One of the most pernicious myths of the past half century is that guaranteeing healthcare for all Americans would strike a mortal blow against this country's system of free enterprise.
In a keynote address last Friday in Baltimore, Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley broke down the reasons behind his administration’s decision to make Maryland the first state in the union to employ a Genuine Progress Indicator (GPI), a quantitative assessment that integrates both the costs and the benefits of economic development into a monetary measure of whether growth is truly enhancing the welfare of individuals and communities.
NEW YORK -- Today, the Supreme Court released its decision in Arizona v. Inter Tribal Council of Arizona (No. 12-71), striking down an Arizona law that created unnecessary barriers to voter registration in violation of the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA).
Regulators in the United Kingdom are looking into allegations that traders from some of the world's largest banks have been manipulating benchmark foreign-exchange rates to make profits on the backs of clients.
Bloomberg News broke the story earlier this week, citing interviews with several anonymous traders who claim the practice has been occurring for at least 10 years. [...]
We have learned, painfully, of the damage derivatives can do to an economy in a financial crisis. But derivatives are hurting the economy even on its best days, according to a new study.
First, the American Pediatrics Association noted that poverty was the number one danger facing children today. If that wasn’t bad enough, it seems the elderly are just as vulnerable, especially in the light of potential entitlement cuts.
In the wake of the National Security Agency scandal, the mainstream media is obsessing over Edward Snowden’s security clearance. It is asking, along with Senators from the Intelligence Committee, why a systems administrator at Booz Allen Hamilton had access to troves of top-secret documents and whether or not the vetting process for the other 1.4 million people with top-secret clearances is rigorous enough. The fear, the mainstream seems to be pushing on Americans, is that other leaks are in store.
The retail sector has been a star of recent jobs reports. May's numbers from the Department of Labor say it was responsible for adding 28,000 positions to the overall economy. It's on an upward trend – the monthly retail employment number has averaged 20,000 for the past year.
Considering one in nine Americans work in, for or in stores ranging from the corner grocery to big box behemoths, this should be great news. And it would be – if these jobs paid anything resembling a living wage. But all too many of them don't. [...]
Borrowing a line from Tolstoy, Gar Alperovitz’s latest book, What Then Must We Do?: Straight Talk About the Next American Revolution, seeks to resolve a troublesome political puzzle: How do we eradicate systemic problems like inequality, climate destruction, and poverty when these problems seem to get worse and worse, year after year, despite the good efforts of social reformers, progressives, and radicals of all stripes? Good question.
One by one, the House Financial Services Committee has rubber-stamped industry approved bills that would weaken elements of Dodd-Frank designed to hem in risky derivatives trading.
A new report details how the failure to finalize rules harms the American people by compromising the safety of food, automobiles, workplaces and protections for investors.
Yesterday, Senator Jeff Merkley (D-OR) got off to an auspicious start as chair of the Banking Subcommittee on Economic Policy by doing something that is all too novel—inviting people with the most at stake in economic policy decisions to testify in Congress.
Dramatic new public policy initiatives are needed to accomplish two broad interrelated goals: to ensure that all Americans have a chance to move into the middle class and, second, to ensure greater security for those in the middle class.
The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) has just released the third iteration of its Better Life index with a fantastic data visualization tool that allows you to compare the 34 existing member countries based on 11 different indicators of human well-being: material conditions including housing, income, and jobs and quality of life conditions including community, education, environment, c
Imagine that you're trying to make an extremely complicated decision. You want to understand the facts and do the right thing. At one ear, you have someone -- perhaps a former colleague -- who whispers you highly detailed advice six times a day, cajoling and pleading. At the other ear, is someone who whispers you advice only once or twice a week.
(New York, NY) – In light of Walmart’s illegal retaliation and intimidation tactics against the members of the Organization United for Respect at Walmart (OUR Walmart), who recently announced their plans to strike for better work place practices, Demos Vice President of Policy and Outreach Heather McGhee issued this statement in support:
Around the world, wealthy countries might be creating jobs but they’re worse jobs that pay lower wages and offer fewer benefits. In the United States, one of the largest employers of low-wage workers is Walmart. About 1.4 million Americans work for Walmart — the company has about two million employees worldwide. And the average hourly wage for a Walmart associate? An estimated $8.81 an hour.
Housing prices are coming back and consumers—feeling flush now that their home equity is rebounding—are more confident than they've been in four years. The American middle class is finally getting back on its feet after a half decade of trauma, right?