Portside

Two years after we last investigated the the foreclosure crisis in most affluent black county in America, things aren't exactly looking up—except, maybe, for the banks.

Walmart, the largest retailer in the world and the largest private employer in U.S. announces the elimination of insurance for an estimated 30,000 part-time workers and across-the-board hikes in health insurance premium costs for the remainder of its workforce. Despite soaring profits, Walmart is cutting health insurance for its part-time workers even as it is "systematically eroding full-time jobs."

According to leading Ebola experts, major cuts in funding from the U.S., Britain, and European governments to the World Health Organization (WHO) contributed to critical delays in responding to the Ebola outbreak in west Africa, which allowed the epidemic to spin out of control. Citing the international recession, Western governments dramatically reduced their contributions to the WHO, and also failed to implement much-needed structural reforms.

The headlines regarding the "border crisis" caused by the thousands of unaccompanied Central American children crossing the U.S. border have faded, but not so the problems that forced them to embark upon their dangerous journeys. U.S. government officials are adopting an "out of sight, out of mind" approach to a problem that has deep roots, including the destabilizing role of successive U.S. administrations in Central America.

According to a report by the Restaurant Opportunity Center United (ROC), workers who like female restaurant workers rely on tips to make a living experience twice as much sexual harassment as those earning minimum wage. The report, "The Glass Floor: Sexual Harassment in the Restaurant Industry," asserts laws that allow employers to pay "tipped" workers below the minimum wage place female restaurant workers in a "uniquely vulnerable position."

A new book, "Collective Bargaining and the Battle of Ohio: The Defeat of Senate Bill 5 and the Struggle to Defend the Middle Class," by John McNay, draws lessons from the battle in Ohio that defeated a Republican anti-union bill by public referendum.

Last week Jean-Claude "Baby Doc" Duvalier died, signaling the passing of the last Duvalier to rule Haiti. But corruption in Haiti is still rampant, and the U.S.-backed regime of President Michel Martelly uses the political toolbox developed by the Duvaliers to control the country. "Papa Doc" and "Baby Doc" Duvalier are dead; but Duvalierism lives on.

A ProPublica analysis of killings by police shows outsize risk for young black males.

When President Obama took office, there were five million Americans at home all day who are now, sadly, not at home

In this view, hand stencils and animal paintings in Europe and Asia, separated by some 13,000 kilometers, have a common, far deeper origin in Africa.