Development

Dani Rodrik says: ... China’s currency policies not only undercut the competitiveness of African and other poor regions’ industries; they also undermine those regions’ fundamental growth engines. What poor nations get out of Chinese mercantilism is, at best, temporary growth of the wrong kind. So Chinese mercantilism is, on balance,

I'm pretty sympathetic to this idea: In the last decade ... the governments of the nations where most of the world’s poorest actually live have begun to turn to an idea that seems radical in its simplicity: Solve poverty and spur development by simply giving out money. In

From the AP: Factory workers demanding better wages and working conditions are hastening the eventual end of an era of cheap costs that helped make southern coastal China the world's factory floor. A series of strikes over the past two months have been a rude wakeup call for

Over at Eyes on Trade, Travis McArthur links to an article about Bill Clinton's views on free trade, which states: Former U.S. President Bill Clinton says the free-trade agriculture policies he supported as president were a mistake. Many critics blame these policies for contributing to Haiti'

Over at vox, Ejaz Ghani of the World Bank argues that services can play a more important role in development than is generally thought: The story of Hyderabad – the capital of the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh – is truly inspiring for late-comers to development. Within two decades, Andhra Pradesh has

Economist Tyler Cowen writes the following in the NY Times: Putting aside the United States, which ranks third, the four most populous countries are China, India, Indonesia and Brazil, accounting for more than 40 percent of the world’s people. And all four have made great strides. Indonesia had solid

I've blogged about Dani Rodrik and policy space before.   He is now making similar points related to the specific case of China, arguing that China's currency undervaluation is a substitute for the protectionist policies it can no longer undertake as a result of joining the WTO:

From the FT: The World Bank and Beijing are in discussions about setting up low-cost factories in industrial zones in Africa to help the continent develop a manufacturing base and reverse its declining share of global trade. Robert Zoellick, the president of the World Bank, said Beijing had shown "

Over at Eyes on Trade, Todd Tucker cites this WSJ article and expresses concerns about offshoring of Japanese animation jobs to China, Korea and Viet Nam. I’m going to use his post as a jumping off point for the following questions about offshoring: Isn’t offshoring good for economic

At the NY Times Economix blog, economist Edward Glaeser asks, "What Happened to Argentina?": A century ago, there were only seven countries in the world that were more prosperous than Argentina (Belgium, Switzerland, Britain and four former English colonies including the United States), according to Angus Maddison’s