The New Republic

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Earlier this week, the Association of International Educators (NAFSA) released new estimates of the expenditures of international students in the United States during the 2011-2012 academic year. According to the organization, this education spending (which count as exports) totaled about $21.8 billion last year in the 50 U.S. READ MORE >>

Tonight, President Obama will accept the Democratic Party nomination with a speech in which he will lay out the case for a second term. The context, of course, is the volatility of the past four years in the U.S. economy and the entire global economy, marked by deep recession and weak recoveries in the developed economies and cooling growth in emerging markets. READ MORE >>

Earlier this week, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) lowered its growth forecast for the global economy for this year and next. It seems that both developed and developing countries are going to expand more slowly than expected earlier this year. In a pattern also seen in 2011, the United States is experiencing a loss of momentum and the Eurozone countries are still stuck in a sovereign debt quagmire. But now the large emerging markets (Brazil, India, and China) are growing at a slower rate than last year. READ MORE >>

In this week’s TIME Magazine and on last Sunday’s CNN prime-time special, Fareed Zakaria focused on the shortcomings of the U.S. immigration policy and its current and future impact upon the U.S. economy. A lot of the discussion was about the inability of high-skilled immigrants to stay in the United States and how it influences the competitiveness of U.S.-based companies. READ MORE >>

Earlier this week, after a lengthy period of uncertainty, the Senate passed the reauthorization of the Export-Import Bank (Ex-Im Bank) of the United States. This is good news, as my colleague Devashree Saha has detailed in other postings, as the Ex-Im Bank is an important element of our National Export Initiative and a critical source of needed financing for would-be U.S. exporters. READ MORE >>

The Great Recession forced U.S. companies to think in new ways about their growth and survival in the coming years. In 2010, the first year of the recovery, U.S. domestic demand remained sluggish, so American businesses looked for clients outside their  borders, especially in emerging markets, where most global growth has been taking place in recent years. As a result, U.S. exports increased rapidly in the first year of recovery, by more than 11 percent in real terms, the highest growth since 1997. READ MORE >>

Yesterday, the World Bank released a new less optimistic forecast for global growth in 2012. It warrants a look back at the year that just passed. 2011 was marked by slower growth in both developed and developing countries. The protests of Arab Spring, Japan’s catastrophic earthquake, and the Eurozone’s debt problems contributed to slower growth around the world. READ MORE >>

Often when making the case for U.S. infrastructure investment, someone will point overseas to Europe or Asia and wonder aloud why other countries have world-class, economy-shaping infrastructure and the United States doesn’t. There are obviously many reasons but a key problem is that, unlike other nations, the United States is still over-reliant on the public sector for delivering infrastructure projects. READ MORE >>

Two new reports show the impact of the record number of foreign students studying in the United States.  According to the Institute of International Education, more than 723,000 international students attended higher education in the United States during the 2010-2011 academic year, about 3.5 percent of the total higher education enrollment.  READ MORE >>