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The One Percent Solution: How Corporations are Remaking America One State at a Time
Get PDF[Excerpt] In January 2015, Tennessee’s Republican governor, Bill Haslam, unveiled a proposal to expand his state’s Medicaid program to provide health insurance to two hundred thousand low-income residents. At the time, Haslam was at the peak of his power: he had just won reelection with 70 percent of the vote and had been named to head the Republican Governors Association. Haslam insisted that his plan was “not Obamacare”; indeed, he had gained concessions from the Obama administration allowing him to write conservative requirements into the program. His Republican colleagues—who controlled both houses of the legislature—supported his proposal, based partly on polling showing widespread voter approval. And yet none of this was enough.
An advocacy group funded by the billionaire Koch brothers, Americans for Prosperity (AFP), sent field organizers into the state, ran weeks of advertising, and staged demonstrations insisting that any Medicaid expansion whatsoever amounted to “a vote for Obamacare.” Republican caucus chair Glen Casada termed AFP’s campaign “politics of intimidation.” But it worked; the governor’s bill was defeated. Declaring victory, an AFP spokesman warned that “other governors [should] look at Tennessee as an example.”
The Tennessee experience raises important questions about American politics and the forces that shape Americans’ economic lives. How could an outside advocacy group overturn the will of elected officials and their constituents? What led a corporate-backed group to undermine its Republican allies? Why would the Koch brothers, whose primary interests are in the oil industry, care enough about Medicaid to bankroll this type of campaign? And finally, if corporate lobbies have the power to do what they did in Tennessee, what else could they do? In what other ways might they be trying to rewrite the rules that govern our economy?
In answering these questions, this book aims to show how America’s most powerful corporate lobbies are working to remake the country’s economy in ways that will affect all Americans profoundly—and yet are largely invisible to most of us. Understanding these forces’ legislative agenda is essential to comprehending America’s current political and economic trajectory. Because this agenda has been enacted in state legislatures rather 4han the U.S. Congress, it is state-level initiatives that form the subject of this book
The Rise and Fall of Almond Prices: Asia, Drought, and Consumer Preference
Get PDF[Excerpt] In recent years, nuts have become a crucial export commodity, and nuts now play an influential role as a staple among U.S. agricultural exports. Throughout the 2000s, the harvests and sales of almonds, walnuts, pecans, and hazelnuts rose. During this period, almond output in particular flourished and quickly outpaced the growth of other nuts as demand rose among Asian economies and domestic consumers. That demand subsequently led to higher prices, with the price per pound of almonds rising from 4.00 in 2014. On the supply side, effects from the drought in California slowed the pace of almond production despite continual growth in almond acreage. Yet, between June 2015 and April 2016, prices dropped for 10 consecutive months, a response to stalled foreign demand and a strong U.S. supply. This Beyond the Numbers article examines how almonds have become such an influential U.S. export and details the factors that have contributed to dramatic fluctuations in prices
High Tech and High Touch: Headhunting, Technology, and Economic Transformation
Get PDF[Excerpt] In High Tech and High Touch, James E. Coverdill and William Finlay invite readers into the dynamic world of headhunters, personnel professionals who acquire talent for businesses and other organizations on a contingent-fee basis. In a high-tech world where social media platforms have simplified direct contact between employers and job seekers, Coverdill and Finlay acknowledge, it is relatively easy to find large numbers of apparently qualified candidates. However, the authors demonstrate that headhunters serve a valuable purpose in bringing high-touch search into the labor market: they help parties on both sides of the transaction to define their needs and articulate what they have to offer.
As well as providing valuable information for sociologists and economists, High Tech and High Touch demonstrates how headhunters approach practical issues such as identifying and attracting candidates; how they solicit, secure, and evaluate search assignments from client companies; and how they strive to broker interactions between candidates and clients to maximize the likelihood that the right people land in the right jobs
What do Newer Entrants into the Workforce Really Want?
Get PDFCompanies have had to evolve continuously to remain competitive in today’s marketplace. Technological advancements, shifting in social dynamics, and the changing demographics all impact how companies attract and retain talent. As more information becomes available on the internet, and as more generations are in the workforce at the same time, it becomes increasingly challenging for companies to develop cost effective and attractive benefits schemes
Huntington, Town of and Town of Huntington Unit, CSEA Local 1000, AFSCME, AFL-CIO, Suffolk County Local 852 (2017) (MOA)
Get PDFRepresentativeness of the European Social Partner Organizations: Central Government Administration
Get PDFThis study provides information allowing for an assessment of the representativeness of the actors involved in the European sectoral social dialogue committee for central government administration. The aim of Eurofound’s series of studies on representativeness is to identify the relevant national and supranational social partner organisations in the field of industrial relations in selected sectors. The study identified TUNED (representing employees) and EUPAE (representing employers) as the most important European-level social partner organisations in the sector
China Employment Law Update - December 2017
Get PDFIn This Issue: Amendment to China\u27s Anti-Unfair Competition Law Strengthens Trade Secret Protections Major National and Local Developments Related to the Employee Housing Fund System Repeal of Regulations May Impact Calculations of Economic Compensation for Employees PRC Holiday Schedule Announced for 2018 Shanghai Amends Regulations on Employee Representative Councils Shenzhen Issues Guidance on Labor Dispute Arbitration Beijing High Court Rules Dismissal Lawful for Employee Who Lied About Traveling While on Sick Leave Nantong Court Deems Hire of Non- pensioner Retiree to Create Special Employment Relationshi
Hong Kong Employment Law Update - August 2017
Get PDFIn This Issue: Case Reviews Amendment to employment contract void due to lack of consideration Civil servant successful in claiming benefits for same-sex spouse Recent UK decision on legal privilege may have consequences in Hong Kong First company director sentenced to imprisonment after defaulting on MPF contributions Expat employees may benefit from UK employment law protection Company director fined for default on Labour Tribunal award UK case limits the blue pencilling test Legislative Developments Proposed Employment (Amendment) Bill 2017 gives employees right to reinstatement Government proposes working hours protection for those earning HKD 11,000 or less Government\u27s MPF offset abolishment proposals approved by Executive Counci
Innovative Strategies for Accelerated Human Resource Development in South Asia: Information and Communication Technology for Education - Special Focus on Bangladesh, Nepal, and Sri Lanka
Get PDFInformation and communication technology (ICT) has the potential to revolutionize education equity, quality, and efficiency. South Asia’s governments have recognized this potential and invested in ICT-focused education initiatives and projects. While these efforts helped to introduce ICT-enabled teaching and learning practices, they may not be sufficient for widespread sustainable adoption within their countries. The stage of implementation and impact of investments also vary significantly from country to country in South Asia. This paper examines the existing state and gaps of ICT in education of three South countries—Bangladesh, Nepal, and Sri Lanka—and suggests strategies to address these gaps
Two Decades of Structural Transformation and Dynamics of Income Inequality in Indonesia
Get PDFSuccessful reductions in poverty, resulting from substantial increases in income and structural transformation, have been associated with growing levels of income inequality. This paper explores the link between structural transformation and inequality in Indonesia by applying Theil’s L decomposition (both static and dynamic) to the National Socio-Economic Surveys of 1996, 2005, and 2014 and panel data analysis of provincial macroeconomic datasets. This study confirms that, as has been seen in other developing countries, Indonesia has experienced an agriculture–service transition, before the industry sector has matured. Moreover, the Inverted U Kuznet curve exists in Indonesia. Inequality will increase in tandem with an increase in per capita income until it reaches an income level beyond which the inequality starts to decline. From both static and dynamic decomposition of Theils’s L, this study found that (i) the root cause of increasing inequality in Indonesia is the pure inequality effect (unexplained effect); (ii) population shifts from the agriculture sector to either the industry or service sectors, from rural to urban areas and from informal to formal employment are the second contributor to explain increases in inequality; (iii) an increase in educational attainment has also contributed to increasing inequality during the last 2 decades; and (iv) even though the contribution is cancelled out, increasing inequality has been curbed by the growing income from those working in the agriculture sector, in the informal sector, by those living in rural areas, and by those without formal education. Finally, our estimation results suggest that the structural transformation of economic development was responsible for the growing inequality in Indonesia. Nevertheless, the increasing share of service sector to the national gross domestic product has degraded the growth rate of inequality during the observation period