The annual check-up is just one of the many unnecessary practices with a price tag scattered throughout our health care system.

China’s ability to use foreign investment got a boost with the the AIIB. But Beijing is having some problems with leveraging soft power to achieve its geopolitical ends, in part because of its corrupt practices.

In health care and travel both, the complexity of modern life is generating new kinds of service jobs. Expect more demand for such jobs as life gets less and less simple.

Americans are not “for” or “against” so much as “supportive, but deeply skeptical.”

The real problems in NATO aren’t about European military capability deficits, but politics. Europe is once again fragmenting along cultural and historical divides.

If they do, the consequences could be profound, impacting oil prices and perhaps drawing Pakistan into the fray.

Leaked texts appear to show that a Russian loan to French far-right party the Front National may have been a quid pro quo for supporting the annexation of Crimea. The scandal doesn’t bode well for Marine Le Pen’s otherwise strong prospects in France’s 2017 election.

French MPs pass a law banning fashion models from being too skinny. Good thing all of the world’s other problems have been solved.

Zhou Yongkang, the biggest “tiger” ever to be snared by Xi’s massive party purge was formally charged. Xi continues on his quest to become China’s most powerful ruler since Mao.

Texas was riding high on shale, but the oil price plunge is producing some worrying numbers in the Lone Star state.