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In the South and West, a Tax on Being Poor

Katherine S. Newman New York Times
These regional disparities go back to Reconstruction, when Southern Republicans increased property taxes on defeated white landowners and former slaveholders to pay for the first public services — education, hospitals, roads — ever provided to black citizens. After Reconstruction ended in 1877, conservative Democrats — popularly labeled “the Redeemers” — rolled taxes back to their prewar levels and inserted supermajority clauses into state constitutions.

Chamber, Labor Unions At Odds Over Guest Worker Program

David Nakamura The Washington Post
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is pushing for 400,000 new visas for foreign workers, a demand that has been met with fierce resistance by labor unions and which could help derail an agreement between the two sides over an immigration reform bill being developed in Congress.

US-Style School Reform Goes South

David Bacon The Nation
"Both have two central elements in common. They criticize public education in their countries, and they're financed and backed by important people in the business world."

Aw, mom

Tom Toles Washington Post