Economy and Business
Social Security: It Ain’t Broke
Social Security is more popular than sliced bread. And it should be. Our Social Security system is the foundation of our families’ security: We work hard and pay into it with every paycheck so each of us can retire with dignity.
The Invisible Hand Won’t Stop Inequality in Its Tracks
Economist Lars Osberg started writing about income distribution in the 1970s, back when few scholars shared his concern.
Beyond the Jobs Report: A Call for a Transformational Economy
Don’t count on the latest round of good economic news to have much of an impact on the elections. There are very few undecided voters left and these minor changes aren’t likely to change anyone’s mind.
The Dead-End Servant Economy
Fire fighter, basketball player, lion tamer, teacher, nurse: Ask little kids what they want to be when they grow up, and you’ll get all sorts of answers. But you’ll never hear this one. You’ll never hear youngsters say they want to devote their careers to serving rich people.
Where’s Joe the Plumber When You Need Him?
Four years ago, a chance encounter between Barack Obama and Samuel “Joe the Plumber” Wurzelbacher injected inequality right into the heart of the 2008 presidential race.
Middle Class Fantasy
America is big on fantasies. We savor staged reality shows and overhyped football games. We fawn over celebrities and video games. But perhaps our biggest fantasy is the persistent belief that nearly all of us are middle class. More than 80 percent of us think we’re perched on one of its rungs.
The Poison Pill of Tax Cuts
The presidential candidates are debating George W. Bush’s 2001 and 2003 tax cuts, which were supposed to expire in 2010. Obama wants restore tax rates on the wealthiest families to earlier levels. Romney’s campaign is standing up for the top 2 percent with incomes over $250,000, and then sweetening their pot by abolishing the Alternative Minimum Tax and estate taxes too. His plan would give people earning over a million dollars an average tax break of $160,000 a year.
Empty Anti-Wall Street Rhetoric
European Victory on Taxing Speculation
European campaigners for a financial transaction tax have done some awfully goofy things over the past three years.
Apparently, Suite Crime Does Pay
What should we, as a society, do with all those reckless financial industry execs who helped trigger the Great Recession and the tidal wave of foreclosures? Should we put these power suits behind bars? Or should we forgive and forget, and lavish down upon them hundreds of millions of dollars in new rewards?
