Word: worst
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...time of nearly universal dismay over the business outlook, there are few experts anywhere who can out-gloom Jim Walker, an economist at an independent Hong Kong research firm called Asianomics. In his thick Scottish accent, Walker predicts the worst global recession since the Great Depression. GDP in the U.S., he says, could contract as much as 5% in 2009, and Europe by 2%. He is no more bullish about the economies in his area of specialty: Asia, a region where most of his colleagues foresee more buoyancy. China won't see GDP rise more than...
...Before writing off Walker as just another member of a growing Greek chorus of dispirited prognosticators, consider that he has a history of detecting worst-case scenarios before they came to pass. Back in 1995, Walker, then an economist at brokerage house CLSA, penned a report entitled It's Life, Jim, but Not as We Know It: Asia Decoupling, in which he and his team of economists warned that Asian currency regimes, if not reformed, could be susceptible to Mexico-style meltdowns in two to three years. Two years later, the region plunged into the 1997 Asian crisis, which...
...contract. In a sign of how much damage the global slowdown is causing in China, the government this week estimated that 20 million migrant laborers have lost their jobs. But just as important to Chinese growth is private investment. Corporate profitability in China was deteriorating even before the worst of the global financial crisis hit, and that will soften investment, which makes up more than 40% of GDP. In the first 11 months of 2008, profits at 350,000 enterprises in China grew a mere 4.9%, down from 37% in the same period in 2007. "We're already seeing...
...China crunch will have repercussions for the rest of the region and the world. The hope among other economists was that trade within Asia, with a stable China at its core, could spare exporters such as Taiwan and South Korea from the worst of the recession in the West. That hope, Walker argues, has evaporated. A major downturn in China "takes the floor away" from growth in the rest of Asia, he says, leaving the region more exposed to the woes of the U.S. and Europe. Most vulnerable are Asia's smaller, trade-dependent economies. He forecasts Taiwan and Singapore...
...Worst of all, political appointments present a tempting opportunity for quid pro quo backroom deals, as demonstrated by Governor Rod Blagojevich’s attempted sale of Illinois’s open Senate seat. Though most governors would never engage in such brazen corruption, it takes just one light-fingered public official to tarnish the democratic process. Furthermore, even honest governors expect some sort of goodie in return for choosing a candidate, be it political support or fundraising help. As Governor Blagojevich crudely put it, “a Senate seat is a [expletive] valuable thing, you don?...