Some Hidden Casualties of Hurricane Sandy
It’s peculiar to have been in the midst of the superstorm and have suffered pretty much nada in the way of immediate effects.
Read more...Category Archives: The destruction of the middle class
Econ4 Discusses Jobs and Job Creation
Econ4 has released the first video in its series, The Bottom Line. This offering debunks the propaganda that tax cuts for the wealthy create jobs.
Read more...Mr. Market Says the Military Industrial Complex Will Be Largely Spared in Upcoming Grand Bargain
It’s been remarkable to witness the public complacency in the face of the certain-in-trajectory, less-clear-in-details “Grand Bargain” that Obama and Romney are determined to foist on the hapless middle class and poor in this country. One part of the deficit equation that has gotten comparatively little attention: the fact that the military appears likely to be spared the budget axe.
Read more...Michael M. Thomas: Naked Capitalism – An Insider’s Guide
By Michael M. Thomas, who figured out Wall Street was not all it was cracked up to be before most of you were born
More than any other forum, Naked Capitalism consistently suggests and proposes new ways to bridge what I consider the abyss that will one day sink us all if Koch brothers-style politics and capitalism have their way: the chasm that lies between what we need to know and what we have been (and will be) allowed to know.
Read more...Elderly Americans Burdened by Student Debt Too
The Wall Street Journal has an important story on a phenomenon that’s likely to get more attention by virtue of growth: that of middle aged and elderly Americans saddled by significant amounts of student debt.
Read more...Rentier CEOs Advocate Austerity for America
Felix Salmon did an admirable takedown of a “CEOs [sic] Deficit Manifesto” in the Wall Street Journal. It’s yet another entry in the long-running, dishonest campaign funded by billionaire Pete Peterson to pretend that all right thinking people (and of course CEOs believe they have the right to think for everybody else) should be all in favor of trashing the middle class and the economy through misguided deficit cutting.
Read more...Money & Public Purpose: Government is Not a Household
This second entry in the Money & Public Purpose series features Stephanie Kelton and Randy Wray debunking widely held misperceptions on the relationship of governments to the economy (for instance, that running surpluses is a good idea).
Read more...Bill Moyers: Plutocracy Rising
Bill Moyer’s latest show, with Matt Taibbi and and Chrystia Freeland, focuses on how the super rich have established a yawning chasm between themselves and ordinary Americans, both in financial and physical terms. One major focus is view the rich are where they are by virtue of their talents and efforts, not (say) by regulatory and tax arbitrage, and how they’ve convinced themselves and a large swathe of society of this myth.
Read more...Why is a Price-Fixing/Collusion Lawsuit Against the Biggest Names in Private Equity Getting Only Cursory Notice?
It’s troubling that some stinging charges against the very biggest names in private equity are getting only passing attention in the financial media.
Read more...Walmart, the Most Powerful Company in the World, Admits that Protests and Strikes Lead to Wage Increases
Matt Stoller is a fellow at the Roosevelt Institute. You can follow him at http://www.twitter.com/matthewstoller
For the first time ever, a strike is taking place in America aimed at the most powerful company in the economy: Walmart.
The possible strike could be very significant, because the target of the strike is the most important driver of the race to the bottom economy
Read more...Nobel Peace Prize Committee Sets New Standard as Political Contraindicator, Awards the European Union its 2012 Prize
When I was young, one of the cartoons I enjoyed was Rocky and Bullwinkle. An occasional character was Wrong Way Peachfuzz, who made enough of an impression on other children to merit an entry in Wikipedia:
Read more...Randy Wray: The World’s Worst Central Banker
By Randy Wray, Professor of Economics at the University of Missouri-Kansas City and Senior Scholar at the Levy Economics Institute of Bard College, New York. Cross posted from Economonitor
OK, I know you think this is yet another critical column on Chairman Ben Bernanke.
Read more...The German Economy and the European Crisis
Even though most economic commentators focus on the deterioration of the periphery and are nervously taking note of how that is coming to impair the core countries, the strength of the German economy is nevertheless seldom questioned outside the Eurozone.
This Real News Network segment focuses on a generally-overlooked issue: wage suppression and the increasingly precarious conditions that German workers face, and how that plays into Eurozone politics.
Read more...The Disheartening State of American Incomes
Doug Short at Global Economic Intersection has a must-read post that pulls together some Census Report data on US incomes since 1967 and draws some conclusions. He looks first at real, rather than nominal, incomes, and shows how income in the top 5% and top quintile have grown faster than for the rest of the population
Read more...Project S.H.A.M.E.: Megan McArdle, a Covert Republican Party Activist Trained by the Billionaire Koch Brothers
We are delighted to post the latest offering of Project S.H.A.M.E., a media transparency initiative led by Yasha Levine and Mark Ames.
Read more...