 2.11. The creative economy as part of the knowledge economy Conclusion Reference list Introduction Creative industries are now more and more promoted as an important component of the “new economies”, which will drive the future economic growth. The economic development debates have now shifted from discussing countries to most often seeing urban areas as the drivers of countries economies and a blooming creative economy is frequently named among necessities for fostering this development. During the past two decades there has been an increasing attention both in academic research and policy making towards exploring the role of creative industries...
Words: 9464 - Pages: 38
...1: World’s largest economies by GDP 3 Graph 1.2: Key economic indicators in Germany since 2000 4 2. Germany’s economy in the lead up to the crisis 4 Table 2.1: Economic data since unification of Germany 5 3. Impact of the crisis in Germany 6 Graph 3.1: Exports in German compared to largest global exporters since 2000 7 Graph 3.2: Germany vs US employment data 8 4. Recovery of the German economy 8 5. Conclusion 9 6. References 10 Introduction: Germany at a glance Germany is a major economic and political force within Europe, and a founding member of the European Union (EU) since 1993. With a population of 82.1m and a Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of €2.5b, Germany is the most populous member state of the EU and has the largest national economy in Europe (EU website, 2014). As indicated in Graph 1.1 below, Germany also has the fourth largest economy by real GDP globally (behind the US, China and Japan) and is the third largest exporter in the world. Graph 1.1: World’s largest economies by GDP Source: International Monetary Fund, World Economic Outlook Database, April 2014 Exports make up approximately one third of Germany’s GDP and are driven by a strong industrial base. Germany is a major producer and exporter of automobiles, transport equipment, mining products, electronic and communications equipment, chemicals and pharmaceuticals (IMF, 2014). As a result of this concentration on exports, competitiveness in the global economy is an important factor...
Words: 3077 - Pages: 13
...case characters ended up in a disaster and causes a lot of negative consequences. Instead of accepting the chief engineer position, Rennalls turns in his resignation because he felt insulted by Baker’s farewell interview and advices. This incident not only puts Baker puzzled about what he might have said wrong but also puts the future of the company’s relations with its regional staff and authorities in jeopardy. Problem Statement The main problem of the Rennalls is over racial consciousness. He had been exposed to the historical facts that West Indie was colonized by Europe. Rennalls could not accept the differences within two cultures and kept on mind that expatriates in the company by thinking that the Europeans were racial consciousness and judged that their people were “down from the trees”. Moreover, the four years he spent in London University had created a sensitive personality in expatriate’s consciousness due to family background and political environment. In addition, he also...
Words: 1742 - Pages: 7
...one of trying to find crops that could be exported: an aim that was first realized in the late nineteenth century with the planting of coffee in the highlands. In more recent history, the economy grew rapidly in the 1950s and 1960s as Nicaragua converted its best lands into fields of cotton and cane, or pastures for beef cattle. As the fastest growing Central American economy at this time, by the turn of the 1970s it was also the region’s most prosperous economy. But the political and social context was one of great inequality between the landowners and those running the import-export houses that supported the agricultural export industry on the one hand, and the majority of the population who subsisted on small-holdings or were plain landless, in both cases often dependent on the seasonal earnings from working on the export crops harvests. The excesses of the dictatorial Somoza regime eventually provoked rebellion and in 1979 a radical alternative took power, the Sandinistas. Although committed to equality and redistribution, the attempt to control the key points in the economy and to intervene strongly in markets led to perverse incentives and resource miss-allocation: as US opposition escalated to the point of funding the Contra, and government spending on defense rose in response, the economy all but collapsed in chaos and hyperinflation. After 10 years of outrageous struggle, peace was signed from both antagonist political factions and a new coalition...
Words: 1670 - Pages: 7
...European Journal of Business and Management ISSN 2222-1905 (Paper) ISSN 2222-2839 (Online) Vol 4, No.8, 2012 www.iiste.org The Role of Entrepreneurship in Economic Development: The Nigerian Perspective Dr. Mrs Ann Ogbo AGU CHIDIEBERE NWACHUKWU Dept. Of management, University of Nigeria, Enugu Campus. PMB 011 *E mail of the correspondence author: annogbo@yahoo.com brightchidi@yahoo.com Abstract The aim of the paper is to develop and analyse the contributions of entrepreneurship in the economic development through SME development in Nigeria. A total of 100 SMEs were randomly selected from a cross section of a population of all SMEs spread around some states of Nigeria and covering virtually all forms of enterprise. Participants were selected through a simple random sampling. The responses to the questionnaires were complemented with personal interviews of some SMEs operators. The responses of the participants were analyzed using the statistical package for social sciences (SPSS), which generated the frequency distributions, means, standard deviations, chi-square statistics, analyses of variance, etc of the responses. The hypotheses of this research which were tested at 0.05 level of significance using chi-square statistics hinged on identifying the greatest problem which SMEs face in Nigeria, the identification and ranking of the top ten problems or challenges of SMEs in Nigeria and the relationship between the form and nature of the business enterprise and its sources of...
Words: 7375 - Pages: 30
...financial sector reform and liberalization measures to encourage investment, government revenue improvement efforts (realized largely through implementation of a value-added-tax), and tight monetary policy. Income transfer measures, Food-for-Work, and other programs were also implemented to help protect the poorest segments of the population from the transitional effects of structural reform. . he shift from a rural/agro INTRODUCTION The shift from a rural/agro based economy to an urban/industrial economy is an essential part of the process of economic development. Although policymakers in the least developed countries (LDCs) have, at various times, attempted to make agriculture the primary engine of economic growth and employment generation, this approach has not worked, not least because of the contributions of the Green Revolution, which has had the dual effect of increasing agricultural productivity in the LDCs and displacing the rural labor force at the same time. Led by the example of the East Asian economies, most LDCs now accept the need for greater industrialization as the fastest path to economic growth. In particular, countries such as Japan, Taiwan and South Korea have demonstrated that an export-oriented industrial strategy can not only raise per capita income and living standards in a relatively short time; it can also play a vital role in modernizing the...
Words: 947 - Pages: 4
...Introduction Understanding of the economic growth process and it connection to institutions is highly important for explaining why certain countries are less developed than the other ones. Economic growth is defined as “An increase in the capacity of an economy to produce goods and services, compared from one period of time to another. Economic growth can be measured in nominal terms, which include inflation, or in real terms, which are adjusted for inflation. For comparing one country's economic growth to another, GDP or GNP per capita should be used as these take into account population differences between countries. (http://www.investopedia.com/). The role of institutions in economic growth was first proposed in writings of Adam Smith in 1776. Later in 1993 Douglass North received a Nobel Prize for his work on connection between institutions and economic growth. By studying history, analyzing data and statistics we can see that high quality institution have positive effect on economic growth and therefore on income in a long and short runs. In order to prove it we are going to find out what economic institutions are, why they are matte, what are the reasons behind different institutions in different countries and finally support it with historical facts. 1 Links between economic growth and economic institution What are institutions? The term “Economic institutions” can be defined in mach different way and have multiple meanings. On the one hand North (1990, p...
Words: 2485 - Pages: 10
...An economy or economic system consists of the production, distribution or trade, and consumption of limited goods and services by different agents in a given geographical location. The economic agents can be individuals, businesses, organizations, or governments. Transactions occur when two parties agree to the value or price of the transacted good or service, commonly expressed in a certain currency. In the past, economic activity was theorized to be bounded by natural resources, labor, and capital. This view ignores the value of technology (automation, accelerator of process, reduction of cost functions), and innovation (new products, services, processes, new markets, expands markets, diversification of markets, niche markets, increases revenue functions), especially that which produces intellectual property. A given economy is the result of a set of processes that involves its culture, values, education, technological evolution, history, social organization, political structure and legal systems, as well as its geography, natural resource endowment, and ecology, as main factors. These factors give context, content, and set the conditions and parameters in which an economy functions. The largest national economy in the Americas is the United States,[1] Germany in Europe,[2] Nigeria in Africa[3] and China in Asia.[4] A market-based economy is where goods and services are produced without obstruction or interference, and exchanged according to demand and supply between participants...
Words: 1696 - Pages: 7
...19th century when transport and communication expanded rapidly, world trade grew leading to an increase in interdependence between richer and poorer nations, and capital flows expanded as European companies started operation in other parts of the world * In late 20th century, globalisation was shaped by: emergence of free market ideas, de-regulation of world financial markets, emergence of WTO, GATT, IMF, NICs, opening of large economies of China and India, development of global marketing; global marketers view the world as one market and create products that fit various regional marketplaces. GLOBALISATION: * Increasing interconnection in the world’s economic, cultural and political systems. FORMS OF GLOBALISATION: ECONOMIC: under both the GATT and its successor WTO, world trade has expanded rapidly; TNCs have increased economic interdependence and several generations of NICs have emerged CULTURAL: western culture diffused to all parts of the world through media POLITICAL: influence of nation states diminished in many areas as more and more countries organised themselves into trade blocs; influence of Western democracies on developing countries has also been strong GLOBALISATION CAN BE SEEN IN TERMS OF: URBAN: hierarchy of global cities emerged to act as centres for global economy DEMOGRAPHIC: growth of international migration + rise of cultural societies LINGUISTIC: emergence of English as working language of the ‘global village’ ENVRIONMENTAL: impact of activity...
Words: 4730 - Pages: 19
...ECRM 2007: 6th European Conference on Research Methodology for Business and Management Studies Using PEST Analysis as a Tool for Refining and Focusing Contexts for Information Systems Research Guo Chao Alex Peng, Miguel Baptista Nunes Department of Information Studies, University of Sheffield, Regent Court, Sheffield, S1 4DP, UK lip05gcp@sheffield.ac.uk, j.m.nunes@sheffield.ac.uk Abstract It is common for inexperienced researchers and research students to aim at investigating very wide contexts such as countries (e.g. China, India, UK), regions (e.g. the Arab Countries) or even continents (e.g. Africa). Such studies in Information Systems (IS) are not only unrealistic and potentially unfeasible, but may result in findings that are neither significant nor meaningful. Research supervisors often face difficulties in explaining and resolving these common pitfalls in research proposals. This paper proposes the use of Political, Economic, Social and Technological (PEST, also often referred to as STEP) analysis as a tool to identify narrower contexts and focus research questions around feasible and meaningful regional contexts. It illustrates this process with the results of an analysis carried out as part of an ongoing PhD research project. The project aims to investigate the barriers and risks associated with the post-implementation of Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems in Chinese companies. PEST analysis was used to define an appropriate region in China (i.e. Guangdong)...
Words: 5493 - Pages: 22
...in which resources are not being used. For example, the European colonists viewed the North American continent as an undeveloped area: the land was not actively cultivated on a scale consistent with its potential. Underdevelopment refers to a situation in which resources are being actively used, but used in a way which benefits dominant states and not the poorer states in which the resources are found. 2. The distinction between underdevelopment and undevelopment places the poorer countries of the world is a profoundly different historical context. These countries are not "behind" or "catching up" to the richer countries of the world. They are not poor because they lagged behind the scientific transformations or the Enlightenment values of the European states. They are poor because they were coercively integrated into the European economic system only as producers of raw materials or to serve as repositories of cheap labor, and were denied the opportunity to market their resources in any way that competed with dominant states. 3. Dependency theory suggests that alternative uses of resources are preferable to the resource usage patterns imposed by dominant states. There is no clear definition of what these preferred patterns might be, but some criteria are invoked. For example, one of the dominant state practices most often criticized by dependency theorists is export agriculture. The criticism is that many poor economies experience rather high rates of malnutrition even though...
Words: 365 - Pages: 2
...Introduction The purpose is to analyse a specific given country (South Korea), economic, socio-cultural and legal and political environment. Economic environment Past four decade South Korea showed an impressive growth as well as global integration to become a high tech industrialized economy. In past in 1960s, the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) per capita was compared to the poor countries (Africa and some parts of Asia), by 2004, it joined the trillion dollar club of world’s economies and currently in the top twenty largest economies (Globserver Asia, 2013). They achieved this by placing the system of close government and business ties, also including directed credit and import restrictions (Central Intelligence Agency, 2013). In 2012 due to the market slowdowns in United States, Eurozone and China, the economy has experienced slow growth. Though it is the 8th largest exporter in the world ($548.2 billion) which decreased 0.21% from prior year. The export goods are semiconductors, wireless communications equipment, motor vehicles, computers, steels, ships and petrochemicals (Central Intelligence Agency, 2013). In 2012 the country’s GDP was $1.622 trillion which ranks 13 on the world scale which increased 2.7% from previous year, and a GDP capita in US dollars was $32,400. The real GDP growth rate was 2.7%. The unemployment rate was 3.8% and the inflation rate was 2.2% (Central Intelligence Agency, 2013). Socio-cultural environment Main language spoken and written...
Words: 1135 - Pages: 5
