Was that an FDR-Sized Stimulus?

Obama’s $800 Billion Bill Was Big, But It May Not Have Been a New Deal

Few people know that the federal stimulus legislation of 2009, officially known as the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, was twice as big as the Louisiana Purchase and Marshall Plan combined. Time magazine correspondent Michael Grunwald, in his new book The New, New Deal seeks to rectify that misperception, arguing that the stimulus is transforming American life. In advance of Grunwald’s appearance at a Zócalo in Grand Park, we asked scholars and writers: will the ARRA eventually be remembered as a new “New Deal”? Why or why not?

October 16, 2012

My Hard Times in Tampa

The Sunsets Are Still Free, But Economic Change Has High Costs

by Kevin Walker | August 27, 2012

We hear so much about presidential candidates–and so little about life in the states that elect them. In “Beyond the Circus,” writers take us off the trail and give us …

Let’s Relearn To Share the Loot

Timothy Noah Talks About Growing Income Inequality In the United States—and What To Do About It

July 10, 2012

Is America’s growing income inequality an inevitable product of capitalism and global trends? New Republic editor Timothy Noah, author of The Great Divergence: America’s Growing Inequality Crisis and What We …

Hold Off On Buying Guns and Gold—For the Moment

But Do Prepare For Revolution, Says Michael Lind

June 26, 2012

The key division in American politics and economics right now isn’t between liberals and conservatives, Michael Lind told an audience at the Hammer Museum. It’s between Hamiltonians and Jeffersonians. What …

Economic Recovery Room

Besides the End Of the Great Depression, What Historical Moment Should the U.S. Look Back To For Inspiration In Coming Out Of the Recession?

June 24, 2012

Boom-and-bust cycles are not new. Our economy has had to redefine itself a number of times throughout our history, as Michael Lind’s magisterial book Land of Promise reminds us. And …

There Will Be Mortgage Blood

An Idea That’ll Make No One Very Happy (Which Is Why It’s Good)

by Jordan Wallens | February 12, 2012

By now we are all eminently aware of our nation’s mortgage crisis. Lenders over-lent, buyers over-bought, and state-of-the-art hedging ensured nobody would ever be held accountable.

But four years on, economists …

recession