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MGI in the News

Reports issued by the McKinsey Global Institute are often cited in the international press. We offer a selection of articles below.

For press coverage of McKinsey & Company, visit McKinsey in the News.

Growing pains
Wall Street Journal, April 14, 2008
China's dramatic economic growth is now presenting a new challenge: urban policy.
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Make way for the U-boomers
Forbes.com, April 03, 2008
With big appetites and small wallets, some 24 million Americans are still a huge market.
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The rise of the euro
BusinessWeek, March 21, 2008
The currency isn't simply growing in value. Its strength reflects eurozone financial-market vibrancy.
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Gulf states must use oil wealth wisely
BusinessWeek, February 05, 2008
Policy makers worldwide need to consider the global and domestic consequences of enormous capital investments from the oil-rich GCC.
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Why debt hasn’t killed us yet
Newsweek International, January 19, 2008
The U.S. current account deficit—the broadest measure of the trade gap—could rise from 5 or 6 percent to 9 percent of GDP, or $1.6 trillion, by 2012 as long as foreigners are eager to invest there.
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Boom time for retirees
Financial Times, December 05, 2007
New research by McKinsey shows that baby boomers will tighten their grip on America's economic levers over the next few years.
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Private equity isn’t fading away
BusinessWeek, November 20, 2007
Despite the credit crunch, private equity isn't fading away. In fact, the industry's assets may double by 2012, Diana Farrell writes in BusinessWeek online.
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Power brokers
Newsweek International, October 20, 2007
They are rich, secretive, feared, and poorly understood. Here's the truth about the four hottest players in global markets.
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Financial globalization's new power source
Wall Street Journal, October 4, 2007
In the blizzard of headlines about borrowing by private-equity firms, rising oil prices and accumulating hoards of cash at Asian central banks, it's hard to tell if this is part of the same old story of money sloshing around the globe, or if something big is happening.
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Hard choices on U.S.-China trade
BusinessWeek, August 23, 2007
It's easy to blame the weak yuan for the huge U.S. current account deficit, but MGI research finds it's not the real problem.
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Americans should be warming to energy efficiency
Financial Times, June 21, 2007
In a comment for the Financial Times, Diana Farrell, director, McKinsey Global Institute, and Ted Halstead, president and CEO, New America Foundation, make the case that a concerted effort to boost energy productivity–or the level of output achieved from the energy consumed–could have spectacular results.
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A simple plan to cut energy demand growth and carbon emissions
BusinessWeek, June 07, 2007
Diana Farrell of the McKinsey Global Institute argues a commitment to energy efficiency can help avert a global climate crisis.
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A World Changing Consumer Boom
Newsweek International, May 19, 2007
First came the workers, now the shoppers. Is the world ready?
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Next Big Spenders: India's Middle Class
Newsweek International, May 19, 2007
How India's rising and unique middle class will reshape global consumer markets.
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A Recipe for Sarkozy's Success
BusinessWeek, May 15, 2007
France's new leader should nourish the economy by limiting restrictions, increasing labor market flexibility, and boosting public-sector productivity, Diana Farrell writes.
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India's Consumer Evolution
Business Standard (India), May 07, 2007
India is poised for a dramatic expansion of domestic consumption that will make the country one of the largest consumer markets in the world.
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Tremors Shake Global Capital Markets
BusinessWeek, May 05, 2007
Is New York losing out to London? McKinsey Global Institute Director Diana Farrell discusses worldwide shifts beyond the trans-Atlantic rivalry.
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Asset Growth Set to Slow After 2010
Financial Times, January 10, 2007
The results of McKinsey's annual "mapping the global capital market" survey.
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World's Assets Hit Record Value of $140 Trillion
The Wall Street Journal, January 10, 2007
A study was released by McKinsey & Company that maps financial assets around the globe.
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The Cost of an Overheated Planet
The New York Times, December 12, 2006
There are sizable opportunities for energy efficiency, according to the McKinsey Global Institute.
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Energy Efficiency
Financial Times, December 04, 2006
McKinsey says improved energy productivity on the part of producers and consumers could cut annual demand growth.
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Energy Use Can Be Cut by Efficiency, Survey Says
New York Times, November 29, 2006
The growth rate of worldwide energy consumption could be cut by more than half, according to a report by the McKinsey Global Institute.
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Efficiency Vital to Cut Energy Use
Financial Times, November 29, 2006
The findings of the McKinsey Global Institute's study on energy demand.
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China and India: Room for Reform
BusinessWeek, October 26, 2006
New research highlights the shortcomings of the China and India financial systems and their shared need for rapid reforms.
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Sweden's Balancing Lessons for Europe
BusinessWeek, September 22, 2006
The McKinsey Global Institute's Diana Farrell says the country is demonstrating that a competitive market need not conflict with social protection for citizens.
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Financial Reform Key to Growth
Straits Times, September 15, 2006
For both China and India, financial reforms are much more likely to achieve the social objectives that are currently used to justify the distortion of the financial system by the government. Such reforms should be among their highest priorities.
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China's Financials Need an Overhaul
BusinessWeek, August 09, 2006
Aggressive reform of China's financial system is necessary to promote sustainable growth, according to research by the McKinsey Global Institute.
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Unlocking India's Potential
BusinessWeek, June 29, 2006
Reform of India's financial system would mean better use of capital and the elevation of millions from poverty, McKinsey Global Institute research shows.
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Safe and Sorry
The Economist , June 03, 2006
To achieve faster growth, India needs financial-sector reform.
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Firms Advised to Court China's Nascent Middle Class
The Wall Street Journal, May 31, 2006
Foreign companies focused on China's most affluent consumers should lower their sights, or risk missing a vast sales opportunity, according to U.S. consultancy McKinsey & Co.
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China Should Stick to Trial and Error - but Risk Bolder Trials
Financial Times, June 07, 2006
China's strategy for economic growth has three signal features: the gradualism of its move from the planned economy to the market; the country's extraordinary integration into the world economy; and the level and growth of investment.
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Tackling the Informal Economy
BusinessWeek, May 08, 2006
Companies that operate in the gray sap economic growth in the developing world, Diana Farrell, director of the McKinsey Global Institute, writes in a new monthly BusinessWeek column. Here's what governments can do about it.
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The Hidden Key to Growth
Winter 2006
Martin Baily, Diana Farrell, and Jaana Remes explore how local services stimulate economic expansion.
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Putting China's Capital to Work
Far Eastern Economic Review, May 01, 2006
China's financial system does an outstanding job of mobilizing savings. But there is considerable room for improvement in its capital allocation, and its overall efficiency.
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Don't Be Afraid of Offshoring
BusinessWeek, March 22, 2006
Diana Farrell of the McKinsey Global Institute takes a close look at the workforce in China and India and says U.S. workers have little to fear.
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Breaking Down Barriers to Growth
Finance and Development
In exploring the debate over how best to rekindle the economies of Europe and Japan, MGI's conclusion is that the key to boosting productivity and thus growth is a policy framework promoting competition in all sectors.
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U.S. Offshoring: Small Steps to Make It Win-Win
The Economist Voice, March 01, 2006
While fears of job losses and wage cuts in the U.S. caused by offshoring are vastly overstated, U.S. policy makers should not ignore its consequences, McKinsey Global Institute director Diana Farrell argues.
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Competition Would Overthrow The Tyranny of Vested Interests
Financial Times, January 18, 2006
The Financial Times reviews the concepts in William Lewis' book, "The Power of Productivity."
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Debunking Myths About Asia's Service Industries
The Asian Wall Street Journal, November 30, 2005
The emphasis on boosting offshore services risks overlooking a far larger, though less fashionable, opportunity for Asian nations – that of stimulating their domestic-services sector.
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China's Looming Talent Shortage
South China Morning Post, October 19, 2005
With its huge supply of low-cost workers, China has fast become the world’s manufacturing workshop. Is China set to become a giant in offshore information technology and business-process services as well?
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How Europe's Regulations Hold It Back
Financial Times, October 18, 2005
Fear of change and discontent has influenced voters throughout Europe. The irony is that for Europe to preserve its way of life, it must embrace change and reform.
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The World is Still Round
Newsweek, July 25, 2005
Yes, some engineering jobs and data centers have moved to India and China. More will go. But the process isn't endless and can be exaggerated.
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We Are All French Now?
The McKinsey Global Institute just published a study of how both Germany and France have suffered compared with the United States by trying to put up walls against outsourcing and offshoring.
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In Spite of Offshoring, U.S. Students Can Still Engineer a Career
The Wall Street Journal, June 16, 2005
By 2008, more than half the jobs in engineering could be done anywhere in the world, according to an intriguing new analysis of global outsourcing by McKinsey Global Institute, McKinsey's in-house think tank. Many of them will, in fact, be done in India, China, and other low-wage countries.
Read more on the Wall Street Journal site
Anxiety Over Offshoring of Service Jobs Seen as Overblown
Financial Times, June 16, 2005
A report by the McKinsey Global Institute concludes unemployment fears in richer countries are misplaced and services sector will follow trend in manufacturing only to a limited extent.
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Aging Gracefully
Far Eastern Economic Review, April 01, 2005
Over the next 20 years, the financial wealth of Japanese households will stop growing and begin to decline, leaving them with $8 trillion less than they would have had if historical growth rates persisted, according to the McKinsey Global Institute.
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U.S. Multinationals Reap Overseas Bounty
The Wall Street Journal, April 04, 2005
In a recent paper, analysts at McKinsey & Company concluded that record U.S. trade deficits aren't as threatening as they appear, because they are being driven in part by increasingly profitable U.S. companies, producing in places like China, Mexico, and India, and shipping their goods and services back to the U.S.
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U.S. Trade Deficit Does Not Spell Doom
Financial Times, February 10, 2005
The declining value of the U.S. dollar was supposed to restore balance to global trade, discounting U.S. exports while making imports prohibitively expensive. But record deficit numbers have created a stir of concern. The deficit numbers should be a surprise. Nor should they prompt a protectionist response.
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Beyond Offshoring: Assess your Global Potential
Harvard Business Review, December 01, 2004
Beyond Offshoring: Assess Your Company's Global Potential builds on McKinsey Global Institute Research and argues that offshoring is just the tip of the iceberg in terms of how globalization can transform industries.

Please note: To access the full article visitors will need to register at the Harvard Business Review and pay a fee.
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Boost Growth By Reducing the Informal Economy
The Asian Wall Street Journal, October 18, 2004
Research by the McKinsey Global Institute has put a spotlight on one of the biggest and most misunderstood barriers to economic growth: the vast agglomeration of businesses that evade taxes and ignore regulations, often referred to as the "informal economy."
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Can Germany Benefit from Offshoring?
The Wall Street Journal, August 23, 2004
Is the outsourcing of service jobs to low-wage nations draining the economies of rich countries, as many politicians fear, or can countries on both sides of the equation benefit, as economists like to claim?
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The Aspen Seven
Fortune, August 23, 2004
You think radical change is daunting? Not to these folks. They're all pros at making it happen - or profiting from it.
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Why Do Certain Countries Prosper?
The New York Times, July 15, 2004
A new study looks at productivity and comes up with some contrarian conclusions.
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Tax Evasion a Way of Life in Brazil
The Washington Times, July 13, 2004
With high tax rates besieging workers and companies alike, rampant smuggling and tax evasion has become the norm in Brazil.
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The Next Steps to Greater Indian Prosperity
Financial Times, May 25, 2004
The Congress party's surprise election victory in India this month was a clear message that economic growth must benefit all sections of society. But the new leaders must not step back from reforms if they want India to grow.
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Rage Against Offshoring is Off Target
Fortune Magazine, February 23, 2004
Seldom have so many had such strong opinions about something they understand so poorly - offshoring.
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The Case for Globalization
The International Economy
MGI's latest research shows that foreign direct investment is good for the economic health of developing nations - regardless of the policy regime, industry, or time period surveyed.
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Who Wins in Offshoring
International Herald Tribune, February 07, 2004
Business process offshoring does not mean the U.S. economy loses every time a job is sent to another economy. Rather, it's a win-win game. McKinsey Global Institute analysis shows that the U.S. actually reaps significant economic benefits from offshoring that can be used to retrain workers for higher-skilled and higher-paying jobs.
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Buried Treasure?
Financial Times, December 10, 2003
In the 1990s, when companies were investing like crazy in information technology, many economists remained skeptical about the link between IT and business productivity. Yet now that there is broad consensus that targeted technological innovation is in fact driving a productivity revival in the U.S. economy, many business leaders appear to have lost faith.
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The Real New Economy
Harvard Business Review, December 01, 2003
The Real New Economy builds on McKinsey Global Institute research by assessing what makes IT enhancements pay off in productivity gains and looking at three sectors in detail – retail banking, retail trade, and semiconductors. (Please note: To access the full article visitors will need to register at the Harvard Business Review and pay a fee).
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Report Casts Doubt on FDI Incentives
Financial Times, October 15, 2003
Typical incentives such as tax breaks and other policies used to attract foreign direct investment in developing countries often do more harm than good, according to a new study by the McKinsey Global Institute on multinational corporation investment in the developing world. The study is based on case studies in China, Brazil, India and Mexico.
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