What We Read Today 22 April 2014

Econintersect: Every day our editors collect the most interesting things they find from around the internet and present a summary “reading list” which will include very brief summaries of why each item has gotten our attention. Suggestions from readers for “reading list” items are gratefully reviewed, although sometimes space limits the number included.

• China says one-fifth of its farmland polluted, mostly with toxins from industrialization (Associated Press, Fox News) Hat tip to Roger Erickson. Last year almost half of the rice sold in Guangzhou, a major southern China city, were contaminated with cadmium, a carcinogen that can also affect the kidneys and cause other health problems.

• This Printer Could Prevent Seniors From Getting Pneumonia (AgingCare.com, Care2) Wow! 3-D printing food? Yes that’s right.

• Student debt holds back many would-be home buyers (Tim Logan, Los Angeles Times) The National Assn. of Realtors recently identified student debt as a key factor in soft demand for home-buying this spring. A recent study by the trade group identified student loans as the top reason many home buyers delayed their purchase. This should be no surprise. Six months ago GEI News identified a very conservative estimate of 2 million home sales that may be precluded in coming years because of college debt.

• Class warfare justified? (Robert J. Samuelson, The Washington Post) Samuelson equivocates in this discussion about Thomas Piketty’s new book Capital in the Twenty-First Century. In spite of the indecision this is still a very readable brief summary of the book. More about the Piketty book ‘behind the wall’.

• CHART OF THE DAY: The Escalating Game Of Chicken Between China And Japan (Sam Ro, Business Insider) Most of the tension is over the ownership of an uninhabited group of islands in the East China Sea, called the Senkaku (Japan) or the Diaoyu (China). The primary interest is in potential oil and gas resources. The islands are actually closer to both Taiwan and Okinawa Prefecture, Japan (each 170km) than to China (330 km). The Taiwanese name for the islands is Tiaoyutai, and the island nation also claims the islands. There is more on the significant economic fall-out from this dispute ‘behind the wall’. It appears that it is a serious problem for China, not so much for Japan.

Today there are 14 articles discussed ‘behind the wall’.

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