Rethinking the Economy

Once upon a time, there was a company called Sears. Many years ago ago – 1989 to be precise – it threatened to dump Princess Illinois and run off with another state unless it was given a tidy sum ($170 million). Princess Illinois forked over the dough, and there was much rejoicing throughout the land. [...]

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If you aren’t just fired up about how quickly Occupy Wall Street is taking off and you’re still worried about the lack of specific, winnable demands, 2 suggestions:
1) Borrow a teddy bear and hug it out.
2) If that doesn’t work, check out Investing in Chicago Communities: A Jobs Fund for a Future That Works. This [...]

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This just in: engineers are pissed off enough that they are calling politicians on their shit around the climate crisis (hat tip to Jess Zimmerman):
The technology needed to cut the world’s greenhouse gas emissions by 85% by 2050 already exists, according to a joint statement by eleven of the world’s largest engineering [...]

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The next time a conservative tells you that the reason the economy is in bad shape is because taxes and regulations are crushing small businesses, show ‘em this study by McClatchy.
Politicians and business groups often blame excessive regulation and fear of higher taxes for tepid hiring in the economy. However, little evidence of that [...]

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Wall Street melts down, taking the rest economy with it. Who’s to blame? Unions and workers, of course. In honor of Labor Day, the fabulous Wall Streeter Yves Smith gives Exhibit 23,234 of what a load of crap this is. The whole post is definitely worth reading; here are some highlights:
Let me give [...]

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How much is the insane obsession with deficits costing us? Krugman explains, using the latest projection from the Congressional Budget Office, which optimistically assumes that the economy will bounce back by 2015:
the projection says that we’ll have a cumulative output gap of $5.1 trillion, with $2.8 trillion of that having already happened.
Surely it [...]

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There was a lot of great material in Van Jones’ speech at the Rebuilding the Dream kickoff — so much so that I decided I want to write up some of it to experiment with later. Here are some of my favorites:
On the myth that we are broke:
We’re not broke, we were robbed.
Saying “we [...]

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Does pushing for cleaner energy kill jobs & growth? No, says Google (via Grist’s Stephen Lacey). In fact, waiting will cost us dearly:
Google, a leader of innovation in the digital economy, says that without a private and public focus on innovation in renewables, storage, and electric vehicles, the cost of delaying the clean energy [...]

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On Thursday, activist Van Jones kicked off a new movement called Rebuild the Dream. The speech he gave his one of the best he’s given in quite a while. It’s definitely worth checking out.
I may be wildly optimistic, but I think Rebuilding the Dream – which has backing from Moveon.org, SEIU, the AFL-CIO, [...]

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A great article in the New York Times about the burgeoning world of DIY manufacturing. Because prices of machines that let you build things have been dropping steadily, we’re getting to a point that feels a lot like the early days of PC hobbyists. And eventually it could have an equally powerful impact on the [...]

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