Word: slumped
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...parts for the computers that U.S. dotbombs stopped buying after the tech boom went bust. The result is that Asia has been hit with what Arup Raha, chief economist at UBS Warburg in Hong Kong, calls a "double whammy" of depressed U.S. demand for all goods, and a particular slump in electronics, the cornerstone of Asia's new economy. Taiwan's exports plunged nearly 17% in the second quarter. Singapore, South Korea, Thailand and the Philippines are not faring much better...
...depend on the one country in the neighborhood that is not in bad shape: China. The forecasts for China's future are a bit like harried traffic cops on Shanghai's streets pointing in two directions at the same time. The nation is not nearly as vulnerable to export slumps because its own consumers are spending like mad on everything from cars to vacations at Angkor Wat. That could well keep growth rates at the current 7%. But China also has other big problems?most notably corruption?that threaten to stifle growth. Either way, there is a general consensus that...
...Choi Man Jin, head of Union Metal, a small assembler of air-conditioning parts in the Nandong Industrial Park, west of Seoul. Choi says he has halved his staff, and his orders have all but dried up. Hurt badly by Korea's high cost of labor and the economic slump, he is thinking about moving to China. Hundreds of his compatriots have already gone, and big companies in Taiwan, Malaysia and Thailand are doing the same. "China has the potential to wipe Southeast Asia off the map as a manufacturing base," says Michael Enright, a business professor at Hong Kong...
...Economists. Their unanimous answer: Not right away. Even if the U.S. can steer clear of a recession--and one panelist says we may be in one already--the economy will remain so weak for the next 12 months that to millions of Americans, conditions will still feel like a slump, particularly as unemployment rises. And it will rise...
...particularly hard on California, where consumers and companies are bracing for a summer of blackouts, thanks to the Golden State's famously botched deregulation plan. California produces 13% of the U.S. GDP and could become a national crisis all by itself if energy woes drag it into a slump. Richardson chides President George W. Bush for refusing to put temporary price caps on wholesale electric rates in California, which have risen to an astonishing $1,900/MW-h, vs. a precrisis $30/MW-h. But even if there were such caps, the former Energy Secretary adds, this would be "a horrendous summer...