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This is the VOA Special English Economics Report from voaspecialenglish.com | http The United States government says Apple and five book publishers illegally fixed prices of e-books. Three publishers — Hachette, HarperCollins and Simon & Schuster — agreed to a settlement announced April eleventh with the Justice Department. The agreement says they must repay millions of dollars and stop giving Apple special treatment. Attorney General Eric Holder said the department will continue to take legal action against Apple and two additional leading publishers, MacMillan and Penguin. He says Apple and the publishers conspired to increase the prices that consumers pay for e-books. He said the Justice Department wants to make sure Americans can buy e-books at a fair price. The department says Apple and the five publishers made an illegal deal to set higher prices for electronic books. Because of this, it says, Americans paid millions of dollars more than they should have. The dispute centers on the influence of Amazon.com. The Internet store had been selling e-books for nine dollars and ninety-nine cents. But the government says Apple made a deal with the publishers two years ago as it prepared to launch the iPad tablet computer. The deal guaranteed Apple thirty percent of the money earned on each e-book sold. It also created a pricing model that required stores to sell at a price set by the publishers and Apple. The price was several dollars higher than the one offered by Amazon …

This is the VOA Special English Education Reportfrom voaspecialenglish.com | http Graduate schools in the United States are reporting a nine percent increase in applications from international students this year. The increase is the same as two years ago. Last year’s gain was eleven percent.China, Mexico and Brazil showed the biggest increases in applications to enter master’s and doctoral programs this fall.Engineering is the top area of study for international students and had the biggest increase in applications. Gains in business and physical and earth sciences were close behind. Life sciences showed no growth in the latest survey by the Council of Graduate Schools.The survey includes the top five countries that send graduate students to the United States, plus Mexico and Brazil. The top five are China, India, South Korea, Taiwan and Canada.Applications from China climbed eighteen percent this year. That was down from last year. India’s number increased just two percent. Applications from South Korea and Taiwan decreased by one to two percent.Applications from Africa were down five percent, while the Middle East and Europe showed growth. Council President Debra Stewart says final results will not be available until the summer.She pointed out that applications do not necessarily convert to enrollment. About forty-seven percent of all international applications to US graduate schools come from students from China. But the share of the applicant pool that actually ends …

This is the VOA Special English Economics Report, from voaspecialenglish.com | http The best example of something is often called the “gold standard.” It sets the standard against which other things are measured. In economics, the term describes how major trading nations once used gold to set currency values and exchange rates. Many nations continued to use the gold standard until the last century. In the United States, people could exchange paper money for gold from the eighteen seventies until nineteen thirty-three. Then-President Richard Nixon finally disconnected the dollar from the value of gold in nineteen seventy-one. From time to time, some politicians call for a return to the gold standard. But in nineteen seventy eight, the International Monetary Fund ended an official gold price. The IMF also ended the required use of gold in transactions with its member countries. Since that time, gold prices have grown. But the growth was uneven. Prices — uncorrected for inflation — continue near record highs. Gold is trading above one thousand six hundred dollars an ounce. An ounce is about twenty-eight grams. But people keep buying. Some people are “gold bugs.” These are investors who say people should buy gold to protect against inflation. People have valued gold for thousands of years. The soft, dense metal polishes to a bright yellow shine and resists most chemical reactions. It makes a good material for money, political power — and, more recently, electrical power …