Now is the time for citizens, workers, employers, and policymakers to come together once again to rebuild pathways to the middle class, create good jobs with fair pay and decent benefits, and ensure that prosperity is broadly shared for the next generation.
For decades, GDP has enjoyed supreme status as the predominant benchmark of our economic and social progress. In reality, GDP obscures or ignores essential aspects of Americans’ economic and social welfare, as well as important social and environmental dimensions of our national welfare and future well-being.
For four decades, the Supreme Court’s flawed approach to money in politics has gutted common-sense protections against the power of special interests and wealthy individuals. This defies our core democratic values.
The dominance of big money in our politics makes it far harder for people of color to exert political power and effectively advocate for their interests as both wealth and power are consolidated by a small, very white, share of the population.
In August 2011, Congress passed a strange piece of legislation intended to bind itself into the future. In spite of persistently high unemployment and an unremarkable deficit-to-GDP ratio, and in spite of public polling that consistently showed that creating jobs was the American public’s top priority, politicians inside the infamous Washington “Beltway” had spent months locked in a debate over ways to cut deficits and balance the federal budget—policies that would not create jobs and by some estimates would put millions out of work.
Connecticut has offered a voluntary public financing system for state-wide constitutional and General Assembly offices since 2008. Through financing from the Citizens' Election Fund, candidates that obtain the required number of small donations can receive a lump sum to fund their campaign. The program is very popular and in 2012, 77 percent of successful candidates were publicly financed.
A picture of the current state of the private retirement system, why this picture bodes ill for the future of retirement in the country, and why that system needs reform.
NEW: SECOND EDITION. "Retiring in the Red" is part of the Borrowing to Make Ends Meet Briefing Paper Series. Reports an 89% average increase in credit card debt among America's seniors from 1992 to 2001. Key Findings:
How Maine can use deposits of state tax revenue to tilt the economic playing field back toward Main Street businesses, our community banks, and long-term job growth.
This report reveals the extent of credit information “mission creep,” examines troubling shortcomings in the for-profit credit reporting industry, and recommends common sense steps to reform the credit reporting system.
America needs an election process that is efficient, trustworthy, and welcoming. We need a renewed sense of citizenship and service, and a government that people can believe in.
To increase postsecondary success among low- to moderate-income students, we must reform financial aid and provide additional financial supports to help students cover the cost of living expenses.
States are failing low-income communities and our nation's democracy by not adequately complying with federal law that requires human services agencies to provide voter registration services.
