The European Union (EU) has announced plans to levy a tax on airline emissions for all planes landing and taking off from EU airports. This tax would be calculated not only based on mileage flown in EU airspace but also for the entire length of the flight (thus, Chinese and Japanese airlines would be taxed for an entire journey from Beijing or Tokyo).

The European Union-or at least its feisty climate commissioner Connie Hedegaard-seems determined to take on the whole world by demanding that all airlines pay a carbon tribute for the privilege of crossing EU airspace and landing at EU airports.  

The Obama administration is going all out to attract Chinese companies to invest in the U.S., but at the same time, it has rebuffed the efforts of the Chinese telecoms giant Huawei to obtain contracts with major U.S. Internet providers or to take over U.S. telecom companies. At this event, a panel of experts will analyze the issues from both an economic and a security perspective.

As part of a bid for renewed authority to streamline government, the White House wants to merge six agencies into one bureaucracy focused on trade and competitiveness. The plan has sparked substantial criticism from the U.S. business and trade policy communities. An expert panel will weigh in on the controversy and evaluate President Obama's reorganization proposal.

To combat the economic malaise, the Obama administration is bending over backward to encourage companies to create jobs in America. So why is the White House - and the Congress - challenging Huawei, a high-tech firm eager to invest and compete in the U.S. market? 

Over the past several decades, a new trade paradigm has arisen, one that deemphasizes domestic, vertically integrated firms competing in end products with similarly integrated firms from other nations.  Instead, from automobiles to electronics, chemicals, and clothing, the production process has dispersed.