Latin America

Cuba Loosens Restrictions On Buying New Cars

11:13am December 20, 2013

Automotive News reports the state altered regulations, first in 2011, and now a second time, making it simpler for Cubans to buy or sell new cars. Cubans, too, now have the freedom to ask: "What do I have to do to get you in this new car today?"

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An auto worker tightens bolts on a Focus at a Ford plant in Michigan in October. Labor unions predicted in 1993 that NAFTA would send many U.S. manufacturing jobs to Mexico, and they continue to argue that the pact prompted a race to the bottom for worker

What Has NAFTA Meant For Workers? That Debate's Still Raging

12:31am December 18, 2013

by Don Gonyea

Two decades ago, labor unions warned that the North American Free Trade Agreement would drive away U.S. jobs and push wages down. Today, unions feel as strongly as ever that NAFTA was a mistake for U.S. workers, but quantifying the factors behind the decline in the middle class is no simple matter.

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The Virgencita Plis character from Distroller in Mexico.

World News

Mexico's Patron Saint Is Also Its Hello Kitty

8:52pm December 12, 2013

by Carrie Kahn

As many as 6 million pilgrims have made their way to the Mexican capital to pay homage to the Virgin of Guadalupe on Thursday. One woman has turned the country's most revered religious icon into a cartoon characterization, using it to build a multimillion-dollar company.

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World News

Ex-Brazilian President Kubitschek Was Murdered, Commission Says

12:30pm December 11, 2013

by Lourdes Garcia-Navarro

In Brazil, an investigative commission has released a report that says ex-president Juscelino Kubitschek, thought to have died in a 1976 car accident, was murdered by the 1970's military regime.

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World News

Mexican Lawmakers Hope Private Investment Will Boost Oil Industry

7:35pm December 06, 2013

by Carrie Kahn

Mexico's congress is set to pass a controversial plan to open up the country's vast and sluggish oil industry to private investment. The move requires a constitutional amendment since Mexico forbids foreign involvement in the oil industry. Opponents of the plan say the president is selling out the country, but many experts say that without foreign investment, Mexico won't be able to tap all its oil and won't modernize.

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PLANET MONEY MAKES A T-SHIRT: The Lives Of The Workers Who Made Our Shirt

'Our Industry Follows Poverty': Success Threatens A T-Shirt Business

6:26pm December 04, 2013

by Marianne McCune

Colombia's economy has been growing, and wages have been rising. That's good for the country as a whole, but it may wind up driving away the T-shirt industry.

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Municipal guards with batons chase a mob of thieves that snatched bags and wallets from beachgoers on Arpoador beach, adjacent to Ipanema, in Rio de Janeiro on Nov. 20.

World News

Swarming Thieves Wreak Havoc On Famed Rio Beaches

10:04am December 02, 2013

by Lourdes Garcia-Navarro

In a spate of robberies in Rio de Janeiro, young boys — some only 10 years old — descend on tourist beach areas, robbing and harassing people. The attacks come despite anti-crime efforts in the run-up to the World Cup and Olympics. It's a phenomenon that had not been widely seen since the country's crime-ridden 1990s.

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World News

Born In The U.S., But Struggling To Acclimate In Mexico

10:04am December 02, 2013

by Amy Isackson

An estimated 300,000 kids born in the U.S. are now living in Mexico because their parents were either deported or went south of the border when jobs in the United States dried up. Schools in border areas aren't equipped to educate these children, who may be Mexican but don't feel Mexican.

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A player for Havana's Industriales baseball team winds up to throw a ball during a training session in Havana on Sept. 27. Cuba recently lifted a ban on its athletes' signing contracts to play overseas professionally.

After 50 Years, Cuba Says Its Baseball Players Can Go Abroad

4:45am November 28, 2013

by Nick Miroff

The baseball season is just getting started in Cuba, the first since Communist authorities lifted a half-century-old ban on players' signing professional contracts in other countries. But fans are confident top players will come back home eventually — and that the island has enough talent to go around.

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World News

Whoever Honduras Elects President Faces Tough Road, Broke Country

6:05pm November 25, 2013

by Carrie Kahn

Hondurans went to the polls this Sunday to elect a new president. The Central American country has a whole host of problems to deal with, including the highest levels of violence in the world and increased drug cartel activity. Most pressing, though, the new leader will inherit a failing economy. Honduras is broke. It just borrowed, for the first time, $500 million on the international bond market, but that wasn't even enough to bail the country out of its devastating financial troubles.

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