Over the next decade, it is estimated by the World Economic Forum that the global economy will need to create some 600 million new jobs to preserve social cohesion, and ensure sustainable growth. In the midst of ongoing economic fragility across much of the world, this poses a monumental challenge, and will thus be one of the topics discussed at WEF’s annual meeting in Davos later this month.Education is key to delivering this agenda. Human advancement and development has always been driven by k

HANOI ― As the new year dawns, the world is rapidly growing old, and I’m not talking about the earth beneath our feet. No, birth rates for nearly all of humankind are plummeting.In fact, fewer than 20 percent of the world’s nations are now experiencing growing population rates, the CIA reports. All the rest have either stable or declining populations. The reasons for this are varied ― as are the likely consequences. But first the facts.The nations with the world’s lowest birth rates are here in

Absent from the discussion about whether former Sen. Chuck Hagel would make a good secretary of defense is any focus on lessons learned from personal factors like combat in war, as well as loyalty to the president.As I was grousing about this, my eye caught a name on a rubbing I made from the Vietnam Veterans Memorial wall: “Edward S. Krukowski.” Many years ago, Ed and I studied Russian and were in the ROTC together.Capt. Edward Krukowski, USAF, was flying a C-123 on a resupply mission in Vietna

A federal judge issued an important but puzzling decision last week regarding the Barack Obama administration’s deadly drone campaign against Islamic terrorists. First, Judge Colleen McMahon of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York declared that the White House need not respond to Freedom of Information Act requests that it turn over its legal doctrine for the drone program. Then, after handing Obama that victory, she raised the possibility that he is a murderer. The judg

I once knew someone, many years ago, who was sent to a “rest home” by her aggravated husband. Today, you and I would call that “involuntary commitment,” and the fellow was able to do it with relative ease because he was an important person, knew the right people, and the laws were on his side.This was a time, the 1970s, when a woman couldn’t even be raped by her husband in a number of states and teenagers could be “grounded” all the way to the psychiatric hospital. It was a time when horrific pl

While there have been heated discussions over what to do with Japan’s nuclear power generation, it is important for the government not only to promote development of green energy sources but also to make serious efforts to exploit new fossil fuel resources, especially in the ocean, to operate the thermal power plants substituting for most of Japan’s nuclear power plants now being kept offline.On Oct. 3, Japan Petroleum Exploration Co. extracted shale oil on a trial basis from 1,800-meter-deep be

HARTFORD, Connecticut ― I often wished that state legislators who knew the most about addiction would band together and speak out as one during budget debates. Who better to advocate for treatment and chip away at public denial than the recovering alcoholics I knew who were also members of the General Assembly?Yet the answer was as close as my nearest mirror. Despite being a journalist and writing opinion for years, I was no more likely to publish a column about my own 20-plus years’ recovery fr

For almost two years, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission has been investigating allegations that Google Inc. unfairly dominates the Internet search market. The consumer agency ended the case on Thursday without bringing charges over the main issue ― whether Google favors its own products in search results and, consequently, stifles competition. The FTC missed an opportunity to explore publicly one of the paramount questions of our day: Is Google abusing its role as gatekeeper to the digital econo