The For-Profit Nursing Home Scam
Private equity–owned nursing home facilities across the country are poaching government funds that should be used to increase staffing levels and pay workers more to line their owners’ pockets.
21103 Article(s) by: Julia Goodman
To Make Unions Resonate Again, Study the CIO’s History
Declining union density has diminished American workers’ awareness of labor organizing, pride in union status, and sense of belonging to a tradition of collective struggle. The history of the CIO can teach us how to embed unions in the working class again.
How Israel Facilitated the Guatemalan Genocide
Gaza isn’t the only place where Israel has sponsored mass killing. During the 1980s, Israel intervened in Guatemala as a proxy for the United States, providing arms and training to the military governments that slaughtered thousands of indigenous Maya.
Archaeologists Are Organizing to Dig Out of Poverty Wages
Field archaeologists work physically demanding jobs exposed to the elements, often for low pay and meager benefits from private employers. We spoke to one self-identified “dirty shovel bum” about why he and his coworkers are organizing.
Europe’s Mood of War Is Whitewashing the Far Right
Ahead of June’s EU elections, centrist politicians are again calling for a vote to stop the far right. But the far right has already won mainstream credibility — and it’s because it accepts the EU’s increasing devotion of public funds to the defense industry.
Blaming Low Wages on Bad Schooling Is a Neoliberal Myth
For the past 40 years, privately funded interest groups and lawmakers have promoted the idea that US schools are failing and causing economic dysfunction. The story provides cover for the real culprits of inequality: wealth-hoarding bosses.
Public Housing Is Social Housing
The housing crisis is a calamity that can no longer be ignored. AOC and Bernie Sanders’s newly reintroduced Green New Deal for Public Housing highlights the importance of deeply affordable and generously funded public housing as key to solving this crisis.
US Sanctions on Iran Are Devastating and Ineffective
US sanctions are causing crippling shortages for many Iranians. But far from bringing the Islamic Republic to its knees, the sanctions are an opportunity for elites to remodel the economy — and find new ways of profiting from misery.
The Gaza Massacre Is Undermining the Culture of Democracy
Israel’s supporters have repeatedly invoked the memory of Nazi genocide to legitimize mass murder of civilians in Gaza. Historian Enzo Traverso warns that the cynical misuse of Holocaust remembrance poses a grave danger to our global democratic culture.
Haiti’s Disorder Is Due to Elite Malfeasance and US Meddling
Many observers of Haiti’s social disorder today maintain that the island country has always been dysfunctional. But the poverty and chaos in Haiti is of recent vintage, the product of disastrous decisions by political elites and heavy-handed US interference.
The Power of Finance Is Inherent to Capitalism
Analysts of financialization often present it as a sign of capitalist decline, yet the rise of finance has actually strengthened capitalist domination. The only way to challenge this power is by converting finance into a public utility.
Generic Drugmakers Want to Keep Medicine Prices High
The generic drug industry is pushing back against a government effort to lower the cost of lifesaving medications, even though the plan is built around letting them make more generic drugs.
Can a Major Antitrust Case Rein in Apple?
Last month, the Justice Department charged tech giant Apple with serious antitrust violations related to the iPhone. It’s a relatively aggressive suit — but likely an inadequate response to Apple’s outsize power.
Sahra Wagenknecht Keeps Punching Down
After splitting from Germany’s Left Party, Sahra Wagenknecht is calling for the state to cut rejected asylum seekers’ benefits. She claims to speak for working-class Germans — but she’s combining anti-migrant lines with classic anti-welfare talking points.
Robert Michels Was a Flawed Theorist of Political Oligarchy
In his book Political Parties, Robert Michels argued that mass movements have a natural tendency to develop undemocratic structures. Michels had some sharp insights into the nature of bureaucracy, but his “iron law of oligarchy” was seriously flawed.
India’s Farmers Are Mobilizing Against the Modi Government
The Indian farmers’ movement has posed the biggest challenge to Narendra Modi’s government since it came to power. With elections approaching, farmers are mobilizing once again to challenge rural impoverishment under a destructive neoliberal model.
Wall Street’s War on Workers Can Be Stopped
Democratic Party elites have accepted the loss of vital working-class jobs and written off white workers as bigots. But a new book by Les Leopold shows how we can build a broad working-class movement to fight for the right to a good job.
Democratic Voters Are Furious About US Support of Israel
Nearly 50,000 voters in Wisconsin’s Democratic presidential primary just cast ballots for nobody. In state after state, the voters Joe Biden needs are registering their fury about US support for Israel’s war on Gaza by voting “uncommitted.”
We Can’t Ignore the Difficult Emotions of Political Defeat
The Left’s long history of defeats has produced an equally long history of difficult emotions. Yet left-wing thinkers have often ignored the emotional experience of political defeat in service of an unrealistic ideal of the selfless revolutionary.
The Grind Never Stops in Radu Jude’s Latest Film
Filmmaker Radu Jude’s Do Not Expect Too Much From the End of the World follows a production assistant on a long day’s drive to screen injured Romanian workers for a workplace safety video — painting a bleak, darkly funny portrait of a hollowed-out world.