It is widely acknowledged that the United States Federal Reserve exerts significant influence over the economy and financial markets. The Federal Reserve is responsible for conducting monetary policy so as to promote the goals of achieving maximum employment, stable prices,…
During a recent radio interview in England, David Buffin, Chairman of Buffin Leadership International Ltd (an international management consultancy) was asked by the interviewer to define the attributes of great leadership and to provide examples of great leaders as role…
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) usually holds its Spring Meeting in Washington DC in April. This year, due to the emergency conditions arising from the COVID-19 pandemic, the IMF meeting was conducted in a virtual format. The global crisis resulting…
The French Institute of Actuaries will host an international actuarial colloquium in Paris in May with the theme Individual Choices facing Societal Changes. The organizers of this international colloquium have posed a question that represents a direct challenge to the…
The 2019 Nobel Prize in Economics has been awarded jointly to Abhijit Banerjee, Esther Duflo and Michael Kremer for their work in development economics. In the mid-1990’s at Harvard University, Michael Kremer began studying the nature of poverty by the…
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) held its annual meeting this month in Washington in collaboration with the World Bank. In a closing statement, the policy-setting committee for the 189-nation IMF commented that global growth should accelerate next year, although officials…
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe observed that “history is a great fugue in which the voices of nations one after the other emerge”. The Roman Empire with its classical civilization was dominant some two thousand years ago until its ultimate collapse…
Forty years ago, China’s Reform and Opening was initiated by Deng Xiaoping at the Third Plenum of the Eleventh Central Committee. Since then, China has made great economic progress, with its share of the world economy growing ten-fold from 1.8…
Following the conclusion of the G20 Leaders’ Summit in Buenos Aires at the beginning of December, a declaration was issued on Building Consensus for Fair and Sustainable Development. The G20 leaders agreed to an agenda that is people-centered, inclusive and…
This edition of Commentary represents a continuation of the series on the topic of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. Three previous editions of Commentary, published in December 2017, January 2018 and February 2018, presented a concise overview of the…