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 […]

Joseph Stiglitz offers perspective on the bankruptcy of Detroit and its wider context: At one level, one might shrug: companies die every day; new ones are born. That is part of the dynamics of capitalism. So, too, for cities. Maybe Detroit and cities like it are just in the wrong location for the goods and […]

We interrupt our daily coverage for this moment of humor:  Congress Fiercely Divided Over Completely Blank Bill That Says And Does Nothing WASHINGTON—A blank piece of legislation that says nothing, does nothing, and contains no text whatsoever has been the source of heated debate in Washington this week, and has sharply divided Congress along partisan lines, Beltway sources confirmed […]

by Linda Beale The Right’s Goal–end the one tax expenditure that truly aids poor working families The Tax Foundation, that propaganda tank that masquerades as a “nonpartisan” “think” tank, is at it again.  Now it’s pushing the right-wing agenda of ending any tax expenditures that redistribute resources down to those in the lower-income distributions. It’s […]

by Linda Beale The Right cuts food stamps to pass corporate farm welfare–where’s the sense in that? The House has its priorities firmly in mind.  Those priorities involve making sure that the wealthy people and corporations keep their wealth while any and all possible cuts to any welfare or “entitlement” programs are made. All you […]

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 […]

by Linda Beale Ways and Means–still distracting with false scandals GOP representatives Camp and Boustany are continuing to beat the dead horse of an IRS “scandal” connected with the way the IRS has attempted to efficiently filter new applications for 501(c)(4) status to provide extra scrutiny to the most likely groups to be engaged in […]

by Linda Beale David Sirota Agrees with me on the Tax Reform “Secrecy” Scandal As I mentioned in an earlier post, Max Baucus has established a secret submission process for Senators to let him know what pet tax loopholes they want to retain (probably the ones that high-paid lobbyists representing corporations with operations in their […]

EPI’s Elise Gould reports on the impact of Social Security as a safety net keeping another 25 million people out of poverty.