"Twenty five years ago I quit a job on Wall Street to write a book about Wall Street. Since then, every year or so, UPS has delivered to me a book more or less like my own, written by some Wall Street insider and promising to blow the lid off the place, and reveal its inner workings, and so on. By now, you might think, this game should be over. The reading public would know all it needed to know about Wall Street, and the publishing industry would be forced to look to some other industry for shocking confessions from insiders.
Somehow this isn't the case."
posted by vidur
on Feb 5, 2013 -
47 comments
In less than an hour, the Supreme Court will hand down its final judgment in what has become one of the most crucial legal battles of our time: the constitutionality of President Obama's landmark health care reform law.
The product of a strict party line vote following a
year century of debate,
disinformation, and tense legislative wrangling, the
Affordable Care Act would (among
other popular reforms) require all Americans to buy insurance coverage by 2014,
broadening the risk pool for the benefit of those with pre-existing conditions.
The fate of this "individual mandate," bitterly opposed by Republicans despite its similarity to
past plans touted by conservatives (including presidential contender
Mitt Romney) is
the central question facing the justices today. If the conservative majority takes
the dramatic step of striking down the mandate, the law will be toothless, and in danger of wholesale reversal,
rendering millions uninsured, dealing a crippling blow to the president's re-election hopes, and possibly
endangering the federal regulatory state.
But despite the
pessimism of bettors,
some believe the Court will demur, wary of
damaging its
already-fragile reputation with
another partisan 5-4 decision. But
those who know don't talk, and those who talk don't know. Watch the
SCOTUSblog liveblog for updates, Q&A, and analysis as the truth finally comes out shortly after 10 a.m. EST.
posted by Rhaomi
on Jun 28, 2012 -
1173 comments
Critics of the Occupy Wall Street movement have complained that the protestors have no clear goals, so
WE DON'T MAKE DEMANDS composed a list of 12 concrete, specific suggestions focusing on economic reform, stronger regulation, and closing loopholes.
posted by The Whelk
on Nov 30, 2011 -
193 comments
"
Any industry would be proud of an average annual growth rate of 34% over ten years and of a global reach from Austria to Taiwan. But the headlong expansion of exchange-traded funds (ETFs), which by May this year controlled almost $1.5 trillion of assets (not far short of the $2 trillion in hedge funds), has become a matter for concern among financial regulators. Could ETFs be the next source of financial scandal, or even of systemic risk?" Characterizing the Financial sector "like a hyperactive child" that "can never leave a good thing be",
The Economist appears to be
wishing for the
ETFs to be
better regulated because "it would be a shame if reckless expansion spoiled a good innovation".
posted by vidur
on Jun 26, 2011 -
28 comments
"The paper puts forward a small but novel idea of how we can cut down the incidence of bribery. There are different kinds of bribes and what this paper is concerned with are bribes that people often have to give to get what they are legally entitled to. I shall call these 'harassment bribes'. Suppose an income tax refund is held back from a taxpayer till he pays some cash to the officer. Suppose government allots subsidized land to a person but when the person goes to get her paperwork done and receive documents for this land, she is asked to pay a hefty bribe. These are all illustrations of harassment bribes. Harassment bribery is widespread in India and it plays a large role in breeding inefficiency and has a corrosive effect on civil society. The central message of this paper is that
we should declare the act of giving a bribe in all such cases as legitimate activity [PDF]. In other words the giver of a harassment bribe should have full immunity from any punitive action by the state."
[more inside]
posted by vidur
on Mar 31, 2011 -
37 comments
Doug Lemov is getting some
attention for his work at identifying - and trying to replicate - the key things that successful teachers do.
[more inside]
posted by mai
on Mar 3, 2010 -
44 comments
Atul Gawande
offers a way for health care to be improved through experimentation and pilot programs, much as agriculture was in 20th century
posted by reenum
on Feb 27, 2010 -
24 comments
Health Care: Who Knows 'Best'? "...comparative research on effectiveness is only part of the strategy to improve care. A second science has captured the imagination of policymakers in the White House: behavioral economics. This field attempts to explain pitfalls in reasoning and judgment that cause people to make apparently wrong decisions; its adherents believe in policies that protect against unsound clinical choices. But there is a schism between presidential advisers in their thinking over whether legislation should be coercive, aggressively pushing doctors and patients to do what the government defines as best, or whether it should be respectful of their own autonomy in making decisions. The President and Congress appear to be of two minds. How this difference is resolved will profoundly shape the culture of health care in America." Interesting NY Review of Books article by
Jerome Groopman.
posted by cog_nate
on Feb 8, 2010 -
29 comments
Healthcare reform has agitated right-wing extremists and moneyed interests in the United States for some time — during the presidencies of
FDR and Truman as well as Clinton and Obama, most recently — but where do the objections originate from, and particularly those which are known to be based on complete untruths? Some of these lies start with or are repeated by
well-known right-wing media personalities, but there are other people who get the ball rolling, who are perhaps less well-known.
Elizabeth "Betsy" McCaughey originated one of the current myths more commonly known as
"death panels", but despite her attempts to market herself as a folksy voice fighting for the well-being of senior citizens, she has been an effective advocate for the interests of private health insurance companies since the early 1990s.
[more inside]
posted by Blazecock Pileon
on Aug 22, 2009 -
167 comments
Mark C. Taylor, the chairman of the religion department at Columbia, offers a radical proposal in
The New York Times for the restructuring of the American university system. Two key components of the proposal entail ending tenure and shuttering academic departments—replacing disciplines with problems, and then tackling them with a cooperative and multidisciplinary approach, e.g. The Department of the Future of Water made up of geologists, anthropologists, political scientists, and ethicists. Should we
End the University as We Know It?
posted by Toekneesan
on Apr 27, 2009 -
84 comments
Official transgender blessings -- Kulanu -- the newly-revised manual for LGBT issues and ceremonies put out by the
Union for Reform Judaism (1.5 million US Jews are Reform) now includes 2 blessings (written by a Rabbi now male) for those transitioning and who have completed the change, alongside the already existing same sex marriage liturgy and other documents and procedures. A first? (blessings text inside)
posted by amberglow
on Aug 9, 2007 -
50 comments
