Our banks have gotten into the habit of needing to be rescued through repeated bailouts. During this crisis, Bernanke — while saving the financial system in the short term — has done nothing to break this long-term pattern; worse, he exacerbated it. As a result, unless real reform happens soon, we face the prospect of another bubble-bust-bailout cycle that will be even more dangerous than the one we’ve just been through.... read more »
Did President Obama seize the opportunity at the G-20 summit to set a new foundation for job growth and fair trade? We examine the issues that preceded the summit and critique what it accomplished for American workers.
» Read Dave Johnson's blogs from the G-20 | Other G-20 blogs and commentary
» THE CONTEXT: Robert Borosage: It's not yet time to declare victory over the recession.
» G-20 PREVIEW REPORT: Lessons to Learn, Choices To Make | Blog by Eric Lotke
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The unemployment rate is high and growing higher, nearing an official 10 percent. Since this recession began, 7 million Americans have lost their jobs. Why aren't 7 million of us "too big enough to fail"?... read more »
Conservatives call the state of the economy the “greatest story never told,” but in reality it’s an economy reminiscent of the Gilded Age. The myth of a booming economy does not reflect the everyday experiences of working-class Americans. In fact, most Americans see the nation either in or near a recession. We need a broad reassessment of our economic policies.read more »
On July 24, the federal minimum wage increased to $7.25 an hour. At a time when getting money into the hands of workers—and thus consumers—is key to jump-starting the economy, a 10.7 percent wage increase will mean $1.6 billion in extra purchasing power for the estimated 4.5 million workers directly affected by the increase. read more »
Between 2001 and 2007, more 3 million manufacturing workers lost their jobs—a 17 percent decline.
Today, the top federal income-tax rate for ordinary income is 35 percent, meaning that earned income is taxed at a rate 2 1/3 higher than income from capital gains
When most voters believe their lives are getting better, then the party in power will benefit politically. Ideological abstractions about the size of government or appealing to the base don't matter quite as much. It really is about delivering the goods. The smart post-election political argument for a governing party should be about what policies they can pass that will improve people's lives, not about how to appeal to voters on a more abstract level.read more »
Remember those Republican boasts that they would turn health care into President Obama’s Waterloo? Well, exit polls suggest that to the extent that health care was an issue in Tuesday’s elections, it worked in Democrats’ favor. But while health care won’t be Mr. Obama’s Waterloo, economic policy is starting to look like his Anzio.read more »
Today’s unemployment data contain gloomy news. Gloomy, but expected. The interpretation of the data is even worse. read more »
News of the potential use of U.S. read more »
Today’s “Productivity and Costs” data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics contain what looks like good news. But keep the cork in the bottles.read more »
The financial reform effort was dealt a significant setback in the House Financial Services Committee today when the committee approved a regulatory bill (HR 3817)< read more »
At a meeting with bloggers before last week's Building The New Economy conference, AFL-CIO President Rich Trumka talked about how we have developed two economies, one real and one financial. read more »
The daily Progressive Breakfast serves up what progressive movement members need to know to start their day. Bill Scher is traveling; he will return Monday.
Thursday's news that the nation's gross domestic product grew at an annual rate of 3.5 percent in the third quarter comes with a lot of asterisks. A few of them:
It's was 80 years ago this week that the Crash of 1929 kicked off the Great Depression.
Not quite 79 years later, the fall of Lehman Brothers on September 15, 2008, sent the stock market into a meltdown precipitated by the crises of such Wall Street Giants as Bear Stears and AIG, among others.
Comparisons between now and then are, of course, inevitable.
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