By Jake Johnson/Common Dreams

In an analysis bolstering the arguments of those fighting for minimum wage hikes nationwide, a group of University of California-Berkeley economists has found that Seattle’s decision to gradually raise its minimum wage to $15 an hour has not hampered job growth, despite the frequent warnings of doom-and-gloom critics.
The study, released on Tuesday, examined the effects of the incremental wage increases in 2015 and 2016. After analyzing Seattle job data prior to the wage hikes – which were signed into law by Seattle Mayor Ed Murray in 2015 – and after they began to take effect, researchers found “no evidence of job loss in the city’s restaurant industry, even as pay reached $13 for workers in large companies.”
Professor Michael Reich, lead author of the analysis, said the Seattle wage hikes are “working as intended, raising pay for low-wage workers, without negatively affecting jobs.”
“These findings are consistent with the lion’s share of rigorous academic minimum wage research studies,” Reich concluded.

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Posted on June 22, 2017

By John Donohue/The Conversation

Note: This is an updated version of an article first published on June 24, 2015.
The shooting in Virginia that wounded House Majority Whip Steve Scalise, as well as the shooting in a San Francisco UPS facility that left four dead on the very same day, have generated – yet again – the standard set of responses in the wake of a mass shooting in the United States.
The details of any such tragedy often emerge slowly, but a few points can be made. While deaths from mass shootings are a relatively small part of the overall homicidal violence in America, they are particularly wrenching. The problem is worse in the U.S. than in most other industrialized nations. And it is getting worse.

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Posted on June 21, 2017

By Andrea Germanos/Common Dreams

Intensified airstrikes by the U.S.-led coalition targeting the Islamic State are responsible for a “staggering loss of civilian life” in Raqqa, Syria, a United Nations investigator says.
The northern Syrian city, the so-called capital of the Islamic State (ISIS), is where U.S.-backed forces, including Syrian Kurdish and Arab U.S.-backed rebel groups, have begun an offensive. That effort to retake the city from ISIS, also referred to as ISIL, was aided by U.S.-led coalition airstrikes.
But these increased strikes were in the crosshairs of Paulo Pinheiro, the chairman of the Independent International Commission of Inquiry for Syria, who gave the U.N. Human Rights Council his dire assessment of the situation for Syrian civilians, who “are in the unenviable role of being the target of most warring parties” and face “disastrous consequences.”

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Posted on June 20, 2017

By Benjamin Lesser and Elizabeth Dilts/Reuters

NEW YORK – In three years of managing investments for North Dakota farmer Richard Haus, Long Island stock broker Mike McMahon and his colleagues charged their client $267,567 in fees and interest – while losing him $261,441 on the trades, Haus said.
McMahon and others at National Securities Corporation, for instance, bought or sold between 200 and 900 shares of Apple stock for Haus nine times in about a year – racking up $27,000 in fees, according to a 2015 complaint Haus filed with the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA).
Haus alerted the regulator to what he called improper “churning” of his account to harvest excessive fees. But the allegation could hardly have come as a surprise to FINRA, the industry’s self-regulating body, which is charged by Congress with protecting investors from unscrupulous brokers.
FINRA has fined National at least 25 times since 2000. As of earlier this year, 35 percent of National’s 714 brokers had a history of regulatory run-ins, legal disputes or personal financial difficulties that FINRA requires brokers to disclose to investors, according to a Reuters analysis of FINRA data.
McMahon did not respond to requests for comment. National declined to comment.
National is among 48 firms where at least 30 percent of brokers have such FINRA flags on their records, according to the Reuters analysis, which examined only the 12 most serious incidents among the 23 that FINRA requires brokers to disclose. That compares to 9 percent of brokers industry-wide who have at least one of those 12 FINRA flags on their record.
In total, the 48 firms oversee about 4,600 brokers and billions of dollars in investor funds.
See complete list of firms and statistics on each.

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Posted on June 19, 2017

By Huw Jones and Michelle Price/Reuters

LONDON/HONG KONG – U.S. plans to delay globally-agreed reforms to make banks safer after the financial crisis will throw a system of international regulatory cooperation into confusion, European Union and Asian regulatory sources said on Tuesday.
But the rollback will be welcomed by global banks as it will allow them to cut back on how much expensive capital they must hold to support their business, the sources said.
Since the financial crisis, watchdogs around the world have been working via the G20 group of leading economies to increase cooperation between regulators following the collapse of Lehman Brothers in 2008.
But the U.S. Treasury unveiled plans on Monday to upend the country’s financial regulatory framework in a 150-page report that suggested more than 100 changes.

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Posted on June 16, 2017

By Andrea Germanos/Common Dreams

Michigan’s attorney general announced Wednesday that the head of the state’s health department and four others have been charged with involuntary manslaughter for their role in the years-long Flint water crisis.
Nick Lyon, director of Michigan Health and Human Services, “failed in his responsibilities to protect the health and safety of the citizens of Flint,” state AG Bill Schuette said at a press conference Wednesday.
A statement from Schuette’s office alleges that Lyon waited a year before alerting the public about the outbreak of Legionnaires’ Disease as a result of the crisis, an act that led to the death of 85-year-old Robert Skidmore. He also thwarted an independent researcher from investigating the cause of the outbreak, the statement says.

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Posted on June 15, 2017

By Andrew J. Hoffman/The Conversation

When politicians distort science, academics and scientists tend to watch in shock from the sidelines rather than speak out. But in an age of “fake news” and “alternative facts,” we need to step into the breach and inject scientific literacy into the political discourse.
Nowhere is this obligation more vivid than the debate over climate change. Contrary to the consensus of scientific agencies worldwide, the president has called climate change a “hoax” (though his position may be shifting), while his EPA administrator has denied even the most basic link to carbon dioxide as a cause.
It’s another sign that we, as a society, are drifting away from the use of scientific reasoning to inform public policy. And the outcome is clear: a misinformed voting public and the passage of policies to benefit special interests.

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Posted on June 14, 2017

By Paul Buchheit/Common Dreams

Last year it was eight men, then down to six, and now almost five.
While Americans fixate on Donald Trump, the super-rich are absconding with our wealth, and the plague of inequality continues to grow. An analysis of 2016 data found that the poorest five deciles of the world population own about $410 billion in total wealth. As of June 8, the world’s richest five men owned over $400 billion in wealth. Thus, on average, each man owns nearly as much as 750 million people.

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Posted on June 13, 2017

By Steve Rhodes

The Tribune states it plainly in its remarkable series on Cook County’s property taxes and the broken – some would say rigged – system run by Assessor Joe Berrios (and his predecessors):
“Cook County failed to value homes accurately for years. The result: a property tax system that harmed the poor and helped the rich.”
That’s not an opinion. It’s a reported conclusion – one that seems irrefutable.
Now, what are we gonna do about it?

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Posted on June 12, 2017

By Jonathan Pie

New Labor is dead, you fuckers!

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Posted on June 9, 2017