Two good Ideas

This post on CT has two excellent ideas to alleviate poverty and the concentration of wealth in our society. One, index the minimum wage to inflation now that we have a Congress and President who are sympathetic. It will be hard for Republican to reverse this if they assume power again (right) by which time its positive effect on spending and consumption will surely be felt. Secondly, increasing the level and income access to the earned income tax credit (EITC) will also pay dividends in terms of buying power for lower and middle income workers and it promotes employment over welfare which is popular on both sides of the aisle. Here's a breakdown of the EITC distribution in terms of income and family size:

Health Care Reform Now!

This article provides some absolutely stunning data about the state of our health care system after the last eight years. The price of health care has risen fully 6 times more than wages have since 1999 while the average contributions paid by both employers and employees have doubled. This system is not only unjust, it's costing American business, consumers, and government far more than any benefits we are supposed to be receiving from competition in the marketplace. Our present private system is wasteful from a pareto efficient standpoint not to mention the obvious inequities in creates between have and have nots. Even if a public system were to pay the same rates to doctors and hospitals that private payers do, which would likely be unnecessary in a universal system, there would still be a 9% cost savings based on a more efficient delivery of services. Ridiculous.

Paper of record?

I'm not sure when and how the NY Times became cast as a 'liberal' news source. It's indicative, I think, of how much influence a few well placed conservative pundits have had on the political discourse in this country and the well intentioned but the passive way the American journalistic establishment has reacted to that pressure. I'm glad to see that recently we've has some push back on that score, the result of which for me anyway is that the mainstream media will have to start doing their jobs again. In some cases, they're resisting as this story indicates.

Maybe we didn't see the same episodes..

Best description that I've heard in a long time of libertarians (from a Crooked Timber comment):

Libertarianism is politics for over-age Star Trek fans. The real world of real people is ignored in favor of a fantasy land where sweeping abstractions trump actual results. It is a flight from the messiness of everyday life. Why do you think so many libertarians identify with Spock? No messy emotion and the illusion of disinterested analysis. To be fair to the Trekkies there is a lot of libertarian overlap with space colonizers (don’t like the rules on this orbital pod? Start your own!), D&D players and so on. All a retreat from compromise and practicality.

Will they nationalize Citi Field?

Any bets on what they call Citi Field when Citi Bank goes down? Stimulus Stadium, TARP Field, Geithner's Yard? Well stadiums have been renamed when companies have gone bankrupt before, its just another part of post modern city life having our public spaces branded and re-branded. But what would be the scenario if a sponsor became nationalized?

Please forgive me, all baseball related posts should be over now, or at least until the season becomes interesting.

The Neoliberal Yankees

The voters of NYC, Yankee fans or no, are now on the hook for $372 million in tax free bonds, helping one of the richest franchises in sports, with a payroll of over $200 million, build a stadium they most assuredly would have built there anyway. I mean, can you imagine the New Jersey Yankees drawing the same amount for box seats? There was never a credible threat to leave as so much of the Yankee's identity is tied to the city.

Based on entertainment projects that have occurred in cities lately, the likelihood that this project will return the revenue that the Yankees have promised is close to nil. Historically, cities have needed to chase projects like these because of the mobility of capital and competitive pressure placed on them by other cities. In this case, the Yankees need the city as much as the city needs the Yankees. I suspect that a good deal of the Yankee merchandise you see is worn because of its connection to the city as much as it is to the team. We've allowed sports franchises to be the specific purview of private interests as if they had no connection to cities for which they play. Are they just that, or can we return to looking at them as public goods the decisions about which the citizens of a city must have a say.

Factor in the pay-off seats allegedly supplied to members of the Bloomberg Administration for fast tracking the project, and what you see is another give away to big business at the expense of the common tax payer. New York is managed by a billionaire former CEO acting on behalf of the interests of his class (more luxury seating, fewer over all seats) and using the power of his office to ensure that there is little if any scrutiny over a $1.3 billion project. The citizens of New York, like so many other cities, have divested themselves of participatory government and corporate interests have taken control.

Meanwhile, the local kids living close to the stadium lose their own playing field and get a huge parking lot in return. I was reminded of a visual essay by Bill Moyers last fall that pretty much summed my thoughts on this. It seems even more absurd given the current climate.

Executive compensation

Nice round up of executive pay of the largest publicly owned companies in the US in the NY Times today. Reads like a who's who of rich white men. I was happy to see that Steve Jobs was near the bottom of the list despite Apple's recent successes. Makes me an even prouder owner.