China’s command economy hits great wall of the free market
Columns, Latest news“They’ve gone about as fur as they c’n go.” Sixty years ago, Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein used those words to describe the state of affairs in Kansas City in the musical “Oklahoma.” But I can’t think of a better way to describe what’s going on in China. The Middle Kingdom appears to have hit Read More →
Dubroff: Building South Sudan health care from the ground up
Columns, Health Care & Life Science, Latest newsBefore he embarked on a quest to rebuild the health care system in South Sudan, Ken Waxman of Santa Barbara built a career any physician would be proud of. One of the top trauma surgeons in Southern California, he was the head of emergency surgery at Cottage Hospital and later advised the Ventura County Read More →
Dollar will continue to reign supreme among world’s currencies
Columns, Latest newsIn a time of turbulence in global politics and economics, one thing remains constant. The dollar’s supremacy as the dominant currency for international finance and reserves is unchallenged — nor is it likely to be replaced anytime soon. That’s the theme of a new book by Benjamin “Jerry” Cohen, the Louis G. Lancaster Professor of Read More →
Fed rate increase should help take risk out of financial markets
Columns, Latest newsThe Federal Reserve’s decision to slowly begin the process of normalizing interest rates may not have all that much to do with the economy or inflation. The economy isn’t really overheated and any threat of inflation remains far off in the future. Parsing the Fedspeak of the Dec. 16 announcement that regulators are “reasonably confident” Read More →
Low gas prices great for tri-county consumers but not all businesses
Columns, Energy, Latest newsMarket disruptions have consequences. And the downward spiral in oil prices looks like the sort of disruption that could have far-ranging consequences. For one thing, we may be at the dawn of a decade where baby-boom era memories of gasoline lines fade and global demand for petroleum products is suppressed as China’s appetite for commodities Read More →
Dubroff: Small business owners not as optimistic as they should be
Columns, Tri-County EconomyDespite the growing hype around Small Business Saturday, the promotion developed by American Express that’s gotten some traction in the past few years, the nation’s small business owners aren’t really that happy a bunch. Writing in a Nov. 13 report, Scott Anderson, the chief economist for Bank of the West, notes that one recent indicator Read More →
