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China has accused Italy, Greece and the EU for supposedly illegally subsidizing domestic solar manufactururs (suspected that due to a decline in Italian imports of Chinese Solar panels.)  The US international Trade Commision then made a locked tariff of 24-36% on imported solar panels from China.  A year ago the Coalition of american Solar Manufacturers filed antidumping cases against China, saying they were flooding the US market with inexpensive and heavily subsidized solar panels that the US couldnt compete with.  The US fears that China is dumping because it means their domestic producers are not able to compete in the market for solar panels. Therefore this high tariff of 24-36% has been imposed to promote consumption of domestic solar panels. 

This article discusses the severe rising level of unemployment in Greece. Unemployment rates rose to approximately 24.4% this summer and 55% of young people aged 14 to 24 are unemployed. The reasons behind this high unemployment are that a high percentage of the Greek workforce is employed by the government (about 25%) and these employees receive large unreported subsidies and bonuses. Also, Greece suffers from a large amount of tax evasion, causing it to struggle to pay the high number of government workers. Consequently, Greece had to cut 100,000 government jobs, causing unemployment to rise. Unemployment was high in the first place because of the deep recession which started in 2007. The high unemployment in Greece has further knock on effects on its economy, particularly if the majority of those unemployed are of the younger generation. A young workforce with no jobs means that once the older generation retires, the younger generation will want to take over their jobs but they will not have the experience to do so. Also, they will lose incentive to work hard as they are used to not having jobs. 

1/4th of the labor force in Greece was being employed by the Greek government. However the government borrowed a lot of money and that means that the government workforce will end up decreasing dramatically sooner or later, and that happened.  Their economy has shrunk around 20% since 2008. The article also told us that 'Moody's Analytics predicts that the Greek economy won't start growin gagain until 2015, at the earliest". That is bad for Greece because it will take very long and be very hard for it to become a stable and strong economy again. 

Ireland's high current unemployment rate of 14.9 percent is a result from its economic situation : Ireland is in a recession. The article clearly stipulates this, there is a 'recession in the real domestic economy'. The recession arose from the housing bubble : mortgages were cheap, people overborrowed and then the high housing prices fell so that people were less wealthy and no longer able to pay their mortgages. Wealth is a determinant of AD. It is the added value of all assets or stocks. If wealth or perceived wealth increases, then so will a household's consumption of goods, thereby shifting demand, as the household feels 'wealthier' or able to purchase more. The reverse is also the case, when wealth declines, demand declines, such as in Ireland. The Irish were much less willing to consume goods, as they believed they were less wealthy or had less money( which they eventually did , upon having to pay mortgages; debt), and so consumption decreased, which thus shifted aggregate demand into a demand slide recession. This is a situation where prices in a nation inflate and output decreases, due to the lesser demand. If less is being produced, less factors of production are required. Thus labor, a major factor of production is no longer required in the economy, which gives firms the incentive to lay off many of their workers. This is the unemployment Ireland is experiencing. It is interesting that the article also depicts the  'austerity drive'  that the Irish government resulted to in the recession.  As it correctly suggests, this is 'self defeating', as during a demand slide recession the Keynesian policy follows that the government should not save its funding, but rather spend. In a time of recession, the government should spend,  so as to decrease unemployment stimulate the economy. If the government spends, this will have a multiplier effect through the economy, as it provides income to households ( by spending, the government employs labor), where househo

Currently the economic growth forecast of South Africa isn't looking as promising as thought, while  additionally its budget deficit is going to be higher than promised. 4.8 percent of GDP instead of 4.6 percent. According to the president, Gordhan, this is due to slower economic growth and not due to increase in government spending. He emphasizes that there will be no increase in government spending. From a neoclassical side this is a good thing as an increase in spending accompanied by a decrease in taxes will only further increase the governments budget deficit. The mining strikes ongoing in South Africa have had two significant consequences. 1. more people have become unemployed due to the strikes for higher wages.2. Offshore investors are worried that the government will increase spending to ease the social tensions. As a result both decreases AD as there is less consumption and investment. 

This article explains how the Swiss economy continued to grow despite the predictions that it would shrink or go into a recession. Economists thought this, because the franc became a strong currency, making Switzerland's imports cheaper but making it very expensive for other countries to buy goods from Switzerland, meaning fewer exports for Switzerland. Since we know that GDP can be calculated by adding the incomes produced by C (Consumers) + I (Investments) + G (Government) + X (Exports - Imports), we will see that Switzerland's GDP would decrease because less exports or more exports would make 'X' a negative value lowering the nations GDP. However, Switzerland's GDP went different as expected. Even though exports were now more costly for other countries, Switzerland exports grew by 2.8 % in the last quarter of the year, in precious metals, jewels or arts. Adding on to that, the gross fixed investments also grew by 2.5 % in investments in construction and equipment as the strong currency proved a "safe-haven" for investor. The rise in exports and investments lead to an unexpected and unpredicted expansion of the Swiss economy instead of a recession.

This article talks about South Korea's exports falling for the six month in a row. Exports in South Korea in August fell by 6.2%. Because of this the AD curve would shift to the left. A fall in exports does not mean there has been a fall in income in South Korea, but rather a fall in the national level of income in other countries, which means people are not importing as much as they previously were. When people have a lower income, or when people perceive the economy to be shrinking, they save more money, which means they are not consuming as much. This fall in consumption has an effect inside the country in the form of consumption, but also outside of the country in the form of a decrease in imports. 

This article states that Canada's inflation rate has unexpectedly slowed for a second month this past August, meaning a disinflation is taking place. The consumer price index in Canada rose 1.2% in August from a year ago compared to a 1.3% gain in July, showing a slowing down in the rate of inflation. This has reduced pressure for the Bank of Canada governor to raise interest rates. Normally, when a country's price levels are increasing and inflation is taking place, banks are encouraged to increase interest rates. Increasing them make it more profitable for consumers to borrow less and invest more, resulting in a decrease in consumption and therefore a decrease in AD. This will lower price levels in the country in the long run, solving or reducing the problem of inflation.

India's investors and some politicians want the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to lower its interest rates so that more firms could invest in capital goods in the country. This would increase investment, which in turn would shift aggregate demand to the right and lead to GDP growth. RBI however argues that lowering the interest rates could cause inflation to go up, which in turn would have a great effect on India's lower class citizens. The RBI also argues that interest rates are not very high at the moment, and blame the lack of investment in 'bad governance and lack of reforms'. If the RBI lowered the interest rates and investment did not increase much as they argue, while inflation goes up, many poor people would suffer in the process as they wouldn't be able to buy as many essential goods such as food. This would cause a movement along the aggregate demand curve as price level goes up. On the other hand, from an investor's perspective this would be the best way to generate economic growth, which would benefit the country as a whole if it led to more investment on capital goods.

Investors in India are asking the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) for lower interest rates, so that more can be invested in order to accelerate the country's growth rate (which has been decelerating). However, the RBI is concerned that this could lead to an increase in inflation (which is already high) as AD would increase, causing the country to produce beyond its full level of employment, meaning that price levels would raise more than RGDP proportionally (demand pull inflation). The RBI believes that people are more concerned with inflation as it causes the price of food to go up, affecting poor families. However, there is a possibility that growth is of more importance to Indians when looking at the country's economic performance. Other factors such as an increase in oil prices and a poor-monsoon could drive food prices even higher. As result the Indian RBI must be very cautious whether it will be worth lowering interest rates.

As we know, inflation is a rise in price levels. In India at the moment, there is a slide in the value of the rupee, and simultaneously food, fuel and manufactured items are raising in price, leading in a high inflation. This is an exmple of stagflation becuase it is a 'cost-push' inflation (inflation caused by rising costs of products).  In India, the inflation rate was expected to rise 6.7% (by economists) but it actually rose 7.23%.