Officially, the mission of Pranab Mukherjee’s just-concluded trip was to attend the second annual meeting of the India-US Financial and Economic Partnership. The finance minister brought with him perhaps the most star-studded Indian economic team to visit Washington for a bilateral event. The delegation included chieftains and key officials of nearly all major economic and regulatory institutions that oversee the $1.5 trillion Indian economy, among them, Reserve Bank of India Governor Duvvuri … [Read more...]
Articles
Frank blogs regularly for the Huffington Post and writes occasional columns and articles for publications such as the International Business Times and The Economic Times of India.
Frank writes on a wide variety of topics that are critical to shaping the future of America and the American dream and to making the United States and the world a better place. These include: Business; education; poverty and inequality; politics and public policy; immigration; manufacturing; innovation; leadership; citizenship; and social commentary.
Frank’s most recent blogs are highlighted on this page. To read other blogs or articles by Frank, click on the categories or publications links on the left.
Woes on multiple fronts weigh down US economy
Nearly two years after getting out of a painful recession, the US economy continues to stutter along. Though multiple indicators have suggested that the recovery is real-the world's largest economy has registered an average growth rate of 2.8 per cent per quarter over seven quarters-the recovery is yet to be felt on the Main Street, USA. Middle-class Americans, who bore the brunt of the worst recession since the Great Depression, are still struggling financially. Many are still unemployed, or … [Read more...]
Sense of relief at the demise of Bin Laden
For someone who has been on the run for nearly 10 years, Osama Bin Laden’s end came swiftly. It took the U.S. Navy Seals just 40 minutes to eliminate America’s most wanted man, who was hiding, not in the treacherous mountains on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border — as it was widely believed — but in a sprawling mansion just miles away from Islamabad. Within hours, his body was buried, somewhere in the North Arabian Sea. Not surprisingly, there was one common thread in the way most people around … [Read more...]
Insider Trading Shakes Investor Trust in Market
Since the 1980s, the issue of insider trading has rocked the Wall Street every few years, with a top executive of a company or a reputed individual getting caught while trading with what’s called ‘non-public information.’ What usually occurs at the end of these periodic scandals is a loss of public confidence in the financial system and, for the individuals involved, a loss of reputation and occasional jail terms, if found guilty. Now, more than six years after celebrity entrepreneur and … [Read more...]
At long last, Indians Revolt Against Corruption
In the first 63 years of its independence, India’s attitude towards corruption had been two-pronged: while one half of the nation displayed a remarkable level of tolerance for graft, the other was largely apathetic to the issue. Though front-page story after story had been exposing corruption that pervaded the country’s political system from top to bottom, the electorate’s response has been large yawns. Historically, few governments have been voted out on account of corruption, even though … [Read more...]
India’s rich should emulate Gates, Buffett
Two distinguished Americans are in India this week on a noble mission. William Gates, Jr. and Warren Buffett, the second and third richest individuals on the planet and also among its most generous, landed in the country earlier in the week to preach giving to India’s super-rich. The visits of Buffet, the chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, and Gates, the Microsoft founder, are part of their “Giving Pledge” campaign, which was launched last year to encourage the world’s wealthiest … [Read more...]
India-U.S. trade: A frontier of possibilities
The final figures on India-U.S. trade in merchandise goods for 2010, which was released recently by the U.S. Census Bureau’s Foreign Trade Division, are both encouraging and sobering at the same time. But, first, the hard, cold statistics: the volume of trade between the world’s richest country and its 11th largest economy was worth $48.8 billion last year; the U.S. exports to India accounted for $19.2 billion and its imports from the country totaled $29.5 billion. Exports to the United … [Read more...]
Chinese Premier Wen’s Visit: An opportunity missed
It’s jobs, stupid
The Great Recession may have ended worldwide, but there seems to be no end in sight for the global labour market downturn that accompanied it, especially in the so-called advanced economies. In many countries the job losses and their slow recovery, which are of historic proportion, have the potential to threaten their long-term economic and social stability. In the United States, the epicenter of the slump, unemployment clawed back to a near-double-digit 9.8 per cent last month, perilously … [Read more...]
Reinventing the American Dream: by Frank Islam, George Munoz & Ed Crego – Book Review
"2010 - 2019 will be the decisive decade. The decisions we make and the actions we take in this decade will determine the future of America and the American Dream for all of us", write societal and economic thinkers Frank Islam, George Muñoz, and Ed Crego in their provocative and visionary book Renewing the American Dream: A Citizens Guide. The authors challenge the standard ways of thinking about government, business, the economy, and the role of the nation's citizens, and describe their … [Read more...]