There's a wheat shortage.

Gasoline is scarce around here.

Most of the economic models are built around scarcity and growth.

Today, America is focused on unemployment and the deficit. Both threats to America s future can, in no small measure, be traced to the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Today, America is focused on unemployment and the deficit.

But Europe cannot be built on this democratic deficit.

The worry, however, is that politics and ideology on both sides of the Atlantic, but especially in the US, will not allow any of this to occur.

Fixation on the deficit will induce cutbacks in social spending, worsening inequality.

MADRID For decades, critics of the European Union have spoken about a democratic deficit.

To speak of a bilateral trust deficit might be an understatement.

But, while none is in short supply globally, local shortages may occur.

Leading Bush administration officials used to talk of the US current account deficit being a gift to the outside world.

America s current account balance the surplus of imports over exports is now in deficit to the tune of 3 of GDP.

Coming so shortly on the heels of the subprime crisis, the debate over the debt ceiling and the budget deficit is the last straw.

By focusing on the budget deficit, it is chasing symptoms, not causes.

If output grows above trend, the budget is in surplus if it grows below trend, the budget is in deficit.

The problem is that making it happen requires political will, which, unfortunately, seems in short supply.

Indeed, today's budget deficits reflect long term problems that are not what Keynesian theory envisions.

Essential for the maturation of red blood cells are Vitamin B12 (cobalamin) and Vitamin B9 (Folic acid).

With the current account deficit now exceeding 5 of GDP, US foreign debt is rising fast.

And domestic politics is being distorted by the inability of centrist politicians to address voters concerns about the eurozone s economic policies and its democratic deficit.

Establishing such a mechanism will not be easy, as it requires a resource that is in short supply in Europe today trust.

It is time for a change in how the European Commission thinks, for less of an obsession with deficits and more attention to government spending.

The ensuing loss of competitiveness manifested itself in large and growing current account deficits and slowing growth.

Indeed, the region s population explosion and rapid urbanization, along with the accelerating pace of tourism development, already means water scarcity is holding back growth.

But, unless Greece is able to increase its rate of economic growth, the budget will remain in deficit and the debt will remain at nearly its current share of GDP.

Unfortunately, many of the solutions on offer are either too timid or demand too much of a global leadership that is in short supply.

With soaring deficits, and a rudderless fiscal policy, one does wonder whether a populist administration might recklessly turn to the printing press.

The erosion of support for the government is due to its inefficiency inflation is triple official forecasts, and basic foodstuffs and fuel are scarce and their supply irregular.

The biggest problem concerns the fact that the Stability Pact focuses on a country's budget deficit, rather than on the component parts of government budgets taxes and public spending. Europe's fiscal problems have their roots in governments that are too big and that require, in order to pay for their bloated size, levels of taxation which grossly interfere with the incentives individuals need to work harder, invest more, and run entrepreneurial risks.

LONDON Politics trumped sensible economics in the United States this summer, when Congress and President Barack Obama could not agree on taxes, entitlements, deficits, or an investment stimulus.

Globalization allowed the US to suck up the savings of the rest of the world and consume more than it produced, with its current account deficit reaching 6.2 of GNP in 2006.

Furthermore, it used its political muscle to block the early warning about its deficit that the EU Commission had mandated by the terms of the Stability Pact.

And, as we have seen in many countries efforts to ameliorate the crisis, the non cooperative protectionist response is much more likely to be adopted despite wide recognition that it is highly destructive when aggregate demand is in short supply.

There is not a single day when we do not hear a new story about medicine shortages in Iran and how it adversely affects Iranians, especially those requiring uninterrupted medication.

The bonds were issued by the state run oil company PDVSA and will mature in 2022, effectively giving the cash strapped, highly questioned Venezuelan government more than 865 million dollars.

France is southern in its current account deficit, but northern in its borrowing costs (slightly above Germany s), owing partly to inflows of capital fleeing the south, as well as to modest but positive economic growth.

Bush's election program promised big tax cuts, which he followed through on. When asked about the ballooning deficit, he explained that we have a deficit because tax revenues are down and that the tax relief package has helped the economy, and that the deficit would have been bigger without the tax relief package.

For an American, there is a certain amusement in Australian worries about the deficit and debt their deficit as a percentage of GDP is less than half that of the US their gross national debt is less than a third.

When asked about the ballooning deficit, he explained that we have a deficit because tax revenues are down and that the tax relief package has helped the economy, and that the deficit would have been bigger without the tax relief package.

But, ironically, attention has focused on the fact that some of the investment money was not spent as well as it might have been, and on the fiscal deficit that the downturn and the government s response created.