Pitchfork Economics with Nick Hanauer

The Biden Administration’s 2023 budget proposal includes a Billionaire Minimum Income Tax and a rewrite of stock buyback practices. Will these changes actually take effect? If so, will they do enough to curb runaway corporate power? Niko Lusiani from the Roosevelt Institute breaks down what’s inside Biden’s budget.Niko Lusiani is the Director of Corporate Power at the Roosevelt Institute. Twitter: @NikoLusianiBudget of the U.S. Government https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/budget_fy2023.pdf Roosevelt Institute Responds to Billionaire Minimum Income Tax Proposal in Biden Administration FY 2023 Budget https://rooseveltinstitute.org/2022/03/28/statement-roosevelt-institute-responds-to-billionaire-minimum-income-tax-proposal/ Starbucks Halts Stock Buybacks as Schultz Returns https://www.usnews.com/news/business/articles/2022-04-04/starbucks-halts-stock-buybacks-as-schultz-pivots-to-workers#:~:text=Starbucks%20announced%20late%20last%20year,the%20company%20announced%20in%202018Website: http://pitchforkeconomics.com/Twitter: @PitchforkEconInstagram: @pitchforkeconomicsNick’s twitter: @NickHanauer

The idea behind private equity firms—to buy failing companies and turn them around for a profit—is not inherently bad. So why is private equity such a major driver of economic inequality? Jim Baker, the Executive Director for the Private Equity Stakeholder Project, explains these Wall Street pirates’ risky business practices and shows how workers are paying the price. Jim Baker is the Executive Director for the Private Equity Stakeholder Project Twitter: @PEstakeholderPirate Equity: How Wall Street Firms are Pillaging American Retail https://pestakeholder.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/Pirate-Equity-How-Wall-Street-Firms-are-Pillaging-American-Retail-July-2019.pdf  Website: http://pitchforkeconomics.com/Twitter: @PitchforkEconInstagram: @pitchforkeconomicsNick’s twitter: @NickHanauer

In 2019, a group of business leaders signed a high-profile pledge promising that they would voluntarily move toward a more inclusive stakeholder-focused version of capitalism. But throughout the pandemic, those same companies reported record profits while workers were left behind. Brookings Institute Senior Fellow Katie Bach walks us through her new report examining the pandemic labor practices of 22 companies, spanning nearly every sector, and employing more than 7 million frontline workers. Katie Bach is a Nonresident Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institute and the CBO of &pizza.Twitter: @kathrynsbachAs shareholder wealth soared, workers were left behind https://www.brookings.edu/research/profits-and-the-pandemic-as-shareholder-wealth-soared-workers-were-left-behind Website: http://pitchforkeconomics.com/Twitter: @PitchforkEconInstagram: @pitchforkeconomicsNick’s twitter: @NickHanauer

Non-compete clauses, and the lesser-known no-poach agreements between franchises, are shockingly common for low-wage workers. Although these contracts were originally intended to protect trade secrets among high-level executives, they have spiraled into an unfair labor practice that keeps wages low, limits employee mobility, and decreases competition. Washington state Attorney General Bob Ferguson explains how non-competes and no-poach agreements violate the law in many states, what his team did to get hundreds of huge employers across the country to cease and desist, and why you should tell your state’s Attorney General if you know of any low- or middle-income workers who are being forced into signing these agreements. This episode was originally recorded and released in May 2021.Bob Ferguson is Washington State’s 18th Attorney General. As the state’s chief legal officer, Bob is committed to protecting the people of Washington against powerful interests that don’t play by the rules. Twitter: @BobFergusonAGNoncompete agreements have pushed U.S. wages even lower, saysa new Biden administration report: https://www.fastcompany.com/90729820/noncompete-agreements-have-pushed-u-s-wages-even-lower-says-a-new-biden-administration-report Why aren’t paychecks growing? A burger-joint clause offers a clue: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/27/business/pay-growth-fast-food-hiring.htmlWorkers in Washington state win big under new non-compete law: https://www.emeryreddy.com/2019/09/workers-in-washington-state-win-big-under-new-non-compete-law/ Attorney General Bob Ferguson stops King County coffee shop’s practice requiring baristas to sign unfair non-compete agreements: https://www.atg.wa.gov/news/news-releases/attorney-general-bob-ferguson-stops-king-county-coffee-shop-s-practice-requiring AG Report: Ferguson’s initiative ends no-poach practices nationally at 237 corporate franchise chains: https://www.atg.wa.gov/news/news-releases/ag-report-ferguson-s-initiative-ends-no-poach-practices-nationally-237-corporate Website: http://pitchforkeconomics.com/Twitter: @PitchforkEconInstagram: @pitchforkeconomicsNick’s twitter: @NickHanauer

It’s trendy to mock the malicious pervasiveness of neoliberalism now, but have you ever wondered what its origins are? This week, George Monbiot and Binyamin Appelbaum join the show to uncover just where the dominant economic theory of our time came from and how it took hold. This episode was originally recorded and released in October 2019.George Monbiot writes a weekly column for The Guardian and is the author of a number of books, most recently ‘Out of the Wreckage: A New Politics for an Age of Crisis’. As an investigative journalist and self-described “professional troublemaker,” George uncovers the complicated truths behind the world’s most persistent problems. Twitter: @GeorgeMonbiotBinyamin Appelbaum writes about economics and business for the editorial page of The New York Times. From 2010 to 2019, he was a Washington correspondent for the Times, covering economic policy in the aftermath of the 2008 crisis. His new book, ‘The Economists’ Hour: False Prophets, Free Markets, and the Fracture of Society’ is a Wall Street Journal Business Bestseller. Twitter: @BCAppelbaumFurther reading: Out of the Wreckage: https://www.indiebound.org/book/9781786632890The Economists’ Hour: https://www.indiebound.org/book/9780316512329Neoliberalism - the ideology at the root of all our problems: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/apr/15/neoliberalism-ideology-problem-george-monbiotGames Economists Play: http://bostonreview.net/class-inequality/marshall-steinbaum-games-economists-playWebsite: http://pitchforkeconomics.com/Twitter: @PitchforkEconInstagram: @pitchforkeconomicsNick’s twitter: @NickHanauer

What role does the criminal justice system play in economic inequality? How does economic inequality cause mass incarceration? And how do we tease those two questions apart? Robynn Cox, an expert in the economics of mass incarceration, talks about her research uncovering the links between economic inequality and the criminal justice system. Robynn Cox is an assistant professor at the University of Southern California School of Social Work. She is an economist and inequality researcher, and her work focuses on understanding the social and economic consequences of mass incarceration. Twitter: @RobynnCoxOvercoming social exclusion: Addressing race and criminal justice policy in the United States https://equitablegrowth.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/Cox.pdf The Impact of Mass Incarceration on the Lives of African American Womenhttps://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1007/s12114-011-9114-2 Identifying the Link Between Food Security and Incarcerationhttps://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/soej.12080www.robynncox.com https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/pam.22277https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/07418825.2019.1709883http://www.jameinpcunningham.com/uploads/1/1/2/0/112070441/black_lives_ccow.pdfWebsite: http://pitchforkeconomics.com/Twitter: @PitchforkEconInstagram: @pitchforkeconomicsNick’s twitter: @NickHanauer

Ever wondered what the minimum wage would be if it had kept pace with inflation and productivity like it used to? Here’s a hint: $7.25, and even $15.00, don’t come close. Economist Dean Baker has been crunching the numbers on the minimum wage for years. He joins the podcast this week to share what he’s found and why it matters. Since the publication of this episode, the Center for Economic and Policy Research issued a correction to Dean Baker’s August 2021 report that a minimum wage that kept up with productivity would be $26 per hour. In fact, it would be $23 per hour. Dean Baker is a Senior Economist at the Center for Economic and Policy Research.Twitter: @DeanBaker13Further reading: This is What Minimum Wage Would Be If It Kept Pace with Productivity https://cepr.net/this-is-what-minimum-wage-would-be-if-it-kept-pace-with-productivity/ Work Should Pay: A $15 an Hour Minimum Wage Is a Starthttps://cepr.net/work-should-pay-a-15-an-hour-minimum-wage-is-a-start/ Website: http://pitchforkeconomics.com/Twitter: @PitchforkEconInstagram: @pitchforkeconomicsNick’s twitter: @NickHanauer

While many Americans struggle to make ends meet, corporate America’s 2021 profits were higher than ever. So why are corporations making more money while supply chain issues are still driving up inflation for the rest of us? The Groundwork Collaborative’s Chief Economist, Rakeen Mabud, wants you to know that the supply chain is working exactly as it was designed: for maximum profit, rather than reliably getting goods to people. And that’s the problem.Rakeen Mabud is the Chief Economist and Managing Director of Policy and Research at the Groundwork Collaborative.Twitter: @rakeen_mabudHow We Broke the Supply Chain https://prospect.org/economy/how-we-broke-the-supply-chain-intro/ Corporations Raise Prices as Consumers Spend ‘With a Vengeance’https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/27/business/economy/price-increases-inflation.htmlOpinion: Larry Summers Shares the Blame for Inflation https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/28/opinion/larry-summers-inflation.html Inflation causing financial strain for nearly half of U.S. households, poll findshttps://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/12/02/inflation-gallup-financial-hardship/Stock Buybacks Beat Capital Spending for Many Big Companieshttps://www.wsj.com/articles/stock-buybacks-beat-capital-spending-for-many-big-companies-11631611802The stock market is punishing Walmart and Target for keeping costs low while the rest of the corporate sector prioritizes profits and makes inflation worsehttps://www.businessinsider.com/walmart-target-keep-prices-low-corporations-prioritize-profits-inflation-worse-2021-11Website: http://pitchforkeconomics.com/Twitter: @PitchforkEconInstagram: @pitchforkeconomicsNick’s twitter: @NickHanauer

Investigative financial analyst Tom Bergin cut his teeth investigating corporate wrongdoing. When he turned his attention to the economics profession, he learned that eight major economic theories—used by experts to shape policy across the globe—entirely lack factual basis. He joins the pod to explain how those theories wormed their way into dominant economic thinking, the evidence against them, and why he believes economists are finally starting to shift toward studying the world as it actually is. Tom Bergin is an Investigative Financial Journalist for Reuters and the Author of Free Lunch Thinking: How Economics Ruins the EconomyTwitter: @tombergin_NewsFurther reading: Economics is Once Again Becoming a Worldly Science https://aeon.co/essays/economics-is-once-again-becoming-a-worldly-scienceFree Lunch Thinking https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/111/1118880/free-lunch-thinking/9781847942739.html Website: http://pitchforkeconomics.com/Twitter: @PitchforkEconInstagram: @pitchforkeconomicsNick’s twitter: @NickHanauer

The Congressional Budget Office, the institution that furnishes cost-benefit analyses for federal legislation under consideration by Congress, has a really hard job. But some of the assumptions they rely on to predict economic consequences are just plain weird. Economist Mark Paul leads us through the strangest practices at the CBO, including their (untrue) claim that public investment is only half as productive as private investment and the complete lack of peer-reviewing of reports that can signal the death knell for a bill.  Mark Paul is an Economist at the New College of Florida and a Fellow at the Berggruen Institute.Twitter: @MarkVinPaulFurther reading: The Pitch: Economic Update for February 10th, 2022 https://civicventures.substack.com/p/bidens-big-union-push Mark’s tweet about the CBO: https://twitter.com/MarkVinPaul/status/1491165138288005121  The Macroeconomic and Budgetary Effects of Federal Investment https://www.cbo.gov/publication/51628CBO issues score on how much Build Back Better would cost if programs were permanent https://www.cnn.com/2021/12/10/politics/build-back-better-cbo-score/index.html Website: http://pitchforkeconomics.comTwitter: @PitchforkEconInstagram: @pitchforkeconomicsNick’s twitter: @NickHanauer