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== '''[[International economics]]''' ==
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''by  [[User:Nick Gardner|Nick Gardner]] and [[User:Martin Baldwin-Edwards|Martin Baldwin-Edwards]]
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==Footnotes==
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'''International economics''' is concerned with the effects upon economic activity of international differences in productive resources and  consumer preferences and the institutions that affect them. It seeks to explain the patterns  and consequences  of transactions and interactions  between  the inhabitants of different countries, including trade, investment and migration.
 
For definitions of terms shown in italics in this article see the Related Articles subpage.
 
===International trade===
 
====Scope and methodology====
The economic theory of international trade differs from the remainder of economic theory mainly because of  the comparatively limited international  mobility of the capital and labour
<ref>[http://www.econlib.org/library/npdbooks/Viner/vnstt10.html "A note on the scope and method of the theory of international trade"    in the appendix of Jacob Viner ''Studies in the Theory of International Trade'' : Harper and Brothers  1937]</ref>.  In that respect, it would appear  to differ in degree rather than in principle from  the trade between remote regions in one country. Thus  the methodology of international trade economics differs little from that of the remainder of economics. However, the direction of academic research on the subject has been influenced by the fact that governments have often sought to impose restrictions upon international trade, and the motive for the development of trade theory  has often been a wish to determine the consequences of such restrictions.
 
The branch of trade  theory which  is conventionally categorized as "classical" consists mainly of the application of deductive logic, originating with  Ricardo’s Theory of ''Comparative Advantage''  and  developing into  a range of theorems that depend for their practical value upon the realism of their postulates. "Modern" trade theory, on the other hand, depends mainly upon ''empirical analysis''.
 
====Classical theory====
The law of ''[[comparative advantage]]'' provides a logical explanation of international trade as the rational consequence of the comparative advantages that arise from inter-regional differences -  regardless of how those differences arise.  Since its exposition by John Stuart Mill <ref>[http://www.econlib.org/Library/Ricardo/ricP2a.html#Ch.7,%20On%20Foreign%20Trade,%20comparative%20advantage  David Ricardo ''On the Principles of Political Economy and Taxation''  Chapter 7  John Murray, 1821. Third edition.(First published: 1817)]</ref> the techniques of neo-classical economics have been applied to it to model the patterns of trade that would result from various postulated sources of comparative advantage. However, extremely restrictive (and often unrealistic) assumptions have had to be adopted in order to make the problem amenable to theoretical analysis. The best-known of the resulting models, the [[Heckscher-Ohlin theorem]] (H-O)
<ref>[http://internationalecon.com/Trade/Tch60/T60-8.php The Heckscher-Ohlin Theorem]</ref> depends upon the assumptions of no international  differences of technology, productivity, or consumer preferences; no obstacles to pure competition or free trade and  no scale economies. On those assumptions, it derives a model of the trade patterns that would arise solely from  international  differences in the relative abundance of  labour and capital (referred to as factor endowments).  The resulting theorem states that, on those assumptions, a country  with a relative abundance of capital would export capital-intensive products and import labour-intensive products. The theorem proved to be of very limited predictive value, as was demonstrated by what came to be known as the "[[Leontief Paradox]]" (the discovery that, despite its capital-rich factor endowment,  America was exporting labour-intensive products and importing capital-intensive products <ref>Wassily  Leontief, ''Domestic Production and Foreign Trade: The American Capital Position Re-examined'' Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, vol. XCVII p332 September 1953</ref>)  Nevertheless the  theoretical techniques (and many of the assumptions) used in deriving  the H-O model  were subsequently used to  derive further theorems. The [[Stolper-Samuelson theorem]] <ref>[http://www.ucd.ie/economic/staff/pneary/pdf/stolpers.pdf The Stolper-Samuelson theorem]</ref> <ref>Wolfgang Stolper and Paul Samuelson ''Protection and Real Wages''' Review of Economic Studies, 9: 58-73. 1941</ref> , which is often described as a corollary of the H-O theorem, was an early example. In its most general form it states that if the price of a good rises (falls) then the price of the factor used intensively in that industry will also rise (fall) while the price of the other factor will fall (rise). In the international trade context for which it was devised it means that trade lowers the real wage of the scarce factor of production, and protection from trade raises it.  Another corollary of the H-O theorem is Samuelson's factor price equalisation theorem <ref> Paul Samuelson: "International Trade and the Equalization of Factor Prices", '' The Economic Journal'' June 1949</ref> which states that as trade between countries tends to equalise their product prices, it tends also to equalise the prices paid to their factors of production. Those theories have sometimes been taken to mean that trade between an industrialised country and a developing country would lower the wages of the unskilled in the industrialised country. (But, as  noted below, that conclusion depends upon the unlikely  assumption that productivity is the same in the two countries). Large numbers of learned papers have been produced in attempts to elaborate on the H-O and Stolper-Samuelson theorems, and while many of them are considered to provide valuable insights, they  have seldom proved to be directly applicable to the task of explaining trade patterns.
 
''[[International economics|.... (read more)]]''
 
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Latest revision as of 09:19, 11 September 2020

Paramhansa Yogananda circa 1920.

Paramhansa Yogananda (5 Jan 1893–7 Mar 1952) was one of the first Indian teachers from the Hindu spiritual tradition to reside permanently in the West, and in particular, he was the first to teach yoga to Americans. He emphasized the universality of the great religions, and ceaselessly taught that all religions, especially Hinduism and Christianity, were essentially the same in their essence. The primary message of Yogananda was to practice the scientific technique of kriya yoga to be released from all human suffering.

He emigrated from India to the United States in 1920 and eventually founded the Self-Realization Fellowship there in Los Angeles, California. He published his own life story in a book called Autobiography of a Yogi, first published in 1946. In the book, Yogananda provided some details of his personal life, an introduction to yoga, meditation, and philosophy, and accounts of his world travels and encounters with a wide variety of saints and colorful personalities, including Therese Neumann, Mohandas K. Gandhi, Luther Burbank, and Jagadis C. Bose.

Paramhamsa, also spelled Paramahamsa, is a Sanskrit title used for Hindu spiritual teachers who have become enlightened. The title of Paramhansa originates from the legend of the swan. The swan (hansa) is said to have a mythical ability to sip only the milk from a water-and-milk mixture, separating out the more watery part. The spiritual master is likewise said to be able to live in a world like a supreme (param) swan, and only see the divine, instead of all the evil mixed in there too, which the worldly person sees.

Yogananda is considered by his followers and many religious scholars to be a modern avatar.

In 1946, Yogananda published his Autobiography of a Yogi. It has since been translated into 45 languages, and in 1999 was designated one of the "100 Most Important Spiritual Books of the 20th Century" by a panel of spiritual authors convened by Philip Zaleski and HarperCollins publishers.

Awake: The Life of Yogananda is a 2014 documentary about Paramhansa Yogananda, in English with subtitles in seventeen languages. The documentary includes commentary by George Harrison and Ravi Shankar, among others.[1][2]

Footnotes

  1. Wikipedia has an article about the 2014 documentary film.
  2. The IMBd filmography database has a full cast list and other details about the 2014 documentary film.