Working Life

In the lore of political budgetary rhetoric, Sen Everett Dirksen’s observation is often useful: “A billion here, a billion there, pretty soon it adds up to real money” he is rumored to have said–rumored because there is some debate about whether he actually used that whole phrase. But, whatever–it’s useful to our current discussion. Where […]

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You can’t find a better contrast between the vision for our country than those offered by AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka and Goldman Sachs. One vision sees America as the land of equality and fairness. The other vision sees an America where greed is good.   Here is some of what Trumka will say today at […]

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We hear an enduring myth: the "free market" decides who gets what in an efficient dance of allocation of resources through competition. Garbage. Especially when it comes to CEO pay–though apparently there are some who want to continue the myth of competition.   Over the weekend, I caught this in the NYTimes business section–an excerpt […]

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   For those of you who might remember the days of the Carter Administration when the U.S. embassy workers in Teheran were held under lock and key for a very long time–"Nightline" got its ratings boost, and made its name, from the nightly graphic trumpeting how many days America had been "held hostage". Well, we […]

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   Nice to know that, even though we are suffering through massive unemployment and economic despair, the very people who caused that despair are having a good time: Two years after the onset of the financial crisis, the stock market is recovering and Wall Street’s moneyed elite are breathing easier again. And this means in […]

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The swamp has not been drained. Throw them all in jail. The Wall Street Journal today: Federal authorities, capping a three-year investigation, are preparing insider-trading charges that could ensnare consultants, investment bankers, hedge-fund and mutual-fund traders and analysts across the nation, according to people familiar with the matter. The criminal and civil probes, which authorities […]

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War is peace. Lies are truth. And, now, Melissa Bean is like Elizabeth Warren. That is the instant thought I had when reading about the rumors that the White House might consider appointing Melissa Bean to head the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau if she ends up on the short end of the vote count in […]

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I mean, c’mon–is there no shame? Yes, that’s rhetorical. We have the greatest jobs crisis in decades, with close to one in five Americans not able to find decent, full-time paying work. The minimum wage is a poverty-level wage. But, all is well on Wall Street–as in $144 BILLION in pay.   This just up […]

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Along the road of the past 30 years, productivity has been soaring (and technology has been a minor part of that) while wages have been flat–thanks to de-unionization and a simple corporate decision to cut wages even when profitable. And, despite that assault on wages, the main line of concern was over outsourcing–that is, jobs […]

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Count me in the group, perhaps small, that is unimpressed with the pledge by a group of billionaires to give away large parts of their fortune. Not because I oppose the idea of philanthropy. Rather, the announcement obscures a reality: very little of the money will go to challenging the root causes of the incredible […]

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