they should allocate $100B to the BLS, in my expert opinion

This Day in Labor History: March 1, 1932. The Norris-LaGuardia Act passed the Senate by a 75-5 vote and was signed by President Herbert Hoover a few days later. This outlawing the most loathsome tactics used by employers against workers!!!

It's Amazon's world. Benjamin Y. Fong continues his wonderful journey to reveal how we're just living in it. The latest at Phenomenal World: The Apotheosis of Point of Sale Data www.phenomenalworld.org/analysis/the...

"Developing a general framework for regulating finance, holistically and structurally, which could be put to use when reformers have the necessary leverage, is no more utopian than what private markets themselves promise." Excellent piece by @lenorepalladino.bsky.social

This article is a whirlwind everyone should read, our own later-day Oglesby prospect.org/2026/02/26/n...

"When Covid-19 caused oil prices to plummet worldwide, it was Donald Trump himself who called on OPEC to cut oil production and protect prices. This alone confirms the importance of the organization." Former PVDSA president Rafael Ramirez speaks with PW. www.phenomenalworld.org/interviews/o...

The accounting rules governing public (non-federal) finance - specifically when public employee pensions have to be "pre-funded" - are really up there in terms of relevance to policy and political debate, while being very little known. @jwmason.bsky.social explains: jwmason.org/slackwire/th...

Re: anyone making claims about a "optimal revenue" or "revenue maximizing" level of taxes. As a share of GDP, we've seen it top out with top marginal rates of both 90 percent and 39.6 percent.

Someone should ask Bill and/or Hillary now, given everything that's happened since, to share what they remember about watching Alan Pakula's adaptation of The Pelican Brief in the White House in December 1993.

It is pretty sad how completely Frank P. Walsh has been written out of American history marxistsociology.org/2025/02/forg...

Is there some explanation for why measured productivity growth in US auto manufacturing has been negative for the past decade?

"what the politics of private finance teaches is the inadequacy of considering only what we can achieve in the short term, given the political constraints" www.phenomenalworld.org/analysis/fin...

Reading @lenorepalladino.bsky.social on unregulated finance in @phenomenalworld.bsky.social www.phenomenalworld.org/analysis/fin...

This is definitely worth a read. The New Deal financial regulatory system is mostly holes at this point. Patching it won't help much. www.phenomenalworld.org/analysis/fin...

Teaching Labor's Story - resources from @lawcha.bsky.social "Written and produced by two garment worker-students at Brookwood Labor College in 1927, Start! tells the story of Sonia, a garment worker and ardent unionist, sent from New York to organize garment workers in New Jersey."

Thanks to the OBBB, Amazon’s tax bill for 2025 is $1.2 billion, down from $9 billion the year before despite a 45% jump in profits.

A DHS slowdown in the works:

Woodrow Wilson in the 1912 campaign: "The high cost of living is arranged by private understanding."

& I didn't even touch what's happening at the SEC - perfect image of the 'giant void of nothingness' at U.S. financial regulators these days by @robinwigglesworth.ft.com www.ft.com/content/b5d9...

I wrote about how unregulated finance is now just, well, finance for @phenomenalworld.bsky.social the center of gravity in finance has completely shifted & our mental models & policymaking approaches need to catch up www.phenomenalworld.org/analysis/fin...

Why is everyone reporting the $125 million number when the Leading the Future PAC only has $39 million in its FEC filing?

The collapse of auto parts supplier First Brands last fall was a harbinger of a broader trend, as the financial press reports of "stress" in private markets. @lenorepalladino.bsky.social surveys the growth of unregulated finance: www.phenomenalworld.org/analysis/fin...

Greatly enjoyed learning about the origins and trajectory of private markets in this piece by Lenore Palladino. Disclosure, as the SEC requires of public markets, is a great goal. But as she shows, it hasn't stopped stock buybacks and predatory finance there. www.phenomenalworld.org/analysis/fin...

“A significant part of working at Cluely seemed to involve dressing up as cartoon characters for viral videos.” harpers.org/archive/2026...

A NYT headline writer BADLY needs to be fired www.nytimes.com/2026/02/17/n... I'm willing to bet most readers think this means that Mamdani wants to increase property taxes by 9.5 percentage points.

What does median refer to here? The taxpayer’s income or liability?

But not that one thing.

In many ways, Abundance is a reaction to the politics and econ of rent control. But if we build a 100k new apartments (and we should), the explicit purpose is to lower rents. This leaves the rent controlled landlords in the same place — underwater on their loans. A crisis looms either way.

Only two of the five presidents of Brazil during the military dictatorship died in office.

My dad was a Korean immigrant who was the grievance officer, newsletter editor and vice president of his local union for years. He died in 2000, but cast his last vote for president in the 1988 Michigan primary for Jesse Jackson. As he told me later, there wasn't another candidate he believed in.

Nelson Lichtenstein in 1965

I worked on his campaign in MI in 1988. When he trounced Dukakis there, the Democratic Party went into a panic and did a full-court press to stop Jackson. I remember they got Anthony Lewis, the NYT's token liberal columnist, to write a "shut-up" and eat your Dukakis piece.

Contemporary Texas knowers: What is the deal with Paxton challenging Cornyn? Wilks/Dunn want him? I would imagine Bezos and Musk and the other arriviste (non oil) Texas are happy with Cornyn…

Our grasp on reality is slipping. The response rate to the survey behind the unemployment rate (and the rest of the household survey) is now lower than during the pandemic. The decline in response rates during the first year of the Trump Admin 2.0 was larger than at any time outside the pandemic.

"In 2019, Amazon Logistics delivered 2 billion packages, according to Pitney Bowes; in 2024, it delivered 6.3 billion packages, surpassing UPS in terms of parcel volume." urbanomnibus.net/2026/02/wher...

If Team Abundance is looking for rules and regulations that get in the way of all kinds of useful and life-improving work, they could start with patents and copyrights.

This is indeed broadly true of rent-stabilized landlords in NYC when they lobby against things like rent freezes or low proposed annual increases. “Rising costs” in general audience stories about this almost always describe those as, like, maintenance or wages. But it’s mostly debt-servicing.

Pretty funny way to start a letter

Can confirm: my landlord is doing JUST fine but still trying to evict stabilized tenants and hike rents ignoring the new Good Cause legislation. They are trying to sell the building for double what they paid for it in 2018.

Brilliant article by @jwmason.bsky.social on the economics and politics of housing we can afford www.phenomenalworld.org/analysis/aft...

“But why are building owners facing distress today? The answer in most cases is that they borrowed too much to buy buildings at inflated prices, based on an expectation that rents would rise faster than they actually did.” www.phenomenalworld.org/analysis/aft...

"owners of residential buildings pay most of their rent earnings not on maintenance or operations, but to service their debts to their creditors...they borrowed too much to buy...based on an expectation that rents would rise faster than they actually did." www.phenomenalworld.org/analysis/aft...

I have a new piece out today in Phenomenal World, on the economics of a freeze in NYC regulated rents. www.phenomenalworld.org/analysis/aft...

“Any discussion of rent regulation has to grapple with the fact that owners of residential buildings pay most of their rent earnings not on maintenance or operations, but to service their debts to their creditors.” NEW by @jwmason.bsky.social www.phenomenalworld.org/analysis/aft...

This is a wonderfully written piece and I will be recommending it to everyone who knows how to read. Essential contribution to clarify positions, obligations and incentives under rent-stablization regimes.

excited to share that I am *officially running* to represent Massachusetts state employees on the MA public pension board! I'm running because public pensions are *ours* and should serve the interests of state workers and our communities I'm endorsed by @massteacher.bsky.social www.mapension.com

The Ford worker who heckled Trump during a visit to the company's plant still has his job and "has no discipline on his record," a union official said

Had forgotten that Lutnick raised for Clinton in 2016

New: UAW reaches landmark tentative contract deal with Volkswagen in Chattanooga Tennessee, including 20% across-the-board pay hikes www.bloomberg.com/news/article... "This contract is proof that if you stand up and stick together, you can win a better life”