the oecd released its latest interim economic assessment on thursday. it says europe's outlook remains weak due to its debt problems but the u.s. economy will likely show strong growth. on the global economy overall it forecasts an improvement compared to the second half of last year. on japan, the oecd revised upward its previous prediction made in november as the yen has retreated from record highs shown recently. the oecd estimates the japanese economy has likely grown 3.4% in annual terms in the first three months of this year. but for the april to june period it says growth will slow to 1.4%. >>> meanwhile, the report warns rising prices of oil could push up the prices levels across the oecd by a quarter of a percent. high oil prices could drive down global economic growth by up to 0.2% this year and next. >>> recently we've seen positive economic data and rising stock prices in the u.s. americans encouraged by those numbers, but many others have doubts about whether this momentum is sustainable. our business reporter spoke with one of the leading

fourth, the administration should vigorously work to ensure that all parties to the oecd anti-bribery convention, including russia fully carry out their commitments under the convention to prevent overseas business bribery by their nationals. fifth, russia and the united states should intensify work th administration, and judiciary are freer of corruption. sixth, russia and the united states should cooperate to expand the scope for civil society organizations such as transparency international to monitor, investigate, and report on suspected incidents of corruption. i believe the executive branch i would urge the execut presen plan to implement all of these measures to strengthen the rule of law. i would urge the congress to exert active and continuing oversight to make sure it implements the plan vigorously and makes progress for business in putting it into place, all three sides of the rule of law triangle -- the trade side, the investment side, and the institutional integrity side. thank you. >> thank you very much, mr. larson. some american businessmen tell me they don't want to d

the oecd says the rescue pot really needs to be at $1 trillion euros. let's listen to the experts about how on the part of the rescue pot is. >> the use for them is as a precaution nation measure. the best one is the one you don't have to use, but they are about bringing back market confidence that if something bad was to happen, there would be enough noun protect a country like spain or the like. >> thank you, aaron. >> now pope -- the pope has urged cubans to build a renewed and open society in mas in front of tens of thousands of people. he was speaking. among the kong indication was raul castro who listened to the pope stress the importance of faith and freedom. in panels, reports from havana. >> with an unsteady gate, the pontiff and the president walk side-by-side, there was a time when such a visit would have been unthinkable. but today catholics and communists coexist. this wasn't supposed to be a political visit. but that's not how it sounds. >> i carry in my that's right legitimate sufferings of all cube s. those of the young and the elderly o

the oecd released the latest assessment on thursday. it says europe's outlook remains weak due to its debt problems but the u.s. economy will show strong growth. the report forecasts an improvement when compared to the second half of last year. now, for here in japan, the oecd revised the previous prediction in november as the yen has rekrer retreated from record highs shown recently. the japanese economy has likely grown 3.4% in annual terms in the first three months of this year. but for the april to june period it says growth will slow to 1.4%. meanwhile, the report warns rising prices of oil could push-up the general price levels across oecd countries by a quarter of a percent. it says high oil prices could drag down global economic growth by up to .02 this year as well as next year. >>> now time for a check on the markets. overnight, wall street ended mixed with the dow jones industrial ending higher while the tech heavy nasdaq and s&p 500 ended lower. now we'll go to the tokyo stock exchange for more. here you have the latest key

fourth the administration should vigorously work to ensure that all parties to the oecd anti-bribely convention including russia fully carry out their -- business bribery by their nationals. fifth, russia and the united states should intensify work to ensure that russia's customs, tax administration and judiciary are freer of corruption. sixth, russia and the united states should correspondent to expand the scope for civil society organizations such as transparency international to monitor, investigate and report on suspected corruption. i believe the executive branch and the congress can be and should be partners in this work. i would urge the executive branch of the congress a plan to implement all of measures to strengthen the rule of law. i would urge the congress to exert active and continuing oversight to ensure that the executive branch presents a plan, implements that plan vigorously and presents a problem for business and puts into place all three sides of the rule of law triangle. the trade side, the investment side and the institutional thank you. >> thank you very much mr

you very much for that translation. >> and let's recap, as well, some of the comments out from the oecd suggesting the eurozone should boost firewalls towards $1 trillion. they said further reforms are needed, as well. and should consider a more integrated consideration bank failures falling on the private sector shoulders through the use of bail instruments. patrick, we've seen a big trade this year, if you've been short australian dollar, would you have made a lot of money. the aussie of course as we've seen today might rebound. but so which trade do you you favor? >> i think the biggest concern for me is china. growth is clearly slowing down. it looks like production will be unchanged. that's not good for australia. and you have the head of dow kem cal earlier on talking about how australia was excessively exposed to the chinese economy. so i think ultimately if china does continue to solve then, then we should see perhaps canada as a greater energy exposure, australia has the iron ore and coal. so i think we probably stay with that one, but watch out for general weakness. >> all rig

. >> we're going the latest out of the oecd this morning. they say the first after 2012 shows growth decoupling. investors have been betting anyway and saying the growth prospects are firm in the u.s. and a rebound is seen in japan thp they thousand expect the u.s. to expand 2.9% in the first quarter, 2.8% in the second. spain won't need emergency help for international lenders. they say the uk economy will enter recession, german economy will grow, eithertalian economy will contract in both qe and 2 and french economy will contract in the first quarter, as well, and expand in the second. that call on the uk is a big one because i think the consensus suggests the uk will avoid an official recession. we'll get thoughts on that in a moment from our guest. and also just remind you where we stand, ftse 100 down nearly half a percent after percentage losses yesterday. ibex is up. we're waiting for debt auction results from italy. let's bring in dave. hang you for joining us. just pick up on the oecd forecasts. they're pretty bullish. they talk ab

earlier this week, we heard from the oecd, which said the eurozone needs of the mother of all fireballs. what they meant was one trillion euros needs to be in the pot. markets and investors will breathe a sigh of relief. let's not kid ourselves. it will not last for long. at the end of the day, what's in that popped right now is still not enough money. having listened to this. >> this will protect one additional country, a large one, spain. this is small enough to fit into this, if necessary. it will also show that germany continues to back the european rescue operations, which is also a positive sign. in the past, german politicians resigned over europe. germany would continue to support the euro area. that's a positive. the rescue fund will not be enough, for instance, to protect italy. >> and there is the problem. not enough to rescue italy. the markets will eventually turn their attention on that. >> 800 billion is eight times what apple's got in terms of cash reserves. >> you want to talk about apple? we're talking about the most valuable company in the world. apple is sitting on a

. >> the oecd says the years and it's to take urgent action to restore confidence in the single currencyd -- the head of the organizations as current plans for a 500 billion euro firewall are not enough. calling instead for a permanent rescue fund with at least one trillion euros to back it up. >> the mother of all firewalls should be in place. strong enough, broad enough, deep enough, tall enough, and all sorts of, you know, just big. to ensure that it does not need to be used actually, that people know that it is there and they will therefore not even attempt to either speculate or try to see if it is strong enough. >> on friday, eurozone finance ministers meet in copenhagen to decide on increasing the size of the rescue fund. however, there are only expected to raise it to 700 billion euros from the current 500 billion euros. >> pope benedict has arrived in the cuban capital of on that. >> day two of his tour of the communist island. he was greeted at the airport by singing crowds. the pontiff was given an official welcome to the capital by local roman catholic leaders, include -- inc

and the oecd, no one's idea of a radical right wing organization identified the corporate income tax is -- you've got to do that. number two, we worry a lot about workerses in u.s. economy. increasingly income taxes are paid by workers in the form of less wages, poor benefits and jobs just not being there. number three, we have a big debt problem so you're going to have to raise the revenue. i think you look at boles simpson and the people in the room, ignore the candidates and pray that history doesn't get in the way when we get this done. >> right. so taxes are arithmetic but another arithmetic that matters is demographic. we're going to jump a little bit from issue to issue but there is a line that connects through it. annette, 80 million people. the boomer generation is going to turn 65. this is going to put new strains and it comes at time when people have lost their savings, that they were depending on retiring in the next decade. we're living in a time of potential losterity, lost personal income. what sort of ideas should americans have for investing responsibly to create a s

that's the oecd, not me. and the united kingdom, another country that a few weeks ago this committee who is debating they're somehow stealing all our ipos, they have a 42% higher tax burden than the united states. greece has a tax burden of 25% higher than the united states, even turkey's tax burden is higher than ours. the only two countries that have a lower tax burden than ours is chile and mexico on this particular list. so i'd like to submit that for the record. and i ask this, mr. secretary because we've heard that if europe is somehow doing a good job dealing with their issues and all they're doing is one side of the ledger, which is the austerity measures -- which is fine, am i wrong to think the u.s. has made significant cuts in the last few years to budgets? >> yes. congress reached an agreement last summer to cut more than $1 trillion in spending over the next ten years. and if you look at what cbo said, for example, about what the impact of what the president's proposed policies were on the budget

with that, he's in line with the oecd, but also a lot of non-european countries like the u.s. and asian countries. the germans are saying they believe the firewall should be smaller. they want to combine the esm together with a temporary mechanism, which is already in place. yesterday the german finance minister in copenhagen said he believes a firewall around the size of 750 billion euros to 800 billion euros should be enough so there are fundamental differences. however most analysts believe there will be some sort of negotiations going on and they will come to terms with this and in the end there will be a compromise that could see a firewall of 940 billion euros, at least for a temporary time. certainly there is a lot of discussion, debate going in within the eurozone finance ministers. >> this is a rather difficult time because the main protagonists of solving these crises, like francefrance, are election year. >> reporter: certainly that is something that is very true, and it is alarming here in berlin and france with those elections looming and it is having an effect on

one, making sure that russia had tears to his obligations under the oecd bribery convention which isdisjoint. too, that there be serious cooperative efforts to tackle the issues of corruption's customs and tax administration in judiciary and three, that there be scope for civil society organizations to report on instances of suspected corruption. i think all of that is part of creating a strong rule of law framework for business. i also believe that the extension of ptnr at jackson-vanik will assess, but i think we should do both. >> thank you. i went to thank you for your statement. i appreciate your leadership in this effort. as chairman of the foreign relations committee, i think we are on our committee pretty sensitive to the complexity of our relations with the russian federation and we held hearings recently on the subject of human rights and democracy in russia and expect we will continue to do that. but i would say that senator kyl and others who are questioning this thing are sort of talking past each other a little bit here and a tank missing the point. russia is going into

one recent oecd study showed that the top 10% in america pay a larger share of total taxes. 45.1% than do the top 10% in any of the 24 countries examined. in germany, they pay 31% of the taxes and in france, 28%. the best thing about tax reform is that it kills corruption. so if you ask me what kind of tax code i'm in favor of, i'm in favor of any new tax code that fills one requirement, it should fit on two pages. let's get started. >>> if 2011 was the year of revolutionary change, maybe 2012 will be the year of electoral change. 26 nations go to the polls this week to vote for their president, prime minister, punching bag in chief. that includes four of the five u.n. security council members, the united states, of course, and also france and russia where mr. putin, not surprisingly, got the nod and china has a big leadership change coming, too. this represents 40% of the world's gdp. what does all of this potential change mean amidst all of the other challenges in the world? i have a great panel to talk about this. anne-marie slaughter and richard haas are both former members of the

it's not the case for china which is not a member of the oecd. what do you do about that, or what do you wish to do about that? >> interesting. china. >> i think this is one of the largest threats to our export agenda and to the united states because there's a lot of state-sponsored capitalism. it's opaque, it's not transparent. it doesn't play by the rules. china is certainly one, but they're not alone. brazil and india, to a lesser extent, but i'll give you one stat. currently, brazil, india and china provide greater support for their exporters than all the g7 countries combined. those three countries. most of it, frankly, is brazil and china. what we're trying to do to rebut that is a couple of things. one, when vice president chi was here, there was an agreement made to bring china into some kind of international framework by 2014. we have already had teams of people in china to start working on this in a specific way in terms of an exchange of information, of more transparency so we could define what could be that international framework. bu

the oecd warning that eurozone nations are falling far behind the united states and canada as a fragile recovery takes route in advanced economies. i want to start by asking on tuesday, you said that europe needs the, quote, mother of all firewalls. what does that firewall look like, how big is it? >> well, we don't know yet. they'll be working on it over the weekend. and we've been listening to some larger numbers which is good and at the same time, there is also the incorrect impact on the italy and spain in particular of the ecb funding of the banks. that help willed relieve some of the pressure. and last but not least, hopefully this will also detonate the chimf package wher some european and noneuropean members will put together a growth pack annual package for several. so all together, it could do the trick. >> but when you hear someone like angela merkel say they're willing to raise the bailout fund to 700 billion euros, is that enough? >> well, the question is 740 be billion is related to the maturities of spain and italy over the next 12, 15 months. now, that is long enough and

red hours across the board in europe as well as the oecd cuts the growth there and we're watching italian and spanish yields go higher. we want to check in in chicago with rick santelli. >> we had a spongy. but we see the rally continue. 215, these are the lows for the cycle since rates started to climb on the 13th day of the fed meeting. look at dollar/yen. now, if you look at it over six months, that's done well. that's by design. japanese exporter economy, they prefer a weaker yen, but something got in the way of that and it's called year end. the fiscal year ends at the end of this month, so a couple of days. and even though many bank of japan officials say it's not going to make a difference this time, the repatriation trades, they thing it's one of the reasons they're doing better. carl, back to you. >> rick santelli in chicago. there was breaking news on conan o'brien's tbs talk show last night. >> as of 0900 mountain time, paramount pictures and mooirks ronald joseph aaron burgundy have come to terms on a sequel to "anchorman." >> who knew. ronald joseph aaron burgundy. there will

les-simpson commission reflects three things, we need to grow and we need a ruthless attention, and the oecd -- [unintelligible] number2, we were a lot about workers in the u.s. economy corporate income taxes. number three, we have a big debt problem, so you look at bowls since then -- bowles-simpson and pray that history gets this done. >> we will cover and not a ground and jump from issue to issue. the boomer generation will turn 65 in the next few years. this will put new strains and comes at a time when people have lost their savings that they were depending on during the next decade. we're living in a time of personal loss. what sort of ideas should americans have for investing responsibility to create a secure retirement and how can government help? >> i think retirement is an imperative, and have a lot more focus nationally, because this is going to be one of our great challenges. the earlier panel spoke about this, the 80 million baby boomers who are getting ready to turn 65. it comes to 10,000 people a day turning 65. we find ourselves with an economy that has done poorly. people we

what we see oecd reports that the afghan people expressing not only lack of interest and with the united states is doing, but the fact that even though we are the largest donor of it, they don't believe for doing anything to help them. i do not know how we continue a program without the support of the peep on the country. so i just really want you to be able to, what does best in the safety of our workers and those working with us in afghanistan and that it needs to be our highest priority, protect the message d. >> thank you, senator. i appreciate your expressing such a strong commitment to the safety of our personnel. as you know, we pulled our personnel from specific technical assistance rolls over where we felt they were exposed to undue risk given the current situation environment that will only be putting them back in after ambassador crocker is convinced on a case-by-case basis but that is an appropriate situation from the about their safety. we also know that later this month they will be the implementation of the decree around the afghan public detection force. we have worked ha

that's in stark contrast to what we were getting from oecd yesterday which was calling of course forine there. important implications if they don't get to $1 trillion, you may find the emerging markets are not willing to come through with additional funding for the imf. let's just focus on the european map as we count you out. these bells often catch me out. you'll notice in particular the way in which spain has fallen. those property companies have had a real bad year so far. a sea of red with the exception of the irish republic and some of the northern european countries. let's have a look at where we traded on for example spain and italy because they remain the key focus moving forward. don't forget there's a general strike tomorrow in spain and then they have to come through with that budget on friday. in fact, the worst performing of the west european stock market this far is the ibex down almost 7%. the central question you have to request yourself with so many events coming forward, the greek election, the french presidential election, the degree to which money comes from ecb

today the oecd called for the mother of all bailout funds.xt week a tole of 7 billion euros may not be enough for the market. we will see. the second thing you need to watch out for, what is happening with spain? yes, we have a general strike on thursday. on friday they will present the new budget and you'll be aware, there's a huge conversation between spain and the rest of europe about the degree to which it should borrow in 2012. if we have a look at the bond markets, there's been a clear out-performance, of course, between the italian market and the spanish market recently and you can see that the italian ten year has been coming into negative territory. the third thing to watch out for is what is happening in italy. let me take you to seoul and show you maria monty who was there talking about nuclear issues and the trade particular -- >> markets are closing now. >> don't you hate it when that happens? when you're doing your thing. there you go. that's how we closed out around europe. monty did a news conference in which he gave his count

for when it goes up but of the demand also starts rising as the result of the lower prices it isn't oecd demand expansion that we are seeing it's good to stay ahead so i would welcome any and all production that doesn't necessarily translate in the time to lower prices. >> senator murkowski i think your focus on the spare capacity goes to the heart of the matter before the book when i use writing it i spent a fair amount of time writing the hearings. >> sorry about that. >> another interesting and lively, but spare capacity was the kind of love that things came down to and if you look back when the prices went up in the last decade you look back at 2005 it was a spare capacity issue it was as tight as a clause in the 1973 crisis and when you adjust it for the fact the world demand is higher, and i noticed paul's number mr. capacity was even a little tighter than ours, and it's worrying it's a market with a lot of flexibility when you have that spirit capacity so it is along with inventory one of the things that we need to focus on. >> let me ask in another way and perhaps dr. horsnell, y

that's the oecd, not me, and the united kingdom, another country that few weeks ago stealing all of ours, the heady 42% higher tax burden in the united states. greece had a tax but not 25% higher than the united states. evin turkey's tax burden is high year. the only to countries that have a lower tax burden man-hours as chile and mexico on this particular list. so i would like to submit that for the record. and i asked this because we've heard of the army did a good job dealing with issues and all they're doing is one side of the letter which is the austerity measures which is fine, and i wrong to think that the u.s. has made significant cuts in the last few years to the budgets? >> they reached an agreement to cut more than $1 trillion in spending over the next ten years and if you look at what the cbo said for example but the impact of the president's proposed policies on the budget would reduce the budget dramatically over the next five years to the level of the debt would stop growing in the economies we are making progress on those fronts but we have to be careful to do it in a way

oecd paper and i forget the gentleman who wrote it and future of middle class and middle class oriented development and there was a fascinating sober chart and looked at stages global middle class development and what the shares would be really by region. u.s. and china were broken out. europe, et cetera. what you saw in that chart was over time how very large globs of the european share of the global middle class and the american share of global middle class whittled down to very small, tiny bits. by 2050 and the middle class represented by india and china very substantial. that and latin america and africa remained minor and relatively insignificant. and what you just said about all of those coming middle class represent great opportunities but it also says something else. is that, the u.s. economy in that world probably isn't likely to be the one that makes the weather. that creates the gravitational forces around economic, economic trend. and while it may be good for exporters in a certain way i would like to talk to fred hochberg, the smart thinker, not fred hochberg of ex-im bank.

third, i think it is a very good thing that russia has decided to become a member of the oecd anti-bribery convention and has passed a law. they will not necessarily implement that instantly. a lot of western european countries did not, but it is a very good start that they are trying to discipline their own companies in respect of overseas briberies. many, many observers say there is a very serious problem in russia, especially in the customs tax administration and the judiciary. i think that the administration needs to continue to work with russia on that. i noticed that vladimir putin said in an oped that there is a problem of systemic corruption and he wants to tackle it. well, we ought to take him up on that. the administration ought to propose to congress a plan for how they can follow up and work with the russian government to tackle this problem to the benefit of our u.s. businesses. i do think that civil society organizations like transparency international have a role to play. i think there should be scope for them to report on suspected instances of corruption. be able to do tha