Economy – Page 15 – Impact Lab

Analysis, Business, Economy, Education, Latest Trend

Canada plays the visa card to lure foreign students to its universities

April 12, 2012

Four years ago 60,000 international students came to Canada for school now that number stands at 90,000.

Canadian universities used to find it hard to draw attention away from the U.S. when trying to lure foreign students to its business schools. Not anymore. Over the last two years, Canadian full-time MBAs have seen the biggest increase in applications of any region, according to the Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC), a business school association.

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Analysis, Economy, Globalism, Historical Perspectives, Latest Trend

Limits to growth: 40 year old prediction of ‘collapse’ still on track

April 9, 2012

In a controversial study released 40 years ago, recent research supports the conclusions of that study: The world is on track for disaster. So says Australian physicist Graham Turner, who revisited perhaps the most groundbreaking academic work of the 1970s,The Limits to Growth.

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Analysis, Big Problems, Economy, Education, Latest Trend, Money Talk

Student loans still a burden on senior citizens

April 2, 2012

Americans 60 and older still owe about $36 billion in student loans.

Senior citizens are an unexpected demographic that is still burdened with paying for college and the student loans are wreaking havoc on their finances.

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Analysis, Business, Economy, Latest Trend

America’s fastest growing group in the workforce is changing what it means to be ‘retired’

March 31, 2012

According to government estimates, the over-65 set is the fastest growing segment of the working population: More than 7 million are punching the clock.

Ailika Thomas’ husband brought her coffee in bed after she woke. It was 7 p.m., and the 73-year-old was facing a long, moonlit drive from her rural Indiana home to Chicago; Dean wanted to make the journey as easy as possible for his wife. He warmed the car and stocked it with snacks while she got dressed. When Ailika emerged from the back door in a pink-and-white pants combo accompanied by her two Yorkshire terriers, Dean gave her a warm goodbye kiss and made her promise to call at journey’s end.

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Analysis, Business, Historical Perspectives, Science & Technology News

The 9 to 5 is dead – redesigning work for the modern economy

March 29, 2012

No-hour work week.

The 9 to 5 workday is outdated. Happy workers are more healthy and more creative, so it’s time to start giving our workers the leeway to be happy (because otherwise they work all the time). The secret: Treat them like people.

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Analysis, Big Problems, government, Latest Trend

Many U.S. cities are not prepared for aging Baby Boomer population

March 26, 2012

The nation’s population of those 65 and older will double between 2000 and 2030.

As aging Baby Boomers move out of the workforce and into retirement, few communities have started to think long term about how to plan and redesign services for them.

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Analysis, Economy, Latest Trend

Middle class in Mexico becoming its majority

March 18, 2012

Customers look at laptops at a Wal-Mart store in Mexico City.

The middle class is fast becoming the majority in Mexico, breaking down the rich-poor divide in a profound demographic transformation that has far-reaching implications here and in the United States.

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Analysis, Business, Economy, Latest Trend

More wives outearning their husbands

March 7, 2012

The number of women earning more than their husbands had gradually been rising for years.

Julee Schirmacher has found herself in a spot that has become familiar to many families over the past few years since her husband was laid off last fall. She works full-time for a marketing company and, for now, her husband stays home and takes care of the couple’s two kids, ages 5 and 2.

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Analysis, Education, Latest Trend

30% of Americans over 25 have at least a four-year degree

March 3, 2012

With all the talk recently about whether President Barack Obama is a “snob” for wanting Americans to be educated or Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorumis anti-education for critizing Obama, many may have missed an important milestone.

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Analysis, Culture, Latest Trend

Commuter marriages on the rise

February 21, 2012

David and Candice Knox spend about half the year together with a few weeks apart followed by a few working apart.

Candice and David Knox have been married for 13 years. They met at a seminar 20 years ago in Vancouver, British Columbia. The couple jokes they had to go through customs just to date. Little did they know four years ago when the economy tanked and Candice Knox got a job offer in Palm Desert, that the anniversary luggage he gave her 10 years ago would come in handy.

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Analysis, Business, Economy, Latest Trend

Baby boomers in America enter new era of ‘work til you drop’

February 21, 2012

It’s no longer uncommon for people to work until 70.

In 1972, when Paula Symons joined the U.S. workforce, typewriters in her office clacked nonstop, people answered the telephones and the hot new technology revolutionizing communication was the fax machine.

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Analysis, Business, Economy, Latest Trend, top 10

Top 10 fastest growing jobs in the U.S.

February 11, 2012

6th fastest-growing job in the U.S. is veterinary technologists & technicians

In January, the economy added nearly 250,000 jobs, but that’s only the tip of the iceberg. The economy is expected to add more than 20 million jobs by 2020, a 14.3% increase from 2010 in the number of people employed, according to recent data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Many of these jobs will be focused in a few key industries.

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