Making pay more transparent Swedes discuss their incomes with a frankness that would horrify Britons or Americans. They have little reason to be coy; in Sweden you can learn a stranger's salary simply by ringing the tax authorities and asking. Pay transparency can be a potent weapon against persistent inequities. When hackers published e-mails from executives at Sony Pictures, a file studio, the..
Mutual mistrust between the two administrations scuppered a deal to avoid a head-on clash It was political theater - epic for some, farce for others and tragic for many more. By 70 votes out of 135, and with the opposition having walked out, the Catalan parliament in Barcelona voted today, October 27th, to declare independence and constitute Catalonia as a republic. Minutes later in Madrid, the ..
As the world marks the centenary of the October Revolution, Russia is once again under the rule of the tsar Seventeen years after Vladimir Putin first became president, his grip on Russia is stronger than ever. The West, which still sees Russia in post-Soviet terms, sometimes ranks him as his country's most powerful leader since Stalin. Russians are increasingly looking to an earlier period of h..
Yet again, reality turns out to be complicated Britain is running out of time to finish negotiations before it is due to leave the European Union on March 29th 2019. Theresa May insisted in Parliament this week that the recent EU summit had made important progress. Yet the start of talks on a framework for future trade may not happen until after December. Hence a favorite idea for averting a "cl..
Does this mean no one can challenge him? The constitution of the Chinese Communist Party defines what it means to be a party member and lists the organization's core beliefs. On October 24th a new principle was added to it: "Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era" - quite a mouthful. Xinhua, a government news agency, said the change was approved at the end of ..
Five outliers - Chesapeake Energy, Netflix, Nextera Energy, Tesla and Uber - have collectively lost $100bn in the past decade Yves Saint Laurent, Lady Gaga, David Bowie. Some people do not operate by the same rules as everyone else. Might the same be true of companies? Most bosses complain of being slaves to short-term profit targets. Yet a few flout the orthodoxy in flamboyant fashion. Consider..
Time for fresh thinking about the changing economics of geography Populism's wave has yet to crest. That is the sobering lesson of recent elections in Germany and Austria, where the success of anti-immigrant, anti-globalization parties showed that a message of hostility to elites and outsiders resonates as strongly as ever among those fed up with the status quo. It is also the lesson from Americ..
Canada's Liberal government is starting to make mistakes and suffer mishaps To oppose the government of Justin Trudeau has been no fun. Canada's prime minister has shrugged off controversies that would have hurt a less charismatic politician. Few Canadians seemed to mind when he accepted a helicopter ride from the Aga Khan to holiday on his private island in the Bahamas; most yawned when the gov..
Do not expect Mr Xi to change China, or the world, for the better American presidents have a habit of describing their Chinese counterparts in terms of awe. A fawning Richard Nixon said to Mao Zedong that the chairman's writings had "changed the world". To Jimmy Carter, Deng Xiaoping was a string of flattering adjectives: "smart, tough, intelligent, frank, courageous, personable, self-assured, f..
North Korea highlights a faultline in the world's business architecture Wars are fought with weapons, but also with money. To understand the global balance of power in the coming decades, it helps to pay attention to the commercial subplot of the North Korean crisis. For the first time, America is attempting to use its full legal and financial might to change the behavior of Chinese companies an..
Goldman Sags For the first time, the famous investment bank has more of a business than an image problem By Tradition, Goldman Sachs makes risky financial wagers and stays icy cool under pressure. A bad trade on Treasury bonds in 1986 almost killed it, but was eventually cauterized. The firm's "big short" in early 2007, when it bet that subprime securities would tumble, helped it to book profits..
To avoid calamity, ask Catalans what they really want When a democracy sends riot police to beat old ladies over the head with batons and stop them voting, something has gone badly wrong. Catalans say that almost 900 people were hurt by police in the referendum for independence on October 1st. Whatever the provocation from Catalan leaders in staging an unconstitutional poll, the reaction of Mari..
Luxembourg's "comfort letter" to Amazon was illegal, says the EU Margrethe Vestager's assault on technology firms she deems to have improperly massaged down their tax bills continued this week with a tilt at Amazon. The internet retailer faces a bill of €250m ($293m) for back taxes over what the European Union's competition commissioner considers to have been an illegal sweetheart deal with Luxe..
A massacre sends clerics in different directions Since the horrific massacre in Las Vegas, the word "evil" has been heard with unusual frequency, on the lips of political leaders as well as clerics. This evil-talk is not just a reflex response or a banal statement of the obvious. It has philosophical implications, and often places the speaker in a particular corner of the debate about guns. In t..
Next it will push them apart Murderous, thin-skinned and in possession of nuclear weapons, the North Korean, Kim Jong Un, has one good deed to his name: he has united America and China. Max Baucus, America's ambassador to Beijing until January 2017, recalls the Chinese president, Xi Jinping, privately expressing "disgust" at Mr Kim's reckless pursuit of nukes and missiles to carry them to other ..