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home > the cfr think tank > research projects > Economics Program
Sebastian Mallaby
Brad Setser
Amity Shlaes
Edward Alden
Jagdish Bhagwati
Benn Steil
Caroline Atkinson
David Braunschvig
James Dougherty
Peter Kenen
Roger Kubarych
Matthew SlaughterIn 1985, when the U.S. current-account deficit stood at 2.8 percent of gross domestic product (GDP), foreign governments owned 8 percent of U.S. government debt. In 2004, with the current-account deficit at 5.7 percent of GDP, foreign governments own a much higher 22 percent of debt. This is a cause for concern, both because it represents a greater concentration of holdings and because political factors are more likely to motivate selling by government holders of U.S. debt than by private holders.
Visit our Maurice R. Greenberg Center for Geoeconomic Studies website.
Featured Projects
October 1, 1996—Present
| Director: | Benn Steil, Senior Fellow and Director of International Economics |
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This monthly speaker series brings the world’s foremost economic policymakers and scholars to address a high-level audience from the business and financial community on current topics in international economics, such as outsourcing, monetary policy, and competition policy.
May 9, 2001—Present
| Staff: | Roger M. Kubarych, Henry Kaufman Adjunct Senior Fellow for International Economics and Finance |
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Tremendous controversy swirls around the issue of whether emerging economies would be better off or worse off by embracing the kind of financial market structures that have been developed in the U.S. and other advanced industrial countries during the past two decades or so. This evolution, which we call the “Americanization of Finance” essentially involves the transformation of a financial system centered around traditional commercial banks to a more free-wheeling system organized around open capital markets.
October 1, 2001—Present
| Staff: | Caroline Atkinson, Adjunct Senior Fellow for International Economics |
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This roundtable series brings together key players from the private markets, government, Federal Reserve, IMF, World Bank, and think tanks to discuss pressing policy issues in international economics. The group, which meets monthly, has so far discussed issues such as the impact of terrorism on economic prospects, the outlook for emerging markets, and U.S. trade policy.
January 1, 2003—Present
| Staff: | David Braunschvig, Adjunct Senior Fellow for Business and Foreign Policy |
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This roundtable series explores current issues at the intersection of U.S. foreign policy and private sector activity. Meetings in the past have focused on the possible effects of anti-Americanism in Europe on U.S. brands, the negotiations between the European Union and the United States over genetically modified foods, and the impact of the European Union's satellite navigation system (Galileo) on U.S. strategic interests. The aim of the series is to inform the current debate on those policies important to both corporate executives and government officials, and to provide them with constructive and thoughtful recommendations.
January 1, 2004—Present
| Staff: | James P. Dougherty, Adjunct Senior Fellow for Business and Foreign Policy |
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America’s ability to encourage innovative ideas has helped to establish it as the world’s economic and military leader. However, technological developments over the past thirty years have spawned an increasingly globalized world and created new challenges to American pre-eminence. This roundtable series investigates how the government’s response to these challenges will affect America’s global economic and political standing.
This roundtable series is made possible by the Bernard and Irene Schwartz Foundation.
January 1, 2005—Present
| Chair: | Timothy F. Geithner |
|---|---|
| Author: | Peter B. Kenen, Adjunct Senior Fellow for International Economics Ellen E. Meade, Associate Professor of Economics, American University |
This project will result in a book considering the prospects for the regionalization of the international monetary system. The authors will begin by comparing the various exisiting and soon-to-exist forms of currency consolidation and then examine the prospects for future monetary unions, particularly among NAFTA, MERCOSUR, and East Asian nations.
May 2006—September 2007
| Staff: | Sebastian Mallaby, Director of the Maurice R. Greenberg Center for Geoeconomic Studies and Paul A. Volcker Senior Fellow for International Economics |
|---|---|
| Author: | Robert J. LaLonde, Professor, Harris School of Public Policy, University of Chicago |
Professor Robert J. Lalonde, professor of economics at the Harris School of Public Policy at the University of Chicago, is writing a Council Special Report on job displacement and the experienced worker. In this report, Professor LaLonde examines evidence on the causes of job loss, both through trade, technological change, and other factors, and suggests policies for aiding workers most harmed by job displacement—long-tenured, displaced workers. The report outlines the merits of a wage insurance program that would supplement the earnings of long-tenured workers displaced by international trade and other factors. The report contends that without policies to aid the workers most adversely affected by job loss, public support for further economic liberalization will likely diminish.
Featured Publications
September 13, 2006
| Author: | Douglas Holtz-Eakin |
|---|
Doulgas Holtz-Eakin testifies on the possibility of incroproting dynamic estimation into the analysis of legislative proposals in order to measure the macroecomic impacts of spending and tax legislation.
February 2006
| Authors: | Benn Steil, Senior Fellow and Director of International Economics Robert E. Litan |
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Over the past two decades, another form of economic exchange besides imports and exports has risen to a level of vastly greater significance and political concern: the purchase and sale of financial assets across borders.
July 1, 2005
| Author: | Roger M. Kubarych, Henry Kaufman Adjunct Senior Fellow for International Economics and Finance |
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September 10, 2004
| Authors: | Peter B. Kenen, Adjunct Senior Fellow for International Economics Jeffrey R. Shafer Nigel Wicks Charles Wyplosz |
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Written by a group that combines extensive practical experience and analytical sharpness, the sixth title in the Geneva Reports on the World Economy series presents an overview of how cooperation has evolved, identifies its current limitations, and advances a number of proposals.
July/August 2003
| Authors: | David Braunschvig, Adjunct Senior Fellow for Business and Foreign Policy Richard L. Garwin |
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Summary
May 17, 2002
| Author: | Caroline Atkinson, Adjunct Senior Fellow for International Economics |
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In Termites in the Trading System, Jagdish Bhagwati reveals how the rapid spread of preferential trade agreements endangers the world trading system.
America Between the Wars explores how the decisions and debates of the years between the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the Twin Towers shaped the events, arguments, and politics of the world we live in today.
In The Fall and Rise of the Islamic State, Noah Feldman tells the story behind the increasingly popular call for the establishment of the sharia—the law of the traditional Islamic state—in the modern Muslim world.
Complete list of CFR Books.
After two decades of liberalization, many countries around the world are adopting new restrictions on foreign direct investment (FDI) that could retard continued progress. The authors make recommendations for correcting this protectionist drift by proposing guidelines for how countries can better regulate FDI yet still reap its economic benefits.
In this Council Special Report, the authors make a strong case that the Bush administration’s policy of diplomatic isolation of Syria is not serving U.S. interests, and offer informed history and thoughtful analysis of the country and its external behavior.
Complete list of Council Special Reports.
For more information on the David Rockefeller Studies Program, contact:
Gary Samore
Vice President, Director of Studies, and Maurice R. Greenberg Chair
+1-212-434-9627
gsamore@cfr.org
Sebastian Mallaby
Director of the Maurice R. Greenberg Center for
Geoeconomic Studies, Deputy Director of Studies, and Paul A. Volcker Senior
Fellow for International Economics
smallaby@cfr.org
Janine Hill
Deputy Director of Studies Administration
+1-212-434-9753
jhill@cfr.org
The David Rockefeller Studies Program is the Council’s “think tank.” Its work is integral to achieving the Council’s goal of contributing to the foreign policy debate. Fellows in the Studies Program do this by researching, writing, and commenting on the most important challenges facing the United States and the world.
Copyright 2008 by the Council on Foreign Relations. All Rights Reserved.
