Five decades after President Lyndon B. Johnson declared a war on poverty, the nation’s poor are more likely to be found in suburbs like this one than in cities or rural areas, and poverty in suburbs is rising faster than in any other setting in the country. By 2011, there were three million more people…
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The American Middle Class Is No Longer the World’s Richest – NYTimes.com
More and more coverage of American inequality, but I’m curious about how it’s often framed as the disappearance, or decline of the middle class. This article paints an interesting picture of American middle class decline relative to its counterpart in other countries, and paints a picture of economic crisis fueling the relative decline of Americans…
Boston Fed’s Latest Role: Community Organizer – NYTimes.com
Interesting initiative by the Boston Federal Reserve, making grants to small- and mid-sized distressed cities in Massachusetts. It’s called the Working Cities Challenge, funneling money from private donors to cities based on an application process. I think the headline “community organizer” is a bit of a misnomer, I’m not sure how I would characterize this…
In History Departments, It’s Up With Capitalism – NYTimes.com
Yesterday I met a doctoral student at Berkeley studying the “history of capitalism” in the history department (in six years, the first history student I’ve crossed paths with, oddly enough). And then this morning I stumble on this piece from last year: In History Departments, It’s Up With Capitalism – NYTimes.com. (linked from an article…
Bailing on Detroit – Jamie Peck
Jamie Peck, Geography professor at The University of British Columbia, has written quite a bit about neoliberalism, what he calls “austerity urbanism” and the ongoing saga of Detroit’s finances. He has an insightful blog post on how terms like bailout, responsibility, and federalism are serving to seal Detroit’s fate as a sinking ship, forced to…