The optimists’ case for China is fairly straightforward. Yes, the world’s second-largest economy is grinding to its slowest pace in decades. But as investment and manufacturing -- traditionally the key drivers of Chinese growth -- decline in importance, domestic consumption and services are playing a bigger role: For the first time, services accounted for just over 50 percent of GDP last year.　This much-desired rebalancing should move China toward a far more sustainable growth model. New economy

Viewpoints March 6, 2016

Are Americans ready for autonomous cars? They have been ready for more than a century. 　The horses that pulled buggies were autonomous, capable of finding their way home with little or no help from their drivers. So, autonomous travel is nothing new. It’s just better.　At the beginning of the 20th century, as the number of vehicles increased, the rate of deaths and injuries caused by vehicular accidents likewise jumped. Although modern technology and safer construction has helped decrease the num

Viewpoints March 4, 2016

One of the most exciting and promising developments in the history of medical science may bypass the U.S. if the U.S. Congress fails to act. It needs to lift the ban on federal spending on research involving human embryos.　Other governments are already responding to the progress being made in genetic technology. The U.K. has given researchers permission to use an ingenious new gene-cutting technique called Crispr-Cas9 to investigate how human embryos develop. Chinese scientists have wielded the

Viewpoints March 3, 2016

Asked to describe the current shape of the Middle East, a visiting Israeli official uses a Hebrew expression, “gam vegam,” which translates roughly to: “It’s going in both directions at once.”  　The shards of the Middle East mosaic are as sharp and dangerous as ever, but U.S., Israeli, and Arab officials say these pieces have been rearranged in the past few months -- and may now fit together in different and often surprising ways. There are opportunities few observers would have expected, and al

Viewpoints March 2, 2016

Apple has every right to challenge a federal magistrate’s order to help the FBI unlock a terrorist’s cellphone. This is a legal issue that needs to be resolved, and it is a discussion the nation needs to have.　However the underlying principle is this: No storage device, whether it’s an old-fashioned filing cabinet or the most advanced iPhone, can be immune to a court-approved search. If Apple can provide a “key” to unlock the phone used by a terrorist, Apple should be compelled to do so.　Syed Fa

Viewpoints March 1, 2016

The Printemps department store outlet in Shanghai’s Pudong District would seem to have all the amenities necessary to succeed in modern Chinese retail: luxury brands, a venerable 150-year Parisian retailing history and an exclusive location.Despite these advantages, however, the store‘s management thought it was still missing something to attract customers. So next week they’re unveiling a gigantic, twisting, dragon-shaped slide that shoppers can use to drop from fifth-floor luxury boutiques to

Viewpoints Feb. 21, 2016

Developing countries are bracing for a major slowdown this year. According to the U.N. report World Economic Situation and Prospects 2016, their growth will average only 3.8 percent this year -- the lowest rate since the global financial crisis in 2009 and matched in this century only by the recessionary year of 2001. And what is important to bear in mind is that the slowdown in China and the deep recessions in the Russian Federation and Brazil only explain part of the broad falloff in growth.　T

Viewpoints Feb. 21, 2016

You know -- because anyone with access to social media knows -- that it was Obama’s secret hit squad of pillow-wielding assassins who took out Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia.　　The timing of the “murder” seems a bit curious, so late in his second term that the president has little chance of getting a successor past the Senate. And, of course, Scalia was 79 years old with a history of serious heart problems. No matter. Rational thinking hardly keeps lunatic conspiracy theories like this from

Viewpoints Feb. 21, 2016