A growing band of emerging economies are voicing concerns over the dollar’s status as the world’s premier reserve currency. China has already announced an increase in its bullion holdings as it diversifies its reserves portfolio, and it has also suggested greater use of the International Monetary Fund’s special drawing rights (SDRs).

The world should consider adopting the Nordic approach to capitalism and learn from the region’s response to its financial and economic crisis in the 1990s in the attempt to stave off recession, according to the chairman of two of Europe’s biggest companies.

In finance, things change. Forty years ago you couldn't buy a futures contract based on a currency, 25 years back the first collateralized debt obligation hadn't hit the market, and two years ago subprime wasn't a curse word on Wall Street. But investors—and the folks who make money by packaging new investment products—always seem eager to move on to the next big thing.

The 'MBA phenomenon' has come under heavy fire of late. According to Henry Mintzberg, MBAs are not managers, and any program that treats its outputs as such is a fraud. More subtly, the late Sumantra Ghosal admonished that the focus of business academics on simple-minded theories that assume all human behavior is self-interested has turned these theories into self-fulfilling prophecies, and MBA programs into producers of cognitive misers who make their own dismal predictions come true.

The Group of 20 gave a nod to the idea of a single world currency last week, and other countries such as China are pushing it because they no longer trust the United States to restrain itself from printing too much cash and debasing the dollar.

It's time to stop whining. The economy might be melting down like a pat of butter on a hot Hummer roof, but for some people — you, maybe? — this could be a very good thing. Here's why. At no other time in recent history has it been easier or cheaper to start a new kind of company. Possibly a very profitable company. Let's call these start-ups LILOs, for "a little in, a lot out." These are Web-based businesses that cost almost nothing to get off the ground yet can turn into great moneymakers.