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Outside money transforms California’s income inequality, among the worst in the country, into political inequality.

Hundreds of non-partisan organizations came together for National Voter Registration Day to ensure that hundreds of thousands of Americans will be able to exercise their freedom to vote and make their voices heard this upcoming November.

One article of faith in contemporary political life is that conservatives side with business and progressives are far less friendly to the private sector. 

In many ways, this is true -- judging by the battle lines in Washington, where groups like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Federation of Independent Businesses nearly always back the Republican Party. 

A new study finds that climate change is already contributing to 400,000 deaths per year and costing the world more than $1.2 trillion, or 1.6 percent of global GDP. The report was commissioned by 20 governments and written by more than 50 scientists, economists and policy experts. In the report, the authors detail how the vast majority of deaths occur in developing countries and that the world’s poorest communities within lower and middle-income communities are most exposed to climate change risks.

Thomas Edsell has a column in Sunday's New York Times -- "What's Wrong With Pennsylvania?" -- that explores how various factors have conspired to make the state uncompetitive for Mitt Romney. 

A new report from the Congressional Research Service looks how a carbon tax could be used for deficit reduction or other fiscal measures. The CRS projects that a tax rate of $20 per metric ton of carbon dioxide would generate approximately $88 billion in 2012 and up to $144 billion by 2020. This would be enough to cut the 10-year budget deficit in half under the 2012 baseline CBO projection.

Our long, national nightmare is over. Well, for NFL fans at least. After a protracted negotiation, NFL referees will maintain access to their defined pension plans...for a few more years. When a union wins the support of noted laborphobe Scott Walker, you'd think they'd be on their way. Alas:

The historic elections taking place this November will not just decide what candidates win or lose, or even "just" what policy directions our states and country will take. They will also be a test for democracy itself.

Say you want to buy a house or a car and you need a loan to do it. You do what every personal finance site recommends and obtain a free copy of your credit report from annualcreditreport.com.

It appears that the German Bundestag is ready to impose meaningful limits on high-frequency trading, or ”HFT.”

This is a very big deal.

Perhaps the volume hasn't been quite as loud as it was in 2008, perhaps a lot of the discussion has been subsumed into coded language, but the 2012 presidential election is still very much about redistribution: when it's fair, when it isn't, and, perhaps most importantly from a political perspective, whether Americans like it.

An important component to the student debt crisis involves law and medical school enrollees. Many of the students preparing to enter these professions are looking at six figures worth of loans, according to a study by Finaid.orgs's Mark Kantrowitz.

One of the few thin­gs that President Obama and Mitt Romney are likely to agree on when they debate next week is the need for tax reform. Both candidates have backed streamlining America’s crazy-quilt tax code, and both have said that reforms could boost economic growth. Meanwhile, two key congressional committees held a rare bipartisan hearing last week – with lawmakers from both parties saying that tax reform is needed to rev up the economy.

For years, many thoughtful people -- progressive thinkers, anti-hunger advocates, and business executives at the mercy of energy and food prices -- have appealed for relief from rampant speculation that distorts the commodities markets. Such speculation makes traders rich, but burdens American households, hurts businesses, and leads to empty bellies in areas throughout the world that are dependent on food imports.

It is always nice when a major newspaper points out one of the most obvious facts in Washington today: Which is that the main stumbling block to deficit reduction lies on the right, where ideologues won't give an inch on taxes and thus doom any realistic compromise to reduce the deficit -- compromise that must include a combination of spending cuts and additional revenue. 

In other words, it is precisely the people who complain loudest about rising debt who most obstruct any solution to this problem. 

We hear so much about polarization these days, that it can be easy to forget that Americans are actually quite unified around certain core values -- most notably, the importance of work, community, and individual responsibility.

The problems posed by unpredictable work schedules are starting to get attention, and it's about time. As Susan Lambert recently wrote in a New York Times op-ed, such schedules are increasingly the norm for low-income workers.

Yesterday brought the sad news that noted environmental advocate and scholar, Barry Commoner, had passed away. As pointed out in the many tributes to his life and achievements, Commoner was one of the founders of modern environmentalism and embraced a more complex, holistic view of environmental issues.

This morning saw a big victory for Pennsylvania’s voters when a judge partially enjoined Pennsylvania’s strict new voter ID law in advance of next month’s elections.  Pennsylvania’s voters will not have to show a photo ID in order to vote a regular ballot this November. This victory will remove an unnecessary burden that threatened the freedom to vote for tens of thousands of voters this fall.