Economics HL - Jacob Solomon's group - Year 1

This article suggests that export promotion might not always be beneficial for manufacturers that export their goods, even though this is often why it is implemented.

This article talks about India and its current account deficit. Import substitution is a good way to reduce current account deficit by reducing the import expenditure.

This article discusses the potential of European and Asian nations collaboration to achieve economic growth and face the problems of various nations. "Dealing with these problems and overcoming them requires cooperation, strengthening convergence, and utilizing regional potential properly." 

This article describes a perspective on economic growth and development in Nigeria. Particularly, it focuses on the development of the manufacturing sector in this country in an attempt to fuel economic growth and therefore contribute to development.

This article describes Bolivia's attempt to join the Mercosur trade bloc in South America, which we learned about this week. There are obvious benefits to the trade bloc that it wishes to exploit, but some people don't feel it is ready to join the trade bloc.

This article talks about the sad outlook of eurozone. Eurozone is an example of monetary union/currency union. We can clearly see that the effects of economic downturn affect different countries to a different degree. Greece, Spain, and Ireland are much more heavily affected than the rest. This is the same as the crisis mentioned in this article as the 70s to 80s crisis. Shocks will affect different countries differently--a shortcoming of monetary union.

Venezuela's ports were nationalised in 2010 during a recession. However, now especially during the festive period imports have almost doubled. This has caused a large build up in the ports. Venezuela have just joined the trade bloc, Mercosur. This will cause a larger increase in imports due to the removing of trade barriers. Therefore, the poor infrastructure must be improved. A new container terminal has been suggested to try to cope with this.

This article discusses the potential difficulties of the Mercosur trade bloc in South America. Disputes amongst the members is causing distress to the economic system, and political isolation and dispute are becoming obstacles to economic collaboration.

This article provides evidence and data of Egypt's Export DEvelopment Fund and the promoting of exports in the first half of the fiscal year. Revenue from exports positively impacted the economy, and the EDF seeks to continue to improve the export benefits entering the nation.

The Aussie dollar is very strong, so the Reserve Bank of Australia is trying to gather foreign currency to increase supply, causing the value and demand for Aussie dollar to fall a bit. The RBA doesn't intervene often, but it's necessary now to bring down the strength of the Aussie dollar so that it doesn't continue to lessen the value of exports.

Excerpt from the article: "Most experts think the fall is a direct result of sanctions designed to get Iran to curtail its nuclear program, which Iranian leaders say is intended to generate nuclear power but many suspect could be used to produce a weapon"

Russia and its partners (Belarus and Kazakhstan) are looking to seal a free trade deal with New Zealand. However, the articles talks about external issues to consider that will affect or be affected by the deal. The main concern of both parties is the current negative state of the global economy and how they intend to overcome this by trade. " "The priority goal is to fight protectionism together in all its forms; traditional and new alike ... It is important to build bridges, not walls," he said. "

This article talks about how supply-side policies are implemented and how it affects the price of gasoline. This is mainly because of the global crude oil prices decreasing. On top of that, there is an increase in supply from the Middle East supplemented by a decrease in demand. "If there are any problems on the supply side, as in Iran, Libya or Nigeria, then prices will be right back up," said Michael C. Lynch, president of Strategic Energy and Economic Research.

The article talks about how "human insecurity" takes a toll on the income inequality and how different organizations are taking steps to improve the situation. ""The richest Thais earn 14.7 times more than the poorest," said Gwi-Yeop Son, resident representative of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP),"

This article discusses the possibility of a free trade deal between China and Canada; while Canada has the potential to benefit greatly from this deal, Canadians are weary for numerous reasons, including Chinese takeovers of domestic companies, and human rights issues.

I found this article interesting about the international trade relations between the US and China. The perspective on what type of trade is best is explored in this article, leaving us wondering if the free trade economy model will continue to work for the US, or should there be a change?

China's 40% tax imposed since 2008 is a violation of WTO regulations. As such, they have to renew their policy. However, this would raise their exports competitions decreasing FOB price.