Saving the planet means saving the world (tags)
Instead of today’s economic system, which increases inequality, a new system is indispensable, according to Rockström and colleagues. What is needed is a ‘wellbeing economy’ which serves people and the planet—rather than people and the planet serving the economy, as the Wellbeing Economic Alliance (WeAll) puts it.
Capial in the 2020s (with Thomas Piketty) (tags)
Inequality is not an accident. It’s not like the weather. It actually is being driven by the way capitalism is functioning. You know what we need? We need state intervention, we need government action, and we need that to be very, big. He proposes a wealth tax of 2 percent.
Pandemic and the Policy Roots of a Steady State Economy (tags)
We are in the midst of a radical disruption and nurturing the roots of a just transition. Whichever way events unfold over the coming years, it’s clear that returning to the pre-pandemic status quo is less realistic and more difficult than embracing the change that’s well underway.
The Neoliberal Indoctrination (tags)
Homo oeconomicus fades away as an economic theory along with market fundamentalism and market radicalism. Market failure and state violence epitomized by Enron's expansive accounting method and the aggressive wars in Vietnam, Nicaragua, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, and Syria should be lessons.
Because man is a human being (tags)
People don't have to remain victims. Rebellion and resistance against a disease-causing system serve to stabilize psychological existence and social coexistence. The basis for resistance is sensitization: perceiving that society is deprived and disenfranchised by privatization, for example, that people are violated.
Fighting the "Immigrant Threat" (tags)
The current rise in precarious work is better understood in the context of neoliberal reform, processes of deregulation, deindustrialization, and deunionization, as well as the growing inequality that has resulted.
How should our economy grow? (tags)
If, on the other hand, the inequality distribution is reduced via increased spending on education, positive growth effects may result. In addition, too much inequality can destabilize the political system through social unrest, creating great uncertainty for investors, for example with regard to the protection of property rights.
"We have delegated our moral judgment to the markets" (tags)
"Yes, we can" was a call to solidarity and common goals. The legend that everyone in America can rise as high as their talents can carry them goes back to Ronald Reagan. Access to education should not be a substitute for policies that directly address the roots of inequality and the dignity of work.
Extremely Growing Inequality Destroys Democracy (tags)
When one percent have half of the wealth, mistrust and cynicism drown out public spirit and trust between the generations. A fair tax system means ending tax havens, micro-second trading, stock buybacks and insider trading.
Hayek and the Social Question (tags)
Hayek, author of Road to Serfdom, said the market was self-healing and market outcomes were just outcomes. In his book "Submission is Freedom," Schreiner explains how public investments and market corrections are vital.
IMF Chief Warns of Financial Disaster Driven by Inequality (tags)
IMF Head Kristalina Georgieva warns of a return of the Great Depression driven by inequality and financial sector instability in a speech delivered at the Peterson Institute of International Economics.
Market Economy: The Superrich Endanger Democracy (tags)
It is easy to influence politics with a lot of money, and civil society is often just a nuisance. In the US, this problem is everywhere, but Europe is catching up.
Public Good or Private Wealth (tags)
The deep and growing chasm between the rich and the poor is not an accident. This gulf is the result of political decisions. Many rich countries have lowered or abolished property taxes. Governments reduce spending on education and health care.
Driven to Consumption and Money out of Nothng (tags)
Growth originally created a material prosperity about which earlier generations could only dream. However, more economic growth does not lead to people becoming happier. We are prisoners of a system that forces us to permanent growth. Banks create credits.
Capitalism and Worldwide Inequality (tags)
Thomas Piketty's motto "Inequality is always a problem when it is excessive" introduces the new World Inequality Report. Inequalities of income and wealth swell globally and in individual regions and nations.
The Driving Force of Global Inequality (tags)
Behind closed doors, a powerful industry has developed worldwide since the 1980s: tax avoidance. Taxes that are avoided must be compensated by higher taxation of households with lower incomes.
"The Public Trust Doctrine," Wealth Inequality, and Iraq (tags)
"The Public Trust Doctrine" is a fundamental precursor to modern environmental law. The doctrine has often been characterized as an attribute of sovereignty that carries constitutional force.
Why Tax Cuts for the Rich Solve Nothing by Joseph Stiglitz (tags)
In a country with so many problems – especially inequality – tax cuts for rich corporations will not solve any of them. This is a lesson for all countries contemplating corporate tax breaks – even those without the misfortune of being led by a callow, craven plutocrat.
Segregation in the City of Angels: A 1939 Map of Housing Inequality in L.A. (tags)
Endorsed by New Deal-era federal housing policy, "redlining" encouraged housing inequality in US cities.
Video: Panel Discussion on Income Inequality, 53 min (tags)
Panel Discussion on Income Inequality Kathryn Edin, author of $2.00 a Day: Living on Almost Nothing in America, and Stefanie DeLuca, co-author of Coming of Age in the Other America, talked about income inequality. They spoke at the 15th annual Annapolis Book Festival.
Unemployment and Inequality (tags)
"The past will devour the future" if there is no radical change of direction in economic development. That is Thomas Piketty's prediction. Piketty sees the solution in a global capital tax or wealth tax.
Rethinking Economic Policy! (tags)
The economic crisis calls for social-democratic answers. The fading mass purchasing power (in Germany) is due to the increasing inequality of income and wealth. Deregulation promotes social problems like precariousness and greater income inequality.
Video: Born on Third Base by Chuck Collins, 58 min (tags)
Chuck Collins talked about his book, Born on Third Base: A One Percenter Makes the Case for Tackling Inequality, Bringing Wealth Home, and Tthe Common Good, about inequality in the United States and what to do about it. Mr. Collins is the great-grandson of Oscar Mayer.
Growing Inequality Harms the Political Economy (tags)
Neoliberalism and finance market capitalism encourage creating money out of thin air, exploding inequality, precarious work and environmental destruction. Wages are not only a cost factor but an important demand factor leading to either investments or social blight.
The Filipinos Fight Against Inequality Must Intensify (tags)
Nothing should inspire the public’s outrage more than the chasm that exists between the haves and have nots in Philippine society. And what better indicator can there be of inequality than when poor people suspected of involvement in drugs start dropping dead on the streets while the rich and powerful escape plunder charges through the courts?
The Social State Benefits All of Us (tags)
The social state can on ly fulfill expectations when financed on a broad and just basis. The social state must be adjusted to do justice to the pressing challenges.."The social state is the greatest cultural achievement in the 20th century"
Super Bowl 50: Super Militarization and Super Inequality (tags)
The most expensive single sports game on Earth kicked off under unprecedented militarization of the police and the highest levels of inequality since the Great Depression.
Bernie Sanders' Socialist America (tags)
Bernie believes there has been a corporate takeover of American democracy, and this is where he returns to the idea of political revolution. In nearly every speech he makes this clarion call, ...neither he nor any other politician can make the necessary changes alone.
Oxfam Study: Six Reasons to be Outraged (tags)
Whether inequality harms or benefits was disputed for a long while. It could motivate individuals to more effort and stimulate growth, one side believed. It takes the chances for education and development from those who are poorer, the other said... Money buys power.
Economic Inequality Divides Economics and Society (tags)
An unequal distribution of income paralyzes the whole economy... Redistribution from top to bottom in a national economy ultimately depends on which social groups can enforce their interests more strongly.
Social Inequality Today (tags)
The neoliberal rollback has created growing instabilities. An advancing process of de-democratization and social re-feudalization is connected with the rise of the new "super-rich." Piketty warned of the growing inequality between rich and poor.
Video: It's Time to Get Radical On Inequality, Stiglitz, 18 min (tags)
We are the least consistent with the American Dream. An economic system that doesn't raise standards is a failure.
Economic Crises as Sicknesses and Catastrophes (tags)
The 2008 financial crisis is often wrongly described as a "state debt crisis" where cause and effect are inverted and economists and the market are released from responsibility. Sickness and catastrophe metaphors dominate discussion
Neoliberalism Blames Individuals for Inequality (tags)
In neoliberal theories, social justice is not a meaningful category and social inequality is a necessary result of market processes. Performance justice is a necessary illusion. Responsibility for poverty and misery is often shifted to individuals with the worst genes.
Pope Francis Calls for Global Bankruptcy Process (tags)
Pope Francis called for an international bankruptcy process in a news conference as he left Latin America on Monday. According to the Associated Press, when asked about the Greek debt crisis, Francis stated, "if a company can declare bankruptcy, why can't a country do so and we go to the aid of others?" Francis offered further comments noting that too many countries are struggling with high debts and he suggested a United Nations bankruptcy proposal could be the solution.
Destroying a Nation Without Firing a Shot (tags)
Greece
Rebirth of the One-Thousandth Society (tags)
The richest thousandth (0.1%) could increase their share in the total wealth very intensely since the 1980s. Their share is as much as the bottom 90%..While the millionaires increased their wealth enormously, the mass of the population is exposed to the continuing economic crisis.
Thomas Piketty and the Growing Inequality in Capitalism (tags)
"When capital profit is permanently higher than the growth rate for production and income which was the case up to the 19th century, capitalism automatically produces unacceptable and arbitrary inequalities that radically put in question the achievement principle..."
America
Inequality and Liberal Democracy: A Disturbing Association (tags)
How do we bring fundamental reforms about at a time when organized minorities and disorganized, quiescent majorities appear to be the norm in both the North and the South?
The empirical-historical analysis of the top incomes and their wealth are in the center with Thomas Piketty's "Capital" (2014). The share of the top 10% was never below 60% from 1917 to 2012. A wealth tax is vital to reverse the exploding inequality.
No Redistribution Without the Social State (tags)
In Austria 30 percent of the gross domestic product is spent on social services (not including education spending)...Since the 1990s social security has been increasingly discussed as a financial burden and less as a social achievement
TheInheritance of Inequality and Rethinking Growth (tags)
The economy exists for people, not vice versa. Economics should be pluralist, not a monolith. The economy should be embedded in society; society should not be embedded in the economy. Thomas Piketty and alternative economics emphasize inequality and mass unemployment.
IMF Annual Meetings Focus on Inclusiveness and Global Job Growth (tags)
"The risks the IMF raises are real. We need to address inequality if we are going to grow the global economy," said Eric LeCompte, Executive Director of the religious anti-poverty organization, Jubilee USA.
Why a Global Wealth Tax Reduces Inequality (tags)
The distribution of income and assets is one of the most controversial themes today. History teaches us that economic forces press in different directions - either to more equality or away from equality. Which will prevail depends on what political decisions we make.
The wealth of others has become more a problem and less an incentive. Capital is blind, Thomas Piketty says. Capital grows faster than the economy. Differences in wealth are inherent in capitalism but do not represent a natural law. A society can accept them or act against them.
Despite growth in the Philippines, labor underscores systemic failure in rising inequality (tags)
Exclusive growth for exclusive group of wealthiest businessmen.
A Frenchman Admonishes Americans to Equality (tags)
With his book and the data, Thomas Piketty has shaken the self-understanding of American society.. In 2010 the richest one percent had around 20 percent of the total income. In the 1970s the share was under 10 percent.
The Middle Class Continues Shriveling (tags)
A century ago people said a progressive income tax would never happen. Today it is reality. The top tax rate in the US between 1930 and 1982 was 82 %. That was a very interesting experiment because very high incomes were covered.
On World Economic Forum on East Asia 2014 (tags)
All Glitz, Nothing New to Solve Poverty and Inequality
Political Myths and Elite Misanthropy (tags)
In his new book "Political Myths and Elite Misanthropy," professor Herbert Schui explains the myth of the achiever, the myth of state indebtedness, the myth of the market and competition and the myth of market conforming democracy.
Capital in the 21st Century: Thomas Piketty (tags)
"There is no escaping the fact, however, that social science research on the distribution of wealth was for a long time based on a relatively limited set of firmly established facts together with a wide variety of purely theoretical speculations."
IMF Annual Meetings Focus on High Debt Burdens and Global Inequality (tags)
The annual International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank meetings are focusing on the role of high debt burdens in both global economic recovery and increasing inequality. At the onset of the meetings, the G24 released an IMF statement noting that the IMF's failure to implement quota reform and the outcome of the US Supreme Court Argentina/NML Capital case impacts global inequality.
Liberating the Economy from Prejudices (tags)
Economics is not an immutable unchangeable fate but a human system where changing rules changes outcomes. James Galbraith and Joseph Stiglitz are two well-known economists who question the myths of conventional economics, the self-healing, efficient and deregulated market
Three Things That Make Libertarian Heads Explode (tags)
The inequality problem, the public goods problem and the regulation problem make libertarian heads explode.
The State as a Human Cage (tags)
"Personal performance" always depends on the work of past generations and state interventions. The 1% stylize inequality as a motor to innovation, growth and development. Exploding inequality is the end to public spirit and interdependence.
Unprecedented Inequality Under Obama (tags)
class war
Obama
Does the Richness of the Few Benefit Us All? (tags)
Zygmunt Bauman, born in 1925, is a Polish sociologist. Since 1971, he has resided in England after being driven out of Poland by an anti-semitic campaign, engineered by the Communist government he had supported.
America's Economic Dark Side (tags)
class war
Hardwired Inequality in America (tags)
class war
Chavez Succeeded Where Obama Failed (tags)
When President Obama campaigned in 2008 in Portland, Oregon over 70,000 people came to hear his speech. And although I missed the event, I was intrigued by the raw emotion that the candidate’s words inspired in my community. Obama re-visited Oregon during his 2012 campaign, but the inspiration had faded from his voice, and the audience had drastically changed.
An attack on Howard Zinn in American Educator reveals only the fear of exposure of the violence and inequality built into the structures of the United States.
America's Deplorable State of the Union (tags)
class war
Social Inequality in America (tags)
injustice
Institutionalized Inequality in America (tags)
class war
Paul Krugman Discovers Marx (and Misses the Point) (tags)
In his recent New York Times op-ed piece, Princeton professor and regular columnist for The New York Times, Paul Krugman observed: The American economy is still, by most measures, deeply depressed. But corporate profits are at record high. It’s simple: profits have surged as a share of national income, while wages and other labor compensation are down. The pie isn’t growing the way it should — but capital is doing fine by grabbing an ever-larger slice, at labor’s expense.
Economists Argue over Distribution Question (tags)
More and more economists take distribution questions seriously. When inequality becomes too great in a national economy, the economy becomes unstable. Private indebtedness and income inequality massively increased in the US Financial markets uncoupled from real economy
agitate
Houston Janitors Strike for Economic Justice (tags)
Echoing the story of David vs. Goliath, janitors in Houston are on strike and taking on such corporate giants as JPMorganChase and Exxon Mobile in an effort to pressure the janitorial companies they employ to agree to the workers' modest demands. It is these big business behemoths that are the real powers behind cleaning contractors such as ABM, GCA, ISS etc. By striking against these contractors, and publicly targeting these contractors' employers, the janitors are using their collective power in a showdown that has great significance for not only the Labor Movement but all workers.
Income Inequality Undermining American Democracy (tags)
This is NOT a study of my own, merely a pointer to a piece published by the New York Times, dealing with growing income inequality, undermining US democracy.
America's Great Divide Between Rich and Poor (tags)
class war
Rising Economic Inequality Provokes Search for Practical, Democratic Alternatives (tags)
Interview with Gar Alperovitz, Lionel R. Bauman professor of political economy at the University of Maryland , conducted by Scott Harris
Empire and Inequality Win Again (tags)
"The government could attain Obama?s originally proposed $4 trillion in spending cuts over ten years simply by returning to the enormous military budgets of the Clinton era. But Obama has no intention of moving in this direction..."
Social and Economic Inequality in Israel (tags)
rights
Economists Rediscover the Distrribution Question (tags)
Higher taxes for the rich-traditionally a horror to liberal economists-appear in a new light as state transfers to poorer sectors. Those richer than 95% pocket around 20% of the total income. It was less than half as much at the end of the 70s.
IMF Working Paper: "Inequality, Leverage and Crises" (tags)
"A financial crisis can reduce leverage if it is very large and not accompanied by a real contraction. But restoration of the lower income group's bargaining power is more effective."
The Attack of Corporations and the Rich on the Rest of Society (tags)
In the last decades, wealth has concentrated in a few hands. The increasing inequality does not offend us; this inequality is the result of an active policy. The rich prevail; they are subsidized and relieved from contributions to the social infrastructure while social benefits are cut.
BTL:"Trickle-Down" Economics, Tax Cuts for the Rich Exacerbate Income Inequality (tags)
BETWEEN THE LINES - A four-time winner of the Connecticut Associated Press Broadcast Award for Best Feature in the non-commercial category, this syndicated, half-hour program provides a platform for individuals and spokespersons from progressive organizations generally ignored or marginalized by the mainstream media. Between the Lines covers a wide range of political, economic and social topics.
Social Injustice in Israel (tags)
the data will surprise most people
US inequality and New Zealand, a human rights perspective (tags)
New Zealand has been given another chance to free itself from discriminatory collectivism while the US seems to be still battling with it. NZ was saved by the emerging truth of human rights omissions and one of life's miracles, the major Christchurch earthquake (no one killed).
Community Centers as a New Beginning (tags)
With $1 billion, the US could build 4000 community centers at a quarter-million dollars each. The network of community centers in Vancouver Canada could be our model. Public spirit could arise to counter the exploding inequality.
Memorandums on Alternative Economic Policy (tags)
The social state, solidarity, sharing and social justice open doors while neoliberal deregulation leads to exploding inequality, generalized insecurity and disappearance of the public spirit.
Is Growth Only Possible Through Inequality? (tags)
Does capitalism make the rich richer and the poor poorer instead of creating prosperity for everyone as promised? Inequality declined considerably between 1930 and 1970 in western industrial states.
Economic Crisis and the Crisis of Neoliberal Ideology (tags)
The crisis has his origins in the "real" economy. Inequality is the ideological motor of neoliberfalism. German president Kohler described the financial markets as a monster. The metaphor has changed from market as rational subject to monster.
GERMANY: Oscar Lafontaine on the Financial Markets (tags)
"The present crisis cannot be overcome without a regulation of the financial markets.. When banks are given billions through the so-called bank bailout and these billions disappear somewhere, that is a misappropriation or embezzlement of tax funds.."
IneQuality of Life and the Butt End of the City Budget (tags)
Mayor increases police state with the 2008-2009 Los Angeles City Budget and reduces human state.
Inequality and Equal Opportunity: A German Perspective (tags)
A fifth of Germans no longer believe the national economy is just. With false signals, false promises and false goals, politics kindles the feeling of injustice. The idea of equal opportunity turns out to be the grand delusion of Germany.
The immiseration of the working class – Marx was right! (tags)
Just a couple of weeks ago, America's government tax collectors, the Internal Revenue Service, issued a new report. The IRS found that the richest 1% of Americans earned a record 21.2% of all income in 2005, up from 19% the year before. At the same time, the bottom 50% earned just 12.8% of all income in 2005, down from 13.4%. This was a record. IRS data only go back to 1986, but other academic research suggests that the last time wealthy Americans had such a high percentage of the national income was in the 1920s. And there's more. The IRS data show that the incomes of people right in the middle of all the income brackets (where half earn less and half earn more) fell 2% between 2000 and 2005 when adjusted for inflation, to $30,881. At the same time, the income level for the top 1% grew 3% to $364,657, or over ten times as much! This shows that capitalism is not only a breeder of economic crisis, war and waste, but is also a system of grotesque exploitation and injustice. When Marx wrote Das Kapital around 150 years ago, he argued that "pauperism (poverty) forms the condition of capitalist production and of the capitalist development of wealth... in proportion as capital accumulates, the situation of the worker, be his payment high or low, must grow worse".
U.S. one of worst places for kids (tags)
BERLIN -- The United States and Britain ranked at the bottom of a UN survey of child welfare in 21 wealthy countries that assessed everything from infant mortality to whether children ate dinner with their parents.
In "1984," George Orwell warned that war would become a domestic necessity to divert the people from economic contradictions. Inequality may promote productivity but also undermines public spirit and social ochesion
PEOPLE NATIONWIDE NEEDED TO INFORM 9TH WARD RESIDENTS OF WHATS REALLY HAPPENING AT HOME (tags)
The Common Ground collective is asking people to visit the New Orleans evacuees in their area and let them know that efforts are being made to rebuild their community.
Why the Minutemen failed (tags)
The Minutmen's appeal to the far right ignored the source of illegal immigration, economic inequality between US and Mexico, instead they focused on the border wall band-aid and appealed to phony nationalism..
BTL:Growing Income Inequality in U.S. All But Ignored in Presidential Campaign (tags)
Interview with Ellen Frank, senior economist, Poverty Institute at Rhode Island College conducted by Between the Lines' Scott Harris
Building Bridges Radio-Unemployment Crisis:Portrait of Inequality (tags)
Building Bridges Radio presents this 28 min radio program:A Portrait of Inequality –Today’s Unemployment Crisis - TO LISTEN CLICK ON INDYMEDIA LINK
Study discovers Conservatives see things in "Black and White" (tags)
Hitler, Mussolini, and former President Ronald Reagan were individuals, but all were right-wing conservatives because they preached a return to an idealized past and condoned inequality in some form.
Fear of a spiral into Depression as job losses mount (tags)
Dismal sales at Christmas time were propped up by deflationary price cuts, and now the retail sector is among the hardest hit as one third of a million jobs are slashed in February. Not coincidentally, the same rise of the Extreme Right Wing is taking place as was seen during the depression of the 30s, with the same drive to seek relief in aggressive wars of conquest...
The history of humanity teaches that people have always resisted when the social inequality was outrageous and blatant. The increase of criminality in the South as in the North is caused by the despair of the poorest in view of worldwide injustice.
Just in time for the holidays! [448 kb in MP3 format (57 sec)]
In know you hate it, but things are getting better. Once again, thank you Walter E. Williams. We are so lucky to have you around.
Twelve Ways to Democratize the U.S. Political System: Eighth (tags)
Twelve Ways to Democratize the U.S. Political System: Eighth Reduce wealth inequality.
United for a Fair Economy Brings 'Economic Apartheid' message To Shadow (tags)
United for a Fair Economy Brings "Economic Apartheid" Message To Shadow Convention "Poverty and Wealth Gap Day"; August 14th Program Challenges Parties' Neglect of "Real Issues"
United for a Fair Economy Brings "Economic Apartheid" Message to Shadow (tags)
United for a Fair Economy Brings "Economic Apartheid" Message As Convener of Shadow Convention "Poverty and Wealth Gap Day" August 14