Jun 07
It was late, I was grumpy, and the woman in front of me was buying cigarettes. I noticed the items in her cart: brand-name snacks, colas, and frozen foods. I looked at how she dressed, considered the carton of cigarettes she requested, and made a wager to myself that she would pay with government assistance. …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.easttexasreview.com/none-of-my-business-we-have-a-cockeyed-view-of-poverty-in-america/
May 04
Ebenezer Scrooge, the Dickens character, perfectly personified the nasty rich. For example, when asked to make a charitable donation for people trapped in poverty, Scrooge curled his lip in contempt and snarled: “Are there no prisons?” Blessedly, our American society has progressed well past such heartless disdain. Unless, of course, you happen to be poor …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.easttexasreview.com/making-poverty-a-crime/
Apr 10
It’s her eyes and innocent face that first grab your heart. At least they grabbed mine. Annika, a delicate young girl, has been unwittingly handed into virtual slavery by her homeless father. Sweatshop labor and sex-for-sale portend a bleak future. She seems precious, blameless, so undeserving of this hell. But life is cheap for an …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.easttexasreview.com/human-trafficking/
Mar 05
The Powers That Be say the bulk of America’s middle-class manufacturing jobs are gone and aren’t coming back. High tech jobs are being outsourced, as is an increasing share of the work historically handled by our accountants, lawyers, and some other professionals. Retail jobs at brick-and-mortar shops, however, can’t be exported. But wait, those aren’t …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.easttexasreview.com/retail-injustice/
Jul 30
The world’s super rich, according to a new report, are squirreling away phenomenal quantities of their cash in secret tax havens. By Sam Pizzigati Are America’s rich getting richer? Certainly. Every official yardstick shows that America’s most affluent are upping their incomes much faster than everyone else. How fast? Between 1980 and 2010, note economists …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.easttexasreview.com/marching-towards-greater-inequality/
Nov 01
The nation’s nurses are calling for a tax on financial transactions to begin raising the revenue needed to fix the nation’s growing social crisis. By Deborah Burger National Nurses United, America’s largest union of RNs, is sounding an alarm. We’ve organized rallies in New York, Boston, Washington, Los Angeles, Chicago, San Francisco, and Las Vegas, …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.easttexasreview.com/tax-wall-street-to-heal-america/
Aug 09
By Williams Collins Weapons are Our biggest threat; For falling deeper Into debt. India has the military-industrial complex all figured out. So does Saudi Arabia. Neither of them has one. Who needs to build weapons when you can simply buy them at a discount elsewhere? Not that anyone really needs so many weapons anyway, but …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.easttexasreview.com/the-defense-industry-threatens-america%e2%80%99s-economy/
Aug 02
By William A. Collins America’s wealthy, That’s for sure; Why then pauperize The poor? There’s widespread poverty in America today, though it’s sometimes hard to see how bad it is. Real estate development techniques and zoning rules, plus a healthy dollop of discrimination, force most poor people to live and work in neighborhoods many of …
Permanent link to this article: http://www.easttexasreview.com/shredding-the-safety-net/