Word: forecasting
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...government. The economy is still likely to grow nicely in 2004?Thaksin told TIME he thought a rate of 6.5% was achievable?but it will not reach the level of 8% he predicted at the beginning of the year. In his interview with TIME, Thaksin blamed the reduced forecast on unrest in the south along with SARS, bird flu and rising oil prices. Yet even if the other problems disappeared, the south would continue to demand his attention. Though Thai authorities have imposed martial law in the south, pledged hundreds of millions of dollars in development aid, and tried...
...SCIENTISTS FORECAST MAJOR EARTH-quakes months before they happen? Most experts are dubious, but that hasn't stopped Vladimir Keilis-Borok from trying. And for a while the mathematical geophysicist, 83, seemed to be on a roll. In September 2003, within a time frame Keilis-Borok and colleagues had stipulated in advance, a pair of powerful earthquakes struck northern Japan, setting off tsunamis and injuring several hundred people. In December, another anticipated temblor rattled central California, killing two and damaging dozens of buildings. Then, in July, yet another quake, near the border of Austria, Italy and Slovenia, came close...
Keilis-Borok calls his approach "tail wags the dog," the tail referring to patterns of seismic activity that appear to presage large tremors. (He does not try to forecast smaller events, like the earthquake swarms that rumbled beneath Mount St. Helens before it erupted last week, or the more significant quakes that perturbed Parkfield, Calif.) At first he and his colleagues looked for strong quakes that had already occurred, then scrolled backward through years of seismic data. More recently they have been working with current seismic records as well. Their computer programs home in on small quakes that occur...
...about the extent of offshoring. A report last month by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) said that while outsourcing business services is becoming a significant trend, most of it takes place domestically; only 1-2% is done internationally. Others predict a surge. Forrester in August forecast that Europe will lose 1.2 million jobs to offshore service providers by the year 2015. "The fact is that we are in the foothills of a revolution," says Stephen Green, chief executive of HSBC. Such estimates often overlook important nuances. For one thing, a major beneficiary of the offshoring trend...
...population, rising health-care costs, workforce skills, immigration, retirement savings and the like. Occasionally, prominent voices are heard. Treasury secretary Ken Henry has argued that meeting the fiscal needs of an aging population requires sustained productivty growth and increased workforce participation - basically, a high-growth road to close a forecast gap between revenue and spending in 2040. Reserve Bank chief Ian Macfarlane has warned that unless governments improve the quality of higher education and maintain a flexible economy, future generations could be burdened with higher taxes to meet the health and welfare costs of retiring baby boomers...