Economy

By Naomi Oreskes | – (Tomdispatch.com) – It’s a tale for all time. What might be the greatest scam in history or, at least, the one that threatens to take history down with it. Think of it as the climate-change scam that beat science, big time. Scientists have been seriously investigating the subject of human-made […]

Inequality

We Know Exactly Where to Get the Money to Fix Inequality

Jim Hightower

By Jim Hightower | – (Otherwords) – Jesse Jackson ran a strong populist campaign for president in 1988, advocating bold new policies and programs to address inequality. This prompted establishment skeptics to scoff, “Where ‘ya gonna get the money?” It’s no secret where America’s wealth has gone in recent decades: upwards. Jackson answered directly: We’ll […]

Inequality

How Much in ‘Inequality Tax’ Are You Paying?

Sam Pizzigati

(Inequality.org) – The hidden burden America’s top-heavy distribution of income and wealth places on people of modest means What nation ranks as the world’s richest? A simple question to answer, right. Well, not so much, suggests the just-released tenth annual Global Wealth Report from the banking giant Credit Suisse. Everything turns out to depend on […]

Fossil Fuels

Fueling Global Heating: Our Tax System Rewards the Biggest Carbon Criminals

OtherWords

By Charlie Simmons | – ( Otherwords.org) – Last year, the biggest fossil fuel companies paid zero dollars in taxes — and actually received billions in rebates. By Charlie Simmons | October 16, 2019 Greta Thunberg, the 16-year-old Swedish climate activist who sparked student protests across the globe, had this to tell the UN General […]

Health

In the Billionaires’ America, Inequality Is Literally Killing Us

Sam Pizzigati

( Otherwords.org) – Again and again, studies show that the richer wealthy Americans become, the shorter the rest of us live. What do the folks at the U.S. Census Bureau do between the census they run every 10 years? All sorts of annual surveys, on everything from housing costs to retail sales. The most depressing […]

Climate Change

Could Climate Crisis’ Extreme Weather Threaten American Prosperity?

The Conversation

By Gary W. Yohe | – Scientists say climate change is causing powerful hurricanes like Dorian to increasingly stall over coastal areas, which leads to heavy flooding. Officials in the Bahamas feared “unprecedented” devastation after Dorian hovered over the islands for two days, pummeling it with rain. But beyond more intense and slow-moving hurricanes, the […]

Featured

On Labor Day, US Workers are 1/3 poorer than in 2003 & Top 1% is 2x Richer

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – On Labor Day, American workers have little to celebrate. That’s alright. The September Labor Day, while initially proposed by some workers in the 1880s, was backed by conservative President Grover Cleveland over May 1, which he associated with radicalism (i.e. with workers who would demand their rights). So it really […]

Investment

Trump’s Economic Sanctions: War by Another Name

H. Patricia Hynes

(Informed Comment) – In early 2019, the White House threatened to invade Venezuela, take down the government and replace it with their choice of president and political party. Though no missiles have been fired and no bombs dropped on the country, our government is waging a war by other means, namely criminal economic sanctions, to […]

China

China: How the Republican Imperial Presidency Led to Trump’s Trade National Socialism

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Trump has put US companies on alert that he might force them to withdraw from China, where they have $256 billion invested. He says he is given this power by the 1977 law called the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, or IEEPA. The Republican Party has spent over a century […]