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Paid by Fee-Laden Debit Cards; Lessons from History

Stephen Brier; Jessica Silver-Greenberg, Stephanie Clifford Submitted by the author to Portside
The New York Times reports on the growing trend of workers getting paid via fee-laden debit cards. In a letter to Portside, historian Stephen Brier notes the "eerie parallels" to the 1800s.

We Are All Aboard the Pequod

Chris Hedges Truthdig
Melville, who had been a sailor on clipper ships and whalers, was keenly aware that the wealth of industrialized societies came from the exploited of the earth. “Yes; all these brave houses and flowery gardens came from the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian oceans,” Ishmael says of New England’s prosperity. “One and all, they were harpooned and dragged up hither from the bottom of the sea.”

Paid by Fee-Laden Debit Cards; Lessons from History

Stephen Brier; Jessica Silver-Greenberg, Stephanie Clifford Submitted by the author to Portside
The New York Times reports on the growing trend of workers getting paid via fee-laden debit cards. In a letter to Portside, historian Stephen Brier notes the "eerie parallels" to the 1800s.

Profit and Investment: Does More of One Mean Less of the Other

Dean Baker Center for Economic and Policy Research
Anyone who expects a huge uptick in investment to provide a major boost to demand is either smoking something serious or simply has never looked at the data. It hasn't happen in the last 65 years and it's not about to happen now.

What Do Ants Know That We Don’t?

Deborah Gordon Wired
Ant colonies have been used throughout history as models of industry, obedience, and wisdom. Although the ants themselves can be indolent, inconsiderate of others, and downright stupid, we have much to learn from ant colony protocols. The ants have evolved ways of working together that we haven’t yet dreamed of.

The Recovery

Heidi Shierholz Economic Policy Institute
Four Years Into the Recovery and We’re Just a Fifth of the Way Out of the Hole Left by the Great Recession

This Is Bigger Than Paula Deen

David J. Leonard Washington Spectator
The issue is the potential for a powerful individual's racist worldview to manifest itself into discriminatory workplace policies. A black worker threatened to report the restaurant to the EEOC and was told: "You don’t have any civil rights here." That is what we should be talking about, not Deen's contemptible word choice. More broadly, she symbolizes the injustices plaguing the entire restaurant industry. The evidence is mounting. Restaurants are clearly segregated.