| THE NEW YORK TIMES |
| nytimes.com - An estimated 2.8 million employees will get a raise today, as the federal minimum wage rises from $6.55 an hour to $7.25. Another 1.6 million whose hourly pay hovers around $7.25 are also expected to get a boost as employers adjust their pay scales to the new minimum. The raise is badly needed. It is also wholly inadequate. |
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| HOLLY SKLAR |
| mcclatchydc.com - The minimum wage is stuck in the 1950s. With the raise, the minimum wage is higher than 1950′s inflation-adjusted $6.71, but lower than the 1956 minimum wage of $7.93 in today’s dollars. The long-term fall in worker buying power is one reason we are in the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression |
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| ROBERT B. REICH |
| robertreich.blogspot.com - What’s pushing the stock market upward? Mainly, unexpectedly positive second-quarter corporate profits. But those profits aren’t being powered by consumers who have suddenly found themselves with a lot more money in their pockets. Keep your eye on the real economy, where unemployment and underemployment keep rising. It’s not as much fun as cheering and investing right now, but it’s far safer. |
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| DAVID SIROTA |
| truthdig.com - Here’s a truism: The wealthiest 1 percent have never had it so good. But what really makes the ultra-wealthy so fortunate, what truly separates this moment from a run-of-the-mill Gilded Age, is the unprecedented protection the 1-percenters have bought for themselves on the most pressing issues. |
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| ARIANNA HUFFINGTON
States Forced to Cut Services to the Bone: The Opportunity Cost of the Bank Bailout |
| huffingtonpost.com - Looking at all the money that has gone to the banks – and how well they seem to be doing, using it to bolster their bottom line (and even buy other banks) – while the real economy is doing so poorly, proves just how wrong the government’s approach to the recovery has been. |
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| SEN. BERNIE SANDERS |
| washingtonpost.com - As our nation struggles to recover from the worst economic times since the Great Depression, what we need is an energy revolution that has the capability of creating millions of good-paying green jobs. |
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| PAUL KRUGMAN |
| nytimes.com - Why does meaningful action on medical costs go along with compassion? One answer is that compassion means not closing your eyes to the human consequences of rising costs. Would-be health reformers won’t have the moral authority to confront our system’s inefficiency unless they’re also prepared to end its cruelty. |
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| DIGBY
Rapid Rise in Health Care Costs Linked to Job Losses and Lower Output |
| alternet.org - A new poll draws a link between the decline of industry and skyrocketing health care costs. |
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| DREAMINGONEMTPY |
| openleft.com - Are the Republicans’ recent low favorability numbers simply the result of one scandal after another following so quickly that the numbers can never fully recover? Or do we have a new ‘normal’ where the Republican brand is so tarnished, even in good times favorability would still languish in the negative numbers? |
24 Jul
