Only when those in need receive the minimum living allowance will this form of state aid fulfill its proper role of redistributing social wealth in a fair manner and thus ease the gap between the haves and have-nots. The fact that more than 7,000 relatives of officials at various levels were deprived of the privilege to such allowances in East China’s Jiangxi province alone sends the message that

Housing prices are sliding again, and there is plenty of blame to go around. Factors include the sluggish recovery, ineffective private and public efforts to prevent foreclosures, suddenly risk-averse lenders and temporary tax credits that generated a short-lived and artificial rally in home sales. But a lawsuit filed last week provides a pointed reminder that the bubble would never have happened

“You come into this world on the way out.”All my life, I have heard that axiom. Even as a child, I understood it meant I would die. Of course, as a youngster, I assumed that day would be many years away.Over time, I learned that death is not reserved for the old. Children, young adults and people in their prime could also get a visit from the Grim Reaper.Death is no respecter of persons ― no one c

Here’s a familiar fact: Economic inequality is rising in the United States. The rich have gotten richer, the poor have stayed poor, and families in the middle have seen their incomes stagnate.Here’s a less-familiar fact: Opportunity in America isn’t what it used to be either. Among children born into low-income households, more than two-thirds grow up to earn a below-average income, and only 6 per

I hope that 2011 will provide better foreign policy stories than 2010 did.Consider this woeful litany: The continuing fighting in Afghanistan, the jihadis and floods of Pakistan, a recovering but deeply troubled Iraq, a nuclear-bent Iran that crushed the “Green” opposition. Add a failed Mideast peace process, an increasingly aggressive China and regressive Russia, and a United States drawn inward

We can’t peer into President Obama’s soul, but his statement last week that he is “struggling” with whether to endorse same-sex marriage is open to an unedifying interpretation. Given the president’s support of gay rights in other contexts, his opposition to marriage equality raises the question of whether the struggle Obama referred to is between politics and principle. If so, we hope principle w

With his signature last week, President Obama ended the military’s distasteful policy of “don’t ask, don’t tell.” In doing away with this discriminatory practice, he also ushered the American armed forces back into the mainstream of American life. One salutary consequence is that some of the nation’s most prestigious universities now are willing to host Reserve Officer Training Corps units on thei

Europeans have grown accustomed to seeing government workers shut down their countries when provoked. At this time of huge deficits from Washington to the smallest towns, government workers in the U.S. also face significant cutbacks.Americans may have had their first taste of what that will mean.New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and New York Governor David Paterson are both calling for an inve

When Dmitry Medvedev became president of Russia two years ago he pledged to combat “legal nihilism,” the disrespect for law that feeds corruption and backwardness in his country.Any hope that Medvedev might behave differently from his mentor, and Russia’s real ruler ― Prime Minister Vladimir Putin ― has been doused by the biggest show trial since the days of the Soviet Union. A week ago, the forme

What’s the biggest financial decision facing Europe in 2011? Easy. The choice of a new president of the European Central Bank.When Jean-Claude Trichet steps down from the post in October, the leading candidates to succeed him will be Bundesbank President Axel Weber and the governor of the Bank of Italy, Mario Draghi.Neither is the right man. Weber would be intolerable to the peripheral euro countr

The past year was one of political disappointment in Japan as the government failed to make breakthroughs in resolving crucial economic and diplomatic problems. Prime Minister Naoto Kan and the Democratic Party of Japan should reflect on what went wrong, set clear goals that will capture the minds of people and mobilize every possible resource to realize them. The nation’s economic difficulties, t