Economy and Government

By: Claire Chen The U.S. Department of Labor’s August 2022 CPI report reveals that American consumers may finally see a respite in the inflationary processes that have contributed to a skyrocketing cost of living. The modest 0.1 percent increase in August’s CPI – still higher than expected, but consistent with July’s 0.0 percent increase and a dramatic reversal from June’s 1.3 percent increase – may explain the September 26 remarks expressed by Federal Reserve Chair of Boston Dr. Susan Collins, who states, “I think that it’s quite likely that inflation is near peaking and perhaps may have peaked already.” However,…

By: Ron Ye Around the world, food is getting increasingly expensive. The war in Ukraine and COVID-19 are the main factors behind it. COVID-19 has led to supply issues, growing inflation, and labor shortages. This has caused a surge in food prices in 2021 as countries reopened and demand increased. Now, compounded with the war in Ukraine, the rise in food prices has become more noticeable. Russia is now closed off from trade due to sanctions and Ukraine is unable to keep up its food export due to the Russian invasion.  An Analysis The rise in food prices may not…

By: Lexi Blakes Thursday, Feb. 24, U.S. President Joe Biden announced additional sanctions on Russian banks in light of the recent escalation of the Russia-Ukraine conflict. The crisis has been mounting since tensions developed in 2014, when protesters in Ukraine overthrew President Viktor Yanukovych, who was partisan to Russia’s interests. That same year, Russia invaded and annexed the Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea. In the years following, the Minsk Accords were signed by Russia, Ukraine, France and Germany, but it did little to protect Ukraine from Putin’s ambitions. Now, in 2022, Putin has ordered a full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Citing pro-Western…

By: Trevor Jones An often overlooked facet of global economics is the functionality of island economies. I began exploring this in the wake of the Tonga volcano eruption in January 2022, when a massive eruption caused rampant flooding in the Pacific island nation. The publicity of this disaster led me to consider how the economies of Pacific islands work, given how they have seemingly little area or natural resources to build their wealth off of. With this article I aim to explore the broad components of island economies and compare them to our economy here in the United States. Primarily,…

By: Ron Ye When I began working on the first version of this article, it was about a week before the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. There were many uncertainties. Would Russia even invade Ukraine? It seemed like a risky move for Putin to make. How willingly would European nations support sanctions on Russia? Germany had shown reluctance in agreeing to the possible sanctions. Wouldn’t China help Russia economically? During the Olympics, Putin and Xi Jinping seemed to have had each other’s backs. Because of recent events, these uncertainties have been mostly answered.  However, the effectiveness of the sanctions…

By: Geneva Bass The advent of the novel coronavirus initially paralyzed the global art market. The first half of 2020 saw fine-art auction sales crumble over 50% and the contemporary art market lose 36%, both scraping record lows.  However, the global art market and the auction scene’s swift market orientation paired with a low-interest-rate environment, inflationary monetary policy, and consolidation of wealth quickly fueled a historic rebound for the largest unregulated financial space in the world, the art market, despite the global economy’s continued Covid-induced distress.  The global art market’s nimble adoption of online auctioning proved critical. 2020 heralded a…

By: Ke Tang OverviewInflation in October is rising more than expected. According to the US Bureau of LaborStatistics, the consumer price index in October has increased 0.9% and pushed the year-over-year increase to 6.2%, hitting a 30-year high. In comparison, the consumer price index inSeptember has risen 0.4% on the month and 5.4% on the year. 1 The rise of inflation exceedspeople's expectations and will increase people’s costs for living. However, it is not necessarilythat inflation will influence everyone equally. Depending on an individual’s consumption basket,the impact on one’s cost of living will be different because different products have experiencedvarious…

By: Marvi Ali The Federal Reserve System, or the Fed, is the central bank and monetary authority of theUnited States. Founded in the aftermaths of the Panic of 1907 and a series of financial crises, theFed was tasked with the major responsibilities of conducting national monetary policy,supervising and regulating the banking system, and ensuring financial stability. There are threemain components of the Fed: the Regional Banks, the Board of Governors, and the Federal OpenMarket Committee. One of the seven governors from the Board of Governors is appointed as theChairman of the Fed by the President of the United States and…

By: Mi Nguyen It has been almost two years since the COVID-19 virus was detected and the world is going deepinto quarantine and isolation to battle the immense spread of the virus. By this point, wearingmasks indoors and showing vaccination cards at restaurants has become the new normal already.As we become so used to living with the virus, we tend to forget that COVID-19 is still there,and it still has a huge impact on our current economy. Examining the report from S&P Global Ratings, we can see that although the economy is slowlyrecovering from the initial impact of COVID-19, the…