Category Archives: Social values

Colleges as Merchants of Debt

Student loan debt slavery is even worse than you probably thought.

This entry was posted in Banana republic, Social policy, Social values, The destruction of the middle class on May 13, 2012 by Yves Smith.

Yes Lab Gives US Trade Negotiators “Corporate Power Tool” Award

The Yes Lab is a is brainstorming/training effort associated with the Yes Men to help activists subject people in positions of influence to well deserved ridicule. Aquifer highlighted their latest project, which was infiltrating an award ceremony for a trade group in Dallas and bestowing their own prize.

Robert Shiller is Wrong

By David Llewellyn-Smith, the founding publisher and former editor-in-chief of The Diplomat magazine, now the Asia Pacific’s leading geo-politics website. He is also the co-author of The Great Crash of 2008 with Ross Garnaut. Cross posted from MacroBusiness

The American academic Robert Shiller has taken another contrarian tack with his latest book Finance and the Good Society. His claim is that Western finance has lost the sense of virtue that it once had.

Bill Black: New York Times Reporters Embrace the Berlin Consensus and Ignore Krugman and Economics

Yves here. Black does yeoman’s work in describing the bias in the New York Times’ Eurocrisis reporting

What Can Americans Learn from the Eurocrisis

At the risk of looking like NC has become the “all Michael Hudson, all the time” channel, we’re featuring his latest talk with Real News Network. He discusses how and why candidates make promises to ordinary people that they promptly repudiate when they assume office.

Dan Kervick: The Political Economy of Citadella

Yves here. Readers seem to like Kervick’s storytelling format, and he seemed to take NC readers’ suggestion to heart regarding making it a bit more compact next time.

By Dan Kervick, who does research in decision theory and analytic metaphysics. Cross posted from New Economic Perspectives

Imagine a world and a society in which 500 people own everything – absolutely everything.

The Intensifying Debate Over Food Security

One of the troubling ideas that seems to have gained traction is that nations should not care overmuch about the needs of their citizens and should accept market outcomes.

This entry was posted in Commodities, Risk and risk management, Social policy, Social values, The dismal science on May 9, 2012 by Yves Smith.

How did Quebec Students Mobilize Hundreds of Thousands for Strike?

It’s telling that the fact that hundreds of thousands of people in Quebec have been striking for over two months has gone virtually unreported in the US.

This entry was posted in Income disparity, Politics, Social policy, Social values, The destruction of the middle class on May 5, 2012 by Yves Smith.

Lynn Parramore: Why the Rich Are Sending Pets on a Diamond-Studded Trip to the Afterlife

I live in Manhattan, where signs of the New Gilded Age scream from the windows of deluxe pet spas and boutiques hawking crystal-studded dog collars. The biggest emerging trend of all? That would be giving dead pets the star treatment.

This entry was posted in Curiousities, Guest Post, Income disparity, Social values, The destruction of the middle class on May 5, 2012 by Yves Smith.

Les Leopold: How Wall Street Drives Up Gas Prices

By Les Leopold, the author of The Looting of America: How Wall Street’s Game of Fantasy Finance destroyed our Jobs, Pensions and Prosperity, and What We Can Do About It. Cross posted from Alternet

Gasoline prices have been falling in recent weeks, but they’re still close to their five-year high after climbing steeply for three years. For every penny increase at the pump, $1.4 billion per year leaves our collective pockets, creating a drag on the sluggish “recovery.” Where does it go and what caused the price explosion at the pump?

This entry was posted in Commodities, Energy markets, Guest Post, Politics, Regulations and regulators, Social values, Species loss on May 3, 2012 by Yves Smith.

David Graeber: New Police Strategy in New York – Sexual Assault Against Peaceful Protestors

By David Graeber, a Reader in Social Anthropology at Goldsmiths, University of London, and an author and activist currently based in New York

A few weeks ago I was with a few companions from Occupy Wall Street in Union Square when an old friend — I’ll call her Eileen — passed through, her hand in a cast.

“What happened to you?” I asked.

This entry was posted in Banana republic, Guest Post, Income disparity, Legal, Politics, Social policy, Social values, The destruction of the middle class on May 3, 2012 by Yves Smith.

Adam Davidson Parrots Disinformation as He Extols Rule by the Top 0.1%

Adam Davidson is moving up in the world. He has gone from fellating the 1% to the top 0.1%.

Mirabile Dictu! The SEC is Getting Disgusted With Lawyers Pulling the Same Tricks in SEC Investigations that They Pull in Foreclosure Land Every Day

The Wall Street Journal has an entertaining account, if your taste runs to black humor, of how legal chicanery has reached such high levels that the SEC is toying with the idea of going after it directly.

This entry was posted in Banana republic, Legal, Politics, Regulations and regulators, Social values on May 1, 2012 by Yves Smith.

Charlotte to Suspend Constitutional Free Speech and Assembly Protections to Help Bank of America, Duke Shareholder Meetings

It has become pretty routine for local police to engage in thuggery and run roughshod over Constitutional protections in the name of maintaining order, which increasingly means not annoying big companies.

This entry was posted in Banana republic, Banking industry, Legal, Politics, Social policy, Social values on May 1, 2012 by Yves Smith.

Occupy Wall Street Sues New York City, JP Morgan #OWS

One of the continuing and largely unrecognized aspects of the ongoing media coverage of Occupy Wall Street is that police brutality and lesser abuses have been airbrushed out.