Commentary on the need for reform in China, a status report on the competition for labour, Israel’s conundrum, a different way to explain the Euro scam, and why Iceland should adopt the loonie.

The big shift. The market and the economy are not the same. The market is a theoretical place where people trade their labour and ideas.  The economy is what becomes of the market by virtue of the impact of the community via culture and institutions. Change is very different absent a crisis.

Economist -- China and the World Bank 2030 vision
CHINA’S economic reforms have seen few breakthroughs in the past few years, or so the analysts tend to think.

Related.

Pdf below -- China 2030 World Bank

Case in point.

Financial Times -- Chinese infighting: Secrets of a succession war
The tale of a billionaire allegedly tortured in a crime crackdown offers a rare glimpse into infighting among the political elite.

Related.

Economist -- The politics of economic reform: The Bees Get Busy
CHINA’S reformers have had a few bad years.

 

Economist -- The politics of economic reform: Stoking the furnace
IN 1985 a Chinese steamship, the Bashan, chugged down the Yangzi river, carrying an unusual cargo: ten foreign economists, including one Nobel prize-winner, and almost twice as many Chinese counterparts from the government and academia.

Education and immigration.

Pdf below – Deutsche Bank: The global race for excellence and skilled labour: A status report

Israel’s isolation. (ed’s note – a deal with Palestine is the only way out).

Financial Times -- Israel exposed and isolated over Iran threat
The fear of an Iranian nuclear bomb has been at the centre of Israeli government thinking for more than a decade.

Related.

Financial Times – Mr. Obama must take a stand against Israel over Iran
US president Barack Obama today welcomes arguably his least favourite foreign leader to the White House.

Quote worth quoting.

“In fact, the Palestinian issue is the real existential threat to Israel. More than 500,000 Israeli Jews now live in the occupied territories, and continued settlement building will lead to a single state between the Jordan river and the Mediterranean sea. Given demographic trends, this “Greater Israel” could not be both a Jewish state and a full democracy. Instead, it would be an apartheid state, threatening Israel’s legitimacy and long-term survival. As Ehud Olmert, former prime minister, said in 2007, if the two-state solution fails, Israel “will face a South African-like struggle for equal voting rights”. And if that happens, he warned, “the state of Israel is finished”.

The Euro crisis explained, differently.

Punk Economics

The argument for Iceland adopting the Canadian dollar. (ed’s note – can Greece be far behind?)

Globe and Mail -- Five reasons why Iceland should adopt the Canadian dollar
The idea of Iceland adopting the Canadian dollar isn’t as nutsy as it might seem to some.