The Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act of 2005 (BAPCPA) provided new requirements for bankruptcy filers and gave the U.S. Trustee Program (USTP) new areas of responsibility. One of the new requirements is that any individual who files for bankruptcy must have received credit counseling during the 180 days prior to filing. When a consumer completes such prebankruptcy credit counseling, he or she receives a certificate that must be submitted at the time of bankruptcy filing.
USTP is now faced with having to decide whether to reapprove or remove agencies that are on the approved list of credit-counseling agencies. To do this, USTP must develop criteria for measuring the effectiveness of counseling-agency services that may be used to evaluate whether agencies qualify for approval or reapproval. Complicating the issue of effectiveness is the increased use of Internet-based credit counseling and whether the mode of delivery, particularly delivery through the Internet, affects the adequacy and effectiveness of the counseling provided.
In all former socialist economies, reform programs include three broad elements: stabilization, liberalization, and institution building [Fischer and Gelb, 1991]. Because it reflects the particular legacy of each country and is also the most time dependent element of the transition process, institutional reform epitomizes the distinctive experience of the Eastern European economies, Russia, the Newly Independent States, and China. In each country, transition is fundamentally an account of ownership reform, the distinctive process of unbundling the property rights previously controlled by the state and reassigning them to individuals and groups who assume responsibility for managing the nation’s productive assets.
After twenty years of rapid growth under gradual reform policies that sustained the dominant role of public ownership, China enters its third reform decade with a pledge – and critical need – to carry out deep ownership reform. China’s efforts to advance enterprise restructuring confront a dichotomy. Should public officials directly manage enterprise restructuring? Or should government focus on building institutions that allow the market to serve as the central venue for ownership reform?
Rising levels of foreign direct investment (FDI) concern growing numbers of policymakers and members of the American public. These concerns stem from the perception that foreign activities of American multinational corporations reduce employment and other economic activities within the United States. While investment flows within the United States go largely unnoticed, in an international setting the lexicon of "winners" and "losers" can be inescapable. Curiously, both capital exporting countries and capital importing countries have at times expressed concern over the consequences of international capital flows.
