As the credit crunch continues to leave Britain cash-strapped and high street banks report huge losses, Dispatches investigates who is responsible for the current crisis. Reckless lending and risky investments have been blamed for directly driving up mortgage rates and increasing the numbers of people losing their homes.Dispatches investigates how the bank chiefs allowed this to happen and if
Design and business can no longer be thought of as distinct activities with individual goals. Design the New Business is a film dedicated to investigating how designers and businesspeople are working together in new ways to solve the wicked problems facing business today.The short documentary examines how they are joining forces by bringing together an international collection of design servic
The topic of this show entitled Economics 101 deals with the subject of Economic Calculation, Market Rationale and its effects, along with considerations of the Scientific Principles of Sustainability.This episode features long winded and generally insulting rhetoric, a special guest Gremlin, CID’s “Man on the Street” and the return of the evil peach-suit capitalist – Peter’s alter ego.“Cu
In the second half of this special two-part Dispatches, economist and author Will Hutton continues the definitive insider’s account of how Britain’s economy went from boom to bust.Hutton reveals how those who tried to warn of the impending financial disaster were shouted down, ignored or fired. As a result, the repercussions of the collapse of Lehman Brothers hit an unprepared and vulnerable U
Consumerism has become the cornerstone of the post-industrial age. Using theories of evolutionary psychology to underpin a bold narrative of our times, this film takes a whirlwind tour through the “weird mental illness of consumerism”, showing how our insatiable appetite has driven us into “the jaws of the beast”.By the age of 20, the average westerner has seen one million commercial messages. W
Episode One: The Battle of IdeasA global economy, energized by technological change and unprecedented flows of people and money, collapses in the wake of a terrorist attack .... The year is 1914.Worldwide war results, exhausting the resources of the great powers and convincing many that the economic system itself is to blame. From the ashes of the catastrophe, an intellectual and political str
Chinese property buyers are on a foreign spending spree in the worlds most sought after cities. From New York's Manhattan to Sydney Harbour, real estate is seen as a safe way to stash money and a ticket to permanent residency. 660 billion dollars in Chinese personal wealth sits offshore and in this episode of 101 East by Al Jazeera, drew Drew Ambrose asks if Chinese home buyers are a force to fear
China, a superpower emerging at breakneck speed. It's the Holy Grail for risk-taking entrepreneurs. Every day, hundreds of British businessmen arrive full of hope and expectation. It's the land of opportunity. It's a place where dreams can come true. But Chinese entrepreneurs, unleashed after 50 years of communism, are taking no prisoners in their own relentless quest for wealth. In the wild east,
Boston Massachusetts, 1920 a brash and colorful Italian immigrant Charles Ponzi, promises investors that he can give them a 50% profit on their money in 45 days or double their money in 90 days. He explains his idea, an arbitrage in the foreign exchange markets that seems low risk and highly profitable and unlike most con men it appears that he may well have believed in his own scheme.Ov