March 18, 2004
: Good News for Wisconsin Workers - A double header of good news for workers in Wisconsin, who will soon have an increased statewide minimum wage, and...
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December 27, 2003
: Matt Y Still Out to Destroy Productive Businesses - Alas, Matthew Yglesias is still dedicated to helping low productivity firms destroy high-productivity companies. How? He wants the government to...
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August 29, 2003
: Politics of the Minimum Wage - So here you have the minimum wage-- supported by 80% of the population and able to put tens of billions...
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August 28, 2003
: Why Job Losses from Min Wage Don't Matter - When the minimum wage is discussed, conservatives suddenly discover an overwhelming compassion for the poorest Americans who they see victimized...
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August 27, 2003
: Who Pays for the Minimum Wage? - Whether the increased costs of the minimum wage are passed onto consumers or decrease business profits is as much disputed...
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August 26, 2003
: How Minimum Wage Increases Employment - Here's the problem with the simplistic argument that minimum wage laws automatically cut jobs. It's based on Economics 101 for...
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August 23, 2003
: Why Minimum Wage Beats EITC - Matthew Yglesias thinks the minimum wage is only the second best alternative to the Earned Income Tax Credit and other...
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August 22, 2003
: Illinois Raises Minimum Wage - IL Governor Blagojevich signed a bill raising the state's minimum wage to $6.50 per hour over the next sixteen months....
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Wal-Mart Doing Good for Environment - Seriously. This initiative by Wal-Mart to promote energy-saving light bulbs is a major environmental initiative. "Compact fluorescent" bulbs fit in...
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The Collapse of Tax Cut Politics - You can check out Progressive States rundown of progressive successes in the states on Tuesday, but I want to focus...
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November 08, 2006
A Good Night for Progressives - Let's be clear-- this wasn't just a good night for Democrats. It was a good night for progressives, and no...
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November 01, 2006
Labor Cold War Ends - New International Labor Federation - At the dawn of the Cold War, the international union movement divided up between the ICFTU, dominated by US and Western European unions, and the World Confederation of Labor, largely allied with the Soviet Union. It's taken a decade and a half, but the irrelevancy of that division will end today as the two federations merge-- bringing together 241 labor organizations from 156 countries representing 190 million workers. The new International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) is a good step for a labor movement looking to globalize itself in the taking on global capital power....
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- Valuing Families: State Legislative Models Brought to you by Progressive States and MomsRising What would a policy that really values families look...
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October 09, 2006
Emaciated Models, Labor Regulation - There's a bit of debate in the blogosphere around Spain's new law banning underweight models from the runways in that country. See Jordan, Amanda at Pandagon and Lindsay Beyerstein at Majikthise on whether this is an intrusive regulating violating free expression or something like that and whether OSHA safety regulations are appropriate. Just to throw my two cents in-- any broader OSHA approach would seem cumbersome and bureaucratically intrusive in a deep way. But the original Spanish proposal is brilliant in its high-impact, low-intrusion approach. Regulate only the fashion week type runways, where in a single spotcheck, models can be...
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October 03, 2006
Big loss for Labor-- - The National Labor Relations Board ruled today that a range of professionals are now deemed "supervisors" and thus lose all protections under labor law. That means if they say a positive thing about unions, their bosses are free to fire them at will. The AFL-CIO has more here. To put this denial of labor rights in perspective, 32 million workers or 25% of the workforce already have no right to form a union under federal, state or local law (see this GAO report and this ARAW summary). This includes: Supervisors 16.6 million workers, 8 million new supervisors plus traditional 8.6...
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