China

Migrants often have different reasons for coming to the United States. Two common motivations are their educational and employment aspirations for their children. The dutiful, hard-working child of immigrants has become a kind of cultural type in America, but research suggests the reality for such children is more complex.

At the 2009 U.N. Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, concern focused on the global climate impacts of land-use changes such as deforestation. While the conference sought to establish regulations on emissions resulting from land-use changes only for rapidly growing countries, growth and urbanization in more developed nations also plays a role.

Note: A 2011 report on this topic has been issued that updates the findings below.

Rare-earth minerals are essential to the production of high-tech items such as smart phones and laptops, and they are being increasingly utilized for a variety of purposes in the defense and clean energy sectors. These include elements such as lanthanum, used in camera lenses; praseodymium, for lasers and magnets; and promethium, used in atomic batteries.

As nations undergo economic development and open their markets, they will see necessary structural change within their labor sectors. One key assumption about globalization is that it will uniformly force economies to become more productive and efficient as competition exerts pressure. However, local conditions may significantly alter globalization’s impact, particularly as it relates to the nature and quality of employment.

The economies of Brazil, China and India are growing faster than many of their counterparts in the developing world. Despite this rapid growth, large portions of the populations in all three nations continue to live in conditions of poverty. Each country has had some success in reducing the numbers of impoverished citizens. But these achievements have come through very different approaches, with each employing a distinctive mix along two basic dimensions: pro-poor growth and pro-poor social policies.

During the 1930s, the upheaval of the Great Depression spurred a wave of protectionist trade policies and created a global atmosphere of isolationism that further exacerbated the contraction of economic activity. Many observers feared that the Great Recession of 2008-09 might similarly prompt nations hurt by the financial turmoil to erect barriers around their economies.

In this era of economic globalization, the race for innovation and future growth among nations has prompted a profound debate about how the U.S. is preparing its next generation of workers and leaders. While the United States has responded vigorously to global challengers in the past — the Soviet Union in the era of Sputnik, Japan in the 1980s — the potential for a dramatic loss of competitiveness is more acute than ever.