On Monday, President Obama ordered federal agencies to stop asking most prospective employees about their criminal histories at the beginning of the application process.
For too long, Americans seeking to re-enter the workforce and make an honest living have had job opportunities taken away because of an honest answer on an application--an honest answer about a crime for which they have already paid the price.
Discussion about the working class, who make up the majority of American families and would benefit most from such a raise, has all but disappeared from popular conversation.
Scandal introduced general audiences to the practice of dog-whistle politics, but it’s also important to know the political consequences of dog-whistle appeals.
The voting rights groups say that among other things, the federal exchange should be offering to help applicants complete a voter registration form. Although many applicants use the exchange independently, others turn to its call center or to “navigator” groups that have federal grants to help people apply for coverage.
“The navigators aren’t receiving any training or direction that they have to offer voter registration services,” said Jenn Rolnick Borchetta, senior counsel at Demos.
"The Administration strongly supports the goals of the NVRA and is committed to enforcing its requirements, as applicable,” Aaron Albright, a spokesman for the HHS' Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, said in an email.
But the current configuration doesn't meet the specific requirements in the law regarding language and other administrative mandates, the groups say.
Of course, the vast majority of Americans will never come close to earning a million dollars. Perhaps more tellingly, many of the people politicians think they’re speaking to by talking about the “middle class,” don’t define themselves as such. They view themselves as working class, and basically hear none of the candidates reflecting their lived experiences.
On a late evening this past summer and without warning, one of the oldest buildings in Atlanta caught fire. Gaines Hall — a former dormitory on the campus of Morris Brown College — had been shuttered for years, closed when the school fell on hard times. After firefighters extinguished the two-alarm blaze, what was essentially left of the building was a charred red brick shell.
Parents and students enter into an often complicated and opaque process when trying to secure financial aid, making some kind of financial discussion essentially a requirement for anyone hoping to successfully pay for college, said Mark Huelsman, a senior policy analyst at Demos, a left-leaning think tank.
Critics — and even some supporters — of the program say its designations are arbitrary, and raise questions about whether the benefit should be rethought, expanded, or even eliminated.
Adding farming to the list could introduce further complexity, since farmers in the U.S. work mainly for for-profit business.
In America, chief executive pay is now 300 times more than the average worker. That’s a high enough ratio that presidential candidates are taking note on both sides of the aisle.
Finally, automatic voter registration is good politics for the Democratic Party. "Among eligible voters, some 30% of African Americans, 40% of Hispanics, 45% of Asian Americans and 41% of young adults (age 18-24) were not registered to vote in the historic 2008 election," according to the progressive think tank Demos.
“There are political advantages to saying we’re not going to provide aid to students who aren’t putting in the effort for their education,” said Mark Huelsman, a policy analyst at Demos, a think tank that has been promoting debt-free college.
Robert Hiltonsmith, senior policy analyst at Demos, a progressive think tank, expects the positive trends to continue -- even if Tuesday’s survey suggests employers overall aren’t relenting on tough and irregular scheduling demands. “I think it’s a slow burn, but the pressure’s mounting,” he says.
Either way, the drawdown is a worry in the huge US retirement industry, which managed total assets of $24.8 trillion as of June 30. Massive withdrawals will crimp the lucrative fee income for administrators. And another concern is market performance, with fewer US buyers and sellers available to potentially prop up assets.
The demonized banking industry must make the case it is morally noble. That may jar some ears, but surely enabling retirees to earn a return on their savings and funding business expansion creating jobs and wealth, improving Americans’ quality of and opportunities in life is morally noble. — Eric Glover, the Washington Times, September 24, 2015
The hyperactivity of the presidential election has raised the level of discussion of financial regulation, at least in terms of noise if not enlightenment. Mr.
Americans who vote are different from those who don’t. Voters are older, richer, and whiter than nonvoters, in part because Americans lack a constitutional right to vote and the various restrictions on voting tend to disproportionately impact the less privileged. In 2014, turnout among those ages 18 to 24 with family incomes below $30,000 was 13 percent. Turnout among those older than 65 and making more than $150,000 was 73 percent.
The key to changing public policy in key areas is increasing the number of people who vote, according to a recent report by Demos, a public policy group that supports economic and social equality.
When compared to White voters, non-White voters were more likely to support policies that increased government spending on the poor, guaranteed jobs and a standard of living and reduced inequality.
“Because of the growth of the prison industry, you’re having these artificial shifts that empower the rural communities but take power away from the urban communities,” Marc Mauer, executive director of the Sentencing Project, told me.
That is wrong.
In 2012, Demos — a public policy organization that battles inequality in the U.S. — submitted testimony to the U.S. Census Bureau’s National Advisory Committee on Racial, Ethnic and Other Populations urging it to find a solution to “prison-based gerrymandering.”
Bill Clinton's interview provoked Wallace Turbeville, a former lawyer and investment banker turned financial reform advocate, to contradict him.
"His statement is flat wrong," Turbeville wrote in a blog post for the liberal think tank Demos. "The Graham-Leach-Bliley Act that President Clinton signed had everything to do with the crisis."