It’s Friday, I’m trying to finish my other work before the week ends…but there’s all this interesting stuff to read. I recommend you read it. Depending on your own work situation, of course.
At least one in two children in 17 small counties in the United States is living in poverty, according to a U.S. Census survey measuring income and poverty in small areas and school districts.
If you’re confused by the whole how often to get a mammogram thing (I sure am), what with contradictory recommendations, the New York Times has a helpful explanation.
Building green could add hundreds of billions of dollars to the economy, according to a new report released by the United States Green Building Council.
The study, conducted by consultants Booz Allen Hamilton, predicts that over the next four years, green building practices will create 7.9 million jobs and contribute $554 billion to the gross domestic product of the United States.
Ohio’s attorney general sued Standard & Poor’s, Moody’s and Fitch Ratings on Friday, asserting that they provided misleading credit ratings that led to hundreds of millions of dollars in losses for state funds.
The official, Richard Cordray, filed the lawsuit in United States District Court for the Southern District of Ohio on behalf of five Ohio funds that assert they lost more than $457 million because of “false and misleading ratings” of mortgage-backed securities by the ratings agencies.
In 2005, Senate Republicans threatened to carry out the “nuclear option” of abolishing the filibuster, because Senate Democrats had blocked 10 of the federal appeals court judges George W. Bush had nominated, while allowing 35 to be confirmed. This was intolerable obstructionism, Republicans charged, and everything brought up deserved an “up or down” vote.
In 2003-2004 there had been 49 filibusters; in 2005-2006, there were 54. In 2007-2008, there were 104.
And we all know what’s happening now. Any important legislation “has” to get 60 votes. Although until recently, the filibuster was an extraordinary measure, today it’s taken for granted. Nobody questions that this is the way things are.
But an HCAN poll shows that people—at least in Nebraska, Louisiana, and Arkansas—do question if this is the way things should be.
The poll described the motion to proceed, for example, and asked respondents, “In the Senate, before a bill can be voted on, there must be a vote to allow it to be debated. Regardless of whether you support or oppose the health insurance reform plan itself, do you believe that it should be debated on the floor of the Senate?”
Support was overwhelming in all three conservative “red” states — 88% of Nebraskans, 82% of Louisianans, and 84% of Arkansans all agreed that health care reform should be debated. (It makes one wonder how voters in, say, Maine might feel if they knew that both of their “moderate” Republican senators are opposed to even letting the bill comes to the floor for a debate.)
The poll then asked about cloture: “Once a bill has been debated in the Senate, senators must then vote on whether to allow the bill itself to be voted on. Regardless of whether you support or oppose the health insurance reform plan, do you believe that senators should allow it to be voted on?”
The numbers weren’t quite as strong, but again, support was largely one-sided — 80% of Nebraskans, 77% of Louisianans, and 77% of Arkansans agreed that senators should let health care reform come up for a vote.
Here’s another nice piece of regulation on credit cards: gift cards.
The Fed proposed banning any fees for the first year and limiting gift card issuers to one fee a month if the card was not used for at least a year. It also requires clear disclosure to consumers about penalties.
–snip–
The rules would also prohibit the cards from expiring before five years had passed from the date the card was issued or five years from the date additional funds were added to the card. The rules would be not be put in place until August 2010.
Gift cards issued by banks, malls and credit card companies are more likely to have expiration dates and tack on annoying activation, maintenance, inactivity and transaction fees, according to the National Retail Federation. Some bank-issued gift cards even charge a fee for simply checking the balance, the retail group reports.
The consumers who will spend a total of nearly $4 billion buying general purchase gift cards — those not connected to a specific retailer — pay $4 to $7 for the cards. Some of the card issuers have the audacity to add monthly fees as high as $4.95 if a card is not used six months after purchase. In September, American Express announced it was eliminating monthly fees on all of its gift cards, including those already purchased and stashed away in consumers’ wallets and purses.
Of course, since the new rules won’t go into effect until August, who it won’t affect is shoppers this holiday season. Still, it’s good to keep watching these ways of bilking people out of their money get reined in inch by inch.
Want to know what employers would be required to offer health care under the House plan vs. the Senate plan? What the minimum package of benefits insurers would be required to offer? How a public insurance option would compete with private insurers? The New York Times has a nice interactive side-by-side comparison.
It turns out a Texas windmill farm developer’s request last month for nearly half a billion in stimulus funds to create 2,000 jobs in China doesn’t rank first on the audacity scale.
Shockingly for American taxpayers, and sadly for the staggering 10.2 percent of Americans who are unemployed, it doesn’t even rank second.
That’s because Washington already has doled out hundreds of millions in stimulus funds to foreign renewable energy firms. Of the $1.05 billion in clean energy grants awarded by D.C., $849 million — 84 percent — went to foreign wind companies, according to an analysis by Russ Choma of the Investigative Reporting Workshop.
So we can add that to what I said before about how green jobs need to be good jobs—they also need to be in this country, at least if our tax money goes into creating them.
A food safety bill is moving forward in the Senate, but—surprise!—progress is slow.
Remember how the Chamber of Commerce was going to pay a “respected” economist to do a “study” showing that health care reform was going to steal your lunch money and spit on your grandmother? They’re now not so interested in talking about whether they’re going to go through with that. They’re saying they haven’t decided. Yeah, right.
The city of Philadelphia is trying to keep foreclosed homeowners from losing their homes. Apparently there are criticisms that the program doesn’t go far enough, but at least it’s an effort with a few teeth.
The premise: Cash for clunkers was popular and effective. Could “cash for caulkers”—government funding of home weatherization projects—be equally so?
If the answer is yes, it’s great news for all of us, since weatherization projects reduce energy use, save money over the long term, and create work now. But, as David Leonhardt writes in the New York Times, it’s more complicated than cash for clunkers.
Remember: Many homeowners could already save money by weatherizing their homes. And they are not doing so.
That’s in large part because the projects can seem so daunting. To date, energy experts, in the government and the private sector, have not done a good job of distributing useful information. What does exist tends to be either too complicated or too general. I recently asked various experts what percentage of homes should get new insulation, for example, and several replied that it varied by region — which is both true and unhelpful.
That’s one issue. Choosing what to do to your house is tough—you’re balancing the inconvenience of having to move furniture and people pounding on your walls and the question of how much it will cost and how it will save.
There’s another thing we have to think about with weatherization, though, and Leonhardt doesn’t address it. What are the labor standards going to be for the workers weatherizing houses? Will it pay a decent wage?
Construction jobs often pay pretty well, at least if they’re union. But construction workers don’t typically make nearly as much as you’d think if you heard their hourly wage, because there are seasons when there’s not much work, and jobs don’t always line up so that you go from finishing up Building A on Wednesday to starting on Building B on Thursday. Weatherization work could be even more like that—many full-scale house weatherizations would cost in the neighborhood of $4,000, which might be spread between several different contractors since it can involve electrical work, roof work, carpentry… And that’s not even getting into materials costs.
Not only that, some of the weatherizations Leonhardt talks about might be limited to much, much less than $4,000: sealing some holes in air ducts, installing a new thermostat, little stuff that—don’t get me wrong—makes a big difference in energy use and is absolutely worth doing, but that isn’t likely to produce steady full-time work and would require a really good hourly wage to be a decent job to have.
When we talk about green jobs, this is something important to remember: they have to be good jobs, too. We can’t make someone spend their life stringing together couple-hour caulking jobs at $14 per hour with big gaps in the hours they’re paid for as they drive from house to house or wait for good weather or wait for another house to need caulking and call it a good thing for the economy.
A year ago Wall Street’s financial rupture sent the economy hurtling into a massive crisis, crushing tens of millions of Americans in an avalanche of unemployment, underemployment, home foreclosures, reduced incomes and lost benefits. That financial rupture was caused by a combination of rapacious, mindless greed on Wall Street, the then-bloated housing bubble, and the failure of both regulators and of the financial regulatory structure.
Tomorrow the Senate Banking Committee will begin to take up Senator Chris Dodd’s (D-CT) proposals for sweeping financial regulatory changes. In a statement announcing the proposed legislation last week, committee chairman Dodd said:
“Over the past year, Americans have faced the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. Millions of Americans have lost their homes, their jobs, and their savings – and yet, they’ve watched some of the people and institutions that caused this mess collect million dollar bonuses and receive billion dollar bailouts.”
“Those hard working Americans are asking, what is the government doing to ensure their economic security?”
“It is the job of this Congress to restore responsibility and accountability in our financial system to give Americans confidence that there is a system in place that works for and protects them.”
“We must create a sound foundation to grow the economy and create jobs.”
“The financial crisis exposed a financial regulatory structure that was the product of historic accident, created piece by piece over decades with little thought given to how it would function as a whole, and unable to prevent threats to our economic security.”
“For decades, Washington has failed to deliver the substantial reform we need. If we fail again this time, our economy will be vulnerable to another crisis.”
Both the Obama Administration and the House Financial Services Committee have developed separate regulatory reform plans. But in the view of most observers, Dodd’s proposals would go much further in establishing a fundamentally new regulatory structure and in imposing tighter controls on financial institutions, investment instruments and trading practices — particularly for derivatives.
In a statement released by the Senate Banking Committee, and at his press conference, Dodd marked his determination to succeed with this major regulatory overhaul:
“I will not stand for attempts to protect a broken status quo, particularly when those attempts are made by some of the same special interests who caused this mess in the first place.”
“The American people have been through a lot over the past year. I hear from them every day. They are business owners forced to shutter their doors and lay off workers because their credit dried up. They are senior citizens who have delayed their retirement because their 401(k) vanished. They are ordinary Americans who did nothing wrong, but are paying a steep price. They deserve an economy in which Americans can find jobs, manage their money, and build better futures for their families. They deserve the real and meaningful change in this bill.”
Discussing two of the most critical components of his plan, Dodd continued:
“Our plan will stop abusive practices by creating an independent Consumer Financial Protection Agency with one mission: standing up for consumers. Whether taking out a mortgage, getting a credit card, or investing for retirement, Americans deserve to receive clear and accurate information, to be protected from hidden fees and abusive terms, and to know that the financial products they’re being offered are safe.”
“We will end “too big to fail.” We cannot allow the collapse of a few firms to threaten our entire economy. Our plan will create an independent council of regulators to identify risks, so that government can act to prevent a crisis. We will have a mechanism in place to safely shut down large failing companies without destabilizing the financial system. No longer will the Federal Reserve’s emergency lending authority be used to prop up a failed institution.”
Other key provisions would create a single federal banking regulator; eliminate regulatory gaps for over-the-counter derivatives, hedge funds, asset-backed securities, and payday lending; require companies that sell mortgage-backed securities to keep “skin in the game” so investors won’t be sold worthless securities; and give shareholders a greater say in how executives are compensated.
Not surprisingly, the two biggest defenders of the financial status quo are not at all happy with Dodd’s regulatory reform plan. The American Bankers Association immediately attacked the Dodd plan saying it “would tear apart the existing regulatory structure only to create a new one”. And the U.S. Chamber of Commerce has launched an effort to kill the proposed Consumer Financial Protection Agency (CFPA). These and other powerful special interests and financial industry lobbyists will no doubt be working feverishly to kill Dodd’s reform plan outright, or slice and dice it until its substantative provisions are eliminated or fundamentally weakened.
I’m planning a trip for this April for my parents and for my kid who is graduating from High School. Ugh, I’m so old!! So, I open my e-mail and what do I see?
American Airlines
Winter Flight Deals!
Book now and save on travel into 2010! Great destinations like Chicago, Las Vegas, New Orleans and more are on sale with fares starting as low as $58* each way.
Hurry, purchase your tickets by November 23, 2009, for travel December 2, 2009, through March 10, 2010.
Most excellent except for one small tiny little itty bitty thing…
United Airlines flight attendant members of the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, AFL-CIO (AFA-CWA) will join members of the Association of Professional Flight Attendants (APFA) at American Airlines on the picket line at airports around the country tomorrow. While American Flight Attendants conduct a mock strike and walk the picket line, United. Flight Attendants will join them in solidarity for a fair Contract and coordinated efforts to lift the standard for Flight Attendants across the industry.
Now, American Airlines, did you think you were going to get that one past me? Tease me with a great looking deal, only to piss on the workers who will be protecting my ass in the sky? Well, American Airlines, I think not!
So, get to the table and hammer out a fair deal. Psst, and a fair deal doesn’t look like the kind of crap the the likes of Dick E. Dauch pulled when he sank American Axle into a hole, took millions from the company in pay days, asked workers for 60% pay cuts and left them out their on the picket lines for 11 weeks. Fair pay for CEO’s should be measured based on what the lowest paid workers under you make.
So, for anyone taking a flight tomorrow on American, perhaps, you can reconsider. And thanks for the fabulous deals American, but no thanks. I don’t live in Wal-Merica, I live in the United States of America. So, take that deal… what, I have to paint you a picture?
If ever there was a time for a fierce urgency to confront the massive jobs crisis in America, that time is certainly now.
Today the AFL-CIO, NAACP, Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, National Council of La Raza and the Center for Community Change announced they will urge the White House and Congress to move forward on a new comprehensive plan for job-creation and real economic recovery.
This is big news — and a major step forward for labor, economic and civil rights groups and the progressive community to build a movement for jobs and recovery.
AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka announced the key aspects of the new jobs plan at the Economic Policy Institute’s Spotlight on Jobs forum in Washington, D.C. earlier today.
Promoting this urgent policy initiative on a new webpage America Needs Jobs Now the AFL-CIO summarizes the core components of the plan:
No one needs to tell America’s families that unemployment and underemployment are at crisis levels. We need jobs—and we need them now.
Wall Street has gotten its bailouts. Now it’s time for Main Street to get some immediate help.
The AFL-CIO is calling on Congress and the Obama administration to take five steps now to care for the jobless and put America back to work.
1. Extend the lifeline for jobless workers. Unless Congress acts now, supplemental unemployment benefits, additional food assistance and expansion of COBRA health care benefits will expire at the end of the year. They must be extended for another 12 months to prevent working families from bankruptcy, home foreclosure and loss of health care. Extending benefits also will boost personal spending and create jobs throughout the economy.
2. Rebuild America’s schools, roads and energy systems. America still has at least $3 trillion in unmet infrastructure needs. We should put people to work to fix our nation’s broken-down school buildings and invest in transportation, green technology, energy efficiency and more.
3. Increase aid to state and local governments to maintain vital services. State and local governments and school districts have a $178 billion budget shortfall this year alone—while the recession creates greater need for their services. States and communities must get help to maintain critical frontline services, prevent massive job cuts and avoid deep damage to education just when our children need it most.
4. Fund jobs in our communities. While workers go without jobs, important work is left undone in our communities. We should put people to work restoring our environment, providing child care and tutoring, cleaning up abandoned houses and more. These are not replacements for existing public jobs. They must pay competitive wages and should target distressed communities.
5. Put TARP funds to work for Main Street.The bank bailout helped Wall Street, not Main Street. We should put some of the billions of dollars in leftover Troubled Asset Relief Program funds to work creating jobs by enabling community banks to lend money to small- and medium-size businesses. If small businesses can get credit, they will create jobs.
America’s jobs situation would be even more dire without the economic stimulus program President Obama and Congress enacted, which has saved or created 1 million jobs. But the depth of this crisis demands that we do more—and that we do it now, before more people lose their jobs, their homes, their health care and their hope.
This is a bold first step. Much needs to be done to build the coalition to generate political support for a comprehensive jobs and recovery policy. Right now, I am fired up — having written months ago about The Coming Battle for Jobs and Recovery.
Earlier in the year, as part of the health insurance reform bill, the White House agreed to a deal with the pharmaceutical companies. According to a NY Times story in August:
Pressed by industry lobbyists, White House officials on Wednesday assured drug makers that the administration stood by a behind-the-scenes deal to block any Congressional effort to extract cost savings from them beyond an agreed-upon $80 billion.
Big Pharma agreed to go along with President Obama’s health insurance reform bill, in exchange for this deal.
As it turns out, the drug companies are going to be just fine.
In the last year, the industry has raised the wholesale prices of brand-name prescription drugs by about 9 percent, according to industry analysts. That will add more than $10 billion to the nation’s drug bill, which is on track to exceed $300 billion this year. By at least one analysis, it is the highest annual rate of inflation for drug prices since 1992.
So much for $80 billion in savings.
A Harvard health economist, Joseph P. Newhouse, said he found a similar pattern of unusual price increases after Congress added drug benefits to Medicare a few years ago, giving tens of millions of older Americans federally subsidized drug insurance. Just as the program was taking effect in 2006, the drug industry raised prices by the widest margin in a half-dozen years.
“They try to maximize their profits,” Mr. Newhouse said.
But drug companies say they are having to raise prices to maintain the profits necessary to invest in research and development of new drugs as the patents on many of their most popular drugs are set to expire over the next few years.
Given that research and development is heavily subsidized already by US taxpayers, it’s hard to feel sorry for Big Pharma. They’d have a lot more cash available for R&D if they stopped bombarding us with ads for Viagra, Cialis, and Levitra every ten minutes.
The Chamber of Commerce’s awesome streak continues. Even as the Chamber is out looking for a “respected” economist to sign off on claims that health care reform will kill the economy, more than 5,300 medical professionals have called on the American Medical Association to leave the Chamber over its opposition to reform.
Apparently 90% of US workers (the ones with jobs) are completely or mostly satisfied. What I find hard to buy is that 30% report being completely satisfied. Somehow I don’t think those 30% of people all go home from work every day saying “I am happy with every single thing that happened at my job today.”
It’s really easy to give no thought to the fact that Amazon and other online retailers don’t usually charge sales tax. But it turns out to be worth looking at. Not charging sales tax gives them a competitive advantage over other businesses that do, and Amazon’s rationales for why they shouldn’t have to do so don’t hold up.
Earlier, I wrote about the Chamber of Commerce’s attempt to get an economist to promote their anti-health care reform position. What did a Chamber senior vice president say (in a candid moment) about a previous such maneuver?
“We spent a lot of money to come up with this study,” he told the business leaders. “It’s not what these economic studies say — it’s the cover they give to members who are going to be with us.”
The number of Americans who lack dependable access to adequate food shot up last year to 49 million, the largest number since the government has been keeping track, according to a government report released Monday that shows particularly steep increases in food scarcity among families with children.
In 2008, the report found, nearly 17 million children — more than one in five across the United States — were living in households in which food at times ran short, up from slightly more than 12 million children the year before. And the number of children who sometimes were outright hungry rose from nearly 700,000 to almost 1.1 million.
Among people of all ages, nearly 15 percent last year did not consistently have adequate food, compared with about 11 percent in 2007, the greatest deterioration in access to food during a single year in the history of the report.
