Economy and Business
The Student Debt Time Bomb
There's a generational time-bomb ticking — and the student debt crisis is the trip wire. Adults under 35 disproportionately bear the brunt of escalating inequality. America’s educated youth are graduating into an economy with stagnant wages and a torn safety net....
Health Care Under Fire
Look out, the Supreme Court's black-robed gang of far-right ideologues is rampaging again. The Supreme clan is firing potshots at the Affordable Care Act. Caught in the crossfire is the court's own integrity, along with the health of millions of innocent bystanders....
Banking on Tanking
In Murfreesboro, Tennessee, less than an hour's drive from my childhood home, two high school girls' basketball teams just made national headlines — by trying to lose to each other. The basketball gods must have cringed at the late-February matchup between Smyrna and...
Reclaiming Our State Budgets
I live in Chicago, a city of dramatic skylines and gleaming office towers for titans of business and finance. My state of Illinois is home to 17 billionaires, and our downstate farmers are the country’s second-largest corn and soybean producers. And yet new Illinois...
What We Lose with a Privatized Postal Service
Did you know that when you ship a package through Federal Express, the U.S. Postal Service often carries it the last mile? Last year, the Postal Service delivered 1.4 billion packages for FedEx and UPS. In fact, it delivers the last mile for almost a third of FedEx...
Wal-Mart Does Something Right
Once, I indirectly forced a neighbor to drive far out of her way for a head of broccoli. I think she's forgiven me, but I'm not sure the love is still the same. She was kindly caring for my child and running errands when she turned toward Wal-Mart for a quick stop. My...
A Crash Course on Reality
I was always one of those kids who got As in school. Give me an assignment, I’ll do it. A test? I’ll take it. Lecture to me, and I’ll absorb every word. Now that I’m back at school 11 years after getting my college degree, though, I suddenly find myself in a very...
A Model Philanthropist
When you get fed up with all the greed and narcissism that seems to rule our country, a good way to restore your faith in humankind is to reflect on the generosity of people like Ron Read — a philanthropist from Dummerston, Vermont. Read was no splashy,...
An Escape Hatch for Corporate Cons
"Do the crime, do the time," goes the old saying. Unless, of course, the criminals are corporate executives. In those cases, the culprits are practically always given a "Get Out of Jail Free" card. Even the corporate crimes that produce horrible injuries, illnesses,...
Money to Burn
Someday soon, will all our jobs involve keeping extraordinarily rich people entertained? These days, that prospect doesn’t seem all that far-fetched. "The rich," as journalist Chanelle Tourish notes, "seem to be willing to pay almost any price for outstanding service...
