this is gps, the global public square. welcome to all of you in the united states and around the world, i'm fareed zakaria. we is a great show for you today. first up, we will talk about women's undergarments. seriously. spanx founder sarah blakely is the world's richest self--made billionaire. her story is an only in america story and it is an amazing tale of entrepreneurship. you don't want to miss this. then a big question that affects us all, for the first time in history, a majority of human beings now live in cities. what does that mean? more skyscrapers and congestion?

more detroit? we'll look at the upsides and the down sides of an ever more urban world. we've got a terrific battle that has some surprising ideas. also, "les miserables." it turns out that the book by victor hugo is the all-time favorite novel of a middle eastern leader that the west counts as an enemy. i will explain. but first, here's my take. we are watching a season of discontent in a world of young democracies, from egypt to turkey to brazil. protest marches and one coup. as we watched the turbulence around the world, i think about our own democratic journey and how interesting it is that the distinctive feature of the american system is not how democratic it is, but rather, how undemocratic it is. hear me out -- we have three co-equal branches of government. and the one with the final say

on many issues, the supreme court is composed of nine unelected men and women. the american senate is the most unrepresentative upper house in the democratic universe, with the exception of britain's house of lords, which is utterly powerless. california's 38 million people have the same representation in the senate, as do wyoming's 576,000. state and local governments battle federal power. private businesses and other nongovernmental groups are part of this mix. there are aspects of this system that many americans don't like. i think the senate in general is a broken institution, from its representation to its silly rules about filibusters. but the system of checks and balances has in general worked well. the form of government that came out of the french revolution by contrast, is one of absolute sovereignty. centralizing all powers at the top. since that revolution, france

has had many upheavals and changes in regime, going through two monarchies, two empires, one crypto fascist dictatorship and five republics, the united states by contrast has had a continuous constitutional existence. why is this important as we look at the world today? well in so many of these cases, what we are watching are democratic governments elected freely and fairly, that are abusing individual rights. ignoring minority parties and eroding checks and balances. observing the early flowering of the phenomenon in the mid 1990s, i described it as, ill liberal democracy and this is the problem we confront in the arab world and in so many other developing countries. the good news is that other elements within society are fighting against this kind of ill liberal democracy. political groups, student movements, even the clash between the egyptian military and the muslim brotherhood could be useful in the long run.

because it resembles the clashes between kings and lords, the church and the state. the aristocracy and the new business elites. in the development of western liberal democracy. it can look very messy while it's happening. and neither side has a monopoly of virtue. but the contest between various power centers over time does help to create a system of checks and balances. so what we're watching might look like crisis and breakdown, but it might turn out to be the road to better government. for more on this, go to cnn.com/fareed and you can read my essay, the rise of the illiberal democracy. anyway, let's get started. if you think the american dream is dead, just meet sarah blakely. she's never taken a business class or even worked in her industry. but she's not an accidental entrepreneur.

the tenacious blakely transformed $5,000 in savings into a $500 million a year company called spanx. and she revolutionized women's undergarment in the process. in 2012, "forbes" magazine named the spanx founder and inventor, the world's youngest self-made female billionaire. her brand can now be found in over 50 countries worldwide. but blakely's story is quintessentially american. as with many veninventions it a began as a solution do a nagging problem. listen in. >> sarah blakely. great to have you object. >> thank you for having me. >> explain where you get the idea to make this new kind of underwear. >> well my inspiration for spanx was actually my own butt. so i don't know if this has ever happened to you, fareed, i could not figure out to wear under my white pants. like so many consumers out there, we have these clothes that we can't figure out to wear

under them. so the panties show the panty line and the shapers were too thick and bulky. so by cutting the feet out of my control-top pantihose, i realized this hosery material that's second to skin would make good undergarments and shapers meant to be worn under clothes that would smooth us out and get rid of the pantyline. so spanx filled this niche. two options of undergarment, neither one were quite right and revolutionized the way we got to wear our clothes. >> you had these white pants, what did you do that made it work? >> well i went shopping for shapers and i, the thong and the panty didn't work, you could see the lines and the shapers were thick. so i cut the feet out of my own control-top pantihose and put them on under the pants and everything looked smooth and really per nekt and no lines. but they rolled up my legs all night. so i went home and thought, i have to figure out a way to

comfortably keep this product, just below the knee. so with a soft-knitted band. and i'll have something for not only myself, but for many, many women. >> and so what's going on in your life at this point? where are you? >> how rock-bottom was i? >> at that point in my life, i had always wanted to be a lawyer and had failed the l-sat, i'm not a good test-taker. that led me to try out to be goofy at disney world, but you have to be 5'8", and i'm only at 5'6", so i worked at disney world for three months and i sold fax machines door to door for seven years. that's what was going on in my life. i had never taken a business class, i had never worked in fashion or retail. but i knew i wanted to be self-employed. i had been visualizing that, is had been manifesting that. i was clear with my intentions, that i wanted an idea and if the universe gave me an idea, i would take it and run with it and create it on my own and sell it i knew i could sell fax

machines. i didn't really like fax machines or half the time understand them. but if i could come up with the idea i would excited about, i would not waste it. >> so you've got the idea. you've got, you've done some research. now you've got to get somebody to make the prototype. how do you do that. >> so after i cut the feet out of my pantihose, i went, i did two things right away. when you have an idea, the first thing i did was go to uspto.gov, the united states patent and trademark office website. i searched if there was a footless body-shaping pantihose in existence. >> can you search that? >> yes, you can. you can look for patents. i found ha there wasn't one and the other thingdy was went it a website called thomasregister.com which lists the manufacturers in the united states by product. so i typed in shapers and undergarment and i got my list of manufacturers and i started calling them on the phone. >> cold call. >> cold calling them. which i was pretty good at

because i had been doing for seven years. so hearing the word no did not faze me. i heard the word no for the first two years of trying to get the product made. >> and how did you get it made? >> i realized that everybody who i was calling, you know, it was, i was just being transferred eternally. here's this girl online saying she's going to transform people's butts and change the world. like where do we connect her to and i would get lost in the shuffle. i took a week off of work and i drove to north carolina and i cold-called in person all the hosiery mills that had been sort of hanging up on me and begged in person to help make my idea and they all sent me away. and it was probably two weeks to three weeks after that road trip that i got a call from a mill owner in charlotte, north carolina and he said quote, sarah, i have decided to help make your crazy idea. >> so this guy -- and this is -- southern, a clothing manufacturing, right? >> yes.

>> why do this one guy decide to do it? zwli asked him that, he said why the change of heart? a and he simply said, i have three daughters. so thankfully for me, my passion and enthusiasm for this idea had him run it by his daughters at dinner and they said, this is a great idea, you have to help this girl make it he call me up and gave me a shot. but still not thinking it was a good idea. i think he was really more wanting to help me out. >> now you've got somebody making the product. you still have to figure out how to patent it properly. how to actually you know, manufacture it in large lots and how to sell it and market it, right? >> yes. i mean the patent, once i realized i did my own search and realized there wasn't something out there like that i went to three different lawyers that i looked up on the internet in atlanta. and presented my idea and they all wanted between $3,000 and $5,000 to patent the concept and i had $5,000 set aside in my savings to do this. so i ended up going to barnes &

noble and bought a book on patents and trademark and wrote the bulk of my patent and i went back to one of the lawyers that actually later admitted that when i first met with him, he thought my idea was so bad, that he thought i had been sent by candid camera or his friends set me up or something 20 do this to him. but he said i'll do this for $700 over the weekend. which was the legal portion of the patent that i didn't have the training to write. i had already written the abstract and done the drawings, so we did that and i submitted that and you know, then the packaging, i was making on my friend's computer. >> all right. so you've got the, you've got the prototype. you've got the patent, we're going to come back and figure out how the story ended. you know how it ended. but you'll still want to listen. d security solution to keep your information safe & secure. century link. your link with what's next.

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with odor free aspercreme. powerful medicine relieves pain fast, with no odor. so all you notice is relief. aspercreme. failure is life's way of nudging you on to another path. it's a philosophy spanx founder sarah blakely has cashed in on. as a child she used to watch her attorney father in court. but that wasn't enough to keep

her from bombing the l-sats twice and she was selling fax machines door to door for seven years, that made blakely immune to rejection, which was unavailable when she started cold-calling hosiery millses with her footless pantihose ideas. she was developing spanx after hours she didn't quit her job until she invented the product, wrote the patent, started the website and landed neiman-marcus and saks fifth avenue for customers. here's more of my conversation with billionaire entrepreneur, sarah blakely. >> you were telling us about how you finally got the prototype and the patent. there was one little detail i know from talking to you that you didn't mention when you got the patent. the night before, the patent is going to be filed, you get nervous, because the guy who made the prototype explained what it was made of. tell that story. >> so my lawyer suggested we get

in a three-way call with the man in the back of the manufacturing plant that had really help immediate make my first prototype. and he was extremely southern. and we got on the conference call. and i said ted, you need to explain to sam what's in this product. so he says, well, it's 70% nylon, and 30% lacquer. and so my attorney and i were taking notes and say okay, got it, thanks. and the night before i'm submitting this to the u.s. patent and trademark office i could not sleep. i'm thinking, how is there lacquer in this product, in this shaper. so i called ted the next morning, and i said ted, this is sarah, can you please spell lacquer? and he said yeah, l-y-c-r-a. and i said, oh, my god, lycra!

>> so now you've got the patent, you've got the prototype. what happens next. >> i needed to name it and i needed a package. so i created the package on my friend's computer with her help and i wanted my packaging to be very different. i made it red, which hadn't been done in the hosiery space. i did three cartoon women that are very different looking. for many years it was the same half-naked woman, you know in photography on all of our packages, it was very confusing. so that stood out. i knew if i got my chance on the shelf, i didn't have the money to advertise, it needed to jump off and sort of say, i'm new and check me out. >> what about the name. >> the name, spanx, came to me after a year of really bad names that i would write on scrap pieces of paper everywhere. i narrowed down my thinking because i knew at the time that kodak and coca-cola were two of the most recognized names in the world. what do they have in common. they both have a strong "k"

sound. and the k sound will make their audience laugh. i did research that the man who created kodak. he liked the k so much he put it at the beginning and end of the word. and i said i want my invention to have the k sound. and almost instantly spanx came to me while i was silting in traffic. and that night i went home for $150 with my credit card, trademarked it on the government website and right before i hit send i changed the k-s, to an x. because i felt it would be easier to trademark and more memorable. >> so you're doing, you're, the web and -- you didn't have, you never went to business school, nothing. >> no. i've never taken a business class in my life. and i never worked in fashion or retail. so i was -- a consumer that loved my clothes and want dodd look better in them and also just you know, someone who had been selling fax machines door to door.

so hearing the word no through the process of invent and trying to claim something, i had the process to keep going. >> and your lack of knowledge about the fashion business helped you. you managed to get it into neiman marcus and everyone thought it was incredibly difficult. explain how you got into neiman marcus. >> i always like to tell people that what you don't know can be your greatest asset. if you let it. if you have the confidence to let that be your asset. because i had no idea what i was doing. in most cases it worked to my favor. if you don't know what you'ring did or how it's supposed to be done. you're going to end up doing it different than everybody else and that's what makes great companies and great products. with neiman marcus, the very minute i invented the product and i had a color copy of the packaging, i called neiman marcus around the corner from me and i said hi i'm sarah, can i come over and show you my new product and they said there's a buyer in dallas.

and i call her and said i invented a product it will change the way your customers wear your clothes, i'll fly there. >> and she said, if you're willing to fly here, i'll give you ten minutes. i went to neiman marcus and pitched it. i was so nervous in the middle of the meeting, i said come to me to bathroom, you've got to try it and people were saying how in the world did you get your product in neiman's and i would say, i called them. and i said what do you do? and they said, we do trade shows and set up a booth and hope that the neiman buyer comes to my booth so a lot of the spanx story was me having no idea how it was supposed to be done. >> now what are your sales? >> i'm privately held, i own 100% of the business, i've been self-funded from the start. starting out with my $5,000

savings and my retail sales are well over $500 million. and we're doing great. lot of butts in the world to cover. >> so, ha do you think, when you look back at this, you have no business training, you have no business education. what do you think was the key to your success? >> i would have to say one of the biggest keys to my success was my upbringing and my father and he was very determined growing up to encourage me to fail. so -- >> encourage you to fail? >> yes, my dad at the dinner table. he would ask my brother and me what we had failed at that week. if we didn't have a story to tell him, he would actually be disappointed. i can distinctly remember coming home and telling him, dad, dad, i tried out for this and i failed horribly and he would say, way to go. so what happened is reframed my thinking on failure. failure for me became not trying versus not succeeding.

more than anything what stifles entrepreneurship and risk-taking is the fear of failure. that was a big gift i got from the way i was raised, was not to fear that. >> clearly you've managed to take it and go very far. >> thank you. >> sara blakely, pleasure to have you on. up next, what in the world? a a powerful lead anywhere the middle east who loves western novels, who is he and why is it important? i'll explain. i am today by luck. i put in the hours and built a strong reputation in the industry. i set goals and worked hard to meet them. i've made my success happen. so when it comes to my investments, i'm supposed to just hand it over to a broker and back away? that's not gonna happen. avo: when you work with a schwab financial consultant,

you'll get the guidance you need with the control you want. talk to us today. every day we're working to and to keep our commitments. and we've made a big commitment to america. bp supports nearly 250,000 jobs here. through all of our energy operations, we invest more in the u.s. than any other place in the world. in fact, we've invested over $55 billion here in the last five years - making bp america's largest energy investor. our commitment has never been stronger.

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now for our what in the world segment. one of the most powerful leaders in the world once said the following -- victor hugo's "les miserables" is the best novel that has ever been written in history. i have said over and over again, go read it once. "les miserables" is a book of sociology, a book of history, a book of criticism, a divine book, a book of love and feeling. who said those words? it is not the president of france. in fact, it's not any western

leader at all. those are the words of a man the west has come to perceive as a sworn enemy. ali khamenei, the supreme leader and ayatollah of iran. this revelation is a part of a new essay in foreign affairs. it turns out khameni believes that novels have given him a deep insight into the west. the supreme leader has read the "grapes of wrath" as well as "uncle tom's cabin." gangi's essay provides fascinating insights into the most powerful man in iran. he's been in power since the beginning. when iran had its revolution in 1979 and iranians overthrew the american-backed shah to found the islamic republic, khamenei

was at the forefront. he became president in 1981 and supreme lead anywhere 1989 with full control over the military, executive and judiciary. gange s's essay describes an iranian leader for much of his early career was deeply hostile to the west and the united states. he was first and foremost a scholar of islam and its role in society. as the author points out, he was deeply influenced by the writings of an egyptian intellectual, prominent in the muslim brother hood. he also wrote about america as a nation of unprincipled and imperialistic people. khamenei has pointed out that iran's democratically elected government was not anti-american. in fact it looked to america for support, as it tried to break free of a colonial relationship with great britain. but the united states and britain organized a coup against

moussadeq 60 years ago this week. then came american-backed regime of the shah. the books khamenei likes are all critiques of western society for the way it has treated the poor or african-americans or native americans. he does not, incidentally, seem to recognize the strength of a culture that criticizes itself. all these critiques of the west are by wernster werner werners. co-bhani has softened somewhat in recent years, he has recently praised western culture for its science, innovation and even hard work. he still argues that islam is superior because in his quote, western culture is too focused on materialism. but he says it, too, has its strengths and that iran could learn from them. khamenei seems a man who distrusts the west for reasons that have to do with his reading of history, his schooling in

political islam and his own experiences in his country. on the other hand, the picture of him that emerges is of a clever sophisticated, learned man. who does not seem prone to rash decisions or impulsive actions, go to cnn.com/fareed to read this fascinating essay. up next, what a massive wave of urbanization will do to the world and america. i have a great panel of experts on cities. stay with us. ♪

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try capzasin-hp. it penetrates deep to block pain signals for hours of relief. capzasin-hp. take the pain out of arthritis. hello, i'm fredricka witfield in the cnn news room. in syria, state tv says the governor of hama province has been assassinated, it comes as the syrian government and opposition are accusing each other of using chemil weapons. 1300 people were reportedly killed in the attack on wednesday. near damascus. now syria says u.n. inspectors can investigate the alleged attacks. >> they can start immediately. >> what sort of agreement have you reached with them? >> we worked for two days. i have never doubted the possibility of reaching an agreement. >> so they have complete access and they can go anywhere they want, any time they want?

>> yes. >> is that the case? >> yes. >> in all of these areas? >> yes. >> and that can start immediately? >> yes. >> deposed eyith january president, hosni mubarak is in court today, he's being retried for the killing of hundreds of protesters in the 2011 upriding, he was convicted last year and sentenced to life in prison. he appealed. and was granted a retry. a court had been ordered him to be released last week and placed under house arrest. in california, a large wildfire is still burning around the western edge of yosemite national park. the rim fire has consumed more than 130 acres of forest. a state of emergency has been declared for the san francisco area. some of the city's power and water supplies come to that area where the fire is burning. coming up in the next hour, the youngest child of reverend dr. martin luther king jr. opens up about the challenges of having a civil rights icon for a

father. bernice king's candid accounts of her life at 2:00 p.m. eastern. i'm fredricka witfield, "fareed zakaria gps" continues right now. today more than 50% of the world's population lives in cities. by 2030, 60% will be urban. 70% by 2050. china alone is planning to move a quarter of a billion people from rural to urban areas. by 2025. but this isn't a phenomenon happening just in emerging markets or third-world countries. even in a country like the united states that is already 80% urban, people are still moving to the cities at a rate of about 1% each year. what does all of this mean? i'm joined by a great panel to explore it bruce katz and jennifer bradley from the brookings institution co-wrote the "metropolitan revolution" lee gallagher is the author of

"the end of the suburbs" and joe kotkin is distinguished fellow in urban futures at chapman university and the author of "the next 100 million: america in 2050." welcome to you all. do you find that when you look at the urban issues in america, are people going to cities for a reason? are they going away from suburbs? >> it's a combination of both. what i document in my book really a pretty significant change in the zeitgeist of what people want from the communities they live in, the houses they live in and the way that they live every day. so one trend that i'm documenting here is urbanization, which includes the resurgence of cities like new york, like cities all across america, have more you know, outdoor cafes and multiplexes, they're like amusement parks now. but at the same time there's an effort afoot to urbanize the suburbs, the suburbs that do

well in the future will have urban cores, a place to get out of your car and walk. place that's pleasing. there's a tremendous, tremendous yearning for that right now. much in the same way that years ago people yearned for their own yard and a picket fenced a a a car. >> the vast majority of people live in metropolitan areas live in suburbs and between 2000-2010, a huge percentage of growth, 90%, was in the suburbs. i agree with lee, that the suburbs are changing. i still think people want back yards and want single-family homes, 80%. but they will be looking for different things in suburbs. one of the great things about suburbs now, we're getting the immigrants moving to the suburbs, so the quality of the food has gotten much better. much more interesting in certain areas they've made the schools extremely good. particularly asian immigrants. the suburbs are changing but they're predominant choice the vast majority of people, over their 30s and the vast majority

of people who have kids. now if we end up with a very, very low birth rate. that may tilt things more towards cities. >> the part that we haven't talked about. when we talk about cities and suburbs is wait, cities are the future and even if it's the close-in suburbs, what about detroit? >> first of all, judge doust clarify, i think cities and suburbs together are the future. we're a metropolitan nation. and when we use the cities globally, what we're talking about are the vast metropolitan areas. we're the most metropolitan nation in the world. in a way we should be thinking about how cities and suburbs together power our economy forward. detroit, southeast michigan larger, has come back since the recession, right? thanks to the auto bailout. the city itself and the core has been trublted for decades. 138 square miles, loss from

about 2 million in population in the '50s, down to less than 700,000 today. it's an extreme case of urban decline. even in detroit, you can see in the core of the city, a revival. of anchor institutions like health system and quicken loans and philanthropies that are betting on the future. so you know, in america, there's always a second act. and we think, jennifer and myself, that as we talk about the fiscal challenges of detroit, we should talk about the assets and advantages of its core. because like many other metropolitan areas, that's where we see a good portion of what powers are. >> you would argue that the experience of detroit is about one badly-managed fiscal unit within the larger story. in other words that even michigan can thrive, but detroit itself has managed itself for

decades badly. >> i think detroit was a perfect storm of a lot of bad things. it's as if every bad thing that was going to happen to a city, happened more intensely in, and more all at once. than detroit. but i don't think it's emblematic of other places. if you look at a place like northeast ohio, which we talk about in our book, "metropolitan revolution" northeast ohio metros, cleveland, akron, canton, have been able to organize around their assets and figure out how to take the innovative capacity that's in their institutions like the cleech cleveland clinic, find entrepreneur who is want to take that technology and commercialize it. i think of a place like a northeast ohio or a houston, which is booming because it's embraced immigrants and said you're here to work and we want to help you sort of start up the economic ladder. i think those places are much more emblematic of the power and potential of america's metros than detroit. >> what's your diagnosis of

detroit? >> you know, there was absolutely horrendous management. that's one part. the other part for detroit is on the positive side, is when i just did a study on engineers. it's one of the highest concentrations of engineers in the country. they happen to live overwhelmingly in the suburbs and they have some significant immigration as well. i think that detroit region is definitely saveable. i think if the detroit region comes back, i think detroit city may find its role within that region. >> detroit seems to be a story that's sort of at some, in some ways -- opposed to your book and your thesis. because it is a classic case where people left the city for the suburbs, you know, crime grew, it became a negative spiral, more and more -- and the well to do white middle class and upper middle class, just fled the city. they're doing fine i suppose in the outer suburbs, but the city itself imploded. >> it's sort of an outdated

narrative. that was the path that everyone beat in the '50s and '60s and '70s, you had the white flight. that's not happening any more. i would agree with jennifer that detroit in many ways is an outlier. in many ways. but one interesting thing about detroit, is planners are looking at it as a great model of how to shrink. that is the proper response. because you need to shrink the city to meet the demands of its inhabitants, otherwise you have abandoned buildings and that fosters more crime, not good for young children to see that growing up. when we come back we ask how the left-right divide in the united states plays into all of these urban issues. [ male announcer ] when you wear dentures you may not know

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we are back with bruce katz, lee gallagher, joe cotkin and jennifer bradley, talking about urban issues, urban america and the one thing i'm struck by your book, which i love but i want to ask you more about, is you say washington is broken. you know, nothing is working. but if you, if you look beneath the hood of america as it were, what you see is mayors and mungs

pallets, where people are reaching across party lines. working with the private sector and that there is a metropolitan revolution. i guess my question is, isn't the, when i watch republicans in albany and democrats, they seem as divided over everything as anybody else. >> the federal government is a gog. states are governments, whether he we come to cities and metropolitan areas, what jennifer and i find are networks of leaders, elected officials for sure, mayors and county leaders. and heads of major companies, business associations, universities, medical campuses, philanthropies, unions and community and civic groups. and when they come together, they can do grand things together. our book really is about that. it's in the absence of federal leadership, they're mired in partners in rancor, frankly, many state governments are the same. it's a head-to-head fight between the democrats and

republicans. city and metropolitan leaders, these networks and many times across jurisdictions understand, you know, what we do in this global economy and then build our -- on our special under extreme pressure and really didn't get along over anything. there were issues over race and busing and urban expansion. they were really at each other's throats. then at the 1980s the energy economy tanked in colorado. and really socked the denver economy. we're feeling it in aurora. we're feeling it in broom field county. we're feeling it throughout the region. we need a strategy that will help all of us. we started this completely

unheard of development way of doing business which is they pitched the region as a region when they're trying to locate a global economy in the region. there's a lot of good stuff here. once you've decided to come to the region, then you can work out whether you want to be in one jurisdiction or another. they understood that economically they were in it together. they don't have to agree on every single issue. the mayors don't get together at the mayors' caucus meetings and sing cumbayah and roast marshmallows. but they get that their prosperity is enough to share and they can be a great world city if they operate together. i think that's a great model. >> do you buy the basic story of the way to look at the america is not through washington but through the bottoms up r revoluti revolutions? >> as a father i have to look at it that way because if i looked at those clowns i would be very pessimistic. i go out in the field a lot, you

know, reportingwise, speaking and i am amazed at the energy that exists at the local level. and the ability of people to tackle things. now, by the way, i think it's much harder in the bigger metros, the chicagos, the new yorks, the l.a.s, where they've gotten so big and everything is very politicized. but generally speaking, i think it's going to have to come from the bottom up because it's not going to come from the top down and i think the great advantage of america is that we have these different environments, you know. you know, we could have the tech capital of the world be in the bay area and have the energy cap of the world be in houston and have the media capital be in new york, entertainment be in l.a. and all these different regions. and they can be run differently. i don't see why we have to say what works for new york works for dallas. >> right. >> they are very different places. the more we allow these places to innovate appropriately for them the better off they will

be. >> i agree. somebody told me as i was researching the book suburbs have more in common with cities they are attached to than other suburbs. the suburbs have grown to reflect more of america in general, which is a good and bad. everything that we have is now in our suburbs. but there's dramatic shifts happening and we will wait until the next census to see how things really played out. >> fascinating and very optimistic discussion. coming up next on "gps," savvy travelers know if you lik go. want a quiet paris all year-round? i will tell you.

all this is drawing to a close and that means back to work for much of the world but let's stay on the beach for at least a few more moments. my question of the week is related. where in the world do workers have legal rights to the most paid time off? is it, a, france, b, the united states, c, austria, or, d, portug portugal? stay tuned. we'll tell you the correct answer. go to cnn.com/fareed.

also, remember, you can go to itunes.com/fareed if you ever miss a show or a special. this week's book of the week is actually two books of the week. i'm going to re-recommend a couple of books that i read this summer. the first is "wealth and power, china's long march to the 21st century." really smart look at china's history and its future. the other book is "the sleep walkers walkers, how europe went to war in 1914." how world war i began and a wonderfully written book with important lesslessons. now, for the last look. look at the iconic grand boulevards. the only problem, the crowds of tourists are nowhere to be seen. that's common for the real paris this time of year, i suppose, but local media has dubbed this fake paris a ghost town all year-round.

this is 6,000 miles from the city of lights, luxury development, in the outskirts of shanghai that was constructed in 2007 to attract china's new wealthy. but according to the developers, it is currently on the 20% to 30% occupied. location, location, location is part of the problem. the luxury development sprouted in an area surrounded by farmland and dead end roads. it is also a symptom of china's property bubble. ghost towns, even entire ghost cities, are increasingly common sites in china. in this case it seems instead of going to fake paris, the chinese are going to the real city of lights. 1.4 million chinese visited france last year. a 23% increase to 2011. the question to our gps challenge question was a tie. austria and portugal both grant their workers 22 days of vacation time plus 13 paid

holidays for a grand whopping total of 35 paid days off. if you guessed the united states, you must not work here because u.s. workers have no legal right to any vacation time. thanks to all of you for being part of my program this week. i will see you next week. hello, everyone. i'm fredericka whitfield. welcome to the "cnn newsroom." syria makes a new promise to u.n. teams investigating chemical weapons allegation and the u.s. weighs its options. we'll tell you what they are. in california, a massive wildfire shows no signs of slowing down. the threat to yosemite national park and san francisco. plus, the baffling disappearance of a pennsylvania schoolteacher. authorities say he went on a hiking trip a month ago and hasn't been seen since.