As my Chicago friend Mike (doodahman) points out in Facebook, the City has just issued RFPs for additional Charter Schools. This comes after Chicago Public Schools closed 50 schools throughout the city causing students to travel farther and over crowding other schools. The Chicago Teachers Union sees it as a union busting tactic and predicted […]
by Linda Beale The Tea Party’s Disruptive Anti-Government (and anti-tax) Politics The New York Times ran an interesting piece by Kim Messick on the Tea Party’s psyche yesterday: Messick, The Tea Party’s Paranoid Aesthetic, New York Times (Aug. 10, 2013). It’s worth trying to understand this political group’s understanding of itself, since it ” is […]
In another setback for President Obama’s health care initiative, the administration has delayed until 2015 a significant consumer protection in the law that limits how much people may have to spend on their own health care. The limit on out-of-pocket costs, including deductibles and co-payments, was not supposed to exceed $6,350 for an individual and […]
Reader Denis Drew writes (lifted from comments) : The bottom 50% of America’s workforce now takes 12% of overall income. If the federal minimum wage is raised to $15/hr that will add 3.6% direct inflation. $15/hr being today’s median wage, half the workforce, 70 million employees receiving an average $8,000/yr raise would add $560 billion […]
Part of the reason employment and hours worked, in particular, have been so weak in early 2013 is the rapid growth of part-time employment. Part time employment is volatile and subject to many influences. From December to June part time employment rose 589,000. That is a 2.2% — almost 5% annualized – growth rate. Part […]
Detroit Said to Reduce Swaps Debt by 25% in Deal With Banks . The swaps were a “bet” on the direction of interest rates. With the decline of variable interest rates, Detroit found itself owing to the banks. With the decreased credit rating to B2, the same as AIG, Detroit found itself at the mercy […]
“For goodness sakes, of course the employees and the retirees like it, it’s free,” says Republican State Sen. Dave Lewis. 11,000 Helena state employees, retirees, and dependents now go to a state run healthcare clinic which is free. No co-pays, no deductibles, doctors are salaried, wait time is a few minutes, and visits are up […]
Glenn Greenwald offers his thoughts on the issue of NSA surveillance: On Wednesday morning, I’ll be testifying, by remote video, before an ad hoc committee in the House of Representatives about NSA disclosures. It begins at 9:30 am ET and will, I believe, be broadcast on C-SPAN. Following my testimony will be an excellent panel […]
Wired points to lawsuits fizzling so far, but also more secrecy and claims it is off limits to courts. The Obama administration for the first time responded to a Spygate lawsuit, telling a federal judge the wholesale vacuuming up of all phone-call metadata in the United States is in the “public interest,” does not breach […]
Lifted from comments from open thread July 23 by reader Jack Round and around the revolving door does spin. Those who take the ride are guaranteed to win, in the game of securities enforcement law. In yet another move between public and private practice John Khuzami moves from the SEC to “….a job that pays […]