Small business owners, it turns out, are like everybody else. They are Democrats and Independents as well as Republicans. A few make a lot of money; others not nearly so much.
Tomorrow’s GDP numbers will likely show a growth rate around 1.9 percent. Economists predict that an increase in consumer spending will be what helps boost this quarter’s GDP growth rate, which is higher than last quarters’ increase of 1.3 percent. The quarterly GDP release is also a time when we again ask, what exactly are we measuring?
A corporation is a legal structure that enables individuals to contribute and pool resources, capital, and labor in order to generate a profit. Corporations are created by state law in the state in which they are incorporated.
The corporate legal structure receives a number of advantages and obligations from the state. These laws enable the corporation to overcome the limitations of any one individual—like a human lifespan or limited productive capacity—and to accumulate and distribute profits among the various stakeholders.
Happy Food Day! The Center for Science in the Public Interest has designated October 24 as a day “to address issues as varied as health and nutrition, hunger, agricultural policy, animal welfare, and farm worker justice.” It’s a good idea, and to mark the occasion, I’d share an organic apple from my CSA if I could.
The last presidential debate not only continued the silence on climate change, it also advanced the false narrative that we have to choose between economic growth and action on climate change. While the candidates focused on how to keep gas prices down, increase energy independence, and create jobs, they never addressed how we can use our energy plan to fight climate change. By refusing to address climate consequences, both candidates reinforce the idea that we either focus on economic growth or we focus on the environment, but not both.
The new Gilded Age is roaring down on us – an uncaged tiger on a rampage. Walk out to the street in front of our office here in Manhattan, look to the right and you can see the symbol of it: a fancy new skyscraper going up two blocks away. When finished, this high rise among high rises will tower a thousand feet, the tallest residential building in the city.
The credit reporting industry has given us plenty to complain about: credit reports too often contain errors, the errors are fiendishly hard to fix, reports and scores are not accessible enough to consumers, and credit information is increasingly being used for a variety of extraneous purposes, among numerous other problems (for the full bill of complaint, see my paper
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Civil and voting rights groups today commended Clear Channel Corporation for agreeing to take down a number of billboards placed in predominantly African-American and Latino neighborhoods in Cleveland, Columbus, and Milwaukee. The groups had mounted a campaign over the past week to persuade Clear Channel to take down the billboards, which warned of criminal penalties for voter fraud and were designed to stigmatize and intimidate minority voters. The billboards were anonymously financed.
COLUMBUS, OH – Voting rights, civil rights and labor organizations are joining forces to erect get-out-and-vote billboards in four Ohio and Wisconsin cities this week, pushing back against an anonymously-financed billboard campaign aimed at intimidating voters and depressing voter turnout.
Lorraine C. Minnite, a Rutgers University political scientist and a senior fellow at Demos, a liberal think tank, looked for a turnout effect in a 2009 paper she co-authored with Columbia University political scientist Robert S. Erikson. They didn't turn up definitive evidence, concluding, "our data and tools are not up to the task of making a compelling statistical argument for an effect."
Judging by all the complaints about the Dodd-Frank Act, you might think that Washington over reacted to the financial excesses of a few years ago and that the Feds can now ease up on Wall Street.
In fact, though, bad behavior among America's money men -- and yes, those doing wrong are typically men -- continues onward at a furious pace. Consider just the past month at the SEC:
Other outside dark money groups get the press, but the U.S. Chamber of Commerce gets results. That's because the Chamber, the biggest lobbying organization in the country, doesn't disclose its donors, among whom are the most powerful companies in the country. Those corporations use the Chamber's to anonymously funnell money into competitive races. In the beginning of October alone, they've spent almost $5 million dollars on political races. But that's not the source of their unmatched influence.
Four years ago, voter turnout was 49 percent -- the highest since 1968. Still, it remains to be seen if voters will come out in droves as they did during the election. To make sure that no avoidable factors -- ranging from intimidation to a lack of a photo ID -- keeps people at home on Nov. 6, five organizations are hitting the ground to do what they can to encourage all groups to get out and cast their ballots.
When it comes to climate change, there is one area in which the U.S. leads all other nations. Our media gives more time and attention to climate deniers than any other country. The study looked at five other countries besides the U.S.- Brazil, China, France, India and the UK- to see how leading newspapers in each country dealt with climate skepticism. It found that coverage of climate skepticism is mostly limited to the U.S. and to the U.K.
A new report out by the Citizens for Tax Justice offers further evidence of just how screwed up and porous our corporate tax system has become.
Big companies are making boatloads of money overseas and then often piling it up in tax havens. Which means that not only are they not paying U.S. taxes on these profits -- since taxes can be deferred until cash is brought home -- but nor are they paying taxes to foreign governments.
