Working Life

  Back in November, I asked the question: is Robert Rubin a liar or a coward or both? Today, in what should be a welcome sight to every working American, Rubin is effectively being run out of Citigroup, his reputation sullied. And, yet, he continues to obfuscate his role in the financial crisis we face. […]

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Every day, there is another example of the conspiracy of silence that pervades the traditional media’s description of the current economic crisis. Sure, de-regulation, greed and pure stupidity has a lot to do with it. But, in truth, the underlying reason for the collapse has been a persistent war on the wages of American workers. […]

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Jay Gould, the robber baron of the 19th Century, famously said that, "I can hire one half of the working class to kill the other half." As we live through one of the worst economic collapses in a century, Gould’s wish is coming true. And we must stop Gould’s modern-day robber barons from sowing seeds […]

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  The inevitable is happening: the people who lead us over cliff and helped spark the collapse of our financial system are running for cover. They want to avoid responsibility for the debacle. And among those running to hide is Robert Rubin.   In an extraordinary interview published today in The Wall Street Journal, Rubin […]

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  Having crashed the financial system around the globe and consigned millions of people to severe hardship over the next several years, a few bankers are trying to save some face: they are giving back millions of dollars in pay.   I would note first that, personally, I think the whole coterie of Rubinites (those […]

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  This is a story that seems all too familiar, but it’s worth repeating each time it happens: trillions of dollars in retirement and savings are gone, millions of jobs will be lost, we’re facing a severe economic crisis that could go on for a number of years, and we could be in for a […]

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   Readers here know that I’ve been repeatedly saying things will get much worse, regardless of any one-day swings in the stock market. I’ve been saying for many, many weeks that we are going to see very big problems come the holiday season–the more important time for retailers and other businesses to bring in sales. […]

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   I meant to post this yesterday but got all wrapped up in heading out for a work trip to make headway on my book…but how many of you saw the "60 Minutes" segment Sunday where Leslie Stahl interviews the hread of Bank of America, Ken Lewis? Here is the priceless question from Stahl, relating […]

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   For the past couple of weeks, I’ve been focusing a lot of observations about the financial mess–the Paulson bailout for bankers, the AIG bailout, the "The Audacity of Timidity: Where Is The Challenge to Market Fundamentalism"–but, to start off today, I wanted to turn us back to some real voices. And this comes courtesy […]

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   As I said yesterday, the crazy-assed rise in the stock market on Monday was all about one-time profit-taking. And today look for things to begin to come down to earth because, as The Wall Street Journal reports just now on its website: U.S. retail sales took the sharpest drop in three years during September […]

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