War Delivers Another Shock To The Global Economy

WASHINGTON (AP) — The war with Iran is doing collateral damage to the world economy. The conflict is driving up energy, grain and fertilizer prices; threatening food shortages in poor countries; destabilizing fragile states such as Pakistan; complicating options for the inflation fighters at central banks like the Federal Reserve; and imposing new burdens on American consumers already fed up with the high cost of living. Causing much of the pain: Iran shut down the Strait of Hormuz – through which a fifth of world’s oil passes – after the U.S. and Israel launched missile strikes Feb. 28 that killed Iranian leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.