The counter to this neoliberal vision involves, then, a more thorough moral critique—and a more transformative policy agenda—that tackles the underlying forces of corporate power, market inequities, structural racism, and anti-democratic political institutions. That progressives are finally talking in these expansive terms represents a potentially transformative inflection point in American politics.
While Demos celebrates the legislation’s strong mandate on emissions reductions, the governor’s exclusion of community investment mandates and labor standards prolongs the fight for climate justice in New York and nationwide.
“This is a problem that has not gone away but has gotten worse in many communities. It’s enough of a problem that people expect some action on it, and they expect some plan for how to get there.”
Demos’ Race-Class Narrative (RCN) project developed an empirically-tested narrative on race and class that resonates with all working people and offers an alternative to—and neutralizes the use of—dog-whistle racism.
Baltimore’s campaign donors lack diversity across race, gender, and socioeconomic status. The Baltimore Fair Election Fund, designed with equity and community engagement at the forefront, can change that.
"On today’s anniversary, we encourage voters from all walks of life who have faced barriers to voting to visit WeVoteWeCount.org to share their story."
"It’s also clear what we must do: restore the race-conscious protections of the Voting Rights Act and enact affirmative measures to expand ballot access across the country."
Immigrants must be encouraged to respond to the Census to ensure that their communities are fully counted and that they receive the full share of federal resources to which they are entitled.
Hundreds of thousands of families lost their homes because of loans that were often not fully explained or under¬stood. Beyond the Mortgage Meltdown distills the origins and nature of the crisis in the housing market. Senior Fellow James Lardner highlights the complicity of regulators and lawmakers in the genesis of the mortgage epidemic, and warns that bolder steps will be needed to stem the rate of foreclosures along with its broader economic impact to protect both markets and consumers against future catastrophe.
Part of a Demos series of reports on deregulation showing that often the most significant impact is on the quality and reliability of work — in this case, on port trucking.
Since the Spring of 2007 and continuing into the Summer of 2009, Public Works: The Demos Center for the Public Sector and the Topos Partnership have collaborated on a Ford Foundation-funded effort to create a new public conversation on the role of government in the economy. This effort has included a wide range of qualitative and quantitative research efforts, spanned a period of dramatic change in the national economic landscape, and built on earlier research conducted by Topos principals concerning the public's view of government and public understandings of low wage work.
Paving the Way is part of a larger effort undertaken by the Topos Partnership and Public Works to create more constructive public dialog about public policy and economic outcomes. Promoting Broad Prosperity contains the complete findings and recommendations from this body of research.
Taxes support the government services that undergird the quality of life Americans enjoy. As communicators, we must promote this unique and foundational role that taxes play. We can do this by explicitly communicating the relationship between the purpose of taxes and the well-being Americans appreciate. We need to help people see taxes as a means to an end, a necessary part of how we achieve shared goals. This document helps achieve this by providing sample language and a checklist for communicating about taxes.
How the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Actwill bring greater security to American consumers, investors and Main Street businesses.
This guide includes strategies for defending public services and the revenues needed to support them. Produced during the anti-government, budget-slashing political climate of 2010-2011, this report advocates for affirming the role of public services, systems, and structures. It examines dominant narratives about public budget challenges, and offers lessons from success stories in several states. Ultimately, Americans must reconnect the dots between the shared goals and desires they have for their communities and the public tools and resources necessary to achieve them.
