The pundit world is busy rehabilitating the reputation of George ‘W’ Bush. Somehow in today’s America killing hundreds of thousands of human beings illegally invading a country, torture, corruption and “no-bid contracts” to crony insiders, crashing the economy, intentionally creating massive deficits, using phony terrorist-attack alerts to stampede frightened citizens into voting against their own [...]
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A quick point on whether the minimum wage “costs jobs.” An op-ed in today’s San Jose Mercury News, Minimum wage: Credible studies show raising it costs jobs says, The usual corporate nonsense, the usual “low wages create jobs” stuff, the usual “paying people hurts the economy” bullwaste, the usual this, the usual that… Here is [...]
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Austerity is beginning to hit and the economy is slowing as a result. The most immediate effect is that flights are delayed, but unemployment checks are smaller and there are fewer things We the People do to make our lives and economy better — also called “government spending.” But hey, as Dean Baker writes in, [...]
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The Walton (Walmart) heirs now have as much wealth as up to 40 percent of all Americans combined, and Walmart’s sales have been slowing down. What does the first fact have to do with the second? (Hint: Sign this petition for raising the minimum wage.) The top 1 percent now rakes in 20 percent of [...]
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Earlier this week I wrote about Executive PayWatch from the AFL-CIO. This site tracks the huge wage gap between CEO pay and the average employee. Something many people don’t know is that the Wall Street reform law was supposed to do this, but years later the regulations still have not been written! The SEC delays [...]
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Where does the Republican Party put its energy? On anything that furthers the interests of the wealthiest. Tax cuts and kicking government are right at the top of that list*. Also near the top comes blocking minimum wage increases, blocking workplace safety rules and keeping lots of people unemployed so they are desperate to take [...]
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All the smartest people in the executive suites just knew that the taste of Coca-Cola needed “reform.” Rival Pepsi was advertising to the “New Generation” and Coke’s executives came to believe their product wasn’t what the “cool” people wanted to drink. Everyone they talked to at the executive-level strategery seminars, and all the other executive-level [...]
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Take a look at the 2013 Edition of the website called Executive PayWatch from the AFL-CIO. This site, active since 1997, helps drive awareness of the huge wage gap between CEO pay and the average employee. Compare your pay to the pay of top executives. Heck, you might even make more than they do! (Hint: [...]
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Tax day. At a time when elites are lecturing us on deficits, giant corporations are demanding even lower taxes for themselves. Their message: “deficits equal austerity for thee and lower taxes for me.” Tax “Reform” Giant corporations and opinion elites are calling for tax “reform.” When you hear the word “reform” coming from corporate lobbyists, [...]
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The “Grand Bargain” is about showing the world that we can hurt people, so they will know we are “serious.” Reading Jason Linkins’ HuffPo account of elite-pundit thinking about the “Grand Bargain,” Passing ‘Grand Bargain’ Voters Don’t Care About Is Critical To Confidence In Government, Apparently, I am struck by the similarity between the (elite [...]
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