One of the most pervasive myths about poverty in right wing circles is that people who are unable to lift themselves out of it aren't working hard enough. Some of the most militant advocates of this philosophy are those who come from poor backgrounds themselves, and insist that ...read more
Once again, Donald Trump is trying to dig himself out of a hole by lying and doing a spectacularly bad job of it. After threatening an ill-advised trade war against China and then actually going through with it without consulting anyone because he was having a bad day, the stock ...read more
Why did the stock market crash today? Sean Hannity has the answer, and all you Democrat loving Obamabots aren't going to like it. Because guess what, it was the black man's fault!"The Obama economy was so weak all of these years we had just artificially cheap money," Hannity told ...read more
Ali Velshi and Stephanie Ruhle invited 'Donald Trump for President' advisory board member Brad Thomas onto their MSNBC show today and gave the hapless business man one of the most savage dressing downs I've ever seen on live television. Thomas appeared to think that he could lie ...read more
When not continuously checking the news for updates on the Trump Administration's descent into chaos (and now potential impeachment), I have recently spent a significant amount of time researching the amazing surge of interest in crypto-currencies. Why? Because I'm rapidly coming ...read more
We live in an era where the line between politicians and bankers is almost non existent. Bankers work on Wall St for a few years, then go into politics. After this, they go back to banking having learned the machinations of government and how to manipulate it better. This ...read more
Despite the conservative insistence that the same economic policies responsible for wrecking the economy in 2008 are the only ones capable of fixing it, President Obama has now definitively shown otherwise. The release of the annual Census Bureau report on income, poverty and ...read more
As every responsible media outlet and economic analyst is reporting, Donald Trump's economic plan for America would be a complete disaster for anyone not already incredibly wealthy. The plan is essentially a more extreme version of the policies George W. Bush enacted during his ...read more
After having what can only be described as an apocalyptically bad week, Donald Trump attempted to rebound and rebuild his rapidly sinking popularity by introducing his economic plan for America. Unsurprisingly, Trump's plan delivered at the Detroit Economic Club yesterday, was a ...read more
Paul Krugman takes on the myth that Donald Trump is somehow more qualified to manage the economy than Hillary Clinton -- a perception corroborated by several polls:One of the many peculiar things about his run for the White House is that it rests heavily on his claims of being a ...read more
In an extremely interesting interview with New York Times Magazine about his economic legacy, President Obama delivered a stinging assessment of current conservative economic ideology and trashed the economic platforms of the Republican candidates running for president. After ...read more
Sadly, the myth that tax cuts for corporations and the rich creates economic growth is still the basis for Republican policy on pretty much everything. Want better health care? Cut taxes for insurance companies and stop regulating them. Need new roads? Cut taxes for the rich so ...read more
Serial liar and conservative propagandist Sean Hannity had a rather embarrassing interaction with a real economist on his radio show yesterday, and was ruthlessly exposed for spreading false information about President Obama's economic record and the causes for the economic crash ...read more
If one were to sum up the Republican Party's general stance on economics, it would go something like this: Debt is bad, government is bad. Tax cuts are good, big corporations are good. Sadly, there isn't much more to it than that.Despite the menacing language used to illustrate ...read more
As a Brit I have always been confused by what Americans regard as 'right' and 'left'. Having followed politics closely in this country since the late 90's, I understand that in America Bill Clinton is considered liberal while George W. Bush is considered conservative. In Britain, ...read more
This is not an endorsement, but a proclamation: Bernie Sanders is laying the foundation for a new Democrat that will change the party for the better. This past week, the Democratic Party witnessed political validation for one of its own as presidential candidate Bernie Sanders ...read more
Today, the Huffington Post reported on a truly stunning fact -- a fact that should have the entire planet up in arms and threatening a global revolution. Based on statistics from Oxfam, the Huff Post reported that: "62 ultra-rich individuals -- a list that is primarily made up of ...read more
You may have noticed the alarming headlines today declaring global markets are in sharp decline due to China's market collapse. Reported the Huffington Post:Chinese market chaos rooted in long-held but sporadically-acted-on fears of economic malaise, negative U.S. manufacturing ...read more
If you choose to look at the world through the lens of a particular ideology, you won't ever see reality as it is. When it comes to the lens of economic ideology, some schools of thought are so toxic that when applied to human societies, the wreak untold havoc. In the UK, the ...read more
(Pictured above: Conservative Ian Duncan Smith, the architect of Britain's welfare reform) If you want a very good example of how destructive conservative economics can be, look no further than Great Britain and the huge economic revolution the Tory government has foisted upon ...read more
While tech billionaires and sycophantic journalists who report on them laud the hipster friendly 'Sharing Economy', the reality is, this is just a buzzword for a new economy that badly screws the poor. Writes Robert Reich:It’s estimated that in five years over 40 percent of the ...read more
Paul Krugman weighs in on the latest round of insane German/Euro demands on beleaguered Greece:Eurogroup list of demands is madness. The trending hashtag ThisIsACoup is exactly right. This goes beyond harsh into pure vindictiveness, complete destruction of national sovereignty, ...read more
Jeb Bush recently told a forum hosted by the Union Leader newspaper of Manchester, NH that he aimed to generate 4% economic growth when elected in 2016. Despite the country being massively overworked as it is, Bush wants Americans "to be a lot more productive," by working longer ...read more
Historical analogies are not always particularly useful given the enormous complexity of human behavior. One could quite easily compare the American and British Empires with, say, the Roman Empire, or draw an analogy between the war in Iraq with America's invasion of Vietnam. But ...read more
by Timothy Woods Syriza, the governing party in Greece came to power at the beginning of 2015 as a desperate Greek people did away with the dominance of the austerity-imposing parties and opted for a stab in the dark with a new, radical leftist government. This didn’t go down too ...read more
Over the weekend, the Greek people voted overwhelmingly to reject austerity and have effectively defaulted on their debt to the European Central Bank (ECB) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Under overwhelming pressure from German leader Angela Merkal and the Eurozone, ...read more
If you are thinking about moving to New YorkCity, don't. Unless you are a millionaire, have incredibly wealthy parents, or want to live a life trapped in never ending debt, New York City is not the place for you. With average real estate reaching a historic high, the average home ...read more
Speaking to Gawker's Hamilton Nolan, venture capitalist, billionaire and civic activist Nick Hanauer dismissed the right wing theory that when wages go up, employment goes down. "My message is that the counterclaim," said Hanauer, who was one of the initial investors in Amazon, ...read more
We are living in strange times. With a record number of billionaires joining the economy, a rising stock market and surging house prices, wealth is seemingly all around us. Acquiring it though is a distant dream for the vast majority of people in America and around the world. As ...read more
When you design an economy to be based on short term profit to the benefit of giant corporations, the results over the long term will be a country so hostile to human life that the unreasonable and unthinkable becomes an every day reality. Wealth inequality, mass poverty, a ...read more
In an interview with CNBC last week, 2016 presidential candidate Hillary Clinton's campaign manager Robby Mook was asked how Clinton would appeal to younger voters. Mook told CNBC: "What voters are looking for in this election is someone who’s going to be a champion for everyday ...read more
Back in 2013, creator of the HBO hit The Wire David Simon wrote a scathing attack on American capitalism arguing that the relentless pursuit of profit had created 'two Americas', one with a viable economy and future, and the other completely devoid of all hope. He wrote:That's ...read more
When I went to college in the UK in the early 2000s my tuition fees were roughly $2500/year. Fortunately my parents could afford the fees and made sure I didn’t have to take out a loan or work while I was there. While university used to be free in the UK, $2500 isn’t an insane ...read more
I grew up in Clapham, south London in the 1980's, and have clear memories of what the city felt like. It was an intimidating, yet often warm and exciting city jammed with people of different color, religion and social class. When I was little, I went to an inner city state school ...read more
Practically speaking, if you have had some success in life it is unlikely that you'd willingly deny your children money in favor of handing it over to the government. Funding public schools and roads is all well and good, but your hard earned cash could buy your children a house, ...read more
I had a funny experience after going on the Thom Hartmann's show 'The Big Picture' last night, and one that made me cautiously optimistic for the future of America. I went on the show to discuss Illinois Gov Bruce Rauner's declaration of war on state unions and Bernie Sander's ...read more
When the rich begin to worry that poor people are too poor and that they might be too rich, it is probably a fairly good indicator that society is on the brink of big change. In an interview with Bloomberg today, notorious investor Rob Arnott, chief executive and co-founder of ...read more
If Jesus Christ was alive today, he would be horrified by much of what passes for the religion he created. Many who claim to be 'Christians' are so far removed from Christ's message that he would have to publicly denounce them or change his name completely. Likewise, many of ...read more
(I have an ON switch)Either I have just seen a great commercial for an amazing product or a terrible commercial for an awful product. Either I have seen the heralding of a new dawn in technology where the science nerds have finally delivered something worthwhile or I have ...read more
We're creating an ownership society in this country, where more Americans than ever will be able to open up their door where they live and say, welcome to my house, welcome to my piece of property. - President George W. Bush, October 2004. When the housing bubble burst back in ...read more
It could be said that the only people idiotic enough to believe in free market economics are: a) academics and b) TV business personalities. Everyone else either pretends to believe in it while siphoning gigantic tax breaks and bailouts off of the tax payer, or accurately ...read more
Yesterday, Bob Cesca went after Matt Taibbi for making the claim that President Obama's record on corporate America has been worse than George Bush's. Generally, I agree with Bob's assertion that this claim is off the mark (Bush presided over a virtually unprecedented era of ...read more
Noam Chomsky lays out some basic economic facts about the suppression of the minimum wage to the Huff Post's Ryan Grim:"Part of the neo-liberal assault was the minimum wage in real value started declining, and not growing...As GDP of economy grew, as productivity grew, minimum ...read more
Much of the internet has piled onto New York Times columnist David Brooks for his recent musings on 'The Inequality Problem', and deservedly so. Not only was Brooks timing spectacularly bad (British charity Oxfam just released a shocking report showing 85 people have as much ...read more
As the World Economic Forum starts in Davos, a recent report from the charity Oxfam highlighted the astonishing global wealth divide that now exists between the super rich and super poor. Reports the Guardian:The extent to which so much global wealth has become corralled by a ...read more
On Wednesday’s edition of CNN’s Crossfire, former Clinton administration Secretary of Labor Robert Reich (a real economist) got into a lively debate with conservative host S.E. Cupp (not a real economist). Cupp, whose credentials in economics include having a degree in Art ...read more
Question: Is Africa poor because... a) Africans are lazy b) The continent was subjected to 400 years of slavery and colonialism and had vast amounts of its natural resources stolen Tom Corley wants you to believe it's 'a'. President of 'Cerefice and Company', and author of "Rich ...read more
Matthew Taylor from the RSA weights in on Mark Carney, the Governor of the Bank of England's argument that Britain needs to grow its finance sector despite the calamity it wrought on the economy:"Arguably, the high flyers of finance capitalism are as obsessed with making money as ...read more
While much of the planet lives on less than $2 a day, Bill Gates has a 66,000-square-foot main residence on Lake Washington, Medina, that was recently profiled on Yahoo.com. Worth a cool $120.6 million, some features of the house include: * A 2,100-square-foot library with ...read more
I went on Thom Hartmann's show last Friday to debate the Republicans' votes to cut food stamps and defund Obamacare, and controversially, whether historically more people have committed suicide under conservative or liberal economic policies. I went at it with conservative ...read more