Dollars & Sense articles from May 2008

Dollars & Sense archives from May 2008

From the editors.
May 1, 2008... As skyrocketing prices for food and other commodities dominate the headlines, why is Dollars & Sense running a cover article criticizing consumerism? After all, basic necessities like food and fuel are stretching people's household budgets in...

Minimal wage increase.(the short run)(Brief article)
May 1, 2008... Here's some good news for California's low-wage workers: in January, more than one million workers received a pay raise of 50 cents, to $8 an hour, as the state completed a two-step process of increasing the minimum wage. But now the bad news:...

Beggar thy neighbor.(the short run)(condominium fees )(Brief article)
May 1, 2008... The collateral damage of the subprime mortgage meltdown keeps mounting. The New York Times recently reported that many condo owners who have never missed a payment are seeing their condo fees skyrocket as neighboring units are boarded up. The...

By snobs, for snobs.(the short run)(Brief article)
May 1, 2008... What would you do if you were an owner of the world's largest nickel producer and had $22 billion or so burning a hole in your pocket? If you're Russian billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov, you spend $150 million of your fortune on a multimedia...

Theory about the minimum wage.(Cartoon)
May 1, 2008... WHAT'S THAT? MY THEORY ABOUT THE MINIMUM WAGE. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] ISN'T IT SHINY AND ELEGANT? IT PROVES THAT THE MINIMUM WAGE HURTS POOR WORKERS BY RAISING UNEMPLOYMENT! [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] WHAT'S THAT STUFF...

Poverty tourism.(travelers' enlightenment of country's condition)(Brief article)
May 1, 2008... In early April, the luxurious Lebua Hotel in Bangkok hosted a sightseeing trip for 30 of its most affluent patrons, according to Robert Frank's "Wealth Report" blog in the Wall Street Journal online. But this wasn't any ordinary tour. Absent...

Evicted by the Olympics.(the short run)(Brief article)
May 1, 2008... The upcoming Olympic Games in Beijing have boosted the cost of housing in some parts of the city sky-high. One local newspaper, Fazhi Wanbao, reported that apartment rents in areas near the Olympic stadium have risen by a factor of three or...

A $4.2 billion mastercard payment?(the short run)(Brief article)
May 1, 2008... Since online music sharing came on the scene, much has been made about the faltering music industry. The numbers speak for themselves: in 1999 U.S. music sales totaled $14.2 billion, but by 2006 that number had fallen to around $10 billion....

Can the Fed handle a systemic crisis? maybe.(Federal Reserve)
May 1, 2008... The Federal Reserve's bailout in March of 85-year-old Bear Stearns, one of the world's largest investment banks, gave a clear signal that the U.S. financial system was facing a systemic crisis. Bear Stearns was highly leveraged. Like...

Carlyle Group targets immigrants.(active culture)
May 1, 2008... Immigration advocates met at the corporate headquarters of the Carlyle Group in New York City on April 22 to protest the global private equity firm's targeting of low-wage immigrant workers at two popular U.S. food chains, Dunkin' Donuts and...

Dust-up at the Labor Notes conference: SEIU and CNA at loggerheads.(Service Employees International Union, and Certified Nursing Assistant)(Conference notes)
May 1, 2008... Labor activists brought more than just talk to the 2008 Labor Notes conference, held April 11-13 in Dearborn, Mich. They organized, protested, and struggled among themselves--providing textbook examples of solidarity as well as discord in the...

America beyond consumerism: has capitalist economic growth outlived its purpose?
May 1, 2008... One of the great benefits of studying the history of economic ideas is coming to the recognition that the founding figures of capitalist economics, and in particular Adam Smith, author of the pivotal Wealth of Nations, were often deeply...

Paying more, getting less: how much is the sick U.S. health care system costing you?
May 1, 2008... By any measure, the United States spends an enormous amount of money on health care. Here are a few of those measures. Last year, U.S. health care spending exceeded 16% of the nation's GDP. To put U.S. spending into perspective: the United...

The world is not flat: how Thomas Friedman gets it wrong about globalization.
May 1, 2008... Turn on the TV and flip to a C-SPAN or CNN discussion of the global economy and you are likely to spot the square head and mustachioed face of New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, who will probably be expressing enthusiasm for the business...

It's a new globalized world, Mr. Jones.(Economic and Political Conflict in a Transnational World)(Book review)
May 1, 2008... The Dialectics of Globalization: Economic and Political Conflict in a Transnational World, by Jerry Harris Cambridge Scholars Publishing, Newcastle upon Tyne (U.K.), 2006, 278 pp., $80 If you wanted to read just one primer to get a...

Dear Dr. Dollar: who cares if Bear Stearns fails? or the Carlyle Group? Or Merrill Lynch? Or one of the other big financial companies? They've made their profits. So what's the problem?(ask Dr. Dollar)(Bear Stearns Co., Merrill Lynch Co,)(Column)
May 1, 2008... When Bear Stearns, the large New York investment bank, closed its doors in March, some people lost money. Even with the bailout of Bear Stearns engineered by the Federal Reserve, the stockholders of the company paid dearly. [ILLUSTRATION...

Remittances to the rescue?(aid in managing financial crises)
May 1, 2008... Remittances--the money sent home to families by migrants living in foreign countries--have been gaining attention in the last few years from international institutions such as the World Bank, the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), and the...