Keep Your Profits

摘要

Could it be only three years ago that we were wringing our hands about Germany and Japan's economic might—and America's fatal weaknesses? Last week's headlines said all you need to know about whose weaknesses are showing these days. DASA, Germany's premier aerospace company, said it was laying off 8,000 more workers, adding to an embarrassing unemployment rate of just under 10 percent in Germany. In Japan, Tokyo's once proud banks must now pay a punishing "Japan premium" for their overnight loans from other financial institutions. And for good reason. Tokyo's financial system is a shambles. The United States, meanwhile, has turned itself into a lean, mean, high-tech production machine. For the second year in a row it's claimed the world's most "competitive" economy title, as bestowed by the World Economic Forum. Japan was third, and proud Germany a pathetic sixth.