A few interesting developments

This past week there have been some massive protests in South Korea. Many people are upset about the economic and health care policies of their recently elected president, Lee Myung-Bak, and one of the more controversial issues is the importation of American beef because mad cow disease turned up in a few of our cows (or as my students say, “America has crazy cow!”). South Korea was, believe it or not, the third largest importer of American beef at one point (last weekend, two of the Koreans with whom I went out for lunch ordered steaks and were elated to eat one of their favorite foods that they don’t get in the school cafeteria.) One of my Korean students went home last weekend to get a few things done before going to study in New Jersey and told me about what was going on in Seoul. I have had a few long conversations some of the students who follow current events and they have told me how most young people in Korea feel. One of their biggest concerns is affordable and universal healthcare and, as a matter of fact, Michael Moore’s movie Sicko was a hit in the country. So I’ve learned that hamburgers and healthcare are two problems that we share in common.

MasterCard produces quite a bit of research – I’ve noticed that they put together timely reports on consumer spending based on purchases using MasterCard credit cards – and one of their reports is an annual list of the most influential cities in terms of business. New York and Chicago rank in the top 10, while the other eight of the top ten cities are in Asia and Europe. China is striving to make Shanghai the leading financial center in Asia and it came in at 24 this year (I came across this because it was featured in the local news). As one of the largest ports in the world and the focal point for the Yangtze delta economy, the city ranks high as a center of trade and exports and also benefits from a huge labor supply, but it still has a long way to go in the other criteria. It looks like it won’t be 24th for long:

“Dr. Michael Goldberg, Program Director, MasterCard Worldwide Centers of Commerce, points to Shanghai as a city on the path to global leadership. ‘Shanghai, which rose in its ranking to the number 24 position this year from number 32 last year, continues to
leverage its historically strong position as the financial and logistical hub to Asia. Shanghai
is well positioned to assume its place among the top three cities in the world within the next
15 to 20 years,’ said Goldberg.”

It’s hard to think of Shanghai in the same league as London and New York in just 20 years, but then again, the city was probably nothing like it is now only 20 years ago.

I was listening to an NPR podcast the other day and at the end of a report about the tough job market in the U.S., a few Americans working in Shanghai were interviewed about how they are doing well here, where they are untouched by the foreclosures, high gas prices, and layoffs that are hurting so many people in the U.S. One of the people interviewed was someone I know of through CouchSurfing. It was weird to hear a familiar name on the podcast. And it’s true – I feel none of the pain in the U.S. economy here – I don’t buy gas and don’t have a mortgage and there is no shortage of job opportunities. After nearly ten months I’ve saved a comfortable sum of money (for living standards here). To be fair, many Chinese are hit by high inflation (7-8% this year) and all the small time investors (there’s a lot of them now, it’s almost a pastime for many retired people) have taken hits in the stock market, which is down 44% so far this year.

Finally, officials from Taiwan and China are meeting in China. Airline flights between Taiwan and the Mainland may soon be allowed.