Assorted content to end your week. – David Brancaccio and Rose Conlon write about the tendency for people involved in deliberately-rigged contests to believe their success is the result of skill rather than manipulation – offering an important comparison to wealthy people who can’t sort out luck from merit in
Continue readingTag: Robert Reich
Accidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Adam Finn writes about the factors which have allowed for the rapid development of safe COVID-19 vaccines. – Helen Tang discusses the stress and frustration she’s heard from the people she’s had to reach as a contact tracer. Madeleine Cummings tells the stories
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Donald McNeil discusses how inconsistency in state-level policies and a lack of federal leadership have combined to result in the coronavirus epidemic manifesting in radically different ways across the U.S. And Karen Wang points out the ticking clock facing Canadian students, parents and
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – T.M. Scanlon analyzes the dangerous effects of wealth inequality. And Philip Alston discusses how COVID-19 has only exposed an existing pandemic of poverty and inequality which was previously masked by grossly insufficient poverty lines: The consequences of this highly unrealistic picture of
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Robert Reich discusses how Donald Trump’s insistence on pushing reopening without a plan to alleviate an ongoing pandemic has led to disaster both for the U.S.’ economy and its public health. And the Economist highlights the need to make basic health precautions into
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Afternoon Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Eric Levitz points out how the damage COVID-19 has caused to the U.S.’ economy arises largely out of underlying ailments, including its dependence on discretionary spending by people with extreme wealth. And Robert Reich highlights how Donald Trump’s racist demagoguery has distracted
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Robert Reich writes about the end of any pretense that Donald Trump was acting as a president rather than a self-serving social media influencer. – Branko Milanovic discusses why it’s useless to make modeled economic predictions in a time of complete uncertainty
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Afternoon Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Robert Reich argues that U.S. corporations need to prioritize the health of their workers over immediate profits. But James Galbraith writes about the wider need to move past disaster capitalism, including through government action to take core economic decisions out of the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Rochelle Baker interviews David Suzuki about the lessons from the coronavirus pandemic which we should apply equally to the threat of a climate breakdown. And Mike Layton writes that we need a Green New Deal as our recovery program once the pause on
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Afternoon Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Daniel Markovits argues for a wealth tax to fund the relief and rebuilding effort needed in response to COVID-19, while Paul Mason points out the need to not only tax existing wealth but build new economic structures which deter extreme wealth accumulation.
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Tobias Jones discusses how COVID-19 has emphasized the importance of social interaction to human well-being: It seems callous to suggest that this tenebrous pandemic is letting the light in, and daft to offer immediate consolations amid so much grief. But there is a
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Kenan Malik discusses how the coronavirus pandemic has exposed the fragility of the UK’s social and economic structures: The economic burden imposed by the policy of social distancing has fallen most upon the poorest and the lowest paid, many of whom cannot
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Emmanuez Saez and Gabriel Zucman call for (PDF) governments to act as buyers of last resort to minimize the economic fallout from the coronavirus. Andrew Jackson offers his take on the appropriate public policy response to ensure that workers’ incomes aren’t decimated at
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: Don’t Agonize. Organize
So says the indefatigable Robert Reich, who, while admitting that the times are very discouraging, urges no one to give up in despair. You need only watch the first three minutes to get the gist of his message: Recommend this Post
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Robert Reich comments that Democrats who failed to recognize and respond to a rigged economic system share in the blame for the rise of Donald Trump’s toxic populism. And George Monbiot notes that Trump is just one of many strongmen-in-the-making daring anybody to
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Afternoon Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Nathan Robinson writes that there’s every reason for younger people – in the U.S. and elsewhere – to support the principle of socialism based on a desire to achieve gains for everybody rather than only a privileged few: A better definition, at
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – Paul Thacker discusses the importance of addressing the climate crisis as a health issue. CBC takes a look at a few of the ways a deteriorating climate is affecting Canada. And Taylor Noakes points out the central role a national public transit
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Jeremy Rifkin sets out how Canada can implement a Green New Deal – while also reminding us of the costs of failing to do so. And Brett Dolter charts the path toward net zero emissions from Saskatchewan’s perspective – even as Scott Moe’s
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – Arwa Mahdawi writes that the outsized influence wielded by billionaires makes them something beyond merely wealthy people. Tom Whyman challenges the worship of the excessively wealthy as a particularly destructive religion. Robert Reich points out that the means of accumulating a billion
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Robert Reich points out that the most significant political divide is the one between the wealthiest few and the rest of the population: In reality, the biggest divide in America today runs between oligarchy and democracy. When oligarchs fill the coffers of
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