News Blog

State pilot program will pay unhoused students $500 a month to go to school – KRQE Albuquerque

Students in need were paid $500 a month to stay in school. It worked. – msn/WaPost

“The payment program was pioneered by New Mexico Appleseed, a child poverty nonprofit that first tested the initiative in 2020. Only 51 percent of the state’s homeless students had graduated the year before, but in the test cohort, 13 of 14 seniors graduated — a 93 percent rate.

‘Now, leaders in New Mexico — which in 2023 had the highest child poverty rate in the nation and has about 10,000 homeless students — hope to test that success at Mayfield High and about a dozen other districts with a three-year pilot program. The initiative is the first of its kind, advocates say, and could become a national model for improving academic outcomes for homeless students.”

NWSLPA files grievance against league on Trinity Rodman contract offer – msn/ESPN

“At stake is the future of the NWSL’s biggest star and the league’s salary cap structure. Rodman’s previous contract was set to expire at the end of the month, and her impending decision was the focal point around the NWSL and its recent championship match in which she and the Washington Spirit participated…

“ESPN previously reported that Rodman has received multiple offers from European clubs that exceeded what NWSL teams could pay her due to the league’s salary cap. The cap in 2025, after adjustments for revenue sharing, was $3.5 million.”

Challenge: Identify examples of capitalism and socialism in the ‘Venn diagram’ of ways that the US women’s soccer league attempts to balance competition and cooperation among its own teams and players, and with foreign competitors. (Good luck.)

China has brought millions out of poverty. The US has not – by choice – Eduardo Porter/Guardian

“Despite the US’s economic success, income inequality remains breathtaking. But this is no glitch – it’s the system.”

“The poor’s share of the US economic pie is shrinking to developing-world levels. The income of Americans in the top 90th percentile of wealth grew more than twice as fast between 2000 and 2023 as that of Americans in the bottom 10th percentile. These days, Americans in the poorest 10th of the population draw about 1.8% of the nation’s income, about the same as poor Bolivians. In Nigeria, they reap 3%, in China 3.1%, in Bangladesh 3.7%…”

Jeff Bezos’s Very Own Editorial Page – American Prospect

“Shortly after he installed some longtime Rupert Murdoch polemicists to the top posts at The Washington Post, Jeff Bezos—the paper’s sole owner—also announced that the paper’s editorial pages would no longer feature a diversity of viewpoints, but become instead a megaphone for laissez-faire capitalism…”

Admiral who oversaw deadly boat strike appears in Congress – msn/WSJ

Family of victim in alleged Trump ‘drug boat’ killings files first formal complaint – Guardian

Family of man slain in a US boat strike in the Caribbean lodges complaint – Al Jazeera

“Family of Colombian fisherman Alejandro Carranza say his right to life was violated in US ‘narco-terrorist’ strikes.“

If killing defenseless people on Caribbean speed boats presents moral and legal problems for the US, multiply by 1,000 and look carefully at what Israel is doing with billions of $$ of US military aid in Gaza.

How Trump’s trillion-dollar war machine enriches the 1% – Popular Information

They could be a start:

Michael and Susan Dell donate $6.25 billion to encourage families to claim ‘Trump Accounts’ – AP

But there’s a long way to go. CCSE analysis of ‘Trump account’ legislation:

‘Trump kids accounts’ in budget bill would drive up inequality and raise the national debt

“…Congress should go back to the drawing board and develop savings and investment vehicles that include all Americans, including young people capable of making financial decisions. Unfair gaps in existing programs should be fixed before new ones are created. Financial security systems subsidized by taxpayers should dampen growing inequality and not add fuel to the fire.”

Click here for one way to set up a universal savings and investment system.

In a dramatic shift, Americans no longer see four-year college degrees as worth the cost – NBC

Young Men Refuse to Fight in the Hunger Games Economy – John Ehrett/Commonplace

“…Getting the diagnosis correct is the first step. Randomness and chance are, of course, facts of life. But the economy—and society as a whole—should not be experienced as a perpetual casino where success and failure become untethered from rational decision-making. The ‘gales of creative destruction’ can sometimes blow too fiercely. And a humane conservatism—one that truly cares for the well-being of our nation’s young people—must take this to heart.”

2,000 Des Moines area UnityPoint nurses to vote on unionization this month – Iowa Capital Dispatch

“Alano De La Rosa, the principal officer for Teamsters Local 90, which includes the Des Moines area and reaches into many other Iowa counties, said nurses will be able to negotiate with the full force of the Teamsters Union behind them. This includes a $400 million national strike fund, he said…”

A pregnant worker in a warehouse needs a bathroom break…

Fighting for Amazon’s Employees: Lawsuits and Organizing – Power At Work Blogcast

This episode delves into two lawsuits brought by New Jersey’s Attorney General alleging Amazon has broken the laws protecting its workers, as well as Teamsters Union efforts to organize Amazon delivery drivers and others.

Virginia Democrats are poised to take the reins. Here’s what’s on the General Assembly’s docket. – Virginian-Pilot

“Democrats, who will enjoy a trifecta, holding the governor’s mansion and majorities in both chambers of the legislature come January, have filed familiar bills on progressive policies such as raising the state’s minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2028 and paid family and sick leave. Undeterred by Democratic majorities, some Republicans have begun to introduce legislation lowering taxes and expanding law enforcement powers…”

CCSE work on paid sick days:

All Workers Should Have A Few Paid Sick Days. The President And Congress Can Make It Happen – Health Affairs

What about a few paid sick days? Are low-wage workers simply invisible to Virginia’s elected leaders?

Measuring the space between poverty and a middle-class income for families raising kids:

An investor called $140,000 the new poverty line. Experts disagreed but said he had a point. – msn/WaPost

“The U.S. poverty line, the number that the Department of Health and Human Services says is necessary to keep a family out of poverty, is $32,150 for a family of four. Green says it should be more than four times that — a figure that would mean the majority of American households are living ‘in poverty,’ by his metric…

“’…This is unfortunately very much the lived experience for people who are trapped in that valley of death,’ Green said, the term he applied for when people earn too much to qualify for benefits like food stamps and Medicaid, but too little in his view to afford necessities. He sees that ‘valley’ as being inhabited by people earning between about $40,000 and $100,000, or even more in high-cost areas…

“The Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s state-by-state Living Wage Calculator says that in Maryland, for instance, two working adults with two children need an income of $129,572 to afford food, child care, housing, transportation and other expenses. The left-leaning Economic Policy Institute says that for a ‘modest but adequate standard of living,’ a family needs $139,524 to pay for housing, child care, health care, food and transportation in the D.C. metro area, or a little over $100,000 in Birmingham, Alabama, or Cleveland, or $84,019 in El Paso.”

So… Congress: How about those ACA exchange subsidies and where to put the cap?

Target’s layoff push exposes corporate America’s cold new normal – msn

“Target’s latest round of white-collar layoffs is not just a story about one retailer trimming costs. It is a window into how large employers now treat corporate staff as a flexible expense line, even after years of record profits and aggressive hiring. What looks like a one-off restructuring at a big-box chain instead reflects a harsher, more transactional playbook that is spreading across corporate America…”

$426M Tyson Beef Collapse Shuts Nebraska’s Biggest Plant—Entire Town Loses 4,900 Workers – msn

Texas Faces Largest Job Loss in Years as 1,300 Laid Off in Cascading Cuts

September’s Job Data is Finally Out—Here’s What It Revealed – Investopedia

Unemployment Rates By State 10/21/2025 – Forbes

Sunday, November 30, 2025

Trump admin selling off historic public art to the highest bidder – Alternet

“It is a tragic irony that murals meant to represent the contract between the government and its citizens—the Social Security that over 70 million Americans rely on today—would be sold to the highest bidder rather than preserved for posterity. The Cohen building is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, which should require a review and consultation before it’s sold or torn down—but wasn’t that also true of the White House’s historic East Wing? While the nonprofit Living New Deal has taken steps to intervene and issued a petition to save the murals, the administration’s ‘move fast and break things’ ethos may run roughshod over due process.

“So it must be said: The Cohen murals, like all New Deal art, were made by and belong to the people. They tell us about who we’ve been, who we are, and who we aspire to be. Preserving them would not only steward a significant chapter of American cultural history—itself a civic responsibility—but also keep alive the New Deal dream of social security for all, especially for society’s most vulnerable.”

Talks with Authors: Born Equal: Remaking America’s Constitution, 1840–1920 – AEI

“In Born Equal: Remaking America’s Constitution, 1840–1920, Prof. Akhil Reed Amar traces the arc of American constitutional debate from the post-Founding era to the Progressive Era, focusing especially on America’s fundamental question raised originally by our Declaration of Independence: what does it mean to say that all men and women are ‘created equal’?”

To determine the framers’ intent, Amar says it is important to consider historical circumstances along with the dictionary meaning of words in the Constitution. More than two centuries later, much has changed. For example, unlike President George Washington or King George III, today the president of the United States has the physical capability to destroy much of the human race in a matter of hours.

Would you buy a bond…

…from one of these guys?

Welcome to the New Era of U.S. Debt, Where the Bond Market is King – Heather Long/Peterson Foundation

“…history shows there is almost always a moment when the bond market finally speaks decisively. By then, the tough choices to fix the situation are harsh. Just ask Liz Truss.”

Debt to GDP Ratio by Country 2025 – World Population Review

Excerpt from the 1926 novel “The Sun Also Rises” by Ernest Hemingway, U.S. author, winner of Nobel Prize in Literature:

“How did you go bankrupt?” Bill asked.

“Two ways,” Mike said. “Gradually and then suddenly.”

“What brought it on?”

“Friends,” said Mike. “I had a lot of friends. False friends. Then I had creditors, too. Probably had more creditors than anybody in England.”

A ‘tale of two retirements’ shows only the rich are saving more — while most Americans are putting away much less – msn

“Workers making less than $50,000 saw the steepest drops — with participation in an employer or individual retirement plan moving from 58% in 2022 to 52.9% in 2024, and their overall savings rate dropping from 4.9% to 4.6% over that time, Dayforce found. In fact, workers earning $150,000 to $250,000 a year contributed nearly 13 times more money toward retirement each year than those earning under $50,000, the study found…

“If the retirement system continues as it is, there will be increased elder poverty,” said Matt Bahl, vice president at the Financial Health Network. “It’s going to be harder and harder for people not earning high six figures to save for retirement.”

The US should follow the example of countries including Great Britain and Australia which have set up retirement savings systems that include all workers:

Including all workers in our retirement savings system requires two things: a universal tax credit and a secure place to invest it. Congress should be working on both. – Karl Polzer/CCSE … op-ed

Black Friday, 2025:

Has the K-shaped economy become a Jenga tower?

How the K-Shaped Economy Is Hurting Everyone But the Rich – msn/Bloomberg

“The US has experienced rising inequality for decades, but the difference in spending patterns among consumers that has unfolded in the past year is raising concern among some economists that the current balance might ultimately lead to a downturn. Consumer spending, which drives two-thirds of US economic activity, is more concentrated among the wealthiest 10% of Americans than ever before. About half of all spending is fueled by those earners, and the top 20% account for almost two-thirds of all spending. The bottom 80%, which made up nearly 42% of spending before the pandemic, now accounts for just 37% of it, according to Moody’s Analytics.”

4 charts show who’s feeling good about the economy — and who isn’t – msn/WaPost

Most Americans continue to rate the U.S. economy negatively as partisan gap widens – Pew

Why health savings accounts aren’t the fix Republicans hope for – Yahoo!/WaPost

“Experts say individual savings accounts are no replacement for insurance for anyone with an expensive medical condition like cancer, diabetes or pregnancy. Treating those conditions can cost far more than the $6,600 annual subsidy collected by the average subsidized marketplace consumer, according to KFF, a nonpartisan health research organization. Except for the wealthiest Americans, it would be almost impossible for these patients to save enough money.”

Five Reasons Lawmakers Should Reject Expansions of Health Savings Accounts – CBPP