Crisis

A Greedy Economy On Borrowed Time: America Under The Sword Of Damocles

September 29, 2018 Jon Jeter, Mintpressnews.com Educate! Crisis, Finance and the Economy

NEW YORK — On the afternoon of December 31, 1999, I boarded a flight from Chicago O’Hare airport for San Francisco International and found myself seated next to a bear of a man, who, at 6 feet 6 inches tall, and more than 300 pounds, squeezed into the middle seat of an emergency row. His unkempt sandy blonde beard contrasted with a ratty, tent-sized red plaid shirt. As we hit cruising altitude, he introduced himself as “Gary” and began to tell me his life’s story. He’d run with a wild crowd in Illinois, smoked way too much meth, gotten locked up, then released, locked up again, released a second time. With the help of a good woman, he said, he finally kicked his drug habit — though he’d gained nearly 100 pounds in the process — and decided a change-of-scenery would do him good. Hence, he was relocating to the backwoods of northern California.

America Traded One Recession For A Far More Serious One

September 27, 2018 Michael E. Porter, Bostonglobe.com Educate! Capitalism, Crisis, Recession, United States

The headline economic indicators – GDP growth, the unemployment rate, the stock market — all say that the United States is in the midst of a sustained economic expansion that was slow to develop after the Great Recession. But a deeper look at US performance offers far less cause for celebration. America is mired in a social progress recession. Data from the Social Progress Index, the first ever rigorous measurement of social performance across a broad range of indicators and all major countries, reveals that the quality of life and opportunities for many Americans is lagging. The fact is that our country is failing on many of the things we hold most dear. And it’s getting worse. The Social Progress Index focuses exclusively on social outcomes (not spending or inputs), capturing key aspects of quality of life, including health, water and sanitation, personal safety, education, and environmental quality.

How Unions Can Solve The Housing Crisis

September 27, 2018 Erik Forman, Inthesetimes.com Create! Crisis, History, Housing, Unions

DR. JAMES PETER WARBASSE OPINED in the journal Co-operation, “Once the people of New York City lived in their own houses, but those days have gone. ... The houses are owned by landlords who conduct them, not for the purpose of domiciling the people in health and comfort, but for the single purpose of making money out of tenants.” That was in 1919. A century later, things have gone from bad to worse. A quarter of U.S. households pay more than half their income in rent. In New York City, homelessness has hit record levels. Most activists can reel off a list of demands to address the housing crisis: rent control, community land trusts, affordable housing development. But one of the most effective strategies has been forgotten. A century ago, the labor movement in New York City planned and executed a bluntly practical solution to the problem of housing: Build it.

Puerto Rico One Year Later: We’re Fighting For Justice And Prosperity

September 27, 2018 By Amira Odeh, 350.org Create! Crisis, Hurricanes, Natural Disasters, Puerto Rico

As the wind blew I could hear things falling and breaking outside. The walls of my (concrete-built) home were vibrating and water was coming in through every single window and door. At the moment I could only think of how to prepare for the worst and to be ready to seek refuge inside a closet or a bathroom. On September 20, 2017, I was fighting to keep my home and family safe during those long 24 hours that we endured Hurricane Maria. I would have never imagined what the next year would look like.

Get Ready For Another Crash

September 26, 2018 By John Feffer, Inequality.org Educate! Capitalism, Crisis, Deregulation, New Economy, Uneven Development

You might remember that phrase from the 1990s. Alan Greenspan, the head of the Federal Reserve at the time, was describing how the tech boom was creating a bubble by generating enthusiasm way out of proportion to the actual value of the new companies. Such an unwarranted economic boom was hardly something new, so it was easy to predict what would happen next. Periods of irrational exuberance — whether the dot-com expansion, Dutch tulipmania in the 17th century, or the housing bubble in America of the 2000s — have always led to a sudden crash and a serious hangover. And now, here we go again. Trump, always exuberant when talking about himself and his putative accomplishments, loves to boast about how well the American economy is chugging along.

Why Sustainability Is No Longer Enough, Yet Still Very Important On The Road To Regeneration

September 24, 2018 Daniel Christian Wahl, Medium.com Create! Climate Change, Crisis, Sustainability

For many people achieving sustainability might seem already like a visionary goal that is difficult to reach. Yet, we need to do even better to respond adequately to the converging crises ahead. Just looking at the situation with regard to climate change alone, we have to now face the reality that we are in the midst of dangerous run-away (self-reinforcing) climate change. The window of opportunity to avoid catastrophic irreversible climate change is closing. In reality there are already many climate catastrophes affecting people and biodiversity around the world. Maybe we should speak of ‘irreversible cataclysmic climate change’ as that is what we are rushing towards if we do not fundamentally redesign the human presence and impact on Earth.

On the 10th Anniversary Of Lehman Brothers 2008: Can ‘IT’ Happen Again?

September 21, 2018 Jack Rasmus, Counterpunch.org Educate! 2008 crash, Capitalism, Crisis

This past weekend, September 15-16, marked the 10th anniversary of the Lehman Brothers Investment bank collapse and the subsequent generalized financial system crash that followed. Business and mainstream media flooded the airwaves and print publications with recounts and assessments of the events of ten years past. Most promoted the theme about how the Federal Reserve central bank and the US Treasury rescued us all from another 1930s-like depression. The corollary message is that ‘IT’ can’t happen today because of the various reforms instituted in the wake of the crash that now prevent the repeat of something similar like 2008. Buried in the reviews of 2008 events is the sticky question of whether the investment bank, Lehman Brothers, should have been allowed to fail—as the US Treasury Secretary, Hank Paulson, and the chair of the Federal Reserve, Ben Bernanke, decided to allow.

Ten Years After The Financial Crisis, The Contagion Has Spread To Democracy Itself

September 18, 2018 Zach Carter, Huffingtonpost.com Resist! Crisis, Finance

By the time Lehman Brothers filed for the largest bankruptcy in American history on Sept. 15, 2008, the country had been navigating stormy global financial waters for more than a year. Bear Stearns had been rescued in a bailout-facilitated merger with JPMorgan Chase, and the government had nationalized housing giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. For anyone paying attention to the financial system, the situation had been quite dire for a long time. And yet throughout the mess, the Federal Reserve and the U.S. Treasury had been permitting the largest banks in the country to funnel as much cash as they wanted to their shareholders ― even as it became clear those same banks could not pay their debts. Lehman itself had increased its dividend and announced a $100 million stock buyback at the beginning of 2008.

Why Hurricane Florence Could Become A Public Health Crisis

September 18, 2018 By Jessica A. Knoblauch, Earthjustice.org Educate! Crisis, Hurricane Florence, Hurricanes, Public Health

In the path of the storm are giant pits filled with coal ash, lagoons swirling with hog manure, Superfund sites and industrial facilities stocked with toxic chemicals. People in the southeastern U.S. are facing life threatening winds and rains from Hurricane Florence. Less obvious, but also of great concern, is the public health threat posed by a variety of contaminated sites located around the region. These include giant pits filled with coal ash, a byproduct of burning coal that contains toxic chemicals like arsenic and lead; lagoons swirling with hog manure from factory farms; hazardous waste dumps known as Superfund sites; and industrial facilities stocked with thousands of pounds of toxic chemicals. Many pollution-filled pits in the region are not as hardened against the potential for storms and other emergencies as the public would expect. Coal ash is a case in point.

Retrospectives Of The Financial Crisis Are Leaving Out The Most Important Part—Its Victims

September 17, 2018 David Dayen, Inthesetimes.com Educate! Capitalism, Crisis, Finance, Revisionism

Because I’m a masochist, I’ve read as many retrospectives as I could about the 10th anniversary of the fateful failure of Lehman Brothers, the emblematic event of the financial crisis. And I can’t help but notice a gaping hole in the narratives. I’ve heard from Lew Ranieri, the Salomon Brothers trader who invented the mortgage bond in the 1980s, and now regrets it. I’ve heard bailout architects Ben Bernanke, Hank Paulson, and Tim Geithner justify their beliefs in doing whatever it took to save the banks. I’ve endured you-are-there narratives about bankers and policymakers racing to rescue the financial system. Wonks, pundits, and reporters have all offered thoughts on the crisis’ origins, the response, and its ultimate meaning. It seems the only people not consulted for their perspective were those most powerfully affected by the crisis’ impact...

Under Trump, The Next Financial Catastrophe Is Cooking

September 15, 2018 By Lynn Parramore, Ineteconomics.org Educate! Capitalism, Crisis, Trump

At summer’s end, the U.S. economy looks to be sizzling. Unemployment is low. Growth is higher than expected. Consumer confidence is soaring and Wall Street just set a record bull run. “We are crushing it,” Trump’s economic advisor Larry Kudlow recently boasted. The euphoria feels a bit like… just before the crash of 2007-8. Does that worry you? It should. Hold onto your 401(k)s, because the Wall Street casino that nearly tanked the global economy ten years ago is up and running amok again. But what about the much-touted safeguards in place today? It’s true that in 2010, the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act was passed to ensure that taxpayers would never again be on the hook to bailout of big financial institutions.

Conjuring Up The Next Depression

September 11, 2018 By Chris Hedges, Truthdig.com Educate! Capitalism, Crisis, New Economy

During the financial crisis of 2008, the world’s central banks, including the Federal Reserve, injected trillions of dollars of fabricated money into the global financial system. This fabricated money has created a worldwide debt of $325 trillion, more than three times global GDP. The fabricated money was hoarded by banks and corporations, loaned by banks at predatory interest rates, used to service interest on unpayable debt or spent buying back stock, providing millions in compensation for elites. The fabricated money was not invested in the real economy. Products were not manufactured and sold. Workers were not reinstated into the middle class with sustainable incomes, benefits and pensions. Infrastructure projects were not undertaken.

To Stop The Next Financial Crisis, We Need Public Ownership Of Banks—Now

September 10, 2018 Thomas M. Hanna, Inthesetimes.com Create! Banks, Crisis, Finance

In mid-September, a secret party is scheduled to take place in London. The participants will be hundreds of alumni from the defunct global investment bank Lehman Brothers. The occasion? The 10-year anniversary of the bank’s collapse in the midst of the Great Financial Crisis. For many Americans, the sight of those very same bankers walking out into the streets of New York City in 2008, with cardboard boxes containing their belongings and shocked looks on their faces, was the first sign that something was truly wrong. But the subsequent publicly funded rescue of America’s giant financial corporations and the “1 percent” demonstrated how unable and unwilling the nation’s political leadership was to address that wrong by fundamentally reshaping the industry responsible for the crisis in the first place. A decade later, we are still experiencing the political, economic and social ramifications of that failure.

The Suicide Of Capitalism

August 17, 2018 Steven Jonas, Greanvillepost.com Educate! Capitalism, Crisis

Capitalism, the world’s dominant socio-economic system, is in the process of killing itself. Like the cleaner of a loaded hand-gun, capitalism thinks that there is absolutely nothing to worry about, that whatever it’s doing will result in no harmful outcomes, and that anyone who tells it not to do such a thing is a hoaxer of the worst order. Inadvertently killing oneself with a loaded handgun is bad enough. What capitalism is doing of course is far worse. Not only will it kill itself as a system, but it will likely take our species along with many others right along with it.

How The Ultrarich Can Help Fix The Affordable Housing Crisis

July 31, 2018 By Chuck Collins, Yesmagazine.org Create! Affordable Housing, Crisis, New Economy

A growing number of people invest in real estate they never intend to occupy and push up prices for the rest of us. Cities should make them pay. Down the street from my office, a luxury residential tower is rising, the fifth such project in Boston in the last decade. The 61-story “One Dalton Place” is being marketed as “New England’s tallest and most luxurious residential building.” Across the coastal cities of North America, cranes are rising to construct similar stunning new glass towers of both residential and commercial properties. Real estate in existing neighborhoods is being bid up by investors and wealthy buyers, pushing up the cost of land and housing for everyone else. A high percentage of these housing units will sit empty or rarely occupied. In Boston’s luxury Millennium Tower, for example, only 25 percent of the units are considered the occupants’ principal residence.

«1 2 3 4 5 »

Daily movement news and resources