Media

Every single working day of the year, American women pay a 22.6 percent gender tax on their income.  By gender tax, I mean a negative transfer imposed upon women’s wages which reduces the wealth they control and increases the amount of time they work.

The credit reporting industry likes to argue that credit checks reveal something about an individual’s character or ability to act responsibly.

In great news this week, Vermont became the first state to legislate the adoption and use of an alternative to GDP called the Vermont Genuine Progress Indicator (GPI). While Vermont isn’t the first state to calculate genuine progress, we’ve highlighted Maryland’s groundbreaking work in this area, it is the first state to actually adopt a GPI through legislation.

The Washington Post ran a remarkable article yesterday on how huge layoffs by state and local governments -- with over 600,000 jobs lost since 2009 -- have been a leading obstacle to economic recovery.

Earlier this week, I argued that Apple's moral failings -- tax avoidance and sweatshop labor practices -- were all the more inexcusable because this a company drowning in profits and cash. It can afford to pay its fair share of taxes and to pay its workers better.

Now, thanks to Isaac Shapiro at the Economic Policy Institute, we have some hard numbers to back up this point. Here's what Shapiro found:

House Republicans want to avoid big defense cuts by whacking other areas of government instead -- like programs that help low-income people.

No big surprise there. Putting guns before butter has been a staple of the GOP playbook for decades -- ever since Reagan pushed sweeping cuts in social spending while giving the Pentagon a blank check.

Yesterday, I wrote about how renewable energy is flourishing, despite a lack of political support. Recent data from the Energy Information Agency confirms this trend.

Last week, the House attempted a quid pro quo: a proposal to extract funds from the $17 billion ACA fund intended for "immunization campaigns, health screenings and other preventive practices" in exchange for a freeze on student loan interest rates.

The Supreme Court may not have decided yet on the Arizona v. United States case. But there is already a sense of defeat among immigrant rights activists (and a sense of celebration among the restrictionist movement) based on the feeling that the justices, including the liberal ones, may lean towards upholding at least some parts of Arizona’s SB 1070 anti-immigrant law.