Yes, Profits Have Risen With Prices
That unbelievably expensive grocery bill? Turns out there’s a simple explanation: a new report in Canada finds that corporate profits have doubled since before the outbreak of the pandemic.
132 Articles by: David Moscrop
David Moscrop is a writer and political commentator. He hosts the podcast Open to Debate and is the author of Too Dumb For Democracy? Why We Make Bad Political Decisions and How We Can Make Better Ones.
School Smartphone Bans Are Picking Up Steam
There is increasing evidence that smartphones and social media use have a destructive impact on the mental health of young people. Big Tech may not like it, but more and more schools around the world are instituting bans on phones in the classroom.
IKEA’s Genius Plan: Pay Workers More to Keep Them
Faced with sky-high turnover, notoriously anti-union IKEA has reluctantly decided to pay workers more and offer them childcare in a tight labor market. To rebalance power between management and labor in the long term, workers need a union.
The Great Video Game Swindle
The video game industry exploits its workers and abuses its market dominance, ruining the quality of games while investors rake in fortunes. Worth more than the film and music industries combined, this behemoth is a beast that needs taming.
Welcome to the Era of Garbage Film and Television Streaming
Private equity and monopoly capitalists will destroy anything to make a buck, and they’ve turned their sights on TV and film. If you hated cable’s high prices, endless ads, and copycat programming, you’re going to loathe the future of streaming.
Red Lobster Had to Close So That Rich People Could Get Paid
Red Lobster’s bankruptcy isn’t a story about the recklessness of having endless shrimp on offer — it’s a story of how private equity firms bled a restaurant chain dry, leaving workers and diners adrift.
Walmart Is Still Putting Ebenezer Scrooge to Shame
Infamous for its starvation wages, Walmart just posted staggering first-quarter profits. The surge is a result of its strategic shift toward catering to affluent shoppers while its full-time workers continue to rely on Medicaid and food stamps.
Failure to Safeguard Free Speech Is Always a Problem
Recent crackdowns on free assembly are a reminder that the state will always finish first in deplatforming contests. Parts of Canada’s Online Harms Bill may be a massive overreach that chills speech at the worst time possible.
The Canadian State Is Euthanizing Its Poor and Disabled
Canada boasts one of the world’s highest assisted-death rates, supposedly enabling the terminally ill to die with dignity. However, this suicide program increasingly resembles a dystopian replacement for care services, exchanging social welfare for euthanasia.
What If Labor Owned Its Workplaces?
Worker-owned firms have less wage inequality, greater job security, higher job satisfaction, stronger community ties, and greater resilience during economic downturns. The model needs to spread.
The Unbearable Necessity of Experts
Right-wing populism’s disdain for the opinions of experts can be mistaken for the Left’s scorn for technocracy. But democratic principles and mass politics are the real antidote to the appropriation of power by experts.
Welcome to a Brave New World of Price Gouging
Sellers have always had access to more information than buyers, and “dynamic pricing,” which harnesses the power of algorithms and big data, is supercharging this asymmetry.
Your Car Is Spying on You for Insurance Companies
It turns out that the “Internet of Things” is full of automated snoops and spies. Data collection, now integrated into new car designs, is more pervasive than ever and is ushering in a brave new world of surveillance and corporate collusion.
Tech Titans Are the Robber Barons of Our Gilded Age
Apple’s battle with Epic is a reminder that today’s tech companies behave like 19th-century monopolists. Installing democratic control over these modern throwbacks to Gilded Age robber barons is the only way to curb their power.
Billionaires Hate This One Weird Trick: Taxing Them
The global movement to tax billionaires, much to the dismay of the 1%, is gaining steam. Sure, wealth taxes are not a panacea for the ruinous problems caused by capitalism, but the fact that the rich hate them is a good reason to pursue them further.
Strikes Are Meant to Be Disruptive
Critics of new anti-scab legislation in Canada are worried about the ability to “get things done.” But halting production is the very purpose of strikes — to create disruptions that force bosses to negotiate.
Labor’s Tide Is Rising
North American workers are gearing up for pivotal labor actions. With a tight labor market and the tailwind of significant union wins, the coming months promise a royal rumble between labor and capital.
Are We Transitioning From Capitalism to Silicon Serfdom?
The idea that we are entering an era of techno-feudalism that will be worse than capitalism is chilling and controversial. We asked former Greek finance minister Yanis Varoufakis to elucidate this idea, explain how we got here, and map out some alternatives.
Our New Cities Can Be Born From the Ashes of the Old
Commercial real estate is in crisis throughout North America. This presents an opportunity for the mass conversion of commercial buildings, which could help address the housing crisis and create better cities in the process.
The Rich Want Their Own Cities
From Honduras to California, the dreams of the rich are reshaping urban spaces into exclusive private domains. The future of our cities must not be ceded to elites striving to construct walled utopias.