Counting cranes, hidden debts

By Brian Keeley. When visitors to Chinese cities are trying to take the pulse of the local economy, they often do a very simple thing – they look out the window and count the cranes.
Crane counting is a trick used by analysts from London to Sydney to get a real-time sense of economic activity: Cranes mean construction, construction means jobs, jobs mean people have money to spend, and so on. More...