Is It Now Time To Talk About A Global Living Wage

The idea of the living wage is back on the political agenda. In the United States the Democrats are proposing to double the federal minimum wage.

Near-record low unemploymenthas companies fumbling to find the best ways to recruit and retain workers. Our research suggests a sure-fire way to do just that: give them a real stake.

Robert Reich explains why labor unions impact the middle class and raise wages.

Hardly a week goes by without another story in the media covering a family somewhere in America dealing with an outrageous medical bill.

Google is digesting its third whopping antitrust penalty from the European Commission, having been fined €1.5 billion (£1.3 billion) for abusing its market dominance around online advertising.

Robert Reich and W. Kamau Bell explain the criminalization of poverty and the flaws in our criminal justice system.

As the federal election approaches, we’re expected to drown in slogans like “lower taxes”, “wage growth”,

Less than half of school-aged children in the United States are flourishing, research finds.

Early childhood education programs can benefit life outcomes in ways that span generations, new research shows.

So runs the story of one of the Italian nuns I interviewed earlier this year, as part of a wider investigation into the unsung contributions of women workers, and why they have been historically undervalued. 

A college education can set you up for a lifetime – though it can come with a hefty price tag

Feminist campaigner Caroline Criado Perez’s latest book is an essential if enraging read.

The politics of climate change in Australia has always been about the costs of change.

The story about how we started to think this way about food is closely linked to the rise of the potato as a national starch.

Robert Reich explain how the wealthy and corporations receive billions in corporate welfare.

With the U.S.-China trade war intensifying, there is a lot of talk about whether tariffs save American jobs – as President Donald Trump claims – or destroy them.

Recently, the Ontario government proposed educational reforms that collectively amount to savings of almost $1 billion, according to an analysis by the charity People for Education.

The idea that has been passed around by most conservative and liberal government leaders and representatives is that little can be done for the people because "money" is in short supply.

A new report shows growth of dollar stores in low-income and rural communities furthers inequity and pushes out local businesses.

The current outbreak of measles has startled public health practitioners, who declared measles controlled over two decades ago.

Medical robots are helping doctors and other professionals save time, lower costs and shorten patient recovery times, but patients may not be ready.

While critics charge that charter schools are siphoning money away from public schools, a more fundamental issue frequently flies under the radar: the questionable business practices that allow people who own and run charter schools to make large profits.

There is a widespread perception that mental ill health is on the rise in the West, in tandem with a prolonged decline in collective well-being.

Teacher strikes swept the United States in 2018, from West Virginia to Oklahoma, Colorado, Arizona, North Carolina and beyond.

A sister company of Google, Alphabet’s Wing Aviation, just got federal approval to start using drones for commercial delivery.

Robots have been taking our jobs since the 1960s. So why are politicians and business leaders only now becoming so worried about robots causing mass unemployment?

The banking system is a source of great confusion for many people, How was fractional reserve Banking put together, what is the history of banking in the United States?

From the valsartan blood pressure drug contamination that exposed thousands of patients to cancer-causing impurities, to a massive pacemaker recall undertaken to fix a hazardous software bug in half-a-million cardiac devices, health care product quality problems are ever-present and highly dangerous.

Robert Reich debunks 12 misconceptions about tax policy in America.

In 1950, men and women at age 65 could expect to live about 11 years more on average. Today, that number has gone up to 17, and the United Nations forecasts that it will increase by about five more years by the end of the century.

Robert Reich explains how the modern economy really works and what we can do expand economic opportunity. Watch More

Australia’s national minimum wage should become a “living wage”, according to a new campaign from the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU). But what exactly is a living wage?

“Digital ethics and privacy” shot into research and advisory company Gartner’s top ten strategic technology trends for 2019. Before that it barely raised a mention.

There has been an impressive expansion in school enrolment in India since the early 2000s. Despite this, India is in the midst of a “learning crisis”, with improvements in learning lagging behind increases in enrolment.

Society’s expectations about gender roles alter the human brain at the cellular level, according to a new paper.

Every aspect of life can be guided by artificial intelligence algorithms – from choosing what route to take for your morning commute, to deciding whom to take on a date, to complex legal and judicial matters such as predictive policing.

Solar power has seen a boom, but what happens to all the panels in a few decades when they’re no longer useful? And what about electronic devices with even shorter life spans?

The tiny Mexican town of Boquillas del Carmen sits nestled between the Sierra del Carmen Mountains and the Rio Grande. Its Chihuahuan Desert location is strikingly beautiful, with green vegetation along the river, the brown soil of the surrounding desert and pink mountain cliffs creating splendid color contrasts.

Just a week ago, President Donald Trump appeared poised to take the drastic step of closing the U.S.-Mexico border to both trade and travel. 

As millions of people tune in to watch the Final Four, much of their focus will be on the numbers on the scoreboard. 

To end austerity and make the economy work better for the whole country requires transforming the tax system.

Traditionally, when a car breaks down, the solution has been to fix it. Repair manuals, knowledgeable mechanics and auto parts stores make car repairs common, quick and relatively inexpensive.

No matter how you slice the data, women in the U.S. earn a lot less than men. A typical woman working full-time makes 81 cents for every dollar a man earns, little more than the 77 cents she got a decade ago.

“Our Country is FULL!” U.S. President Donald Trump recently tweeted. He was referring to immigrants, but the rhetorical tweet begs the question: Can a country ever be full?

What and how a country chooses to tax says a lot about its values. A core value built into the DNA of America, for example, is equality.

In an outbreak that has now run for more than 28 months, at least 279 people across 41 states have fallen ill with multidrug-resistant Salmonella infections linked to raw turkey products.

It has not only boosted gross domestic product and budget revenue, as would be expected when with more people, but also also living standards

It’s tax time in the U.S., which means Americans and residents are hurriedly poring over paperwork, filling in forms and hoping to file by the April 15 deadline.

Canadians continue to grapple with what it means to be an inclusive society. Despite a general trend to inclusive education in provinces across Canada, policies and services are inconsistent.

Reducing the number of debt accounts lowers the mental burden of people in poverty, research finds.

President Trump enthusiastically declared on March 26, 2019, that Republicans will be known as “the party of health care.” He also ordered the Justice Department to defend the ruling of a Texas judge that seeks to eliminate the Affordable Care Act in its entirety during the appeals process.

If we really care about protecting the people who make the things we wear and use, we need to raise wages for workers in supply chains to above the poverty line.

Historian Rutger Bregman, whose speech at the Davos World Economic Forum went viral, explains why often-dismissed plans to correct inequality can actually work.

American congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez recently shook up environmental politics by releasing a broad outline of a Green New Deal – a plan to make the US a carbon-neutral economy in the next ten years, while reducing both poverty and inequality.

One of the claimed benefits of a living wage is that employees will spend most of their extra income, resulting in large increases in national spending, national income, and even the tax take.

President Trump promised to protect healthcare for people with pre-existing conditions, but his administration is now fighting to throw out the entire Affordable Care Act. Ali Velshi is joined by Kentucky

The classroom is bright with enough room for 26 kindergarten kids to move around their stations of discovery.

The ruling Liberals have tabled another deficit budget. The government debt grows larger. Commentators are wringing their hands and wagging their fingers. The worries are largely based in misrepresentation or ignorance of government debt and money.

Scandal has thrust the troubling inequality of higher education in the U.S. into the spotlight. News media have highlighted how big money donations, sports scholarships, SAT tests and admission consultants can help people game the elite admission system in both legal and illegal ways.

Federal attorneys have arrested 50 people in a college admission scam that allowed wealthy parents to buy their kids’ admission to elite universities.

Ontario Premier Doug Ford may be planning a two-tiered, profit-driven health-care system, according to the Toronto Star. This is clearly the wrong solution to the health-care woes of the province, and the nation as a whole.

Calls for a Universal Basic Income have been increasing, most recently as part of the Green New Deal introduced by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and supported by at least 40 members of Congress.

U.S. roads and bridges are in abysmal shape – and that was before the recent winter storms made things even worse.

The Trump Organization, Donald Trump’s private, family-run business, is well known to have operated at the fringes of what’s legal. Trump got his start in the rough-and-tumble atmosphere of New York City real estate development, after all.

Have you ever searched for a product online in the morning and gone back to look at it again in the evening only to find the price has changed?

Mexico City, 1970. Cleo’s alarm sounds very early in the morning. She gets up and climbs down the stairs from her rooftop room in the upper middle class house where she lives and works.

Weeks after my father passed away from cancer in 2010, my newly widowed mother received a bill for US$11,000.

Spending on pharmaceuticals is on the rise worldwide. And it well should be. Today, we are able to cure some diseases like hepatitis C that were virtual death sentences just a few years ago.

Seventy-one out of the world’s 195 countries saw their democratic institutions erode in recent years, according to the 2018 year-end report by democracy watchdog Freedom House, a phenomenon known as “democratic backsliding.

American views on marijuana have shifted incredibly rapidly. Thirty years ago, marijuana legalization seemed like a lost cause.

The world can limit global warming to 1.5℃ and move to 100% renewable energy while still preserving a role for the gas industry, and without relying on technological fixes such as carbon capture and storage, according to our new analysis.

At the heart of the greatest works of Ancient Greek literature are mighty acts of revenge.

Don Lane’s employment contract for his work as a courier described him as an “independent contractor”. This meant he was neither an “employee” nor a “worker”

Imagine there was a store where there were no prices on items, and you never knew what you’d pay until you’d picked out your purchases and were leaving the shop.

When school officials suspend students, the idea is to maintain a safe environment and deter violence and other problematic behavior on the school campus.

A decade ago, on Jan. 29, 2009, newly inaugurated President Barack Obama signed his first bill into law: the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009.

Where’s the weed!? That’s been a common Canadian refrain lately. Shortages appeared almost immediately after recreational cannabis sales began last October.

The 2008 financial crisis continues to plague the world economy and our politics. It’s also messing with how we understand our narratives of global integration.

The end of growth will come one day, perhaps very soon, whether we’re ready or not. If we plan for and manage it, we could well wind up with greater well-being.

Internet shopping has grown massively, especially now that free delivery and returns, with multiple ways of making them, are the norm.

The doctor was desperate. ‘I need to talk to my patients,’ she said, ‘and give them time to ask questions.

Another year, another list of the World’s 50 Best Restaurants. And another round of Michelin stars, Good Food Guide hats, and Gourmet Traveller Top 100 Restaurants in Australia.

The biggest untold story about how we pay for government involves a big switcheroo by America’s wealthy.

The United States spends much more per person on health care than other developed countries. But it’s largely because prices are higher, not because Americans get more care, according to a new study.

It was once widely anticipated that the process which saw the standard working week fall from 60 to 40 hours in wealthy nations over the first half of the 20th century would continue. 

Stocks have been slumping on a variety of concerns, from President Donald Trump’s ongoing trade war with China to worries about an economic slowdown and rising interest rates.

Many of our festive traditions – from exchanging cards and pulling crackers to decorating trees – were popularized by the Victorians.

The Chicago police officer Jason Van Dyke fired 16 shots, killing the African-American teenager Laquan McDonald; 14 of those shots were apparently fired while McDonald lay on the ground.

Just like the rest of us, the rich and powerful have had to accept that youth is fleeting, that strength and health soon fail, and that all possessions must be relinquished within a few decades.

The number of farmers markets in the US has grown dramatically in recent years, but with an aging population of farmers, who’s supporting this growth? Meet the “new American farmer.”

The U.S. economy is growing at the fastest pace in five years, American companies are earning record profits and unemployment is at the lowest level in almost half a century.

As a sociologist who studies feminist activism, I often get asked when and how the #MeToo movement is going to trickle down. This is a fair question, and not one easy to answer.

In the wake of controversial and widely publicized incidents involving the use of deadly force by the police against racial and ethnic minorities, President Obama appointed the President’s Task Force on 21st Century Policing in 2015 to propose ways to improve policing in the U.S.

The right would like us to believe that the inequality we see in the United States, and increasingly in other countries, is a natural outcome of market processes.

Forida, 22, lives in Dhaka, Bangladesh, with her infant son and husband. They live in a dark compound built mostly of tin and wood with six other families and just one toilet. It floods and leaks when it rains, and beside the compound is a polluted pond that attracts mosquitoes. Forida says that if she were paid a little more money, she could one day send her son to school. She could live happily; her family could live a better life.

Sorry to deliver the news, but it’s time to worry about the next crash. The combination of stagnant wages with most economic gains going to the top is once again endangering the economy.

There is a significant perception gap between what the general public think about why people become homeless, and what people who have experienced homelessness say

Kelsey Hrubes knew she had a challenge on her hands when she visited Germany as a study abroad student back in 2015. “I was forced to adapt to cultural norms I had never considered before and try to comprehend everything in a new language,” recalls Hrubes, a software engineer at Microsoft and 2017 Iowa State graduate in German and computer science.

One in every five people in the UK today are living in poverty – that is, living with a household income below 60% of the median national income when housing costs are considered. Food is a key component of household budgets. Poverty is linked directly to how people access food.

A family in India needs fresh water. But this family can’t just turn on a tap. Instead, the women in the household must walk to fetch it, sometimes travelling miles carrying plastic or earthenware pots, possibly with a child or two in tow, to the nearest safe source – regularly repeating the journey up to three times a day.