In an inaugural week, you would expect the international news weeklies to carry a cover story on the incoming US president. Time ran a feature on President Obama entitled, “Great Expectations.” The Economist did the same, but called it, “Renewing America.” Newsweek? Well, their editorial board decided to publish a special issue, labeled “Why China Works.”
Maybe that says two things: that the world does not revolve around Washington and that the global economy may be a bigger issue than who is in the White House. The subhead to the Newsweek cover story certainly had a sobering message for many US-focused economists: “Inside the command-capitalism model that will outrun all rivals.”
Currency Wars: View From Beijing
by Douglas Clark Johnson
16 January 2011
Any belief that the Chinese will allow the yuan to appreciate meaningfully beyond their pre-determined framework belies a certain naiveté, in our view. Export growth stoked by a weak yuan helps soothe two sources of serious internal pressure.
Pomp and circumstance was in high gear in Washington last week. Amid the ongoing frustrations of jump-starting the US economy and sorting out the mortgage mess, President Hu Jintao’s state visit was a public relations victory for the Obama administration. The awkwardness of the Free Tibet demonstrators in Lafayette Park was a distant sideshow.
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Tags: China, consumer price index, currency issues, currency rate, inflation, investment, policy analysts
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