COVID-19 has walloped the world’s women. As the virus spread, women—who are overrepresented in hard-hit industries like food service, hospitality, education and, crucially, health care—found themselves vulnerable, unemployed and without a social safety net, and often neglected by government crisis responses. Closures of businesses and schools, necessitated by social distancing, have pushed millions of women from the global workforce: Worldwide, women lost 64 million jobs—$800 billion in earnings—in 2020. At the same time, women’s retreat to the home widened gendered inequities in household labor, as women shouldered ever-greater child care responsibilities and more domestic chores. More time at home also [...]
While the Biden administration tries to navigate the domestic political obstacles to implementing the president’s so-called Build Back Better plan, it has quietly started laying the groundwork for a parallel program with major geopolitical implications. Just getting off the ground, Build Back Better World, or B3W, is a plan to improve global infrastructure, widely defined, with an eye to not only raise living standards but, just as importantly, to counter China’s growing influence. The idea was formally announced by the Group of Seven leaders during the G-7 summit last June. It aims to take on China’s high-profile Belt and Road Initiative, or [...]
High drama has always been a mainstay of Argentina’s politics. Sadly, although the country’s never-a-dull-moment political machinations provide entertainment value, they almost always unfold against the backdrop of a struggling population. As political soap operas go, it would be hard to find anything more gripping than what has been unfolding in Buenos Aires in the past few days. Argentines have barely been able to take their eyes away from a pitched battle between President Alberto Fernandez and Vice President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, exploding in full view on social media. As you might recall, Cristina Fernandez, the former president and [...]
