As the recession ends, consumer confidence is widespread. For some, however, there was never a recession. In China and India, optimism remains at an all time high. The effects of globalization that were expected early last decade, that of outsourcing these growing countries to even cheaper labor, has produced the opposite effect. Companies like Brazil’s Embraer, a jetliner corporation, buys its component parts from Western countries, and assembles its products at home.

China and India lead the pack, as college graduates, graduate degrees, and satisfaction with life has risen dramatically over the past ten years. This is in large part thanks to a new sort of innovation, one that leaves many Western countries scratching their heads about how to remain competitive. New design methods that allow for even more widespread accessibility, especially among an emergent consumer class. Simpler and cheaper is the new “new and improved” and these once third world countries are showing everyone how to do it, from cars to computers. Population booms expect more than 5 billion Asians by 2050, and a doubling of Africa’s denizens, from 1 billion in 2010 to 2, over the next 40 years.   Competing on a global scale is what these emerging market companies are after, and not only are they achieving it, but they in fact, are leading the way.

With the annual collection of world leaders for Washington’s Spring Business Conference looming next month, and recent numbers for the first quarter already in, the recession is over and recovery has officially begun. China’s economy has grown by over 11% since a year ago, Singapore’s grew an astounding 32% last quarter, the U.S. had 3% growth, but Europe, one of the world’s most important economic regions, had just 1% growth.

Part of the problem is Greece. Just days after a European bailout was arranged, doubts about Greece’s ability to recover and potentially defaulting are rampant. Because the $16 billion allocated to Greece will be paid at near market value, the country is subject to all of the jolts of the market without an interest rate ceiling. While this flaw is being currently addressed, other economies like Portugal, Italy and Spain also look weak in comparison to Northern European countries. Over the past decade, these countries saw prices and wages rise more quickly than the euro-area average and ran up huge debts. Now their recovery is stilted as the rest of the European economy is ready to grow, without the deficits that hamper these countries.

Another part of the problem is that European consumers are not spending money. Germany’s reliance on exports is a good example of how not enough purchasing power is being exercised.

On April 7th, British Airlines and Iberia inked a merger deal to become the world’s sixth largest airline in revenue. A day later, United Airlines and US Airways resumed talks that failed in 2000 and 2008. If these two were to merge, they would become the world’s 4th largest airline behind Lufthansa, Air France, and Delta.

These mergers come during a decade of losses for the battered airline industry, which suffered from a spike in oil prices in 2008, and the weakness of the travel industry in 2009. With global economies rebounding, there are hopes that eliminating competition will send air fares higher. When Delta and Northwest merged in 2008, Delta effectively became the nation’s largest airline. This success has partly prompted these talks.

In the past, these deals have been difficult to pull off due to labor contracts. US Airways, while one of the weaker American airlines, has a key hub in Phoenix, which competes directly with Southwest. Southwest was the only large scale airline to turn a profit last year. United, which has a strong presence on the East Coast with hubs in L.A., San Francisco, Chicago, Denver, and Washington, would benefit from the Southwestern exposure.

Although a deal is not expected to go through for weeks, it at all, this merger signals that the world of airline travel is changing.

In March, residual signs of a market turnaround continued as unemployment held steady at 9.7%. The total number of jobs gained was 162,000, a dramatic raise since the market began shedding jobs almost two years ago.  About a third of the added jobs come from the U.S. census, which has taken many employees under its wing full time, albeit for just a couple of months.

In order to sustain growth, the job market must create at least 100,000 jobs every month. The government predicts that the unemployment rate will stay roughly in the nines all year, and that it will take until 2016 for the unemployment rate to drop back to the pre-recession rate of around 5%.

Although the unemployment rate is finally dropping, it is still 1.8% higher than it was last year at this time. Economists, however, say that this is a good sign of economic recovery. The report also showed that the average rate of pay dropped .1 both for all employees to $22.47 and for nonsupervisor employees to $18.90.

Meanwhile, President Obama is in Charlotte, N.C. today to promote his job creation plan as Democrats prepare for midterm elections this November. Congress is attempting to submit a bill that will promote job growth by offering tax breaks to small businesses that begin hiring.