Fighting the Wealth Hoarders with Transparency and Taxes

Over the last five years, from my 5th floor apartment window, I’ve watched a blue spire rise in the distance. Fifteen blocks south of me, 225 West 57th Street has just joined Billionaires’ Row in Manhattan. At 1550 feet it’s now the tallest. Apartments in these buildings have been selling for over fifty million dollars per floor. The windows grant a falcon’s eye panorama of New York, but visitors on a windy day report feeling seasick from the swaying. No matter. These apartments aren’t for living;they’re for hoarding wealth. . . . → Read More: Fighting the Wealth Hoarders with Transparency and Taxes

From Germany to America: A Dialog on Inequality

At a coffee break between sessions at a history of economics meeting, I chatted with a young woman professor of political science at a German university. On hearing that I work on inequality, she immediately challenged me: “I don’t believe in equality. Inequality is just a statistic… What matters are policies to improve citizen’s wellbeing, like health or education, not policies to reduce inequality.” . . . → Read More: From Germany to America: A Dialog on Inequality

How Colonies Can Liberate Themselves by Taxing Real Estate

A colony is an area of land belonging mostly to outsiders, who extract more than they put in, hold good property underused, and control local politics. Greece, Haiti and Puerto Rico are colonies. Given the political will, and absent military intervention, colonies can liberate themselves by taxing the land. . . . → Read More: How Colonies Can Liberate Themselves by Taxing Real Estate

James Galbraith Tells Us What Everyone Needs to Know About Inequality

Inequality has surged in the U.S. over the last forty years; many observers now blame the deregulation and tax cuts for the rich starting with the presidency of Ronald Reagan in 1980. In his new short book, Inequality: What Everyone Needs to Know, James Galbraith explains how this happened through the change in U.S. industrial structure. He offers a surprising recommendation. . . . → Read More: James Galbraith Tells Us What Everyone Needs to Know About Inequality

How a Progressive Tax System Made Detroit a Powerhouse (and Could Again)

In 1995, we encountered a group of economic advisors to Governor John Engler of Michigan, intent on cutting property taxes. We reminded them of California’s 1979 Proposition 13. After Prop. 13 rolled back and froze property taxes, sales taxes reached crushing levels, budget crises became routine, local services collapsed, and public schools fell from the best in the nation to among the worst. But Engler was determined. . . . → Read More: How a Progressive Tax System Made Detroit a Powerhouse (and Could Again)

It Takes Government to Create Markets: Alex Marshall’s The Surprising Design of Market Economies

Conventional economics wittingly or unwittingly provides cover for the One Percent, by professing that “the market” operates benevolently on its own. Alex Marshall gives us an entertaining, thoughtful, and well-written antidote to this dangerous abstraction. . . . → Read More: It Takes Government to Create Markets: Alex Marshall’s The Surprising Design of Market Economies

It Takes Government to Create Markets: Alex Marshall’s The Surprising Design of Market Economies

Conventional economics wittingly or unwittingly provides cover for the One Percent, by professing that “the market” operates benevolently on its own. Alex Marshall gives us an entertaining, thoughtful, and well-written antidote to this dangerous abstraction. . . . → Read More: It Takes Government to Create Markets: Alex Marshall’s The Surprising Design of Market Economies