Our city governments make decisions that affect us most, yet we know very little about the ways that money influences them. In a previous post I explored new evidence that people of color are not well represented by their councils. One possible reason is the overwhelmingly white municipal donor classes.
Campaign finance reform crusaders on Wednesday lauded a D.C. Council measure that would forbid political action committees from raising unlimited funds in nonelection years and ban businesses from donating to candidates who could influence their contracts with the city.
The “Campaign Finance Transparency and Accountability Amendment Act of 2016” is part of a bevy of bills aimed at increasing the political distance between candidates and businesses in the District.[...]
Imagine a rich person. For most Americans, the image that comes to mind is a wealthy white man. While white men certainly make up a disproportionate share of the wealthy, there is growing diversity among the wealthiest members of society. Given the increasing political salience of racial justice and gender equity, this diversity could have impacts on policy. I find that there are indeed large differences between rich men and rich women (defining that group as those earning more than $150,000 a year), as well as between rich white people and rich people of color.
The D.C. Council is considering a bill that would bar businesses from performing credit checks on job applicants. Supporters of the legislation say credit histories can be inaccurate and indicate little about workers’ character.[...]
“Our research shows poor credit more often tells a story of personal misfortune far more convincingly than one of poor work habits,” says Amy Traub, a senior policy analyst at Demos.[...]
According to the Demos report, credit checks were never intended to be used for hiring.
D.C. Council member Kenyan R. McDuffie said he will introduce emergency legislation to bar contributions to political action committees during non-election years in an effort to close what some view as a major campaign finance loophole before the start of 2017.
“It’s important that we address the issue as soon as possible, before Jan. 1,” McDuffie (D-Ward 5) said. “There’s a lot of support for it from what we’ve seen from the public in general.”[...]
President-elect Donald Trump has made it clear that he wants to repeal President Barack Obama’s signature climate policies—the Clean Power Plan and the Paris Agreement on global emissions reductions. If he is successful, we will need a Plan B that the Republicans cannot obstruct. That means turning to states and cities, and in a big way.
As he's packed his proposed Cabinet with wealthy white men, President-elect Donald Trump has been criticized for assembling an administration that doesn't look like America, much less the "forgotten men and women" on whose behalf he claimed to have campaigned.
Next week, Washington, D.C.’s municipal government will vote on new legislation that, if enacted, would guarantee people working in the District up to 11 weeks of paid leave to care for a new baby or child. But this is just the latest in a string of state and local governments taking action to address the needs of working parents and their families.[...]
In a new report, “Asset Value of Whiteness,” Demos and the Institute on Assets and Social Policy take a deep dive into the intrinsic link between racism and capitalism; specifically, how whiteness infests the so-called American dream and renders it inaccessible to anyone who doesn’t meet the pre-selected criteria.
A new report out this morning called The Asset Value of Whiteness: Understanding the Racial Wealth Gappurports to shatter traditional explanations for the lack of financial progress in African American and Latinx households as compared to white ones in the U.S.
With the court split 4-4 on this and other issues, the stakes couldn’t be higher. Mr. Gorsuch’s record suggests he’s not the person to shift the tide toward building a democracy in which the size of our wallets doesn’t determine the strength of our voices. Senators must press for clear answers.
More than 90 percent of voters (including 91 percent of Trump voters) say that it is important for Trump to nominate a Supreme Court justice open to limiting big money in politics.
Trumpcare is dead. President Donald Trump is humiliated and so is House Speaker Paul Ryan. The Democrats can hardly believe their luck: The Republicans have hobbled their own agenda, while Obamacare, aka the Affordable Care Act, lives to fight another day. But unlike the law’s previous brushes with death—most notably its bruising encounters with the Supreme Court in 2012 and 2015—this latest example of its resilience represents a turning point, if Democrats choose to seize the opportunity.