Market & Finance

“One Processors’ Found 250 Mobiles Devices (Snapdragon processors)”

2012-01-26T03:17:00.000-08:00

Snapdragon processors bring together all the best-in-class components a Smartphone needs on a single chip. Because when everything is made to work together, everything works more efficiently. So you can do more. Do it faster. And recharge less.

Talk, text and watch videos without interruption. Snapdragon S1 mobile processors deliver superior performance when you need it, with better battery life, always

Snapdragon processors are found in more than 250 amazing mobile devices.

Which one is best for you?

1) HTC Arrive

2) Samsung Focus

3) HTC Status

1) HTC Arrive:-See what's now and what's next in a single glance.

You want instant everything, everywhere. Surf the Web, view pictures, play games, and immerse yourself in apps with a brilliant 3.6-inch touch screen. Every Windows Phone 7 device is powered by a Snapdragon processor. Qualcomm worked closely with Microsoft on Windows Phone 7 Series software and Snapdragon chipsets are an integral part of bringing to life the rich, integrated experiences on a Windows Phone in a way that conserves battery life and provides always-on connectivity.

Optimized Games: - Snapdragon's Adreno GPU delivers console-like quality 3D graphics to your Smartphone. Get the most out of your experience by finding a game optimized for Snapdragon powered devices.

About Snapdragon:-Talk, text and watch videos without interruption. Snapdragon S1 mobile processors deliver superior performance when you need it, with better battery life, always.

Specifications: 1 GHz CPU, Adreno 200 GPU,576 MB RAM,5 MP Camera,720P Video.

Samsung Focus: - view your world with the super-sharp AMOLED Screen, The Samsung Focus brings breakthrough entertainment for your life in motion. Enjoy state-of-the-art 4" Super AMOLED display, a sleek design, and exciting entertainment - from Xbox LIVE to Zune music and videos. Every Windows Phone 7 device is powered by a Snapdragon processor. Qualcomm worked closely with Microsoft on Windows Phone 7 Series software and Snapdragon chipsets are an integral part of bringing to life the rich, integrated experiences on a Windows Phone in a way that conserves battery life and provides always-on connectivity.

Optimized Games :- Snapdragon's Adreno GPU delivers console-like quality 3D graphics to your smartphone. Get the most out of your experience by finding a game optimized for Snapdragon powered devices.

About Snapdragon :- Talk, text and watch videos without interruption. Snapdragon S1 mobile processors deliver superior performance when you need it, with better battery life, always.

Specifications: - 1 GHz CPU, Adreno 200 GPU, 512 MB RAM,5 MP Camera,720P Video,

You HTC Status: - Share it Faster,

Your Face book friends never felt closer. The HTC Status makes it easy to share and stay in touch with your Face book friends. Just touch the dedicated Facebook share button to update your status, share a photo or website, post what song you're listening to, or check in at a location. You can even add social apps and widgets like Friend Stream and Facebook Chat to make it even easier to stay connected. ,

Optimized Games :- Snapdragon's Adreno GPU delivers console-like quality 3D graphics to your Smartphone. Get the most out of your experience by finding a game optimized for Snapdragon powered devices. Instant everything, everywhere. Surf the Web, view pictures, play games, and immerse,

About Snapdragon: - Talk, text and watch videos without interruption. Snapdragon S1 mobile processors deliver superior performance when you need it, with better battery life, always.

Specifications:- 800 MHz CPU,Adreno 200 GPU,512 MB RAM,5 MP Camera,

“TATA Blass the Hundred Years in Steel”

2012-01-26T01:13:00.000-08:00

“TATA Celebration 100 year saga of iron making,”

Tata Steel achieved yet another milestone in its industrial history with the completion of 100 years of its Blast Furnace operations. It was on December 2, 1911 that the plant at Jamshedpur became active when the Blast Furnace was blown for the first time. Steel production commenced a few weeks later on February 16, 1912.

It has been a long and eventful journey over the last 100 years. For a plant with an initial capacity to produce 160,000 tonnes of pig iron, 100,000 tonnes of ingot steel, 70,000 tonnes of rails, beams and shapes and 20,000 tonnes of bars, hoops and rods, the Jamshedpur Works of Tata Steel has come a long way, and is well on track to becoming a 10 million tonne steel plant in a few months from now.
The early years, the plant essentially consisted of a battery of 180 non-recovery coke ovens and 30 by-product ovens with a sulphuric acid plant and two blast furnaces, each of 350 tonnes per day capacity, and a 300-tonne hot metal mixer, four open hearth furnaces of 50-tonne capacity each, one steam engine driven 40-inch reversing blooming mill, one 28-inch reversing combination rail and structural mill with reheating furnaces and one 16-inch and two 10-inch rolling mills. In the early days, an average of 6,300 people was engaged daily at the Works by the Company and its contractors.
Even as the Jamshedpur Works – whose present capacity stands at 6.8 million tonnes per annum -- is set to become a 10 million tonne steel plant a few months from now, the philosophy of the Founder that “in a free enterprise, the community is not just another stakeholder in business, but is, in fact, the very purpose of its existence” continues to be the beacon that guides the Company in all its activities.

“TaTa Built Strong Piller in Steel”

Established in 1907 as Asia's first integrated private sector steel company, Tata Steel Group is amongst the leading steel manufacturers in the world with an annual crude steel capacity of over 28 million tonnes per annum (mtpa). It is now the world's second-most geographically-diversified steel producer, with operations in 26 countries and a commercial presence in over 50 countries. The Tata Steel Group, with a turnover of US$ 26.64 billion in FY '11, has over 81,000 employees across five continents and is a Fortune 500 company. The Group’s vision is to be the world’s steel industry benchmark in “Value Creation” and “Corporate Citizenship” through the excellence of its people, its innovative approach and overall conduct. Underpinning this vision is a performance culture committed to aspiration targets, safety and social responsibility, continuous improvement, openness and transparency. In 2008, Tata Steel India became the first integrated steel plant in the world, outside Japan, to be awarded the Deming Application Prize 2008 for excellence in Total Quality Management.
Tata Steel is temporarily to mothball the hot strip mill at its Llanwern site in Newport, South Wales, with immediate effect.The facility is expected to remain mothballed until the UK economy and steel demand justify a restart. In the meantime the market will be supplied with material from Tata Steel’s other hot strip mill in South Wales at Port Talbot, whose costs are lower. The Llanwern cold rolling mill and ‘ZODIAC’ galvanising line will continue in operation.
However, the site will see a reduction of some 115 roles carried out by fixed-term contract employees, agency workers and contractors,

“Tata Steel in Europe”

The European operations of Tata Steel (formerly known as Corus) comprise Europe's second largest steel producer. With main steelmaking operations in the UK and the Netherlands, they supply steel and relatedservices to the construction, automotive, packaging, material handling and other demanding markets worldwide. Tata Steel is one of the world’s top ten steel producers. The combined group has an aggregate crude steel capacity of more than 28 million tonnes and approximately 80,000 employees across four continents.

“Kawasaki challenging China's high-speed railway projects,”

2012-01-20T04:12:00.000-08:00

Achieving indigenous high-speed rail technology has been a major goal of Chinese state planners. Chinese train-makers, after receiving transferred foreign technology, have been able to achieve a considerable degree of self-sufficiency in making the next generation of high-speed trains by developing indigenous capability to produce key parts and improvising upon foreign designs.

Examples of technology transfer include Mitsubishi Electric’s MT205 traction motor and ATM9 transformer to CSR Zhuzhou Electric, Hitachi’s YJ92A traction motor and Alstom’s YJ87A Traction motor to CNR Yongji Electric, Siemens’ TSG series pantograph to Zhuzhou Go front Electric. Most of the components of the CRH trains manufactured by Chinese companies were from local suppliers, with only a few parts imported,

For foreign train-makers, technology transfer is an important part of gaining market access in China. Bombardier, the first foreign train-maker to form a joint venture in China, has been sharing technology for the manufacture of railway passenger cars and rolling stock since 1998. President and Chief Country Representative of Bombardier China, “Whatever technology Bombardier has, whatever the China market needs, there is no need to ask. Bombardier transfers advanced and mature technology to China, which we do not treat as an experimental market. Unlike other series which have imported prototypes, all CRH1 trains have been assembled at Bombardier’s joint-venture with CSR, Bombardier Sifang in Qingdao.

Kawasaki’s cooperation with CSR did not last as long. Within two years of cooperation with Kawasaki to produce 60 CRH2A sets, CSR began in 2008 to build CRH2B, CRH2C and CRH2E models at its Sifang plant independently without assistance from Kawasaki. According to CSR president Zhang Chenghong, CSR "made the bold move of forming a systemic development platform for high-speed locomotives and further upgrading its design and manufacturing technology. Later, we began to independently develop high-speed CRH trains with a maximum velocity of 300-350 kilometers per hour, which eventually rolled off the production line in December 2007."Since then, CSR has ended its cooperation with Kawasaki. Kawasaki is currently challenging China's high-speed rail project for patent theft.

In 2007, travel time from Beijing to Shanghai was about 10 hours at a top speed of 200 km/h in the upgrade Beijing-Shanghai Railway. To increase transport capacity, the Ministry of Railways ordered 70 16-cars transects from CSR Sifang and BST, including 10 sets of CRH1B and 20 sets of CRH2B seating trains, 20 sets of CRH1E and 20 sets of CRH2E sleeper trains.

Construction of the high-speed railway between Beijing and Shanghai, the world's first high speed rail with designed speed 380 km/h, began on April 18, 2008. In the same year, the Ministry of Science and the Ministry of Railway agreed to a joint action plan for the indigenous innovation of high-speed trains in China. The Railway Ministry then launched the CRH1-350 (Bombardier and BST, designated as CRH380D/DL), CRH2-350 (CSR, designated as CRH380A/AL), and CRH3-350 (CNR and Siemens, designated as CRH380B/BL & CRH380CL), to develop new generation of CRH trains with top operation speed 380 km/h.

A total of 400 new generation trains were ordered. CRH380A entered service on the Shanghai-Hang Zhou High-Speed Railway on October 26, 2010. The CRH380A is the first indigenous high speed train of the CRH series.

On October 19, 2010, the Ministry of Railways declared the beginning of research and development on "super-speed" railway technology, which would increase the average speed of trains to over 500 kilometers per hour.

Samsung Appointed Mr. B D Park as a Regional President & CEO Samsung South West Asia,

2012-01-20T03:45:00.000-08:00

Mr. B D Park has been appointed as the President and CEO of Samsung South West Asia Operations and Managing Director, Samsung India Electronics Ltd. by Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. Mr. .Park, who was Head of Mobile & IT Division at Samsung India as Director, Mobile & IT assumes his new role from today. He succeeds

Mr. Jung Soo Shin who was President & CEO for Samsung South West Asia from February 2009 till date.

In his role as President & CEO of Samsung South West Asia Regional HQ, Mr. Park will oversee the operations of Samsung India Electronics Pvt. Ltd. (SIEL); Samsung India Software Operations (SISO), Samsung’s R & D Centre at Bangalore; Samsung India Software Centre (SISC) and SEL India, Samsung’s R&D Centres at Noida as well as the Company’s operations in the SAARC Region.

Dynamic Person by Park.

Mr. Park brings with him over 28 years of work experience at Samsung having started his career with Samsung Electro Mechanics Co. Ltd in 1983. He joined Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd in 1991 and has worked in the Overseas Marketing Planning Group in Korea ; Samsung Latin America RHQ and was the Head of the Company’s subsidiary at Chile . He became the Director of the Mobile Export team in 2001 and became the Head of South East Asia/South West Asia/Middle East Marketing Group in Global Mobile Business in 2004. He came to India as the Head of Mobile and IT Division in 2008 and has now been elevated to the position of President & CEO, Samsung South West Asia.

Under Mr. Park’s leadership, Samsung has emerged as a market leader in the fast growing Smart phone market in India and the Company’s market share in Mobiles has grown from 6% in 2008 to over 30 % as on date. Mr. Park is well known within Samsung for his very practical management style, innovative channel management and his customer oriented approach.

After assuming office today, Mr. Park thanked Mr. Shin, for his contribution in making Samsung a leading Electronics brand in the country. “It will be my endeavor to leverage the synergies of the existing Samsung businesses in

India

to ensure stronger growth for the Company in this region and make Samsung as the Most Loved Brand in the country.”

“2008” Unemployment Claims at 3,52,000,

2012-01-20T03:25:00.000-08:00

The number of people seekingunemployment benefits plummeted last week to 3,52,000, the fewest since April2008. The decline added to evidence that the job market is strengthening.Applicationsfell 50,000, the biggest drop in the seasonally adjusted figure in more thansix years, the Labor Department said Thursday. The four-week average, whichsmooths out fluctuations, dropped to 379,000. That's the second-lowest suchfigure in more than three years.

A department spokesman cautioned that volatility at this time of year is common. Applications had jumped two weeks ago, largely because companies laid off thousands of temporary workers hired for the holidays.

Still, whenweekly applications fall consistently below 375,000, it usually signals thathiring is strong enough to push down the unemployment rate.

"This continues a clear downshift in claims," said Ian Shepherdson, an economist at High Frequency Economics.

Hiring improved in the second half of 2011. In December, employers added 200,000 jobs. That marked the sixth straight month in which the economy added at least 100,000 jobs. And the unemployment rate fell to 8.5 percent, a three-year low.

For all of 2011,the economy added 1.6 million jobs. That was up sharply from 940,000 in 2010.Economists say they expect roughly 1.9 million more jobs to be added this year,according to a survey by The Associated Press.

Still, the job market has a long way to go before it fully recovers from the damage of the Great Recession, which wiped out 8.7 million jobs. More than 13 million people remain unemployed. Millions more have given up looking for work and so are no longer counted as unemployed.

The overall number of people receiving benefits, which isn't seasonally adjusted, rose. More than 7.8 million people received benefits in the final week of last year. They include about 3.6 million people covered by extended-benefit programs begun during the recession.

The manufacturing sector remains a bright spot. Factory output jumped 0.9 percent in December, the Federal Reserve said this week. That was the sharpest monthly gain in a year. Manufacturing gained 225,000 jobs last year, the most since 1997.

The pickup in hiring reflects stronger economic growth. The economy likely grew at an annual rate of about 3 percent in the final three months of last year, economists estimate.

The Italian lawmakers earn / €11,000 -$14,300.

2012-01-03T23:06:00.000-08:00

The Italian lawmakers earn / €11,000 -$14,300. The government-mandated has confirmed to Italians.
for Italian lawmakers stirs anger.

International markets have punished Italy in recent months for failing to come up with a coherent strategy to deal with its €1.9 trillion ($2.5 trillion) debt mountain. That drove up the borrowing rates for the eurozone's third-largest economyItaly's bloated public sector and the privileges of its political elite have come under fire as the country battles its debt crisis with tax hikes, labor market and pension reforms that are hurting ordinary Italians.Premier Mario Monti has vowed to trim the cost of governing as part of his austerity measures, and has renounced his own salary as premier and economy minister. The report, published Tuesday, looked at comparisons between labor costs for lawmakers in Italy compared to France, Germany, Spain, the Netherlands, Belgium and Austria. It also considered 34 public agencies in Italy to see if there were analogous ones in the other countries. The commission's president hopes the findings will provide ‘food for thought" even while stressing the difficulty in comparing data from wildly diverse governments.His replacement, the well-respected economist, Monti, has formed a government of technocrats to grapple with the problems and has already undertaken a series of unpopular spending cuts and tax hikes. The findings, which the authors freely admit are incomplete and provisional, showed that a lawmaker in Italy's lower Chamber of Deputies earns €11,283 a month followed by €8,503 for a Dutch lawmaker, down to as little as €2,813 for one in Spain.The Italian salary is fully taxed, but there are perks that are either more generous than, or similarly generous in other countries: €3,503 a month tax-free in cost of living allowances and free travel on trains, planes, boats and Italian highways. Only German lawmakers have a higher cost of living allowance at nearly €4,000, while Belgian lawmakers get none.Adding to the strain on public coffers is the €3,690 in office expenses the government spends every month for each Italian deputy. Only France spends more, at €6,412 — though both France and Germany spend much more to pay the deputy's assistants: a maximum of €9,138 in France and €14,712 in Germany, while Italian deputies have to pay their assistants out of the office budget.On the other hand, there were several Italian public agencies that had no counterparts elsewhere including the "independent commission for the evaluation, transparency and integration of public administration," the authority overseeing public contracts and one making sure essential public services work during Italy's frequent strikes.While the findings imply possible areas for streamlining, the study's authors note that many of those jobs may be being carried out in other countries, just not as independent commissions with their own administrative bureaucracies. And the study didn't investigate whether there were agencies in other countries that had no counterparts in Italy. And during the six-month course of the study, three of the Italian agencies were either eliminated or merged into other government structures.

Economy in 2012 , Handling with care leads to the well being of the nations,

2012-01-03T22:24:00.000-08:00

Add caption

U S & European situations improve,

As long as we hold it together and things don't fall apart, I think the stock market could have a reasonable run this year,
Investment strategists and money managers expect the S&P 500 will rise 7%, on average, in 2012, the United States and Europe are dealing with, fundamental problems" like extremely high debt levels and weak economies, last year's volatility will likely carry over, added Day. People remain nervous and uncertain about the global outlook,
Even if the U.S. and European situations improve, it's unlikely that we'll get fundamental solutions anytime soon, so investors will continue to react to headlines day by day.
Europe's problems are obviously still out there, and there's potential for more curve balls, but we're making a bullish assumption: things won't spiral out of control and we will get some good news, whose year-end target for the S&P 500 stands at 1,450, which translates to an impressive 15% gain for the year.
I expect global growth will continue to slow in 2012," said Mark Luschini, chief investment strategist at Janney Montgomery Scott, citing the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development's expectations for stalled global growth around 1.6% in 2012. That would be down from 1.9% in 2011 and sharply below the 3% growth in 2010.
Do you in markets?
The slowdown will make gains in the stock market hard to come by,
who expects the S&P 500 will finish 2012 right around where it started the year.
A recession is inevitable in Europe / now there's only a question of severity and duration,\
U.S. economic growth will remain lackluster, and growth in emerging markets will also slow, as China, which has been the major engine of global growth, loses steam.

Trading shower in German, “French”

2012-01-02T22:21:00.000-08:00

Stocks fell in South Korea and closed flat in Taiwan, Asian stock exchanges closed.Germany DXClosed up2 3%, on Monday’ lower than 2011,& 2% hike in Newyork Trading,

London investors Investors appeared to be reassured by European purchasing managers survey index numbers that improved in December from November. manufacturing sector was up, but at levels that still show a fifth straight month of contraction.Data releases later in the week such as euro zone inflation on Wednesday and German factory orders and U.S. non-farm payrolls on Friday will give traders more grist. The U.S. employment is expected to rise by some 150,000 after increasing 120,000 in November.

Debt woes may be compounded by at least a mild recession over the last quarter of 2011 and the first part of 2012. In Asia, South Korea's Kospi, which lost 11 percent of its value last year, closed nearly unchanged at 1,826.37. South Korea's tech sector move higher, with Samsung Electronics up 2.1 percent and LG Electronics gaining 2.3 percent. Steel giant POSCO slid 1.1 percent and Korea Electric Power shed 1.8 percent.

Markets face an uncertain first quarter as euro zone leaders try to get control of government debt woes that threaten to harm the global economy with another financial meltdown., the euro zone's third-largest economy and the focal point of the euro zone's struggle to deal with a crisis caused by heavy levels of government debt. Fears of default on those debts mean that bond investors demand ever-higher interest, making it a challenge for the new government of Prime Minister Mario Monti to roll over €53 billion ($69 billion) in debt maturing in the first quarter. If a country can no longer borrow affordably to pay off bonds that are maturing, it faces eventual default or a bailout.

The eurozone economy is expected to sink back into recession.

2011-12-29T05:49:00.000-08:00

As early as the second full week of January, bond auctions in which Italy and Spain need to borrow big chunks of cash will start showing whether the eurozone is finally getting a grip on the 2-year-old crisis that has seen Greece, Ireland and Portugal bailed out.

If the auctions go well and borrowing costs ease, the crisis will ease, lending support for the EU strategy of getting governments to embark on often-savage austerity measures to reduce deficits, along with massive support for the banking system from the European Central Bank.

High rates, on the other hand, would feed fears of a government debt default that could cripple banks, sink the economy and, in the extreme case, destroy the 17-member currency union. Key events early in the New Year— Italy and Spain will seek to borrow heavily in the first quarter at affordable interest costs, starting the second week in January. — The slowing eurozone economy may slip into or already be in recession, lowering tax revenue and increasing government budget deficits. — Bailed-out Greece must agree with creditors on a debt writedown that will cut the value of their holdings by 50 percent in an effort to start putting the bankrupt country back on its feet. The task is for the major players — eurozone governments, the European Union's executive Commission and the European Central Bank — to convince financial markets that troubled governments can pay their heavy debts and therefore deserve to borrow at affordable interest costs.

Default fears have driven up bond market interest rates and made it more and more expensive for indebted governments to borrow to pay off maturing bonds. That vicious cycle forced Greece, Ireland and Portugal to seek bailout loans from the other eurozone governments and the International Monetary Fund. A key stress point will be whether Italy can continue to raise money in the markets at affordable rates. In the first quarter, it has to step up its borrowing to pay off €72 billion ($94 billion) in bond redemptions and interest payments. Spain, which is expected to sell up to €25 billion ($33 billion) in new debt, starts a heavy period of auctions on Jan. 12, and Italy begins on Jan. 13.

Overall, Italy has more than €300 billion ($392 billion) in debt maturing in 2012. "If Italy manages to auction this debt successfully, then the debt crisis will take a step back from the cliff edge," said analyst Jane Foley at Rabobank. "If it doesn't, it could go over the cliff edge. At the end of the day, whatever the nuances and hours of discussion that have gone on about the sovereign debt crisis, it boils down to whether a sovereign can sell its debt in the open market."

If Italy fails to borrow at affordable rates, the options are few and unattractive. The eurozone's €500 billion ($653 billion) in bailout funds — already partly committed to earlier bailouts — would struggle to cover Italy's financing needs, even if additional help can be found from the IMF. A bigger solution — commonly guaranteed eurobonds — faces German resistance and would take time to implement.

The European Central Bank could use its power to buy large amounts of Italian and Spanish bonds with newly created money — but has so far refused, out of concern that a central bank bailout would remove the incentive for governments to control their spending.

That will make it harder for governments to persuade voters to accept more cutbacks in spending, pensions and government wages while raising taxes. It's not clear how long voters in Greece, which will have its fourth straight year of recession next year, will tolerate continuous austerity. Yet the cutbacks are the price of getting the bailout loans that have kept Greece from default.Meanwhile Greece is striving to get creditors to agree to write down some debt and avoid larger losses in case of a default that is not agreed ahead of time. A €14.4 billion ($18.8 billion) chunk of debt comes due in March.

"There will be a point in the summer when people have seen a lot of action from government and no improvement in their living conditions and they will ask, do we have this euro to live with austerity and high unemployment," he said.Wolff thinks that the determination of political elites to keep the euro together will win out: "I think it's going to survive."

Subjects Financial crisis, Economy, Government and politics, Recessions and depressions, Government finance People Mario Monti Locations Italy, Europe, Spain, Greece, Germany Organisations European Central Bank, European Union

“2011” Wage Raise in Eight States,

2011-12-29T05:18:00.000-08:00

Eight states will be raising their minimum wage next week, boosting the pay of more than a million workers across the country.Most of the raises will be modest, on the order of 28 to 37 cents per hour, but the new rates will translate into hundreds of additional dollars annually for many people who are working yet remain in poverty.

Setting a new benchmark, Washington will become the first state to crack the $9 ceiling, raising its minimum wage from $8.67 to $9.04, which translates for full-time minimum-wage workers into an extra $15 or so in pretax pay each week. The other states raising their rates are Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Montana, Ohio, Oregon and Vermont.

Workers in all of these states owe their raises to the cost-of-living adjustments written into their state laws. Such laws require that the minimum wage be tweaked every year to account for the rising cost of basic necessities, usually pegged to the consumer price index. Ten states, including the eight above, have such laws on the books. Nevada raises its rate during the summer, and although Missouri has a cost-of-living adjustment, this year it will not push the state rate above the prevailing federal minimum wage of $7.25.

In recent years, advocates for low-wage workers have tended to lobby hard for cost-of-living adjustments on the state level, arguing that such laws protect against the erosion of workers' purchasing power. The federal minimum wage is not automatically adjusted for inflation and requires new legislation each time it increases. Thirty-two states currently have minimum wages no higher than the federal rate.

Paul Sonn, legal co-director of the National Employment Law Project, called the cost-of-living adjustment "the most important sort of protection" keeping the minimum wage from losing its purchasing power over time.

"Workers in those states are enjoying substantially stronger wages than in others," said Sonn, who argues that such adjustments also offer the business community some predictability. "From our perspective, in the states that have adopted indexing, the minimum wage is preserving its real value."

But even in Washington state, with the highest rate in the country, today's minimum wage does not match its historical highs when adjusted for inflation, Sonn noted. Had the minimum wage kept pace with the rising cost of living since the 1970s, it would currently stand around $10 an hour.

Not satisfied with the rates set by their state governments, some cities have passed local ordinances establishing their own minimum wages. Among them is San Francisco, which next week will become the first major city with a minimum wage higher than $10.

Business owners and trade groups in San Francisco and elsewhere have argued that a relatively high minimum wage forces businesses -- restaurants in particular -- to cut back on staff and displaces jobs to other communities. Although the body of research is conflicting, recent some studies have concluded that raising the minimum wage has no significant impact on local job markets.

Urgent approvals for Spain economy measures

2011-12-27T01:27:00.001-08:00

Deputy Prime minister Soraya Saenz de Santamaria said Friday Spain's new government will approve a set of urgent measures next week as it begins working on extracting the country from its severe economic crisis.

Santa aria gave few details of the measures to be approved Dec. 30 but said they would include a freeze on filling new civil service vacancies except in key areas such as the security forces. She also intimated that a current wage-freeze for civil servants could be extended. However, Saenz de Santa aria said, the measures next Friday would also bring back cost-of-living adjustments for pensions.

She said the government's priority was to reduce the bloated deficit, adding that the government would present a proposal on a public spending ceiling to Parliament by Mar. 31. Spain has pledged to bring down its deficit from 11.2 percent of GDP in 2009 to within the European Union limit of 3 percent by 2013, Saenz de Santa aria also said Spain would overhaul its banking sector in the first six months of the new year. The deputy premier, who is also government spokeswoman, set Jan. 7 as a deadline for employers and unions to come up with a new labor reform agreement as part of the government's bid to get the countries near 5 million jobless back to work.

Earlier Labor Minister Fatima Banez said she was optimistic a new reform accord would be reached. Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy has warned that if an agreement is not reached the government will impose its own measures. Spain has the highest unemployment rate of the 17 countries that use the euro at 21.5 percent. The country is also running a swollen budget deficit at a time when the economy continues to falter following a near two-year recession triggered by the collapse of a real estate bubble.

Rajoy's Popular Party won a landslide victory in Nov. 20 elections on a promise to get the Spanish economy moving again. Spain has already made sharp cuts to its national spending and introduced several reforms under the former Socialist government in a bid to convince investors and the European Union, but the measures have so far failed to reboot the economy.