The Korea Herald

[Kim Myong-sik] Realistic fantasy in final days of detente year

Dec 5, 2018

North and South Korea completed the destruction of 10 guard posts on either side of the Demilitarized Zone and removed personnel from those positions last week to make a portion of the heavily fortified border a real no man’s land. The two Koreas have thus accomplished one symbolic task in the list of tension-reduction measures signed by their top leaders in their summit in Pyongyang in September. Work details from the South and North Korean armies have also finished clearing mines in the centra
[Leonid Bershidsky] France faces typical Facebook revolution

Dec 5, 2018

The liberating role social networks played during the Arab Spring and the Russian protests of 2011 and 2012 was widely lauded. Little of that enthusiasm is on display today amid the violent “yellow vest” protests in France -- even though Facebook is still doing what it does best: letting people channel their rage.In a 2011 paean to “the Facebook revolution,” Chris Taylor of the tech news website Mashable wrote that Facebook was “democracy in action.” Philip Howard of the University of Washington
[Kim Hoo-ran] Not walking the talk

Dec 5, 2018

Korea ushered in the era of 5G era at the stroke of midnight on Dec. 1, when the country’s three mobile carriers -- SKT, KT and LG Uplus -- simultaneously switched on 5G networks. Although the services are limited to business users on fixed-wireless access, with the roll out of 5G cellular services for consumers expected in March 2019, the day was marked with much fanfare by the mobile carriers as they offered visions of a world more connected than ever at a faster speed than ever. Things that d
[Tyler Cowen] Trump deserves some credit for a truce with China

Dec 4, 2018

Just because the US and China have agreed to call a truce in their trade war doesn’t mean that it’s over: This was a classic exercise in can-kicking. Nonetheless, most cans have quite a few kicks in them, and overall this is good news for the global economy. Instead of sweeping everything under the rug, as was the case before US President Donald Trump took office, America and China have found a new way of addressing conflict by talking openly.Let’s consider the announcement itself. The US has pl
[Robert J. Fouser] Listen to the broad middle

Dec 4, 2018

Labor strife in South Korea is back in the news, as the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions launched a general strike on Nov. 2l. The KCTU also boycotted a meeting of the Economic, Social and Labor Council, a newly expanded presidential commission designed to develop policy consensus on economic and social issues. The KCTU is protesting the bipartisan agreement to relax temporarily the recently established 52-hour limit on weekly working hours.In its protests, the KCTU argued that President Moo
[Mohamed A. El-Erian] G-20 gives markets a short-term win

Dec 4, 2018

The G-20 Summit in Argentina ended without fireworks involving the US, which was appropriate in a way, given the pall cast by the death of President George H.W. Bush.The US went along with a watered-down communique rather than stand in the way of a consensus, as it recently did at the APEC summit and the G-7. And rather than ending the meeting with a dramatic breakthrough or a loud breakdown, America reached an agreement to freeze trade tariffs with China that went somewhat beyond the one it rea
[Hal Brands] Elizabeth Warren has (half) a foreign policy

Dec 4, 2018

A crucial challenge for the Democratic Party is to formulate a foreign policy platform that goes beyond critiquing US President Donald Trump and lays out a compelling vision of America’s role in an increasingly dangerous world.Sen. Elizabeth Warren, who will likely be a leading candidate for the party’s nomination in 2020, offered up her vision in a recent speech at American University. That speech, and an accompanying article in Foreign Affairs, outlined a strategy of progressive internationali
[Kim Seong-kon] The fear index based on Korea’s future

Dec 4, 2018

The fear index, also known as the Volatile Index, refers to the stock market’s expectation of volatility and investors’ anxiety amid extreme uncertainty. “The Fear Index” is also the title of famed British writer Robert Harris’ novel about the financial crisis that swept the world due to the subprime mortgage crisis in 2007 and the Lehman Brothers’ bankruptcy in 2008, which culminated in the Flash Crash of 2010 that created panic for 36 minutes all over the world. Due to the fear index that may
[Shannon O’Neil] Latin America’s new populism isn’t about economy

Dec 3, 2018

A year ago, Latin American nations and their bevy of pragmatic, market-friendly, middle-of-the-road presidents stood out from some of their OECD counterparts. Eight presidential races later, the region looks less exceptional. Populism has returned to its historic home. Yet this time injustice, not economic class, turned voters against the political establishment, elevating outsiders who have threatened to undermine democratic norms.Democracy’s supporters shouldn’t yet despair, as many of the reg
[Noah Smith] Growth remedy for wage stagnation

Dec 3, 2018

Wages for the average American aren’t rising very quickly. Apart from a brief burst of growth in late 2014 and 2015, both average hourly earnings and total compensation (which includes health care and other benefits) have barely grown at all since 2010 when adjusted for inflation.It seems possible that recent wage stagnation is connected to the longer-term trend.In reality, there are several trends. The first is sluggish productivity growth. Overall, the amount of material wealth in an economy i
[Faye Flam] Nature hasn’t created perfect species

Dec 3, 2018

For such flawed creatures, human beings are surprisingly hard to improve, at least through our genes.That’s one reason there’s so much outcry over the recent claim that researchers in China altered the genes of a pair of twins girls -- endowing at least one with resistance to HIV. The genetic change, even if it worked as advertised, would not be a clear-cut improvement but a trade-off.The claim is that the researchers disabled a gene called CCR5, which in its intact form helps HIV enter cells. G
[Alexandra Borchardt] Mundane dangers confronting news media

Dec 3, 2018

The brutal torture and murder of the US-based Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi has focused attention on Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who is widely believed to have ordered the killing. It also highlights the hazards of the news business. When the final numbers are tallied, 2018 could be the most dangerous year on record for journalists worldwide.But while physical attacks on journalists have become frighteningly bold, most dangers confronting the profession are much more mundane. Five
[Julian Lee] OPEC might kick Saudi Arabia when it’s down

Dec 3, 2018

OPEC and friends meet in Vienna later this week, and the backdrop isn’t pretty. Oil prices are their lowest in over a year, and there’s the prospect of a glut in 2019 if the group doesn’t make a new deal to cut production.But agreement may be impossible. Saudi Arabia is adamant the burden must be shared. Others in the group argue that the kingdom’s output boost since June has created the problem and it is up to the kingdom to solve it by bearing the brunt of the cuts.From an economic perspective
[David Ignatius] America needs to use power silently

Dec 2, 2018

Listen to the voice barking orders on a Russian ship last Sunday as it drove straight toward a Ukrainian tug: “Crush him from the right. ... Do it! Do it! (Expletive) cut him off!” And then, just before the deliberate collision, a satisfied: “Hold on, everyone.” What you sense is the raw exuberance of Russian power, in the audio and video recordings released by the Ukrainian interior minister and posted on YouTube by BBC News. The Russian captain snarls obscene, bellicose orders to his crew -- c
[John Micklethwait] China inching in the right direction

Dec 2, 2018

It was appropriate that US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping flew to Buenos Aires for their showdown summit at the close of a month that began with the centennial of the end of World War I. America’s economic tussles with China are all too reminiscent of the rivalry at the beginning of the last century between Britain, the superpower, and the rising power, Germany.This is not as bleak a comparison as it sounds, for two reasons. First, nobody now seems to be planning on immi