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Several emerging economies have, until recently, experienced large government surpluses and accelerating foreign exchange reserve accumulation. This has been accompanied by economic booms, exchange rate appreciations and in some cases increases in domestic inflation. We show that one way to understand these episodes is as manifestations of balance of payments anti-crises, as reflecting the perception that the government intends to discontinue its accumulation of reserves in the near future. The end-phase of such crises is characterized by nominal interest rates approaching their zero lower bou

A worldwide financial crisis of enormous magnitude continues to unfold rapidly. Unlike other crises in recent decades, the current episode is rooted in industrial countries' financial systems and is affecting low-income and middle-income countries (MICs) alike. Defaults on securitized sub-prime mortgages as a real estate market bubble burst led to failures or near-failures of several large financial institutions and a collapse of inter-bank and commercial paper markets. A tightening of credit, combined with declining consumer confidence, has brought on worldwide recession with growing unemployment, and many fear that the downturn will be severe and protracted. At the same time, the rapidly multiplying signs of contraction are prompting strong responses, including fiscal stimulus packages and reductions in benchmark lending rates, on the part of several of the affected developed countries. The Bank Group is well placed to help mitigate the impact of the current crisis with financing and advisory services, and its clients are already requesting increased support. A rapid, high-quality response that combines financial and advisory support can do much to ease the inevitable ramifications of the crisis. Lessons from evaluations of previous Bank Group responses to past crises can help inform the response to the current crisis in order to increase its effectiveness.

In ancient Egypt, food crises were most often occasioned by bad harvests following low or destructive inundations. Food crises developed into famines when administrative officials—state or local—were unable to organize storage and redistribution systems. Food deprivation, aggravated by hunger-related diseases, led to increased mortality, migrations, and social collapse. In texts and representations, the famine motif is used as an expression of chaos, emphasizing the political and theological role of the king (or nomarch or god) as "dispenser of food."

In ancient Egypt, food crises were most often occasioned by bad harvests following low or destructive inundations. Food crises developed into famines when administrative officials—state or local—were unable to organize storage and redistribution systems. Food deprivation, aggravated by hunger-related diseases, led to increased mortality, migrations, and social collapse. In texts and representations, the famine motif is used as an expression of chaos, emphasizing the political and theological role of the king (or nomarch or god) as "dispenser of food."

In ancient Egypt, food crises were most often occasioned by bad harvests following low or destructive inundations. Food crises developed into famines when administrative officials—state or local—were unable to organize storage and redistribution systems. Food deprivation, aggravated by hunger-related diseases, led to increased mortality, migrations, and social collapse. In texts and representations, the famine motif is used as an expression of chaos, emphasizing the political and theological role of the king (or nomarch or god) as "dispenser of food."

Comparisons of the economic situation in the USA to the Great Depression are many not only in the USA but also abroad. There are published scenarios of a speedy and complete economic collapse, elimination of the dollar as national currency and international reserve currency; some even expect a partition of the USA into several parts near at hand, etc. Regrettably, many assessments of today's crisis tend to take a simplistic view of what is happening and use biting remarks and statements that often have nothing to do with real facts and shun serious sociopolitical analysis. Now then, what is really happening in the USA and which are the causes and effects of to day's crisis? K. Hyatt Stewart

A team of expert contributors analyze the near- and long-term implications of efforts by both the Obama and Bush administrations to fix the current financial crisis. They examine a range of issues affected by the proposed reforms, including health care, going green, the Employee Free Choice Act, an open world economy, and more.

This article confronts two recent sets of thinking on slums and slum dwellers-the optimism that inadequate shelter can somehow be resolved in the near future and the opposing naysayer view warning of some kind of apocalypse. Neither line of thought is entirely wrong. Without the implementation of appropriate policies, the growth of festering slums continues to be an inevitable occurrence. The heart of this paper warns against over-generalization of the urban housing crisis: a phenomenon afflicting most journalists and increasingly academics too. To inject some objectivity into this pressing discussion, current lines of fashionable thinking about the proliferation of slums, access to land by the poor, infrastructure policies, social and residential segregation, privatization, property rights, and slumlords will be challenged and contested. The paper will also denounce the recent resuscitation of the word 'slum,' a pejorative term with all of its negative connotations, for the people who live in low-income areas. Adapted from the source document.

We derive forecast confidence bands using a Global Projection Model covering the United States, the euro area, and Japan. In the model, the price of oil is a stochastic process, interest rates have a zero floor, and bank lending tightening affects the United States. To calculate confidence intervals that respect the zero interest rate floor, we employ Latin hypercube sampling. Derived confidence bands suggest non-negligible risks that U.S. interest rates might stay near zero for an extended period, and that severe credit conditions might persist

This paper looks at the most recent aggregate profit rate data for the United States. It then makes five arguments. First, the new data reinforce the rejection of "neoliberalism as successful capitalist restructuring that could possibly restore or surpass the pre 1970s rate of profit." Second, when the new data are viewed together with the rest of the post-WWII data, it reinforces the appearance of the fall in the rate of profit as a one-step fall between an earlier and a later period. Third, this result argues against understanding the fall in the rate of profit in terms of an increasing organic composition of capital. Fourth, the one-step fall understanding is consistent with understanding profit rate dynamics in terms of the change of economic regimes between the "Keynesian compromise" period and the neoliberal period. These first four results are all consistent with, though certainly not broad enough to claim to be a proof of all of, the recently reformulated social structures of accumulation theory by Kotz and Wolfson. Finally, when the new data are considered together with several now widely held general beliefs about the near-term performance of the U.S. economy, this paper makes arguments about some likely characteristics of the behavior of the aggregate profit rate over the next business cycle.

The German EU presidency is confronted with a number of challenges in the first half of 2007: first, there is the quest for a solution to the constitutional crisis; second, there is the need to make strategic decisions in a number of important EU-policy fields; & third, Europe must find the ways & means to cope with international crises in Africa & the Near & Middle East. Also, there are still unresolved problems in Europe's backyard, the Western Balkans, where the most challenging task will be conducting a civilian ESDP mission in Kosovo as the successor to the UNMIK. One of the difficulties is that a number of important EU member states have become weak players on the European stage because of domestic problems, upcoming general elections or difficulties in forming a government. It is against this backdrop that many hopes rest on Germany, which is seen at present as the central actor in shaping European politics. The German presidency will have to explore the lines of consensus on the constitutional issue & deal with the question of a common European energy policy, which has moved to a top priority on the EU's agenda due to the most recent Russia-Belarus gas & oil dispute. One approach for securing European energy demands would be making the energy issue a part of the European Neighborhood Policy (ENP), the reorientation of which is already on the European agenda as it is. Should the German government also be able to beef up the European economic & social policy & strengthen cooperation among member states in justice & home affairs on issues such as terrorism, trans-national crime & migration -- issues where European citizens have deep concerns & high expectations towards the EU -- the presidency could achieve a real success in advancing European integration. Adapted from the source document.