Skip to content

Recession

The Movement Gets Big – And Its Enemies Reveal Themselves

The scope and intensity of the convulsion that has shaken the United States since the police murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis on Memorial Day, is breathtaking. Hundreds of thousands of people of all ethnicities have participated in actions ranging from silent vigils to pitched battles with police in at least 140 cities, by the New York Times’ estimate – or nearly 500 localities nationwide, according to a marvelously detailed Wikipedia page. The National Guard has been called out in 26 states and Washington, DC, and U.S. Army units, including a battalion of paratroopers from the 82nd airborne division, await deployment to cities by the self-proclaimed “law and order president,” Donald Trump. 

‘Misclassification Error’ Is Making Unemployment Rate Look Lower Than It Really Is

Buried at the bottom of the Bureau of Labor Statistics' May jobs report—which President Donald Trump and Republican lawmakers touted Friday as evidence that the U.S. economy is rebounding from the Covid-19 crisis at an extraordinary clip—is a note conceding that a "misclassification error" during the agency's data-collection process made the unemployment rate look significantly lower than it really is. BLS, a Labor Department agency staffed with more than 2,000 career officials, admitted at the end of its report that "a large number of workers... were classified as employed but absent from work." Those workers, the agency explained, should have been classified as "unemployed on temporary layoff" by household survey interviewers but were not.

Lee Camp: Robert Scheer On The Fall Of American Journalism

Robert Scheer is a veteran journalist with a legacy of fearless reporting on the US Empire. Lee interviews Scheer in this special episode of VIP. They discuss the anti-China sentiment in the US, the fanfare of the two party political system, the state of the US economy and how it contributed to Trump's victory, the insane size of the military industrial complex, Russiagate, and more. Natalie McGill reveals the origins of the US Pledge of Allegiance. It evolved from a salute to the flag from a Civil War veteran, to a children's magazines attempt to get kids pumped about Christopher Columbus, to a patriotic group's jingoistic push to strengthen nationalism.

Black Misleaders Seek To End Protest

The aftermath of George Floyd’s murder at the hands of Minneapolis, Minnesota police has created a national political crisis. The revulsion caused by this latest killing caught on camera spawned protests in Minneapolis and all over the country. Black people are the angriest, knowing they are at risk of the same treatment and because most police killings rarely result in convictions. But the mass actions present a problem for the rulers. Anger boiled beneath the surface after years of the race to the bottom austerity regime, the worsening economic collapse in the wake of the COVID-19 quarantine, and another Democratic presidential primary rigged by that party’s donor class to defeat the prospect of even minimalist reforms.

Millions Of Tenants Are Ready For A Rent Strike Revolution

Calls to “cancel rent” are catching fire. First came a couple of tweets on Twitter. Then progressive firebrands like Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez endorsed the #CancelRent movement. Now, millions are on a rent strike. Even presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden has declared his support for rent and mortgage forgiveness. As millions of tenants mobilize to cancel rent, they are not asking nicely or relying on lip service from politicians. Rather, millions of tenants are taking action by using a powerful time-tested strategy: rent strikes. As the desperation builds and another month of bills and rent arrears accrues, tenants are no longer politely asking for help. Tenants are rightfully taking matters into their own hands by organizing rent strikes to bring the fight to their landlords and elected officials to cancel rent. “When we fight, we win!

US Firms Shield CEO Pay As Pandemic Hits Workers, Investors

New York/ Boston - Sonic Automotive Inc (SAH.N), which operates 95 U.S. car dealerships, started laying off and furloughing about a third of its workforce as the coronavirus pandemic crushed its sales. Then it changed its executives’ pay packages - handing them a multimillion-dollar windfall. On April 10, Sonic’s board gave its top executives stock options to replace performance-based share awards, regulatory filings show. The options it gave Chief Executive David Smith, whose family controls the company, are now worth about $5.16 million - more than four times the value of the performance-based stock awards he got last year. Some of Sonic’s terminated employees, meanwhile, face hard times.

Capitalism’s ‘Dirty Little Secret’

At a time when wealth is concentrated in the hands of a tiny elite, maintaining comfortable living standards for the majority requires reliance on abundant borrowing. Too much lending, as we saw in the financial crisis of 2008 with the collapse of global investment banks like Lehman Brothers, can have devastating impacts on everyday people. Nevertheless, somehow lending is now described as “the answer to capitalism’s dirty little secret.” That dirty little secret is coming back to haunt us amid the current crisis where lending is being treated as an immediate "solution" to help businesses and economies weather the financial storm. The COVID-19 pandemic has pushed the global economy on to a cliff edge, even as there were encouraging signs of an economic recovery from the 2008 banking collapse.

Mutual Aid In Public Housing Continues After Housing Authority Pushback

In early April, Baltimore City’s Housing Authority threatened Reverend Annie Chambers with arrest and eviction for distributing food to her neighbors at Douglass Homes, citing a policy barring non-government organizations from giving food donations to public housing residents. Rather than stopping Chambers’ mutual aid initiative, the incident led to widespread support for her work. Chambers says that the Housing Authority has not interfered with a giveaway since and that the public attention has resulted in an increase in donations. ”We have not had any trouble from them since. People called The Housing Authority from Washington, New York, Philadelphia and Virginia,” Chambers told The Real News Network. “Senator [Mary] Washington and the Teachers Union called the Housing Authority. Many single individuals have called the mayor and The Housing Authority on our behalf.”

Corporate Landlords Should Cancel Rent, Mortgages And Utlities During COVID-19

While so many of us struggle to survive, some of the richest billionaires in the world dominate the residential real estate industry in the United States. These corporate landlords are companies owned by extremely wealthy individuals, Wall Street entities like private equity firms and hedge funds, and institutional investors. Corporate landlords include many well-known entities like Kushner Companies, Mosser Capital, Equity Residential, Related, Essex, Starwood Capital, CBRE, Blackstone, and Irvine Company. Across the country, from New York and California to Arizona, Georgia, and Florida, these companies own large apartment complexes, office buildings, hotels, single-family homes, and a significant chunk of our mortgage debt. Corporate landlords do not pay their fair share in taxes at the local, state, or federal level.

Home Mortgage Delinquencies Rise By 1.6 Million In April

Delinquencies on home mortgages spiked by a record amount last month as the coronavirus pandemic’s economic fallout continued to explode and government programs began allowing payment delays without punishment. Roughly 3.6 million homeowners were past due on their mortgage in April, a 1.6 million jump from March, according to data from Black Knight. The national delinquency rate nearly doubled to 6.45 percent from 3.06 percent, a record increase. Nevada, New Jersey and New York led all 50 states in delinquency increases as each state saw a rise of roughly 5 percent from March.

Another Bank Bailout Under Cover Of A Virus

When the Dodd Frank Act was passed in 2010, President Obama triumphantly declared, “No more bailouts!” But what the Act actually said was that the next time the banks failed, they would be subject to “bail ins” – the funds of their creditors, including their large depositors, would be tapped to cover their bad loans. Then bail-ins were tried in Europe. The results were disastrous. Many economists in the US and Europe argued that the next time the banks failed, they should be nationalized – taken over by the government as public utilities. But that opportunity was lost when, in September 2019 and again in March 2020, Wall Street banks were quietly bailed out from a liquidity crisis in the repo market that could otherwise have bankrupted them.

The Pandemic Has Shown That We Need A Public Option For Banking Services

As marginalized families without bank accounts struggle to get stimulus checks, it's time to fix the rusty pipes of our inequitable financial system. The COVID-19 pandemic response has shown that the very foundations of our economy are shaky, fragile, and — for some of us — downright dangerous. We’re once again watching working people, especially working people of color, bear the brunt of the fallout. Meanwhile, big companies traded on the stock market took two-thirds of the money meant to bail out small businesses.

Payday Report: Strikes Spread And Union Organizing Grows

The strikes in the Yakima Valley of Washington State continue to grow. Workers are already on strike at 7 major sites, and now they’re expected to strike on at least 6 more major sites this weekend.  The Yakima Herald has the story:  Hundreds of strike supporters showed up Thursday morning, traveling on foot or by vehicle between plants in a pack that workers started calling “the caravan.” They had painted their vehicle windows with messages of support in Spanish. They honked and waved as they drove by. Strikers waved back, held their protest signs higher, and quietly said “Thank you” to each passing vehicle. Rosalina Gonzales was one of those strikers. She’s worked at Columbia Reach Pack for 19 years. She does the physically demanding work each day to provide for her children and family, she said. Gonzales, who held a neon poster board sign lettered with “Social Distancing — 6 feet” in bold Sharpie strokes, admitted to being nervous about speaking up. She said she and many other workers normally don’t talk to the press.

Racial Health And Economic Disparities Are Two Sides Of The Same Coin

In Baltimore, like in the rest of the United States, Covid-19 exacerbates racial inequality and economic marginalization. The legacy of discrimination and the continued corruption and disenfranchisement take shape in the city’s biggest issues – homelessness, food insecurity, crime, poverty, and lack of access to resources. Covid-19 magnifies these issues and shows that they cannot be fixed without systemic change. The Baltimore Brothers, a nonprofit organization serving the city’s most vulnerable people, have been providing food and necessary resources to the communities who aren’t reached by local agencies or state government. After a devastating shooting on March 17, the Brothers fed the community for 3 days straight after watching the city fail to provide any kind of social aid.

The Great Potato Giveaway

Auburn, Washington - When Tina Yates pulled her truck up to a mall in western Washington state on Thursday, workers waved her past hundreds of cars waiting to pick up free russet potatoes. “You get a VIP pass!” Yates, a bus driver in her 50s, said the workers hollered, as she loaded 1,800 pounds (816 kg) of potatoes into her gray Chevy Silverado, bound for the Salvation Army, local food banks and homes throughout western Washington. Giving away food is just one example of how people around the world are adjusting to the strain the coronavirus pandemic has put on supply chains, as restaurants, schools and hotels close. With unemployment soaring, demand from food banks is rising fast at the same time farmers have fewer outlets to sell their crops.

Urgent End Of Year Fundraising Campaign

Online donations are back! Keep independent media alive. 

Due to the attacks on our fiscal sponsor, we were unable to raise funds online for nearly two years.  As the bills pile up, your help is needed now to cover the monthly costs of operating Popular Resistance.

Urgent End Of Year Fundraising Campaign

Online donations are back! 

Keep independent media alive. 

Due to the attacks on our fiscal sponsor, we were unable to raise funds online for nearly two years.  As the bills pile up, your help is needed now to cover the monthly costs of operating Popular Resistance.

Sign Up To Our Daily Digest

Independent media outlets are being suppressed and dropped by corporations like Google, Facebook and Twitter. Sign up for our daily email digest before it’s too late so you don’t miss the latest movement news.