Media

The blizzard that pounded the Northeast on Friday was no Hurricane Sandy, but it has left thousands of people without power throughout the region. For some households, losing power may be no big deal. But if you're old or disabled, this can be a dangerous situation.

The problem is that it's hard in most communities to know which residents may badly need help. After Sandy, hastily organized volunteers knocked on doors in buildings in Rockaway and other places to identify the old and frail.

High unemployment and underemployment forced one in four Americans to pull money out of a retirement plan to make ends meet.

Deficit reduction is supposedly a huge priority in Washington, especially among Republicans who apparently skipped economics classes in college and don't understand that reducing spending -- and demand -- is the last thing you want to do in a weak economy.

But here's a question: Given all the focus on deficits, including by the media, wouldn't you think that it would be big news if the CBO revised its budget deficit projection for the next decade upward by $4.6 trillion? 

"I served in the military for 30 years and received the highest level security clearances," said Brooklyn resident and war veteran Emmett Pinkston.  "Yet I was turned down for a job as a TSA baggage screener, because of a bogus charge on my credit report.  I found myself stuck at a low paying job."

Councilman Brad Lander speaks at a February 2013 rally to ban employment credit checks

Here’s another reason why income inequality is so destructive—it’s ruining our planet and increasing the severity of climate change. A new paper from the Center on Economic and Policy Research looks at a novel way to slow climate change: reduce the hours that we work. For reasons that are not entirely understood, shorter work hours are linked with lower greenhouse gas emissions.

The Pew Charitable Trusts released a nifty interactive report this week that compares the 50 states and the District of Columbia on their administration of elections.

Pew gathered information from the Census Bureau, public surveys, and other sources to develop its Elections Performance Index. So far, the data is available only for the 2008 and 2010 elections, but it makes clear that the security of your voting rights depends heavily on where you live.

President Obama raised eyebrows during his inaugural address last month when he put the fight against long election-day lines in the context of the nation’s movement toward “tolerance and opportunity, human dignity and justice.” Now the New York Times says Congress is preparing for a showdown on the issue.

Alfred Carpenter, 52, was working for a high-end shoe store in 2007, when the recession put the company out of business. A long-time salesman, Carpenter wasn't worried about getting another job, but then broke an ankle a few months later and ended up in the hospital. With no insurance and a $50,000 emergency room bill, he filed for bankruptcy protection.

Then his troubles got worse. One employer after another rescinded job offers after checking his credit report, he says. He finally found work, but at a fraction of his usual pay.

The Department of Justice has brought a civil suit against Standard & Poor’s, the credit rating agency, that centers on the decisions that S&P made concerning models it used to evaluate default risk for mortgage-backed securities prior to the financial crisis. Default risk was central to the credit ratings assigned to the bond issues. The models calculated statistical probability of various outcomes based on historic data and many assumptions.