Portside

Our history too often sidesteps the question of finances. But sonorous ideals don’t keep an army supplied with uniforms, guns, and grub.

Nearly $2 trillion of wealth has evaporated from the global crypto market since October. Outside of crimes and scams, the technology is useless, and its economics are even worse.

Congress should immediately pass the Wall Street Tax Act,(A Financial Transaction Tax - FTT), which would tax the sort of high-speed trading that has turned the financial sector into a casino at the expense of our communities.

We must see real estate market for what it truly is: an institution rooted in settler colonialism that allows land (and the housing that sits atop it) to be distributed and controlled by those who have enough money for their preferences to matter.

The repo market is a fragile house of cards waiting for a strong wind to blow it down, propped up by misguided monetary policies that have forced central banks to underwrite its highly risky ventures.

At its best, sensible policies about how land is used, transferred, and owned can make it possible for young people to farm with dignity, a living wage, and a future. It can help poor people stop being poor. It can let young farmers who want to farm break through the barriers to entry. It can provide a secure retirement for America’s older farmers. It can happen and should happen in countries as democratic and as rich as the United States.

Since 1997, we have lived through the biggest real estate bubble in United States history — followed by the most calamitous decline in housing prices that the country has ever seen. Fundamental factors like inflation and construction costs affect home prices, of course. But the radical shifts in housing prices in recent years were caused mainly by investor-induced speculation. Previous events were fundamentally different from the recent housing bubble.