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Do you hear your labor and justice leaders shouting out against this? NO, they are backing the neo-liberals who are embracing Trans Pacific Trade Pact pretending it will create jobs. Well, you will be working as a third world Chinese sweat shop employee with these neo-liberals.
Below I show the local effect of PERESTROIKA of American citizen's assets by global corporations. I have spoken before about the goal of privatization of public water. We see the effect in Detroit, a city gutted with fraud and corruption just as in Baltimore. The American people have paid loads of taxes over a few decades that would have rebuilt state and city infrastructure if that revenue was not being looted by Baltimore Development Corporation and Hopkins to expand global interests. Now, they want to raise public water bills over double the amount to pay again for rebuilding infrastructure and guess what----the same Johns Hopkins is there to pocket the profits from this public work as VEOLA ENVIRONMENT. Remember, these Ivy League universities made their billions in endowment profits from the subprime mortgage fraud and AIG investment firm that was spun to become HighStar. So, all of that profit was based on fraud. They used that money made from fraud to by VEOLA ENVIRONMENT from the French global corporation. These same Ivy League universities like Hopkins are now pushing Baltimore City Hall to privatize public transportation to French Veola and privatize public water and waste to HighStar VEOLA ENVIRONMENT. So, Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford, Berkeley, et al of the Ivy League are using those endowment funds to privatize public water and waste all over the world. At the same time they are buying all fertile land and fresh water sources around the world at the same time contaminating US and world aquifers with fracking.....as in Maryland with the Marcellus Aquifer.
I am writing today after coming from the center of fraud and corruption----Baltimore City Hall and the Board of Estimates meeting. I attended today because they are handing contracts to private corporations for public water service that everyone knows is only steps towards water privatization. There is Jack Young and Mr. Black for Rawlings-Blake and Comptroller Pratt ready to vote for privatization of Baltimore city public water and waste. All working for the most neo-conservative institution in the world----Johns Hopkins while running as Democrats.
PRIVATIZING PUBLIC WATER----HOW NEO-CONSERVATIVE OF THEM!!!!!
Jack Young as head of the Board of Estimates has worked hard to make sure public interruptions do not occur during meetings by placing a police officer to escort citizens out if they try to speak. You know, the public is not allowed to speak about public policy in public in Maryland and especially in Baltimore. So, instead of speaking during the Board of Estimates meetings on camera for all to see, people like Cindy Walsh must speak to the room before the meeting starts. Only today, when I explained to all in the room what the goal of this privatization is and how Johns Hopkins is involved-----Jack Young called the police to drag me out BEFORE THE MEETING EVEN STARTED. He works so hard to make sure no one knows what is happening that he was prepared to throw me out for just speaking in the City Hall room. I of course reminded him that the meeting had not started and he could not throw me out of the room -----he immediately called the meeting to order.
YOU KNOW WHO LEADS IN PRIVATIZATION OF ALL THAT IS PUBLIC? O'MALLEY/ANTHONY BROWN. YOU KNOW WHO BACKED BROWN DURING THE ELECTION FOR GOVERNOR? LABOR UNION LEADERS. KNOW WHO WAS THERE TO PROTEST PRIVATIZED WATER----LABOR UNIONS. ASK FRED MASON OF MARYLAND AFL-CIO WHY HE BACKS NEO-LIBERALS DOING ALL THIS DAMAGE?
We need labor union leaders working for their membership's interests when they support candidates. You cannot support the neo-liberals installing these policies and then pretend to fight against them. Union members and labor and justice need to see how VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY BAD THESE PRIVATIZATION POLICIES ARE FOR EVERYONE!
IT TAKES A SOCIOPATH TO PLAN THESE KINDS OF CORPORATE POLICIES AND THE POLS HIRED TO PUSH THESE GOALS INTO PLACE ARE NEO-LIBERALS AND NEO-CONS.
ALL OF MARYLAND POLS ARE NEO-LIBERALS AND NEO-CONS.
Don't privatize Baltimore water
[Letter]June 23, 2014
The presence of the private water industry at this week's United States Conference of Mayors meeting threatens public health and democracy in Baltimore.
Time and time again, experiences in other cities that have privatized their water systems have demonstrated that privatization fails to provide secure and equitable water access to residents. The industry's strategy of placing profits over the human right to water is reprehensible and undermines the democratic system.
As a voter and someone who calls Baltimore my home, I strongly urge Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake to take a stand at the USCM and keep the private water industry out of our city.
Jacob Fishman, Baltimore
Did you know that it is Johns Hopkins who is a major shareholder in Veola Environment through HighStar Investment firm that is pushing the privatization of public water and waste? Did you know that Veola Environment and HighStar have Ivy League endowments in the other cities pushing the privatization of public water----like Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford, and Berkeley. Privatization of public assets to maximize profits for these endowments.
Did you know the goal is to privatize water, end public subsidy of water as water rates rise, use SMART METERS to ration water to what the every growing impoverished public can afford all to maximize profits for Johns Hopkins endowment?
You must be listening or reading Maryland media -----they make sure you do not know----especially Marc Steiner.
VEOLA ENVIRONMENT is a global corporation bought from the French global corporation VEOLA of transportation fame. The one known for slave conditions for their workforce all over the world. VEOLA ENVIRONMENT is working all over the world to privatize the world's public water and waste and in nations having the pleasure of a few decades of their presence water rationing with SMART METERS has been in what followed. Now, Wall Street and Ivy League endowments want to bring it to America since they are taking the US to third world levels. That Trans Pacific Trade Pact may not be in place in the US but Maryland and neo-liberals in Congress are preparing for it.
I wonder if an interview with Hopkins staff will let people know what the goal is and who is behind it?
Water Privatization in Baltimore
08/12/14 Marc Steiner
August 11, 2014 –
Segment 3 We turn to the topic of the possibility of water privatization in Baltimore, with: Lauren DeRusha, National Campaign Organizer of Corporate Accountability International; and Dr. Lester Spence, Center for Emerging Media Scholar-in-Residence and Associate Professor of Political Science and Africana Studies at Johns Hopkins University.
The Dangerous Return of Water Privatization
Community waters systems have sustainably provided safe drinking water for generations but corporations are now using local fiscal crises to push for water privatization. By Maude Barlow and Wenonah Hauter, from Sojourners
January/February 2014 Utne
It's time for an integrated, holistic national water policy, including the establishment of a federal water trust fund. Instead we face the cannibalization of our public utilities by private corporations.
The United States has one of the best public water supply systems in the world. More than 250 million people count on local governments to provide safe drinking water. Over the last 40 years, federal, state, and municipal governments have worked together to improve and protect water resources. The Clean Water Act, the Safe Drinking Water Act, and the Endangered Species Act have kept the U.S. on target for preserving rivers, lakes, watersheds, wetlands, natural aquifers, and other sources of fresh water.
Great strides have been made in managing waste water and storm water. More than 90 percent of community water systems in 2012 met all federal health standards. Public water utilities have been a tremendously successful model for the U.S. and continue to keep drinking water safe, accessible, and affordable for all Americans.
It hasn't always been this way.
During the 1800s, private companies controlled the water systems of several large U.S. cities—to dire effect. Because the companies were more interested in making a profit than providing good service, many poor residents lacked access to water. As a result, cholera outbreaks were common in poor neighborhoods; water pressure was sometimes too low to stop fires, which destroyed both homes and businesses.
By the turn of the 20th century, city governments, including Baltimore, Boston, New Orleans, and New York City, had taken over drinking water provision from private companies. The goal of government was to improve service, reduce waterborne diseases, and increase water pressure to better fight fires. New York City, for example, assumed control of its drinking water services from the bank and holding company called the Manhattan Company, the predecessor of JPMorgan Chase, after an outbreak of cholera killed 3,500 people and a devastating fire caused extensive property damage.
These cities learned the hard way just how important public water provision is for human and environmental health. The shift to a public utility system, responsive to community needs, allowed local public control of water and sewer services. Public utilities helped local governments manage water resources, growth, and development, and ensured that safe and reliable services were available to all.
Now, just past the turn of the 21st century, our national water framework needs rethinking with climate change and sustainability in mind. It's time for an integrated, holistic national water policy, including the establishment of a federal water trust fund. Instead we face the cannibalization of our public utilities by private corporations.
Despite our success over the last 100 years, public water utilities face daunting challenges in the days ahead:
1. Water systems nationwide are aging and wearing out. Last summer more than 150,000 residents in the greater Washington, D.C. region faced the specter of being without water for days because of a stuck valve on a major water main. Delayed maintenance on the valve due to funding cuts led to the crisis.
Ivy League university endowments were heavily invested in the subprime mortgage loans knowing they were fraudulent and would bring down the economy. They took the profit made from those fraudulent loans and started buying land overseas with the intent of cornering the next market----privatized public works like transportation and water and waste. They starved governments with massive frauds and corruptions just to pretend we now have to hand all that is public over to the same institutions creating and profiting from the frauds.
I'm picking on Ivy League universities today but there are plenty of other bad guys profiting from these policies. Look how rich Ben Cardin and Nancy Pelosi are getting from Insider Trading for example! Those Clinton neo-liberals who voted for global corporations and markets have worked two decades to advance these policies. IT'S THE REPUBLICANS THEY SAY-----
WELL, MARYLAND IS ONE BIG NEO-LIBERAL STATE SO IT'S BOTH NEO-CONS AND NEO-LIBERALS.
US universities in Africa 'land grab' Institutions including Harvard and Vanderbilt reportedly use hedge funds to buy land in deals that may force farmers out
John Vidal and Claire Provost
The Guardian, Wednesday 8 June 2011 15.18 EDT
US universities are reportedly using endowment funds to make deals that may force thousands from their land in Africa. Photograph: Boston Globe via Getty Images Harvard and other major American universities are working through British hedge funds and European financial speculators to buy or lease vast areas of African farmland in deals, some of which may force many thousands of people off their land, according to a new study.
Researchers say foreign investors are profiting from "land grabs" that often fail to deliver the promised benefits of jobs and economic development, and can lead to environmental and social problems in the poorest countries in the world.
The new report on land acquisitions in seven African countries suggests that Harvard, Vanderbilt and many other US colleges with large endowment funds have invested heavily in African land in the past few years. Much of the money is said to be channelled through London-based Emergent asset management, which runs one of Africa's largest land acquisition funds, run by former JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs currency dealers.
Researchers at the California-based Oakland Institute think that Emergent's clients in the US may have invested up to $500m in some of the most fertile land in the expectation of making 25% returns.
Emergent said the deals were handled responsibly. "Yes, university endowment funds and pension funds are long-term investors," a spokesman said. "We are investing in African agriculture and setting up businesses and employing people. We are doing it in a responsible way … The amounts are large. They can be hundreds of millions of dollars. This is not landgrabbing. We want to make the land more valuable. Being big makes an impact, economies of scale can be more productive."
Chinese and Middle Eastern firms have previously been identified as "grabbing" large tracts of land in developing countries to grow cheap food for home populations, but western funds are behind many of the biggest deals, says the Oakland institute, an advocacy research group.
The company that manages Harvard's investment funds declined to comment. "It is Harvard management company policy not to discuss investments or investment strategy and therefore I cannot confirm the report," said a spokesman. Vanderbilt also declined to comment.
Oakland said investors overstated the benefits of the deals for the communities involved. "Companies have been able to create complex layers of companies and subsidiaries to avert the gaze of weak regulatory authorities. Analysis of the contracts reveal that many of the deals will provide few jobs and will force many thousands of people off the land," said Anuradha Mittal, Oakland's director.
In Tanzania, the memorandum of understanding between the local government and US-based farm development corporation AgriSol Energy, which is working with Iowa University, stipulates that the two main locations – Katumba and Mishamo – for their project are refugee settlements holding as many as 162,000 people that will have to be closed before the $700m project can start. The refugees have been farming this land for 40 years.
In Ethiopia, a process of "villagisation" by the government is moving tens of thousands of people from traditional lands into new centres while big land deals are being struck with international companies.
The largest land deal in South Sudan, where as much as 9% of the land is said by Norwegian analysts to have been bought in the last few years, was negotiated between a Texas-based firm, Nile Trading and Development and a local co-operative run by absent chiefs. The 49-year lease of 400,000 hectares of central Equatoria for around $25,000 (£15,000) allows the company to exploit all natural resources including oil and timber. The company, headed by former US Ambassador Howard Eugene Douglas, says it intends to apply for UN-backed carbon credits that could provide it with millions of pounds a year in revenues.
In Mozambique, where up to 7m hectares of land is potentially available for investors, western hedge funds are said in the report to be working with South Africans businesses to buy vast tracts of forest and farmland for investors in Europe and the US. The contracts show the government will waive taxes for up to 25 years, but few jobs will be created.
"No one should believe that these investors are there to feed starving Africans, create jobs or improve food security," said Obang Metho of Solidarity Movement for New Ethiopia. "These agreements – many of which could be in place for 99 years – do not mean progress for local people and will not lead to food in their stomachs. These deals lead only to dollars in the pockets of corrupt leaders and foreign investors."
"The scale of the land deals being struck is shocking", said Mittal. "The conversion of African small farms and forests into a natural-asset-based, high-return investment strategy can drive up food prices and increase the risks of climate change.
Research by the World Bank and others suggests that nearly 60m hectares – an area the size of France – has been bought or leased by foreign companies in Africa in the past three years.
"Most of these deals are characterised by a lack of transparency, despite the profound implications posed by the consolidation of control over global food markets and agricultural resources by financial firms," says the report.
"We have seen cases of speculators taking over agricultural land while small farmers, viewed as squatters, are forcibly removed with no compensation," said Frederic Mousseau, policy director at Oakland, said: "This is creating insecurity in the global food system that could be a much bigger threat to global security than terrorism. More than one billion people around the world are living with hunger. The majority of the world's poor still depend on small farms for their livelihoods, and speculators are taking these away while promising progress that never happens."
Why is Harper Selling Canada's Fresh Water Supply to French Companies?
Posted: 10/18/2013 12:35 pm EDT Updated: 01/23/2014 6:58 pm EST Huffington Post
Prime Minister Harper has just signed the Canada-EU Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA), and Canadians who care about our freshwater heritage should be deeply concerned for three reasons.
First, the massive increase in beef and pork exports that have been negotiated will put a terrible strain on our water supplies. Beef producers can now export close to 70,000 tonnes of beef to Europe and an undisclosed but higher amount of pork. Meat production is highly water intensive. It takes over 15 million litres of water to produce one tonne of beef, for example.
Already Alberta's dwindling water supplies are over-taxed by a beef industry that is rapidly expanding and expected to double its water footprint by 2025, according to an assessment done before this deal was signed. Intensive hog operations in Manitoba are killing Lake Winnipeg, their waste creating nutrient overload that covers over half the lake in blue green algae. To protect our precious watersheds, what we need is more sustainable and local food production, not massive new trade deals that will strain our water sources beyond their capacity.
Second, this deal will give French companies Suez and Veolia, the two biggest private water operations in the world, access to run our water services for profit. Under a recent edict, the Harper government has tied federal funding of municipal water infrastructure construction or upgrading to privatization of water services. Cash-strapped municipalities can only access federal funds if they adopt a public-private partnership model, and several cities have recently put their water or wastewater services contracts up for private bids. If Suez or Veolia are successful in bidding for these contracts (and under the new deal, local governments cannot favour local bidders) and a future city council decides it wants to move back to a public system, as municipalities are doing all over the world, these corporations will be able to sue for huge compensation. Private water operators charge far higher rates than public operators and cut corners when it comes to source protection. Privatization of water services violates the essential principle that Canada's water is a public trust.
The same "investor-state" clause contained in the Canada-EU deal poses the third threat to Canada's water. The rules essentially say that if a government introduces new environmental, health or safety rules that were not in place when the foreign corporation made its investment, it has the right to compensation, which a domestic corporation does not have. For instance, an American energy company is suing Canada for $250 million in damages using a similar NAFTA rule because Quebec decided to protect its water by placing a moratorium on fracking. Moreover, transnational corporations are now claiming ownership of the actual water they require in their operations. Another American company successfully sued Ottawa for $130 million for the "water rights"; it left behind when it abandoned its pulp and paper operations in Newfoundland, leaving workers without jobs or pensions. The new deal with Europe will give large European corporations similar rights, further eroding the ability of governments to protect our fragile watersheds and ecosystems.
The Harper government has gutted every regulation and law we had in place to protect our freshwater supplies. Now this deregulation is locked in as corporations from Europe as well as the U.S. can soon claim to have invested in an environment without water protection rules and sue any future government that tries to undo the damage.
On a planet running out of clean accessible water, this is a really stupid way to treat our water.
The same investment firms pushing to privatize public water and waste are behind these fracking industry expansions. Exporting natural gas places fracking in the US and around Maryland on steroids as profits rise and that means more and more fresh water sources will disappear. NO WORRIES. VEOLA ENVIRONMENT will sell you water from overseas and if you cannot afford the price----they will use SMART METERS to ration what you can pay.
THAT JOHNS HOPKINS----LYING, CHEATING, AND STEALING THEIR WAY TO PROFITS AND THEN USING THEM FOR EVIL-----
Fracking Spreads Worldwide
By Nidaa Bakhsh and Brian Swint November 14, 2013
Bloomberg Financial
The hydraulic fracturing of shale in search of oil and gas has hardly started outside the U.S., but that's changing. A record 400 shale wells may be drilled beyond U.S. borders in 2014, with most of the activity in China and Russia, according to energy consultants Wood Mackenzie. (In contrast, thousands of shale wells will be drilled in the U.S. next year.) The number of rigs used onshore in Europe and the Asia-Pacific region has increased 10 percent over the past year, data compiled by oil services company Baker Hughes (BHI) show. Most of those rigs are meant for shale. "It's likely there will be a revolution," says Maria van der Hoeven, executive director at the Paris-based International Energy Agency. "But not everywhere at the same time. And you just can't copy the U.S. experience."
Fracking in the U.K. will start next year, after the government lifted an 18-month moratorium imposed when a fracking company found it had accidentally caused earthquakes. Two utilities—Centrica (CNA:LN) of Britain and GDF Suez (GSZ:FP) of France—have bought stakes in British drilling licenses to help bankroll the drillers and win a cut of any profit.
The shale boom has moved the U.S. closer to energy independence, added jobs, helped revive manufacturing, and lowered gas bills. Yet the conditions that fostered the U.S.'s success don't exist elsewhere. In some countries, landowners don't own the oil and gas in the ground: The state retains all mineral rights. Or a country may levy much heavier taxes on oil and gas profits.
Story: U.S. Shale-Oil Boom May Not Last as Fracking Wells Lack Staying Power Once they start drilling and fracking, though, countries such as China, Argentina, and Russia could experience new oil and gas booms. China has the largest shale gas reserves, estimated to be the equivalent of 212 billion barrels of oil. In shale oil, Russia tops the list with about 75 billion barrels, the U.S. Energy Information Administration says. Australia, Poland, and Algeria all have big reserves.
Fracking activity outside the U.S. is likely to be good for the big oil players. Royal Dutch Shell (RDS/A) teamed up with China National Petroleum Corp. this year to explore in Sichuan, the province that accounts for 40 percent of China's shale reserves. Hess (HES) is exploring with CNPC in the western Xinjiang region. YPF (YPF), the Argentine oil company, has joined with Chevron (CVX) to tap deposits in Argentina's vast Vaca Muerta formation. Says Edward Morse, head of commodities research at Citigroup (C): "Within three to five years, there should be exponential growth in drilling as there was in the U.S."
As I stated with health care and the deliberate building of a perfect storm for antibiotic resistance and world health epidemics we see the same characters------Wall Street, Ivy League universities like Hopkins, and their neo-liberal and neo-con pols working to break our public health and environmental protections to profit from selling what will become a scarce resource. Not to mention how large populations unable to obtain fresh water are easily managed when made desperate.
This is what Maryland Assembly and O'Malley/Brown and in Baltimore, Baltimore City Council and Maryland Rawlings-Blake are working toward. They are neo-liberals and neo-cons who do not care about anything but maximizing corporate profits.
SIMPLY REVERSE ALL OF THIS BY VOTING THESE POLS OUT OF OFFICE AND REBUILD RULE OF LAW AND PUBLIC JUSTICE------AND REBUILD A DOMESTIC ECONOMY WITH SMALL AND REGIONAL BUSINESS WHILE KEEPING GLOBAL CORPORATIONS AT BAY IN MARYLAND.
Contaminated freshwater systems caused by 'fracking'
Friday, April 4, 2014 13:52
Fracking fluids from oil and gas extraction is contaminating our freshwater systems. http://www.blissful-wisdom.com/contaminated-freshwater-systems-caused-by-fracking.html
A local resident recently wrote about the monetary significance of hydrocarbon extraction and exportation. What many advocates of the oil-dependence industry seem to ignore completely is the short-sighted and toxic process with which 'unconventional oil and gas sources' are being extracted. This process is known as 'induced hydraulic fracturing', or 'fracking' (for short).
There is growing peer-reviewed scientific evidence of the harmful effects of shale gas development. 'Pro-fracking' opinions focus on the big bucks and ignore the detrimental effects on our limited, freshwater systems.
There are a million well sites in North America which have used fracking. A horizontal well in a shale formation can use between 7.5 million to 19 million litres of water. That water used for extraction in gas shale 'plays' becomes toxic by the addition of: water‐based fracturing fluids mixed with friction‐reducing additives; biocides to prevent microorganism growth and to reduce biofouling of the fractures; oxygen scavengers and other stabilizers to prevent corrosion of metal pipes; and acids that are used to remove drilling mud. 80 % of this fracking fluid comes back to the surface and 20 % stays in the shale excavation 'play'. This fracking fluid is highly toxic and contaminates local well-water, rivers, and underground water systems.
This is the part which outweighs the financial benefits of present 'fracking' and non-conventional oil extraction methods. Our North American water reserves are limited. Toxifying our limited water resources is insanity to say the least. No amount of remuneration can justify contaminating underground water beds and surface-water courses for coming generations.
As of 2012, 2.5 million hydraulic fracturing jobs have been performed on oil and gas wells worldwide!
Do an internet search on the topic of 'fracking' and why it is so controversial. Be wary of industry-backed politicians who would smooth over the environmental collateral damage left from 'fracking' practices.
Water well testing must take place both prior to and after seismic testing operations
If a well-owner does not test and show healthy conditions were present prior to nearby 'fracking', then there is no possibility of claiming damages when contamination does eventually occur.
For the last hundred years, water rights belong to the owner of the land. Tough luck for those landowners and city-dwellers downstream, since liability favors industry not local taxpayers. High cancer rates and damaging side-effects to human and animal life occur where tailing ponds and fracking fluid has escaped into underground and above-ground waterways.
How can we not seriously demand alternatives to oil/gas addiction and its collateral damage? There is money to be made and jobs to be had, but it requires focusing on developing those alternatives. Industry is not going to encourage that shift. Politicians serve industry and corporate interests, not the long-term health of the nation. And once again…fresh, drinkable water is becoming threatened by 'fracking' practices.
I want to take a few days to look at why Johns Hopkins and Harvard think 'if you are born poor you stay poor' and look at how neo-liberalism and neo-cons are working hard to reshape Western society to reflect this ideal. The corporate frauds of tens of trillions of dollars in the US alone is mirrored all over the world wherever The Clinton Foundation moved in to recruit and educate people who were placed as leaders to do in those nations what was being done in the US. You can follow Harvard graduates from other nations to see where the fraud and corruption emanates in those nations. All over the world the same wealth inequity from fraud and corruption exists and it is because of the philosophy of neo-liberal/neo-conservative free and global markets. No matter how many times a Republican states free markets can work, if you take away the oversight and accountability from corporations and government----they will become systemically criminal and corrupt as exists now in the US. Baltimore and Maryland is at the bottom. You'll notice that not one mention of fraud and corruption will be found in social research from universities.
This is the consolidated wealth. What the American people need to remember is most of this involves criminal activity and lots of unconstitutional actions and all of this can be reversed and recovered. A government aiding and abetting crime and suspending Rule of Law is denying citizens DUE PROCESS and therefore Statutes of Limitations are not in play. So, just engage in politics and take back your government!
Rebuilding Rule of Law and public justice should be the top issue for every American.
Make a good life for your children and grandchildren.
Must Read: The Corporate State of America – Widespread Crime, Corruption and Fraud
October 18, 2007, 10:28 am PR WATCH
Corruption widespread in India, says US report |
Business Line www.thehindubusinessline.com/news/international/...
There is widespread corruption in India in all ... the Bombay High Court ordered that a special team be formed to investigate an alleged fraud in which money ...
EY raises alarm over cybercrime, widespread corruption ... www.vanguardngr.com/2014/06/ey-raises-alarm-cybercrime... West Africa Leader of EY's Forensic/Fraud ... respondents who perceive bribery and corruption to be widespread in Nigeria. 72 per cent of the ...
Compliance and law combine to stem corruption in Brazilian ...
www.insidecounsel.com/2014/06/23/compliance-and-law... CachedJun 23, 2014 ·
A study has determined that 70 percent of Brazilian executives interviewed believe that corruption is widespread in ... fraud and corruption is ...
One in five executives thinks corruption is widespread in Canada's business world, EY report shows
Claire Brownell | June 11, 2014 | Last Updated: Jun 11 5:29 PM ET Financial Post
US commission finds widespread waste and corruption in ... www.csmonitor.com/World/Global-News/2011/0901/US... CachedSep 01, 2011 · US commission finds widespread waste and corruption in wartime ... Afghanistan has resulted in as much as $60 billion in waste and fraud ... .
This article does a good job summing up the war on the middle-class. He cleans up his commentary by not declaring fraud and corruption as the problem and you can see an allegiance to Clinton when he points fingers at all the Presidential culprits but cannot name Clinton. Rather he speaks of breaking Glass Steagall/deregulation/ Nafta without mentioning Clinton's name......and the massive subprime housing fraud was a transfer of wealth. I do like how he identifies THE SEQUESTRATION AND FORCED BUDGET AGREEMENTS TO PAY DOWN THE $17 TRILLION DEBT as simply the final attack on public wealth by neo-liberals and neo-cons working together. These trillions of dollars in cuts......the deliberate manipulation of inflation to zero etc are all assaults on what is left of the American middle/working class wealth and what we won't get will be handed away as corporate subsidy or lost to continuing fraud.
Here in Maryland all pols are neo-liberals and Maryland has moved further than most states in dismantling Democracy and public justice......
SIMPLY REBUILDING A DOMESTIC ECONOMY WITH SMALL AND REGIONAL BUSINESSES AND KEEPING GLOBAL CORPORATIONS AT BAY ALONG WITH REBUILDING RULE OF LAW AND OVERSIGHT AND ACCOUNTABILITY IS ALL THAT IS NEEDED TO REVERSE THIS ATTACK!
It's Official: Rich Declare War on the Middle Class
For the past thirty years the rich have been waging war on the middle class. It's been astonishingly effective, partly because it has been undeclared. But even that pretense is now being abandoned. The President's National Deficit Commission has effectively declared that the rich will now go after what is left of working and middle class wealth and will take whatever steps are necessary to seize it. If allowed to succeed, their plan will reduce Americans to a state of serfdom.
Ronald Reagan began the war on the middle class with his "supply-side" economics. Its very purpose, according to David Stockman, Reagan's Budget Director, was to transfer wealth and income upwards. It cut the marginal tax rate on the highest income earners from 75% to 35% while dramatically expanding spending for war. The results were two-fold: massive federal debt and an astonishing rise in the share of income and wealth going to those who were already the wealthiest people in the world.
The national debt quadrupled between 1980 and 1992. George W. Bush would repeat Reagan's policies and double it again between 2000 and 2008. Meanwhile, the share of national income going to the top 1% more than doubled, from 9% to 24%. The share going to the top one-tenth of 1% of income earners more than tripled. We now have the most unequal distribution of income in the developing world and the inequality is growing rapidly.
Shifts of this magnitude over such short periods of time have never been seen in American history. With the rich getting much, much richer, its means that everybody else is getting poorer. And in fact, real wages for median workers are lower today than they were in 1973. Indeed, while the inflation-adjusted income of the bottom fifth of workers fell by $6,900 between 1979 and 2007, the top 1% saw its annual income increase by $741,000!
To try to keep up with living standards Americans resorted to debt. They increased their personal debt-to-income ratio from 62% in 1980 to 130% in 2008. When housing prices fell 35% nationwide in the recent collapse it left Americans with a smaller share of equity in their homes, 48%, than at any time since the Great Depression. The share they have lost has been taken by the banks.
In other words, all of the income and wealth gains for middle Americans from the "golden years" between 1945 and 1975 have now been wiped out. Or more accurately, have now been transferred to the very rich. The top 1% holds 34% of the nation's wealth while the bottom 50% holds just 2.5%. The bottom 40% owns absolutely nothing.
These effects and numbers can be numbing, even dizzying. But it's important to understand that they have not been the result of random events or impersonal market forces. Rather, they have followed as the intended consequences of the relentless application of a wide array of government and industry policies.
The massive run-up in debt is one such policy. The wealthy are net lenders. This means that massive public and private debt transfers interest income to them from the rest of the economy. Another method for effecting massive wealth transfer: Beginning in 1981 the Reagan administration effectively stopped enforcing anti-trust laws, allowing monopolies to gouge everyone who had to buy their products.
The government actually provided tax subsidies so that corporations could eliminate jobs in the industrial heartland and ship them to Mexico and later, China, India, and other low-wage countries, reducing wages and pitting American workers against each other for those jobs remaining.
The bank deregulation that began in the early 1980s reached its apex with the repeal of the Depression-era Glass-Steagall Act in the late nineties. This set up the "casino capitalism" of the next decade that would spawn massive criminality and mortgage fraud by the nation's leading banks—none of which has been prosecuted. The result was the greatest economic collapse since the Great Depression.
But even as more than five million homeowners have lost their homes, the wealthy had their losses covered by the Bush and later Obama administrations. Bloomberg news estimates that the transfer to the banks through the financial bailout comes to some $13 trillion dollars.
We could go on and on and on with the roster of ways the wealthy have used the government to transfer national wealth to themselves. Environmental and health laws that are not enforced. Deals with the pharmaceutical industry so they don't have to compete with foreign manufacturers. Health care "reform" that forces tens of millions of Americans to buy questionable insurance products, even as insurers continue to kick legitimate claimants off their rolls. Give-aways of the telecommunication spectrum worth hundreds of billions of dollars to media monopolies that ladle out state propaganda as if were news and never, ever challenge official narratives.
In these and a thousand other ways, the rich have conspired with the government they largely control to shift more and still more of the nation's wealth away from the working and middle classes, to themselves. It amounts to the most insidious class warfare and the most rapacious looting of public and private resources in the history of the world.
The result is vast impoverishment, demoralization, and the destruction of the American middle class. One out of eight Americans are on food stamps. One out of five people are in official poverty. One out of four children are raised in poverty. Twenty five million people cannot find enough work, while their skills atrophy and their families and communities are destroyed. These are not figures describing a banana republic, a disaster-stricken region, or a third world country. They describe the United States of America after three decades of plunder by the rich. And now they want to go in for the kill.
Not satisfied with the staggering wealth they have already siphoned away, the ultra-rich are now using Barack Obama's National Deficit Commission to propose even more brazen plunder. And the looting is no longer taking place behind closed doors or under the cover of arcane public policies.
The commission proposes to cut the federal government's budget deficit by $4 trillion over the next decade. But 75% of the "savings" will come from gutting programs that help stabilize the middle class and their communities. None of it comes from policies that would harm the rich.
For example, the commission proposes cutting the tax deduction for mortgage payments. Not only will this render housing much less affordable for millions of prospective home buyers, it will reduce housing prices, perhaps substantially, for without the tax writeoff, buyers will be able to afford much less house. This will decimate the sole source of wealth of tens of millions of Americans.
It is housing wealth that undergirds retirement security for the middle class. Or, at least it did until one out of four homeowners went underwater on their mortgage in the recent bank-triggered collapse. Then, even as the Commission plans to decimate home prices and owner equity, it proposes cutting back benefits to Social Security recipients.
It would lower Social Security cost-of living adjustments while raising the minimum retirement age. And this is being proposed at the very moment that the bank-owned Federal Reserve Board is beginning to print hundreds of billions of dollars to bail out the banks from what's left of their toxic assets still held from the housing crash.
The ensuing inflation is going to destroy the value of retirement incomes at exactly the moment that 77 million baby boomers head off into retirement. It was exactly this process of money printing and bankrupting of retirees that destroyed the German middle class in the early 1920s, giving rise to Adolph Hitler.
The Commission's proposals would increase co-pays and deductibles for Medicare, making it unaffordable to millions. It proposes taxing as income the health insurance benefits millions receive from their employers. The Child Tax Credit would be eliminated as would 10% of all federal government jobs. This, at a time when more than 20% of the workforce is already underemployed and there are five workers trying for every available job.
We should be crystal clear: these policies amount to a mortal assault on what remains of middle class solvency and the democracy that a vibrant middle class makes possible.
But even as it girds up for this assault, the Commission barely touches the ultra-rich on whose boards they serve and who have gained so much over the past 30 years. And it cannot go without being said that it was these same professional predators who actually wrecked the economy, pitching it into its greatest collapse since the Great Depression.
The Commission's proposals would actually lower the maximum tax on the highest income earners, from 35% to 24%. The nominal tax rate on corporate income would fall as well, from 35% to 26%. There is nothing proposed to raise taxes after so many decades of steadily amassed wealth. No financial transactions tax (as the IMF recommends) to stanch the kind of tsunami of speculative buying and selling that brought down the economy. Such a tax would raise over $700 billion over the next decade.
Of course, there will be no claw-backs of the trillions of dollars transferred to the rich under the phony duress of "saving the system" during the height of the financial crisis. No proposal that the cap on earnings subject to Social Security withholding should be removed. That proviso alone would raise more than half a trillion dollars over the next decade.
In fact, it is in comparison with other give-aways to the rich that the take-aways from the middle class by the Commission can be seen as so one sided and venal. Remember, they propose to save $4 trillion over 10 years.
But the war in Iraq, which we now know was entirely premised on lies, will cost more than $5 trillion, according to Nobel economist Joseph Stiglitz. It has proven a huge boon to the rich weapons makers, bankers, logistics companies and oil companies that Bush used to coddle as his "base."
As mentioned above, Bloomberg news estimates that the financial bailout cost some $13 trillion, all of it going to the very richest people on the planet. There is not a syllable in the Commission's report proposing getting any of that back to help reduce the deficit.
Or consider the notorious Bush tax cuts of 2001 and 2003 where fully 40% went to the top 1% of income earners. Obama once promised to overturn them but, as is his typically cowardly pattern, is now folding. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities has estimated that they will cost the government more than $18 trillion over their lifetime—four times what the Deficit Commission claims it will achieve in savings. But God forbid we should ask for even a penny of that back to help battle the deficit.
In other words, there are many, many substantial and just ways that the savings the Commission proposes to create could be secured via small contributions from those who have gamed the system and gained the most over the past three decades. But that is not the Commission's plan. And it is in that omission that its true intent is revealed.
There is no more time for stealth, no more need for subtlety. Western capitalist economies are declining at a pace that is frightening their elite stewards and compelling such desperate, slovenly measures as the wholesale printing of money to postpone the inevitable. While Obama sings lullabies of "hope" and "change" to tranquillize the suckers out front, the rich are backing the truck up to the vault in the back, no longer even deigning to disguise the heist. And of course, why should they? They have the additional diversion of the moronic Tea Party vigilantes ("Keep the government out of my Medicare"), ever ready to cut other people's throats to cure their own nosebleeds.
The Commission's proposal is the most naked, undisguised declaration of class warfare possible. Its agenda is not to reduce the deficit but rather to reduce what is left of the American middle class and American workers, to a condition of servitude, of feudal peonage. Their poverty will make them docile and subservient. This will make possible the final looting of America by those whose sociopathic greed has brought it so low already. The battle over this proposal is the last bulwark against the devastation and final destruction of America. It must be fought and won or our freedom and security ceded forever. There is no other choice.
Below you see one quality of life issue being tackled by US corporate media. You look above and you see why the middle-class is fading and you look below and you would never see that all of this simply needs justice to reverse who has the money.
In Baltimore, Johns Hopkins is pushing Michelle Rhee education privatization and that includes removing playgrounds from schools and building parks for the children to be 'reflective'. There is often no recess,
yet amazingly the hype for education and health care reform in Maryland is wellness and fitness.
The other stat that is interesting is that 20% of Americans are doing OK----FOR NOW. They are moving for only 10% so you better watch out! I point this out because it shows exactly the percentage of voters coming to the polls in elections. THOSE 'LIKELY' VOTERS. Indeed, 80% of Americans are disaffected because they are the victims of the frauds and corruptions listed above and those 20% doing OK are profiting from the fraud and corruption. See why salaries for people in government are rising above $200,000? Taxpayers are not paying for quality employees.....the rich are buying loyalty. So, in Baltimore we have Baltimore Development Corporation and Johns Hopkins skimming billions of dollars of city and state revenue that means they have to allow those minions in City Hall skim thousands just as is done in Afghanistan. Baltimore City Hall actually preys on Baltimore citizens with corrupt fines, fees, and taxes. IT IS BREATH-TAKING. This is what is happening in those nations listed above and the #1 winner----Wall Street banks and their investment firms.
If you notice, the conversation in college athletics is not why are coaches and sports departments being allowed to become corporations----it has become making the college athlete a paid worker. There goes amateur sports. Look below again and you see the real picture----the vocationalizing of K-12 with children tracked into sports training at youth. That is what sports in America will look like just as it does in China say the neo-liberals and neo-cons. We only need children playing sports if they can create profit as professionals!
WAKE UP!!!!!! LET'S SIMPLY TURN THIS AROUND.
Sports & Leisure 2/03/2014 @ 5:11PM
As The Middle Class Fades, The Casual Youth Athlete Dies Out With It
As businesses are ignoring political debates and determining that climate change is real, so, too, are they stepping out of the arguments over income inequality by operating as if it exists. In particular, that there are two markets: the few and the wealthy, and the many and the not-so-wealthy. The market that doesn't exist — or at least not like it used to — the middle class.
"Those consumers who have capital like real estate and stocks and are in the top 20 percent are feeling pretty good," said John G. Maxwell, head of the global retail and consumer practice at PricewaterhouseCoopers .
In response to the upward shift in spending, PricewaterhouseCoopers clients like big stores and restaurants are chasing richer customers with a wider offering of high-end goods and services, or focusing on rock-bottom prices to attract the expanding ranks of penny-pinching consumers.
"As a retailer or restaurant chain, if you're not at the really high level or the low level, that's a tough place to be," Mr. Maxwell said. "You don't want to be stuck in the middle. …
In 2012, the top 5 percent of earners were responsible for 38 percent of domestic consumption, up from 28 percent in 1995, [economic] researchers found.
I bring this up because I think the decline of the middle class, the greater presence (and acceptance) of an all-or-nothing economy, has something to do with why, according to one major report, fewer children are playing team sports.
The Sports & Fitness Industry Association, a trade group for what it calls "leading industry sports and fitness brands, suppliers, retailers and partners," in January reported that since 2008, or around the start of the Great Recession, "team sports have lost 16.1 million participants or 11.1% of all team participants, measured by those who played at least once a year." The sports taking the biggest hit in 2013 were the biggest sports: football, basketball and baseball — a trend that the National Sporting Goods Association, a retail trade group, noted in June (and that are increasingly being reflected in high school sports participation numbers).
The Sports & Fitness Industry Association is very sure of why that decline is happening. The issue is not so-called "core" athletes, who play frequently. In 15 out of 24 team sports measured, the number of core athletes increased (compared with only five out of 24 in 2011). But the occasional athlete, the weekend warrior, the kid just trying out a sport — those numbers are falling hard. From a news release quoting the association's director of communications and research, VJ Mayor:
"The degradation of the casual team sports participant cannot be ignored," said Mayor. "Casual participation is the gateway to more core participants. We have already begun to see a decline in core participation among traditional team sports over the last five years which is alarming. The drop could be influenced by several factors including increased single sport specialization, overuse injury, athlete burnout, safety concerns, and the marginalization of the recreation player. …"
Actually, the several factors spelled out by Mayor are all related to one factor: the increasing professionalization of youth sports and younger and younger levels. Parents are savvy enough to know that their children, at very early ages, are being sorted by a well-organized system into the pile as future athlete, or the pile as future nonathlete. There is no third pile. And there are many businesses out there — not just sporting goods businesses — that know how to exploit the ambitions and/or fears of the parents who want their kids in the athlete pile.
Exacerbating this system is a top 20 percent (as Maxwell described it) willing to spend more on kids' education — including sports careers — out of the willingness of any parents to do what they can for their kids, while also aware that their peers are doing the same thing and thus could squeeze their kids out.
As for the other 80 percent — well, while there are long-told tales of athletes using sports as their perceived only way out of poverty, the middle class is also looking at sports as their only perceived way for their kids not to slip into poverty. At the least, spending big for a college scholarship so they have a chance at graduating from school without mounds of loans to pay. But those 80 percent have to weigh, constantly, whether the cost of play is worth it, with that cost of play driven by the upper 20 percent's ability and willingness to pay. So you end up with two populations — the one that's all in, and the one that's shut out.
Of course, in the whole of the population, there are kids who will opt out of the youth sports rat race because they've found other interests. But a nagging question is, if they had access to sports that weren't hard-core, would they find joy and pleasure in them, and keep playing? Or would they have a chance to discover at a later age, like 10, that they might enjoy a certain sport?
We'll never know, because like in the American economy as a whole, increasingly there is no middle ground in youth sports. So I would expect that participation surveys in future years will show more of the same — a few playing a lot, most playing not much at all.
US Attorney General Eric Holder who along with Obama can see no corporate fraud really hates when his time is pulled back to the American people demanding justice as if they were still citizens with rights and the US Attorney General worked for public justice. He is a corporate lawyer and his entire day is working for US global corporations and their legal issues around the world. This is why corporate fraud and government corruption is rampant----our state and US Justice Departments do not do public justice. A bone is thrown now and then to assuage the masses.
Below is for whom Obama and your neo-liberal Congress person works----it is for whom O'Malley in Maryland has dedicated all economic and development---the International Chamber of Commerce. These are the corporations winning all Federal, State, and local contracts for work and they are the ones openly fleecing governments and individuals with no fear from neo-liberal or neo-con pols.
We must start at the state and local level to rebuild Rule of Law. If Maryland becomes a Rule of Law state the Governor will demand the US Justice Department protect the citizens of Maryland.
DO YOU HEAR YOUR INCUMBENTS SHOUTING TO REINSTATE RULE OF LAW? VOTE THEM OUT OF OFFICE IF NOT!
A word from our Secretary General Welcome to ICC, a unique global business organization.
ICC is – and has been throughout its long existence – a steadfast rallying point for those who believe, like our founders, that strengthening commercial ties among nations is not only good for business but good for global living standards and good for peace.
To that end, ICC provides a forum for businesses and other organizations to examine and better comprehend the nature and significance of the major shifts taking place in the world economy. We also offer an influential and respected channel for supplying business leadership to help governments manage those shifts in a collaborative manner for the benefit of the world economy as a whole.
While policy advocacy is a major part of ICC's work, everything else we do is also devoted to promoting international trade and investment. Indeed, much of our work is of a very practical nature, focussed on making it easier for business to operate internationally. Our world-renowned commercial arbitration service is a form of impartial and dependable private justice that gives more security to commercial partners doing business across frontiers.
Drawing on the expertise and experience of its worldwide membership, ICC has also over time developed a large array of voluntary rules, guidelines, and codes – - sometimes referred to as 'trade tools' –- which facilitate cross-border transactions and help spread best practice among companies. A notable example is ICC's famous Incoterms® rules –- first elaborated in 1936 –- which are accepted as the global standard for the interpretation of the most common terms used in contracts for the international sale of goods.
ICC strives to ensure that the emerging new world, with new poles of power and leadership, stays faithful to the precept that international trade and investment and the market economy system are key factors in raising and spreading wealth.
I remain convinced that the core values that led to the creation of ICC over 90 years ago are as relevant today as they were then. Those values will continue to provide a compass for our efforts on behalf of business to help shape the new world that is emerging.
John Danilovich
Just a few more days on education policy------let's continue to look at higher education and Maryland is ground zero for the dismantling of our public education system at all levels.
Yesterday I showed that Economic students are demanding universities stop teaching only neo-liberal economics-----they said the field had become so narrow as to block all other thought. Think how that translates to Common Core in our K-12. They intend to do the same thing in our grade schools as they have done in universities.......narrowed the curricula to corporate policy. 'Competition' replaces personal best......'Getting the edge' becomes bullying........'Taking out the competition' becomes rape. The level of aggression in our schools and universities is growing because of this corporate mentality. Attacks on women are soaring even at universities because Chancellor Kirwan does not see himself as a public servant upholding public justice and Rule of Law-----
WE WILL SELECT WHOMEVER WE WANT TO BE HEARD IN ELECTION FORUMS AND THERE WILL BE NO DISCUSSION ON ANY UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND CAMPUS THAT IS ANTI-NEO-LIBERALISM!
We heard recently that UMUC----the online college structure that O'Malley spent hundreds of millions if not a billion dollars to create is failing miserably. No one wants online education yet neo-liberals funded by Bill Gates and Wall Street are going to push this until we have no choice they say. O'Malley even went overseas to push our active military to use their GI Bill education benefits on these online degree programs----IT IS A DISGRACE. As you will see below there is absolutely no research that shows these online education programs are providing any quality or creating higher achievement. The data is not there. The only reason they are creating these online venues for 90% of Americans is that it is cheap and only prepares for a job.
FORGET THE WELL-BALANCED EDUCATION THAT IS BROAD AND ALLOWS GRADUATES TO APPLY THEMSELVES TO MANY FIELDS.
First UMUC was going to be made a non-profit so the public could not see how it operates.....now University of Maryland is keeping a failed structure alive but wants to deregulate. Bill Gates requires online instruction and neo-liberals are going to give it to him! The amount of education funding wasted on these global corporate policies mirrors O'Malley's tying the public to Hilton and Hyatt hotels in order to keep them from losing money. Hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars are lost every year in all categories of industry in what is clearly public malfeasance and fraud against the citizens of Maryland. Why do we need a UMUC Asia/Europe?
Meanwhile financial aid and grants are being cut and that aid given is being tied to these cheaper structures as WE THE PEOPLE see our strong public education dismantled by neo-liberals.
DON'T VOTE REPUBLICAN TO CHANGE THIS----THIS IS REPUBLICAN POLICY-----NEO-CONS ARE JUST AS BAD.
UMUC's Mission in Asia
The mission of University of Maryland University College (UMUC) in Asia is to offer academic programs to United States military communities throughout Asia and the Pacific. While serving overseas, students can take a single course or many courses leading to a certificate, an Associate of Arts degree, a Bachelor of Arts degree, or a Bachelor of Science degree. Since University of Maryland University College is accredited by the Commission on Higher Education of the Middle States Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools, students can take courses with the intention of transferring their credits to other colleges or universities in the United States. Students may also continue their studies with UMUC online. Additional information is available at www.umuc.edu.
Although the educational setting is overseas, UMUC's programs in Asia are in all respects comparable to those offered at public institutions of higher learning in the United States. Courses are taught by faculty whose credentials meet standards set by appropriate University of Maryland University College academic departments in Adelphi, Maryland. All UMUC courses taught in Asia carry University of Maryland University College resident credit. UMUC is committed to maintaining standards of academic excellence. The past 50-plus years demonstrate that those standards can be maintained in overseas settings.
UMUC Europe offers thousands of courses for students interested in associate's and bachelor's degrees and undergraduate certificates. UMUC also offers graduate-level certificates and several master's degrees in Europe. With UMUC's 150 locations worldwide, and extensive online offerings, students can begin and finish a degree with us regardless of where they are located.
I bet the citizens of Maryland did not even know UMUC was a global corporation. Meanwhile fewer Maryland citizens are going to 4 year universities.
I don't hold any credence to these online workplace comment programs because they work like American Idol. It is good to see a consistent referral to 'people needing to be treated with respect'. ' Low pay with no opportunity to grow'. THIS IS NOT AN ENVIRONMENT WE WOULD WANT IN A PUBLIC UNIVERSITY. THAT IS WHAT A CORPORATE STRUCTURE LOOKS LIKE. That is because it IS a corporate structure. Under neo-liberals labor is treated as badly as if a Republican were in office yet every election Maryland labor unions get behind these neo-liberal pols. We need the citizens of Maryland taking back the Democratic Party to reverse this failed neo-liberal/neo-con policy!
"Failing company, horrible management" Academic Advisor (Current Employee) Pros – Great vacation/time off. Get to become a state employee after 3 years.
Cons – Moral is so low! Micromanaged beyond belief, constant layoffs, not worth you time.
Advice to Senior Management – Treat us like the educated adults that we are. Learn to value your employees.
No, I would not recommend this company to a friend – I'm not optimistic about the outlook for this company
Add Employer Response
"Not good. Too many secrets and financial problems" Administrative Assistant (Current Employee) Largo, MD I have been working at UMUC full-time for more than 8 years
Pros: Convenient location and great benefits Cons: Low pay and minimal advancement Advice to Senior Management: Treat the regular people like people No, I would not recommend this company to a friend – I'm not optimistic about the outlook for this company… More
Below you see what the deregulation issues discussed by Mikulski and Kirwan will include----as you see again everyone in the system is in the dark as to what these discussions look like. WE DON'T ALLOW CITIZENS IN MARYLAND KNOW WHAT WE ARE DOING SAY NEO-LIBERALS AND NEO-CONS.
UMUC considering plan to become independent nonprofit with ties to university system
Under proposal, it would no longer be a state entity; president seeks input from university community
By Nayana Davis, The Baltimore Sun
7:54 p.m. CDT, July 10, 2014
The University of Maryland University College, which has been struggling with declining enrollment, is considering severing some ties with the state university system to avoid burdensome regulations and work more closely with the private sector.
Under the proposal, the university would become an independent nonprofit organization that retains an affiliation with the state system. The school's president, Javier Miyares, said during a Thursday town hall meeting in Largo that the idea came from a task force of experts organized by the university as a response to a shrinking student body.
UMUC, a mainly online institution, has struggled with a competitive online education market and a smaller military. Members of the military or their families make up about half of the college's students.
The main objective of the proposal is to more readily secure partnerships with the private sector, including working with companies to make courses more employer-friendly and building relationships to help students secure jobs. Miyares said such partnerships can be challenging to forge as a state agency.
"This way we would not be bound by all the regulations and statutes that apply to a public state agency," Miyares said.
University officials also hope the move would help it attract more students outside the United States, though it would retain the University of Maryland name. Based in Adelphi, UMUC offers courses to students in 24 countries.
The plan would allow the university to keep ties with the 12-institution University System of Maryland, but the details have not been worked out. "The validity and credibility you get by being part of the University of Maryland system is huge," Miyares said.
No immediate action will be taken on the task force recommendation, as the school begins a process of soliciting feedback from the college community. University officials said there are few concrete ideas on how the effort would be implemented at this stage; Miyares said he wanted to get input first.
UMUC has the support of the University System of Maryland to look into alternate business models.
"The university is facing some significant challenges," said William E. Kirwan, chancellor of the system. "They are appropriately addressing those challenges."
Kirwan said a more concrete proposal would need approval from the system's Board of Regents before implementation, and possibly the governor and General Assembly. The governor's office declined to comment on the plan.
But some higher education experts expressed concern about the university putting out such a proposal with few details.
Barmak Nassirian, director of federal relations and policy analysis at the American Association of State Colleges and Universities, said it's not uncommon for public universities to form private-sector relationships to outsource certain functions, but it's unclear what the change in status would mean for the university.
"Honestly, I don't know what to make of this," he said. "The decision to operate under a different set of rules is interesting. Whether the move is good, I don't know."
UMUC has been struggling with declining enrollment both stateside and overseas since fall of 2011. Although the rate of decline stateside has remained less than 10 percent in the past three years, overseas enrollment declined 20 percent for spring 2014.
The school has struggled to increase enrollment because of competition from traditional academic institutions that have started offering Web-based classes and popular massive open online courses known as MOOCs, university officials said.
A shrinking military, which is facing large-scale budget cuts, also is a factor in loss of enrollment.
University officials said that 90 percent of its budget comes from tuition and 10 percent from the state. Other colleges in the university system get about 30 percent of their budgets from the state.
"We don't know what the future is going to be like," Miyares said. "But if we don't adapt, we will go into a death spiral."
UMUC's struggles are "a reflection of how competitive online education has become," Kirwan said. "What we do need is to explore if operational flexibility is possible."
"UMUC has been quite unique in the university system," Nassirian said. "It had been mostly self-sufficient because it provides excess revenue back to the system, but that [online] business model has not fared well as of late."
Traditionally, changes in business models for colleges have occurred when a struggling nonprofit university becomes a for-profit venture after a large corporation acquires it. Nassirian gave the example of the Clinton, Iowa-based school Ashford University being purchased by Bridgepoint Education.
Miyares said the change could occur as early as next summer. Academic programs and staffing levels are not expected to be affected if the model changes, unless enrollment continues to drop.
The school laid off 70 staff members from departments at the Adelphi and Largo campuses earlier this year, and 58 the year prior. The university employs about 2,000 in the U.S.
"The whole goal is to get enrollment up," Miyares said. "If enrollment is fine, there should be no dramatic difference to the academic side. This is a pivotal moment in our history."
nadavis@baltsun.com
The article above gives yet another spin----that UMUC and online colleges are being edged out by the popularity of MOOCs-----only MOOCs are not popular. They are used less frequently then online UMUC. We are being fed nothing but spin and this happens more and more because the public universities that would be the first to shout THAT IS NOT TRUE ----IT IS SPIN are now the ones handing us spin because they are corporations. Maryland Assembly was the very first to pass laws that move the accreditation process towards making these online structures legitimate. NO ONE THINKS THIS IS GOOD POLICY. Needless to say when it comes to bad education policy it is Johns Hopkins pushing it in Maryland. Indeed, Baltimore is cursed with a gorilla in the room that pushes the worst of policy all so they can make more profits.
This looks like a Gates Foundation study-------most employers in North Carolina have not heard of MOOCS but 3/4 of them think they are good. Meanwhile, there is no interest in the public for MOOCs outside of simple extracurricular help with existing university structures. Gates says he will buy these policy implementation yet! You know, because he is the 'good billionaire' as NPR always tells us.
All Hail MOOCs! Just Don't Ask if They Actually Work | TIME.com
Why Do So Many Students Drop Out of MOOCs?www.brighthub.com/education/online-learning/articles/...
Study: MOOCs Viewed Positively Among Employers
April 2, 2014 Inside Higher Education
Most North Carolina employers haven't heard of massive open online courses, but about three-quarters of them view MOOCs as having a positive effect on hiring decisions, a survey conducted by Duke University and RTI International shows. The study, founded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, also suggests 71 percent of employers could see themselves using MOOCs for professional development.
Think about how the real world views MOOCs but the article in the Maryland media makes you think they are supported. It happens all the time because they can get away with it. Online resources for education are good----everyone thinks online instruction adds to the classroom at any level. The problem is that corporations have as a goal to replace the classroom with these online products ------aiming at the 90% of Americans becoming trapped by Vocational K-12.......
With all public education funding going to subsidize corporate research and Human Resources we have to make the cost of educating the 90% as cheap as possible say neo-liberals and neo-cons! Calling MOOCS a democratizing tool in a nation with the strongest public education system in the world is a mockery. STOP DEFUNDING AND DISMANTLING PUBLIC EDUCATION.
The University of Maryland is now taking a look at bestowing transfer credit to those who are able to demonstrate a specific level of knowledge after completing a MOOC.
- See more at: http://www.educationnews.org/online-schools/can-moocs-be-a-solution-to-the-us-student-debt-crisis/#sthash.uhO1mk7Y.dpuf
Are MOOCs really dead?
By Jake New, Editor, eCampus News
June 6th, 2014 Recent studies suggest that MOOCs are very much alive, but are not a threat to traditional higher education For some educators and journalists, the rasping final breaths of massive open online courses (MOOCs) began late last year.
They followed nearly two years of hype and excitement that even the most skeptical of instructors and reporters got swept up in. Many of those who denounced the courses did so in a similarly frantic fashion, writing proclamations and open letters condemning MOOCs, as though they were caught in a great academic war.
Then, suddenly, a blow was struck. And it came from one of MOOCs' most famous creators.
"Sebastian Thrun, godfather of the massive open online course, has quietly spread a plastic tarp on the floor, nudged his most famous educational invention into the center, and is about to pull the trigger," Rebecca Schuman wrote at Slate in November 2013.
It was a dramatic way of saying that Thrun had announced that his company, Udacity, would now focus its MOOCs more on vocational training rather than traditional liberal arts courses.
That Udacity was only one company of a growing number focused on MOOCs — and that many of these platforms, including its main competitor Coursera, still aimed to disrupt traditional higher education — did little to slow the wave of speculation.
It was the capper on a year of MOOC hand-wringing. If 2012 was the "year of the MOOC," then 2013 was the "year of the MOOC backlash." Those who trust Gartner's "Hype Cycle" believed MOOCs were going through a common "trough of disillusionment," that would soon be followed by a "slope of enlightenment."
But by the start of 2014, many were already asking: "Are MOOCs dead?"
The answer is not as sensational as the question. MOOCs aren't dead — not yet -- but they likely won't be replacing any traditional means of higher education, either.
Here is the source of creating a massive online system of education for the 90% in Maryland-----Wall Street itself! The quality of education drops each time they grow this online education industry. Since it isn't working at the university level they are now talking of sending it to K-12 vocational. Sitting children in front of computers for online classes the goal of education reform as vocational K-12----YOU BET
Johns Hopkins Offers Nine-Course Specialization in Data ...www.jhsph.edu/news/news-releases/2014/coursera... CachedThe series of nine MOOCs are now open for enrollment and free to anyone. ... 615 N. Wolfe Street, Baltimore, MD 21205. ... Courses Careers Accreditation Web Policies ...
THE REASON MARYLAND IS SILENT AS THE REST OF THE NATION BRINGS OUT MILLIONS IN PROTEST OF NEO-LIBERAL AND NEO-CONS POLICIES IS THAT ERHLICH/O'MALLEY HAS WORKED HARD TO PRIVATIZE MARYLAND'S PUBLIC UNIVERSITIES. IT IS HERE THAT HOLDING POWER ACCOUNTABLE BEGINS AND THAT IS WHY NEO-LIBERALS FROM CLINTON TO OBAMA ARE WORKING AS HARD AS THEY CAN TO MAKE THEM INTO CORPORATIONS.
We saw yesterday that it is University of Maryland's Chancellor Kirwan seeing the need to deregulate universities. Maryland has allowed for-profit career colleges defraud for a few decades now because of deregulation of private career education so now we need to see the same in our public universities. Kirwan says we are making money using taxpayer money to patent research but we need to super-size the profits from the products we are now sending to the corporate structures attached to our campuses----YOU KNOW---THE 'BIOTECH FACILITIES'. Kirwan and Mikulski are not only talking about getting rid of a silly regulation that is out of date----they are intending to deregulate how universities can operate as businesses. All those requirements for receiving taxpayer money for research that make the public partners in this research need to go. We have proprietary patents now with that taxpayer funded research and it is heading for the open market for profit!
Below you see what Kirwan and Mikulski are working towards. Corporations are dismantling their research facilities because universities ARE THEIR RESEARCH FACILITIES. University students are now paying tuition to work in a corporate research project for free supported by NIH and NCA research money. IT'S ALL ABOUT CREATING JOBS! Actually, college grads are as likely now to remain unemployed now as at the time of the 2008 crash because global corporations and neo-liberals are keeping the US economy stagnant. So, these students are more likely to work as VISTAs then to get a job in the field for which they received a degree. Meanwhile, the foreign students coming in to get degrees------doing OK especially if they go back home to work for the US corporation overseas. FREE LABOR PAID FOR BY TAXPAYERS----NOW THAT MAXIMIZES CORPORATE PROFITS SAY NEO-LIBERALS AND NEO-CONS. See why taxes and tuition are soaring on the working and midde-class? It costs lots to subsidize every corporate activity.
CORPORATIONS NO LONGER NEED RESEARCH FACILITIES------UNIVERSITIES DO THE RESEARCH AND ANYTHING THAT IS SUCCESSFUL COMES TO THE GLOBAL CORPORATIONS THROUGH STARTUPS BUYOUTS. THE PEOPLE THEY HIRED TO DO THE WORK IN PRIVATE RESEARCH LABS ARE NOW STUDENTS PAYING TUITION.
The process of patenting university research while having corporations 'partnered' with these universities is a mockery as if people cannot see that this is why student tuition is soaring and all of taxpayer money is funding this 'university' research leaving no money for student financial aid and grants. Directors of these 'university' research facilities being paid like corporate executives.
LET'S GO BACK TO PUBLIC UNIVERSITIES AS PUBLIC EDUCATION!
Below you see what deregulation Kirwan and Mikulski are working towards......making universities driven by profit-----
Colleges Urged to Count Patents in Tenure Reviews
April 29, 2014 Inside Higher Ed
Universities should begin making patents and other industrial and commercial research count toward promotion and tenure, in an effort to stimulate such research nationwide, argues a new paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences journal. "There is a fundamental disconnect between technology transfer activities and incentives for faculty members in terms of merit raises, tenure and career advancement," Richard B. Marchase, co-author and vice president for research and economic development at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, said in a news release. "Beyond the monetary benefit of licensing, which is small in most cases, there is presently little to no benefit to a faculty member's merit raises, tenure and career advancement."
The paper builds on a 2012 report from the National Research Council and other groups saying that business and industry have "largely dismantled large corporate research laboratories that drove American industrial leadership," and which argues that research universities must "fill the gap." In the new paper, called "Changing the Academic Culture: Valuing Patents and Commercialization Toward Tenure and Career Advancement," the authors argue that filling the research gap will entail changing the university "rewards culture" to value not only large research grants but also professors' patents and other commercial activities. Co-author Eric Kaler, president of the University of Minnesota, notes that this kind of work should not replace but "add to" traditional means of assessing scholarly activity. The paper's lead author is Paul R. Sanberg, senior vice president for research and innovation at the University of South Florida and president of the National Academy of Inventors. An abstract is available here.
Keep in mind the same global corporations for whom University of Maryland's Chancellor Kirwan and neo-liberals work are the same entities keeping the US economy stagnant-----and it is deliberate. Remember, the bond market is going to crash causing a greater recession is so there is no intent to employ these grads----but they do free work and pay to do it with ever-higher tuition. THIS IS A SWEET DEAL FOR CORPORATE PROFITS SAY NEO-LIBERALS IN MARYLAND!
The media shout that all of this a great education policy. That more students are being sent to college and graduating with skills that corporations need. OH REALLY?
THEY NEED THEM TO WORK FOR FREE WHILE PAYING FOR COLLEGE AND THEN FORGET ABOUT IT AFTER GRADUATION.
The structure neo-liberals and neo-cons are building have the job pipeline coming from the Ivy League schools-----business leaders now come from these schools and any startups that may come from the public universities are simply bought by those corporations in the portfolio of Ivy League schools. Working and middle-class grads are largely being funneled into poverty jobs or the military.
University of Maryland Baltimore County and Grabinsky were front page news as UMBC is the face of this free labor as corporate university. While Maryland says its unemployment is 6.1% we all know that is only the number of people receiving unemployment checks. Maryland's unemployment is 36% and growing with this economic model. Remember, these are Republican policies of placing corporate profit first so voting Republican will not help----Democrats simply need to shake the corporate neo-liberals out of the Democratic Party!
FOLKS----THIS IS A NEO-LIBERAL ECONOMIC MODEL THEY CALL THE 21ST CENTURY ECONOMY!
All we need is to rebuild state economies having domestic businesses driving the economy and all of this will disappear.
The Deliberate Low-Wage, High-Insecurity Economic Model submitted by pmcovay3 ScienceIndex.com Dec 2012
In contrast to the general biases of orthodox economists, the jobs crisis in America is not inevitable or natural-and more important, does not contribute to more economic efficiency through lower wages or more productivity. It is the result of deliberate political policy choices the nation has made at least since the early 1980s, when productivity was rising on a secular basis at a slow rate. Also, the policy choices were made before the rise of very low-wage emerging markets like China's. In sum, there has been a low-wage, high-unemployment policy regime in the rich world, and especially in the United States, for a generation.
Students Call for Reform of Economics Education
May 6, 2014 Inside Higher Ed
Economics students in 19 countries have issued a joint call -- published in The Guardian -- to change the way economics is taught. The students' analysis (similar to that of some professors in the United States and elsewhere) is that economics has become too uniform in its approaches and too removed from real life. "[I]t's time to reconsider the way economics is taught. We are dissatisfied with the dramatic narrowing of the curriculum that has taken place over the past couple of decades," the letter says. "This lack of intellectual diversity does not only restrain education and research. It limits our ability to contend with the multidimensional challenges of the 21st century – from financial stability to food security and climate change. The real world should be brought back into the classroom, as well as debate and a pluralism of theories and methods. This will help renew the discipline and ultimately create a space in which solutions to society's problems can be generated."
All academics and analysts now look at employment figures as below----the employment to population ratio. We all know some adults of working age may choose not to work but that percentage is not too high. So, if 58% of the population is working------42% are not. 36% unemployment is about right. As this article points out----with wages at an all time low people are now forced to have two incomes in a family. The employment data media and government provides is simply meant to conceal this deliberately high unemployment.
Do you know who is not fooled by the failure of neo-liberalism------ECONOMICS STUDENTS!
The article above shows that university students are fed up with universities that only offer neo-liberal economic models in economic degree programs. As this article states----WHY STUDY A FAILED ECONOMIC MODEL? It is the duty of public universities to hold power accountable and give the public real data and we see this is not happening because of this corporate capture.
That is what university heads like Kirwan are doing.....they are appointed to force global corporate policies that no one wants and it is the governor that appoints these people to public universities.
Unemployment Data Manipulation The Economic Recovery is a Lie!
By Seth Mason
Friday, November 1st, 2013 Wealth Daily
I've argued time and time again that, due to the severity of job losses during the Great Recession, there cannot be a true economic recovery until the labor market has recovered.
Unfortunately, hiring was weak in September, continuing a slowing trend that began in the spring.
To make matters worse, the majority of jobs created last month were menial in nature (nearly 2/3 of them were truck drivers, bureaucrats, salespeople, and temps). These trends have been ongoing throughout this economic depression.
The number of new jobs wasn't enough to keep up with population growth.
And yet the unemployment rate fell.
So, all is well... right?
Clearly, the "headline" 7.2% unemployment rate doesn't tell the whole story about the sad state of the American labor force.
You have to take any data from the Fed with a grain of salt, anyway, as the Obama administration has a vested interest in presenting the best-looking unemployment picture possible, just as all administrations have.
The employment-to-population ratio actually provides a much more accurate gauge of the health of the American job market — and wouldn't you know, it's been showing unhealthy readings since the economy crashed five years ago...
The proportion of Americans in the workforce has barely budged since falling from 63% to 58% during the Great Recession, as you can see on the following chart:
A Precipitous Decline
The last time the employment-to-population ratio was 58% — in the early 1980s — a relatively small proportion of American households sent more than one income earner into the workforce.
Now, in a nation of mostly one-breadwinner households, the 58% employment-to-population ratio was reasonable.
Today, however, due to a decline in real personal income (thanks for the inflation, Federal Reserve), most households send multiple income earners into the workforce.
In fact, it's not uncommon these days for households to have more than two income earners.
Under this paradigm, an employment-to-population ratio stuck at 58% like it's 1982 (when "homemaker" was still a common job title) is very unhealthy.
Also worth noting is that a large percentage of the 58% of Americans who do work are working lower-quality jobs than they were before the economy crashed.
Although the population of the United States has increased by approximately 20 million since 2008, there are 5 million fewer "breadwinner" jobs in this country than there were before this economic depression.
"Breadwinner jobs" are those positions with a base salary of $35,000 or more that enable one to live independently, however meagerly.
So the real health of the labor force is even worse than the unsettling 58% labor force participation rate!
Here we are, more than five years since the fall of Lehman, and the job market is still awful... and it's started to backslide again.
The Fed's Niagara Falls-scale liquidity pumping measures (I say "liquidity pumping" as opposed to "printing" because QE is only one of the Fed's tricks) clearly haven't had much impact on unemployment — or the federal government's $787 billion spending binge, also known as the grand "stimulus," for that matter.
Remember the laughable estimates of unemployment with and without the "Recovery Plan"?
According to the White House's October 2009 estimate (the dark blue line on the chart above), the Fed/federal government's plan should have taken us back to pre-recession unemployment levels by now...
Yet the unemployment rate sits at an unacceptable 7.2%.
And keep in mind the 7.2% headline unemployment rate belies the true awful state of the job market.
Considering the pitiful 58% employment-to-population ratio and the 5 million fewer breadwinner jobs since 2008, it would be an understatement to say that Washington's stimulus measures have failed to reduce unemployment. (That's assuming they were created for that purpose. More about that in a future article.)
We should expect more of the same from our esteemed central planners.
The Fed, which has officially delayed "tapering," will continue to pump indefinitely.
Uncle Sam will continue to borrow and spend like mad, whether he's wearing a DEM or GOP hat.
As a result, the "mother of all bubbles," as Nouriel Roubini has called it, will continue to expand...
And we'll continue party like it's 2006, only with higher unemployment.
We'll keep ignoring the fact that 2008 is just a couple of years away.
Happy crash 2.0!
Seth Mason for Wealth Daily
Having a policy that brings more foreign students into the US with the goal of green cards and employment in high-skilled jobs does nothing for the American people, the high unemployment, or creating quality education and higher achievement in our US students. It is purely a profit-making scheme that continues to consolidate the wealth at the top.
Maryland pols are all neo-liberals so whether Milkulsi and Cardin working in the Senate on legislation to build corporate universities and send trillions of dollars to expand overseas as corporations-----or the Governor of Maryland O'Malley and the Maryland Assembly appointing these corporate university heads and building the corporate structures in our universities-----
THE SOLUTION IS SIMPLY REBUILD THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY IN MARYLAND BY RUNNING AND VOTING FOR LABOR AND JUSTICE.
Currency February 21, 2014
Should Universities Profit From Student Research?
By John Bringardner The New Yorker
In 2011, Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced that Cornell University and Israel's Technion would jointly open a new school on Roosevelt Island to help boost New York's tech sector. The first buildings of the new campus won't open until 2017, but classes are already under way in borrowed space on the third floor of Google's New York office. And, on Monday, Cornell Tech, as the school is called, plans to announce that it has enrolled its first batch of post-doctoral researchers in a one-year "Runway" program, designed to launch them into business ventures based on their specialties: urban planning, e-commerce, health care. In an unusual twist, the school will invest in the companies founded through the program, but also allow students to keep ownership of the intellectual property they create on campus; typically, universities profit by keeping the rights to such property.
Cornell Tech isn't the only institution to invest in student startups. Stanford announced last year that it would invest in companies founded by its students. M.I.T. also takes an equity stake in companies developed on campus. But Stanford and M.I.T. both require those companies to pay royalties on any technologies the students patent while in school. Rather than negotiate complex patent-licensing rights with their researchers, Cornell Tech will treat the value of each post-doc position it awards—about a hundred and fifty thousand dollars—as an angel investment in any business spun out of the program; in exchange, Cornell Tech expects to get an average of a five-per-cent stake in each business. The Runway program echoes the accelerators and incubators popular among venture capitalists—three- or four-month programs in which entrepreneurs get resources to build new startups in exchange for a stake in their companies.
Universities didn't always have the right to the spoils of the research they sponsored. The government spent heavily on research and development at U.S. universities during the Cold War, but new technologies developed with federal cash became government property. By 1980, the federal government had amassed twenty-eight thousand patents but licensed fewer than five per cent to companies that could turn them into products. That year, Congress passed the Bayh-Dole Act, which allowed universities to keep and profit from the patents their students and researchers developed on campus using federal funds. The Economist called it "perhaps the most inspired piece of legislation in America over the past half-century."
Soon, offices focussed on "technology transfer" opened up in schools around the country, staffed with lawyers who poked around campus research labs and flipped through student notebooks to suss out patentable research that they could license to corporations. A new chemical combination might become a blockbuster drug; a technological breakthrough could lead to smaller, faster semiconductors.
In 2012, American universities earned $2.6 billion from patent royalties, according to the Association of University Technology Managers. The tech-transfer model is entrenched in medical schools and in biotech development. But its usefulness in the software world has been less clear. The success of a software startup often depends less on any particular innovation than on how several pieces of technology fit together and appeal to users. A company's value usually becomes apparent years after it has developed and refined its business model, not at the moment it files a patent application. Plus, the very concept of a software patent hangs in the balance: in December, the Supreme Court agreed to review a case that could eliminate them altogether.
Cornell Tech's approach—taking an equity stake in each company instead of licensing rights to a handful of patents—may be a more straightforward way for the school to profit from spin-offs. "Universities look to place a value on technology at its inception, finding a fair rate for splitting royalties between the school and the inventor, but that's not the way digital startups work," Cornell Tech's Dean, Daniel Huttenlocher, said. "I think intellectual-property protection, especially in software and digital tech, is a very small piece of commercialization, one that becomes too big a part of the conversation when universities are involved."
The Runway program is designed to turn deep academic research into a marketable product; its first post-docs have already spent years in the lab, sometimes running into dead ends and starting over in a way that pure academic research allows but investors don't. "A principal mission of Cornell University is the pursuit of knowledge for the benefit and use of society," the school's existing intellectual-property policy reads. Whether society benefits most when knowledge is turned into an I.P.O. is an open question.
"The entire Bay Area is enamored with these notions of innovation, creativity, entrepreneurship, mega-success," the historian and Stanford professor David Kennedy told Ken Auletta in 2012, in a report from Stanford. "It's in the air we breathe out here. It's an atmosphere that can be toxic to the mission of the university as a place of refuge, contemplation, and investigation for its own sake." And when students showed up for their first classes at the temporary campus, in January, 2013, Isaac Kramnick, a professor of government at Cornell in Ithaca, told the Times, "The university has been at the forefront of big science since the 1940s and 1950s. Now it's entering an era in which it seems to be interested in for-profit science, and that does require some thinking as to what the fundamental purpose of a university is." ("Such potential for conflicts is quite manageable with the appropriate procedures in place, enabling this very effective interaction between students, faculty, and companies," Huttenlocher told me.)
Yet universities are forging ahead with more business-oriented models. Over the past decade, angel investors, the main source of capital for startups, have made high-risk bets, providing money for startups to get off the ground in exchange for the right to a piece of the company's equity if it succeeds. Most never do. Venture capitalists call their strategy "spray and pray," sinking money into lots of different startups in the hope that at least one will be the next Facebook. It's a gamble, but it could be a better way for universities to take advantage of the work their students are doing. The amount of revenue schools generate from patent licensing is small compared with over-all university budgets. Alumni philanthropy brings in far more money. "What would happen if schools gave up rights to their students' intellectual property?" Adam Shwartz, the director of Cornell Tech's Jacobs Institute, which runs the Runway program, asked. "Their patent revenue goes to zero, but down the line the successful alumni give back far more money. Here we have the first controlled experiment of this nature."
Rendering of Cornell Tech by Kilograph.
Below you see how bad the success rate of this model is for the student /school so a corporation directs the research it wants to fund----gets free labor and a taxpayer funded research facility----and VOILA all the failures are paid for by you and me. No need for corporate R and D. In lieu of corporate taxes these investment firms just send there money to these university projects and we are told this is the best mechanism for funding universities.
All work on campus is now product-driven-----professors are judged on patenting rather than academics or teaching. Tenure is tied to being this corporate executive. Students are engaged only in what will pay off and not with a broad education limiting their futures. As this article shows it is the student that loses and graduates with the tuition debt and limited focus degrees.
What is sad is that the student's future success with whatever they create requires handing a percentage of future earnings to these university/venture capitalist and the few that do create successful businesses simply hand them to these global investment firms. This is all simply universities as corporate facilities.
THE ENTIRE ACADEMIC MODEL HAS BEEN RUINED AND THE US IS AGAIN ON THE BOTTOM ACADEMICALLY IN ACADEMIC ACHIEVEMENTS. THIS IS WHAT MIKULSKI AND KIRWAN ARE SITTING DOWN TO BOLSTER.
DEAR ENTREPRENEURS: Here's How Bad Your Odds Of Success Are
Henry Blodget Business Insider
As a wise investor puts it: "Many turtles hatch. Few make it to the sea."
Everyone knows that starting companies — and investing in startups — is a risky way to earn a living. But few people appreciate just how risky it is.
Thanks to a recent tweet from Paul Graham, the founder of "startup school" Y Combinator, we now have a better idea.
Graham says that 37 of the 511 companies that have gone through the Y Combinator program over the past 5 years have either sold for, or are now worth, more than $40 million.
Most entrepreneurs would probably view creating a company worth more than $40 million as a success (unless the company raised more capital than that). And, on its face, the "37 companies" number seems relatively impressive.
In fact, however, the number tells a scary and depressing story.
This number suggests that a startling 93% of the companies that get accepted by Y Combinator eventually fail.
(Not all companies that sell for less than $40 million are "failures," obviously. Assuming a company hasn't raised much capital, a sale between $5 million and $40 million could be considered a success. But a high percentage of Y Combinator companies likely end up being worth zero. And for companies that are hand-picked by very smart investors, the 93%-below-$40 million rate is still surprisingly low).
A company accepted by Y Combinator, therefore, has less than a 1-in-10 chance of being a big success.
More alarmingly, the companies accepted by Y Combinator are only a tiny fraction of the companies that apply.
Some have estimated that Y Combinator's acceptance rate is 3-5%.
If we use the 5% rate, we can estimate that Y Combinator has received about 10,000 applications for the ~500 companies it has chosen over the years.
Assuming Y Combinator has even a modest ability to pick winners, therefore, the odds that a company applying to Y Combinator will be a success are significantly lower than the odds of success of the companies accepted into the program.
If only 37 of the companies that have applied to Y Combinator over the years have succeeded, this is a staggeringly low 0.4% success rate.
Put differently, only one in every 200 companies that applies to Y Combinator will succeed.
The reality is that Y Combinator probably misses a few winners, so the actual odds are probably slightly higher.
But in case any entrepreneur or angel investor is deluding themselves into thinking that startups are an easy way to cash in, they might want to think again.
IT'S CALLED SOVEREIGN DEBT/MUNICIPAL BOND FRAUD FOLKS------NEO-LIBERALS SIMPLY FOLLOW WALL STREET'S LEAD NO MATTER WHERE IT ENDS.
I'd like to spend one more day on the bond market and the coming crash.....looking today at the public and private pensions. Folks, neo-liberals and neo-cons look at pensions as fodder only meant to boost Wall Street profit.
LOOK AT WHERE YOUR PENSIONS ARE INVESTED BECAUSE MARYLAND IS RUN BY NEO-LIBERALS WORKING FOR WALL STREET PROFIT AND NOT YOU AND ME!
I pointed to Maryland pol Dulaney and his focus on repatriation taxes and bond market for corporations. The timing of this legislation is no accident----the bond market crash will place this market at the bottom ready to climb to profits just as the 2008 crash made the stock market bottom. So, Dulaney is not warning his constituents that the bond market crash is coming and will take away most of the value recovered since the last crash-----he is only thinking of what legislation with maximize corporate profit. THAT'S A NEO-LIBERAL FOR YOU BUT WHY IS HE RUNNING AS A DEMOCRAT????
The second point is that as you can see all of the major news journals are now reporting the crash is coming just as I have written for four years. What I said was the plan-----and everyone knew it. Please consider where you get your information-----all neo-liberal media like MSNBC and NPR never mentioned these policy goals-----
I spoke of the public malfeasance behind the public pension losses last crash were politicians moved public pensions from the then safety of the bond market into a collapsing stock market in 2007 just to buoy the Wall Street banks. THIS WAS ILLEGAL AND PUBLIC MALFEASANCE AND FRAUD. All of the pols in Maryland involved in doing this were simply re-elected and public sector unions simply agreed to cuts rather than take the fraud to court. The failure to address the last fraud has the same thing coming with this bond crash.....public and private pensions have been used to buoy the coming bond market as investment firms jump ship.
DO YOU HEAR YOUR POLS SHOUTING ALL OF THIS IS BAD FOR THE PEOPLE WHO ELECTED THEM??????? I DON'T HEAR A THING!
Below is a UK article that speaks to what is coming. Look how it states the FED is considering making people stay in the bond market to stop a run. It created the conditions for the crash and now it wants to force people to stay in......punitive exit fees. Remember, people went to bonds because the stock market is criminal.......they are now being forced back into this criminal market because Wall Street imploded the only safe investment ------bonds.
Can you save your pension from the great bond bubble? Why a bank rate rise could ruin your retirement...
'Those limits will be set by each individual fund — they may put a cap on how much you can withdraw, or reduce the value by a percentage.'
By Holly Black Daily Mail Pensions and Retirement
About £800billion of savings and investments sitting in bond funds could fall in value if interest rates begin to rise.
An increase in the Bank of England base rate threatens to burst the five-year bond bubble that has seen the value of funds soar by as much as 137 per cent.
It threatens to wipe out a chunk of the life savings of an estimated 500,000 people who have put their money into bond funds, and millions more in company pension schemes.
Bond bubble: When interest rates rise the value of bonds will fall
However, while any rise in rates is likely to cause a fall in bond funds - any increases should be small, giving investors time to react. There are, though, fears that money in bond funds could be locked up.
In the U.S. there are already reports that the Federal Reserve is considering imposing punitive exit fees on anyone trying to take their money out of bond funds to halt a run on the investments.
Brian Dennehy, founder of investment research site Fund Expert, explains: 'When there is sustained heavy selling there will almost certainly be restrictions, if you're allowed to sell at all.
Bonds are essentially IOUs issued by companies and governments. In exchange for your money, they promise to pay you a rate of interest. These are not fixed-rate savings bonds offered by High Street banks and building societies, which keep your capital safe and your interest fixed.
With investment bonds the value can rise and fall, and they were often seen as a safer type of investment, as they don't change in value very much. But because of poor rates on High Street savings accounts, bonds have become wildly popular and, as a result, prices have surged.
Someone who put £10,000 into the average strategic bond fund five years ago would have £15,500 today. The best fund would have grown to £23,700.
At risk: A substantial chunk of the £770bn of our pensions is invested in bonds
How £800billion could be trapped
Fears of a fall in value of these funds could now lead to a great bond sell-off. A bond-fund plunge has been widely expected since late 2012.
Then, the value of funds had increased by 50 per cent following the Government's policy of printing money to boost the economy, known as Quantitative Easing. This involved the Bank of England flooding the economy with cash, by buying bonds — which led them to increase in value.
Now that QE has come to an end, and the economy is recovering, interest rates could soon rise. When this happens, the value of these bonds will fall, and the interest they are paying will suddenly seem less attractive.
Unlike with shares, the money in bonds is tied up. It means that investors may not be able to trade their bonds freely to eager buyers, leaving them trapped because no one will want to buy them.
Retail investors who have relied on bonds for the past six years have a massive £126billion of their savings tied up in these funds. But a substantial chunk of the £770billion of our pensions is invested in them, too, because many stock-market-linked company schemes move savers' money into bonds the closer they get to retirement.
This is done to protect the cash they have built up over the years by transferring it out of supposedly riskier stocks and shares. The strategy is known as life-styling and happens automatically. But it has meant that workers are being unwittingly exposed to any potential fall in the bond market.
Thousands of investors found themselves stuck in property funds in 2008 when there was a run of people withdrawing cash from these investments. A lack of ready cash available in them meant firms were telling their customers they could not have their money.
Many property funds own entire buildings directly so that if they need to raise money they have to sell them, rather than just sell shares, which is a much quicker and easier process. Bond funds face similar problems.
Bonds have a fixed duration and if funds can't find a willing buyer to dispose of them, they will have to hold onto the investment. That means they can't raise any money to give back to investors looking to sell their units in the fund.
Should you hang on or try to sell?
Many fund managers are already selling their bonds. Marcus Brookes, head of multi-manager funds at Schroders', has reduced his bond holdings to just 10 per cent of his assets and he is planning to sell more.
'Returns have been amazing for too long and we're starting to worry,' he says. And Mr Dennehy points out that with interest rates likely to rise in 'baby steps', investors shouldn't have to rush out of all of their bonds at once.
'But you should still ask yourself why you are bothered to invest in bonds,' he adds. 'At best, they won't lose any of your money this year, but I don't think they will make any either.'
Yet this could leave investors with another dilemma. Ben Gutteridge, head of fund research at wealth management company Brewin Dolphin, explains: 'If you are taking your money out of bonds, where are you going to put it?
'The obvious choice is equities. But if all of your investments are equities, that's incredibly risky.'
Because of this, investors may be forced to accept the risk of staying in bonds in a bid to spread the risk in their portfolio.
Or else they may have to pull out of the stock market completely and bide their time in cash just to make sure that they're not losing any money.
Wall Street and their pols knew people would leave the stock market for the safety of the bond market after the 2008 crash so they started immediately to create the conditions to fleece these bond investors. Congress and Obama created legislation that pushed US bonds to the world market just as they did subprime mortgage loans they knew were fraudulent. Watching the FED and QE create the ballooning of the bond market just to accommodate Wall Street profit knowing a bond collapse would hit Federal, state, and local governments hard.
IT IS A CRIME AGAINST HUMANITY!!!! THESE ARE SOCIOPATHS FOLKS!
Public pensions were never too much to handle for states and local governments-----neo-liberals simply never intended to fund them just as corporations were never made to actually fund their contributions as these benefit packages required. So, there is no pension deficit weighing on governments----it is the fiscal policy schemes that are designed to bring ever more money to Wall Street that are soaking taxpayers. Below you see just another financial instrument that again placed public wealth in harms way. Remember, we went through a fiscal boom last decade albeit fueled by corporate fraud so government coffers should be flush. Rather, billions of dollars were lost to public malfeasance and fraud. The article below shows states using pension investments that were known to be bad policy-----placing bonds into plans at the wrong time and this is not an accident. It takes no rocket scientist to know all of these investment strategies were bad for the public. These neo-liberals did it to hide debt to take on more debt knowing Wall Street would bring in tons of profit.
The story of Oregon is Maryland's story and Martin O'Malley and the Maryland Assembly are the stars of this public abuse. Now, the same thing was done for private pensions as corporations were allowed to fail to fund and place pensions into ever riskier investments everyone knew would fail.
Just think.......if we all knew years ago that the policies since the 2008 crash would implode the bond market-----do you leave state and local governments exposed to bond leveraging? OF COURSE NOT UNLESS YOU WANT TO IMPLODE GOVERNMENT BUDGETS.
Pension Obligation Bonds: Risky Gimmick or Smart Investment?
Pension obligation bonds have bankrupted whole cities. Yet some governments are still big players. BY: Eric Schulzke | January 2013
"It's the dumbest idea I ever heard," Jon Corzine told Bloomberg.com in 2008 when he was still governor of New Jersey. "It's speculating the way I would have speculated in my bond position at Goldman Sachs."
Corzine, who followed up his tenure as governor with a $1.6 billion investment debacle as chairman of MF Global, seemed to know a thing or two about risky ventures. In this case, he was speaking of pension obligation bonds. POBs are a financing maneuver that allows state and local governments to "wipe out" unfunded pension liabilities by borrowing against future tax revenue, then investing the proceeds in equities or other high-yield investments. The idea is that the investments will produce a higher return than the interest rate on the bond, earning money for the pension fund. It's a gamble, but one that a lot of governments are willing to take when pension portfolio returns plummet, causing unfunded liabilities to run dark and deep.
Almost every fund has faced such liabilities from time to time, though current times have been more treacherous than others. As Paul Cleary, executive director of the Oregon Public Employees Retirement System (PERS) points out, since 1970 his state's pension fund has suffered annual losses only four times. But three of those losses were in the last decade, and one, in 2008, was a catastrophic 27 percent decline.
Faced with such losses -- and with a dearth of state and local revenue to make up for the shortfalls -- POBs have become a favored tool to fix pension woes. Oregon is a big player in the POB market, along with scores of its cities, counties and school districts. Other major POB issuers include California, Connecticut, Illinois and New Jersey.
The bonds took on some notoriety this past summer when two California cities, Stockton and San Bernardino, went bankrupt. Generous pensions awkwardly propped up with ill-timed POBs contributed to both debacles.
Over the years, returns on POBs have often fallen below the interest rate the state or locality paid to borrow the money, digging the liability hole even deeper. Nonetheless, they remain popular with politicians in a revenue pinch. Politically, it is easier to borrow money to pay for pension costs than it is to squeeze an already-stressed budget. While many economists and policy analysts view them as risky gimmicks and question the high market growth assumptions that make them seem viable, POBs have defenders who believe that with careful timing they can pay off.
When Oakland, Calif., launched the first pension obligation bond in 1985, it appeared to be a reasonable strategy. It qualified as a tax-free bond that could be issued at the lower municipal bond rates. A state or city could then pivot and invest the funds in safe securities -- a corporate bond, for instance -- at a slightly higher rate. "That was classic arbitrage," Cleary says. "You were locking down the difference between nontaxable bonds and taxable bonds."
The Tax Reform Act of 1986 ended that strategy by prohibiting state and local governments from reinvesting for profit the money from tax-free bonds. When the concept resurfaced, the strategy called for states or localities to issue a taxable bond and leverage the higher interest rate of that bond against higher return but riskier equity market plays. So long as markets boomed, the new tactic seemed savvy. "Some people call this arbitrage, but it's not," Cleary says of post-1986 POBs. "It's really an investment gamble."
Arbitrage occurs when prices for the same product differ between two markets, allowing a nimble player to exploit the difference. "Real arbitrage is free money," says Andrew Biggs, a scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. "But it doesn't hang around very long."
Safe bonds and risky equities are not the same product, but public pension accounting currently permits state and localities to treat them as if they were. "They are counting the return on the stocks before the return is there," Biggs says. "If you borrowed money to invest in the real world, you would factor the current value of the debt with the current real value of the stocks."
Given the inherent risks and possible rewards, how have POBs fared? In 2010, a research team led by Alicia Munnell, director of the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College, ran some numbers to find out. The team took 2,931 POBs issued by 236 governments through 2009. They used each bond's repayment schedule to calculate interest and principal, and then clustered them into cohorts based on the year issued. They assumed a 65/35 investment split between equities and bonds and tracked the results with standard indexes. They then produced two composite graphs -- one at the height of the market in 2007 and the second in 2009, after a crash and before recovery.
In general, bonds issued in the early stages of a stock boom performed well prior to the crash. Thus, POBs issued in the early 1990s were healthy, ranging from 2 to 5 percent net growth. Borrowings in 2002 or 2003 also looked good.
Those issued in the latter years of the 1990s or 2000, however, were in negative territory even before the 2008 crash, having suffered serious losses to their principal in the 2001-2002 downturn. After 2008, all POBs were under water -- except those issued in the trough of the collapse, which by 2009 were already pushing 25 percent gains.
Oregon's numbers mirror Munnell's findings. Local government POBs issued in 2002 at the depth of that market collapse and managed by Oregon PERS gained an annual average of 8.84 percent through 2012, before principal and interest on the bond. Less lucky were bonds issued in 2005. The Springfield School District's POB earned just 5.53 percent, for example. Since that bond carried 4.65 percent interest, it likely earned roughly one point annually -- not much, but slightly above neutral. Oregon's 2007 issuers earned just 2 percent on their investments through 2012, and are upside down today after debt service.
The same fate befell Stockton, Calif., which also came to market in 2007. Similarly, New Jersey issued a $2.8 billion POB in 1997 -- on the wrong side of another stock bubble.
"The whole thing is the timing," Oregon's Cleary says. "You are trying to issue them when the market has bottomed out and when interest rates are reasonable, because really what you are doing is making an investment bet. If people thought when they did POBs that they were refinancing a debt or doing a locked-in arbitrage, rather than an investment play, I'm sure they have been very surprised by the results."
And yet that is exactly how they were sold. When Oregon voted on new POBs in 2009, the voter education pamphlet argument in favor of issuance explicitly framed the choice as a "refinance" and cast the projected returns as money "saved."
"Just like many homeowners are refinancing their home mortgages," the pamphlet read, "the State should take advantage of these historically low rates, which can save Oregon more than $1 billion over the next 25 years. The money saved will help reduce cuts and protect services that all Oregonians rely on."
Because POBs demand headroom between the interest an issuer pays to borrow and the high returns promised on resulting investments, their investment strategies tend to chafe against safer portfolios. Without a hefty "discount rate" -- as the projected annual gain assumed by a pension fund is known -- the pension bonds would not be possible.
In a 2012 paper, Andrew Biggs argues that the aggressive 8 percent discount used by many states overstates likely earnings and understates risks. A fund that required $100 million in 20 years and employed an 8 percent discount rate would be "fully funded" with $21 million, Biggs notes. But if that same fund were to gain only 5 percent annually, it would need $38 million today to be fully funded in 20 years.
Many experts argue that because public pension obligations are legally binding, pension funds should be discounted at close to zero risk on the front end -- at or near the rates offered by government bonds. "While economists are famous for disagreeing with each other on virtually every conceivable issue," wrote then-Federal Reserve Board Vice Chairman Donald Kohn in 2008, "when it comes to this one there is no professional disagreement: The only appropriate way to calculate the present value of a very-low-risk liability is to use a very-low-risk discount rate."
In point of fact, the 8 percent discount rate may be on its way out. The Governmental Accounting Standards Board (GASB) is launching a complex hybrid discount standard in 2014, which will affect the assumptions states make with their funds. Some fear the GASB rule will only create more confusion. Bond rater Moody's is taking a simpler tack in weighing government pension plans, having recently proposed to shift its pension discount rate down to the level of AA taxable bonds, which are now at 5.5 percent. "Currently, discount rates used by state and local governments are all over the place," says Tim Blake, Moody's managing director of public finance. "Most are in the range of 7.5 to 8 percent. We need a uniform rate."
Not surprisingly, 5.5 percent is very close to the rate at which many POBs are sold to investors.
With aggressive 8 percent discount rates now under attack by economists, oversight boards and rating agencies, issuers who counted on rosier outcomes have learned some hard lessons. Five years ago, when Connecticut State Treasurer Denise L. Nappier announced a new $2.28 billion pension bond, she noted that the state had "achieved a favorable borrowing cost of 5.88 percent, which is well below the 8.5 percent assumed long-term return on assets of the Teachers' Retirement Fund. This will provide significant cash flow savings over the long term and a potential savings to taxpayers of billions of dollars."
When the bond was issued in April, the Dow Jones average stood just shy of 13,000. By November, the market was in free fall. It bottomed out the following March at just over 6,600. Connecticut's timing could hardly have been worse. As the market plunged, Pensions & Investments lit into POBs, singling out Connecticut. The editors argued that POBs shove obligations "that should have been paid as earned" onto future generations, along with the risk of the debt.
By 2010, with the market still emerging from the trough, Connecticut's finances were as messy as ever. But now there was little appetite for more bonds. POBs "are certainly a risky proposition," Michael J. Cicchetti, chairman of Connecticut's Post Employment Benefits Commission, told the CT Mirror. "Things are different now than they were then."
Wall Street has the nerve to state that public sector pensions are too big of a liability for governments. After all, Wall Street fraud caused a loss of 1/2 pension value in 2008 and the rating corporations like Moody's was ground zero for the fraud---they should know pensions are limping along!
Indeed, simply taking the assets of the three major rating corporations and pushing them into bankruptcy for their part in the fraud would have made pensions flush with cash. RULE OF LAW WOULD HAVE SOLVED GOVERNMENT PENSION SHORTFALLS. No one shouted this! Did you hear your pols shouting for recovery of pension losses from fraud to make up the shortfall? They went straight to cutting benefits. They through pensions into bad investments just to claim they were liabilities that needed to be cut.
THAT'S A NEO-LIBERAL FOR YOU-----WORKING TO MAXIMIZE WALL STREET PROFITS AT PUBLIC EXPENSE!
Now, why should all citizens be concerned about pension fraud ----even those with no pensions?
THE SAME THING IS HAPPENING WITH SOCIAL SECURITY! YOUR RETIREMENT PROGRAM IS BEING RAIDED BY THE SAME PEOPLE. DO NOT THINK IT OK FOR SOME PEOPLE TO LOSE THEIR RETIREMENTS WHEN THE PROBLEM IS CORPORATE FRAUD AND CORRUPTION AND NOT THE BENEFIT!
So while neo-liberals like Dulaney are busy making sure legislation places corporations into positions to earn grand profits-----they are setting you and I to take the losses once again.
The policy of risk-free rating is not a bad thing-----what is bad is that it comes at a time when pensions are waiting for recovery from fraud by Moody's and it comes as the bond market is ready to implode from public sector malfeasance. Can you imagine how impossible it will be to meet these obligations after an economic crash bigger than 2008?
THAT'S RIGHT-----THEY DO NOT WANT TO BE ABLE TO MEET THEM! THAT IS WHY THEY ARE IMPLODING THE BOND MARKET FOR GOODNESS SAKE!
A Maryland neo-liberal running for Governor of Maryland Heather Mizeur actually stated-------if public employees gave up pension benefits we could build all these schools in Baltimore. That is what neo-liberals do----pit people in the same Democratic base against one another. It is not an either/or----STOP THE CORPORATE FRAUD AND PROFITEERING!
LABOR AND JUSTICE ARE THE DEMOCRATIC BASE!
Moody's Playing Dangerous Games With Public Pension Funds
Tuesday, 07 May 2013 09:29	By Dean Baker, Truthout | Op-Ed
The bond-rating agency Moody's made itself famous for giving subprime mortgage backed securities triple-A ratings at the peak of the housing bubble. This made it easy for investment banks like Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley to sell these securities all around the world. And it allowed the housing bubble to grow ever bigger and more dangerous. And we know where that has left us.
Well, Moody's is back. They announced plans to change the way they treat pension obligations in assessing state and local government debt.
Instead of accepting projections of pension fund returns based on the assets they hold, Moody's wants to use a risk-free discount rate to assess pension fund liabilities. This will make public pensions seem much worse funded than the current method.
While this might seem like a nerdy and technical point, it has very real consequences. If the Moody's methodology is accepted as the basis for accounting by state and local governments then they will suddenly need large amounts of revenue to make their pensions properly funded. This will directly pit public sector workers, who are counting on the pensions they have earned, against school children, low-income families, and others who count on state supported services.
In other words, this is exactly the sort of politics that the Wall Street and the One Percent types love. No matter which side loses, they win. While public sector workers fight the people dependent on state and local services, they get to walk off with all the money.
Wall Street is expert at these sorts of accounting tricks; it is after all what they do for a living. And this is not the first time that they have played these sorts of games to advance their agenda.
The current crisis of the Postal Service, which is looking at massive layoffs and cutbacks in delivery, is largely the result of accounting gimmicks. In 2006 Congress passed a law requiring an unprecedented level of pre-funding for retiree health care benefits. The Postal Service is not only required to build up a massive level of prefunding, it also is using more pessimistic assumptions about cost growth than any known plan in the private sector.
This requirement is the basis for the horror stories of multi-billion losses that feature prominently in news stories about the Postal Service. The Postal Service would face difficulties adjusting to rapid declines in traditional mail service in any case (it doesn't help that they are prohibited from using their enormous resources to expand into new lines of business), but this accounting maneuver is imposing an impossible burden. The change in pension fund accounting could have a comparable impact on state and local governments.
Moody's change in accounting is not just bad politics, it is horrible policy. The key question is how we should assess the returns that pension funds can anticipate on the assets they hold in the stock market. Moody's and other bond rating agencies did flunk the test horribly in the 1990s and 2000s. They assumed that the stock market would provide the historic rate of return even when price to earnings ratios were more than twice the historic average at the peak of the stock bubble.
While some of us did try to issue warnings at the time (here) and (here) the bond rating agencies were not interested. As a result, when the stock market plunged, many pensions that had previously appeared to be solidly funded, suddenly faced substantial shortfalls.
It is possible to construct a methodology that projects future returns based on current market valuations and projected profit growth that maintain proper funding levels, while minimizing the variation in contributions through time. By contrast, if the pension funds adopted the Moody's methodology as the basis for their contribution schedules, they would find themselves making very large contributions in some years followed by years in which they made little or no contribution.
A state or local government that used the Moody's methodology to guide their contributions would effectively be prefunding their pensions in the same way that it would be prefunding education to build up a huge bank account so that K-12 education was paid from the annual interest. While it would be nice to have the cost of these services fully covered for all time, no one thinks this policy makes sense. We would be hugely overtaxing current workers so that future generations could get a huge tax break.
Even worse, Moody's scoring of pensions may discourage pension managers from holding stock as an asset. They would be held accountable for any losses in bad years, but would not get credit for the higher expected returns on stock. For this reason, risk averse pension managers may decide to hold safe but low yielding bonds.
This would lead to the perverse situation in which collectively invested funds held in pensions only hold safe bonds, even though market timing carries little risk for them. On the other hand individual investors, who are hugely vulnerable to market timing, would be holding stock in their 401(k)s.
That outcome makes no sense. But of course it didn't make sense that subprime mortgage backed securities were Aaa. This is Moody's we're talking about.
I spend time talking about labor and unions in a State of Maryland that is not union-friendly because whether Republican or Democratic voter-----it is unions that will be able to counter the power of global corporations. Republican Party used to be a supporter of unions and needs to come back to this. I qualify my support with the fact that we need to rebuild our union leadership and models as they are currently often tying themselves to what neo-liberal politicians tell them to do.
PLEASE TAKE THE TIME TO CONSIDER THESE LABOR ISSUES NO MATTER THE SUPPORT OF UNIONS. CITIZENS CAN SUPPORT UNIONS WITHOUT BEING A UNION MEMBER AS THE WORKPLACE LAWS WON BY THE UNIONS OF LAST CENTURY BENEFIT ALL!
Check out this Facebook page: the movement is growing!
US Uncut
June 30 ·
The Trans-Pacific Partnership is a corporate trade deal that places profits over everything and would affect half of humanity, but the mainstream media refuses to cover it at all.
Share to break corporate media's censorship.
I want to make clear, it is not only the working class and poor being driven deeper into poverty. The middle-class employee is feeling it as well. I spoke of public universities now filled with part-time adjuncts and we are watching as nursing staff and other medical employees with strong middle-class salaries feeling the cuts of Affordable Care Act reform. Post Office employees were strongly middle-class as were MTA bus drivers and all are under attack from privatization. Doctors know they are next as their profession becomes a cog in a profit-driven system. The problem is global corporations having complete control of our US and state economies. Ending that power is the solution to protecting all US workers AND IT CAN BE DONE!
WE NEED EVERYONE ENGAGED IN POLITICS----RUN OR ADVOCATE!
It is a bad sign for democracy when US universities attack the very professors who for centuries were the ones charged with holding power accountable. Taking away tenure and making professors predominately adjunct was meant to kill political activism on US university campuses.....and is why there is silence today. I am glad to see the movement below.
Wednesday, Feb 19, 2014, 3:10 pm
UIC Faculty Rekindle Fight for Public Education With Historic Strike
BY Rebecca Burns
University of Illinois----Chicago
As a tenured professor at the University of Illinois-Chicago (UIC), Josh Radinsky never expected to participate in a strike—or to see so many of his colleagues ready to do the same. "I've never seen anything like it. It's like a ghost town today," Radinsky marveled as he and a group of colleagues picketed outside an empty academic building yesterday morning.
Tuesday marked the start of an unprecedented two-day walkout staged by UIC United Faculty (UICUF), the union that represents more than 1,100 tenure-track and non-tenure-track faculty members at the state university. Strikes by university professors are a rare occurrence: The first of its kind at UIC, the faculty strike is also one of only a handful at U.S. colleges and universities during the past five years. Since gaining recognition in 2012, though, UICUF has been locked in a stalemate with university administrators over its first contract. In December, faculty members voted overwhelmingly to authorize a strike if progress wasn't made at the negotiating table.
This week, the union made good on its threat: Faculty members walked out of their offices on Tuesday morning, fanning out into picket lines across campus.
Though the sight of picketing professors may be novel, it's become increasingly evident to many that the union and administration were coming to loggerheads. As Radinsky, who's taught for 14 years in the university's College of Education, says about the strike, "This needed to happen—I think it's about time."
As it's geared up for a strike, UICUF's central contention has been that the university is not as cash-strapped as it claims to be. The union argues, based on reports of auditors and bond ratings, that UIC has more than $500 million in unrestricted reserves. And during the past five years, according to UICUF, even while the school has deferred faculty raises and withheld other benefits in the name of tough fiscal times, it has also increased the number of administrators by 10 percent.
Though the union says that some progress has been made during negotiations on non-economic issues such as academic freedom, the two sides are still sorely at odds about pay and benefits. Specifically, UICUF has put the penurious conditions of non-tenure-track (NTT) faculty at the center of its struggle: NTT faculty members currently make a minimum of $30,000 annually, and the union is demanding a $45,000 wage floor. Though the university offered $36,000 in its most recent counter-proposal, union negotiators say this does not constitute a good-faith negotiation.
"We don't see that as an actual compromise," says John Casey, a non-tenure-track lecturer who is a member of the union's bargaining team. Casey teaches a freshman writing course and says his low wages impact his ability to give his students the attention they deserve. He says he's had to take a string of outside jobs, including a recent one as a bicycle tour guide, to make ends meet while teaching at UIC.
For its part, UIC maintains the union's proposals for tenure-track faculty would lead to a 23 percent hike in costs for the university; its proposals for non-tenure-track faculty would increase costs by 27 percent. "A work stoppage or strike is not in the best interest of the faculty, the University, or our students," the university said in a statement issued last week on its website. "However, under Illinois law, educational employees in a bargaining unit without an applicable no-strike clause in a contract have a right to strike. Each professor or instructor has the right to strike, or to work."
The UIC strike represents a new height of coordination between tenured and non-tenure-track faculty, who often bargain contracts separately and sometimes see their interests as divergent. As I've reported previously, UICUF has found a unique way to maintain solidarity between the two groups. In 2011, the university successfully blocked tenure-track and NTT faculty members from forming a single bargaining unit—a move union activists say was an attempt to "divide and conquer." But the two groups have maintained the same core demands and the same bargaining team, operating as a unified group even though they must ultimately bargain two separate contracts.
Though the last major wave of faculty unionization took place in the 1970s, labor organizing in the academy is on the rise again. A surge of organizing among adjunct professors during the past year has won new, adjunct-only unions at several private universities, including Tufts University in Massachusetts. This resurgence is "a direct outgrowth of the large increase in the use of low-paid contingent faculty," says William A. Herbert, a distinguished lecturer at CUNY and executive director of the National Center for the Study of Collective Bargaining in Higher Education and the Professions.
However, he notes that the labor action at UIC is fairly unique because of the "apparent [tenure-track and NTT] faculty unity and prioritization for improving the working conditions of contingent faculty."
Casey, who was an adjunct activist even before UIC unionized, tells In These Times that he was initially uncertain whether working with tenured professors would be the best path to improvements in his own conditions.
"I was skeptical when we first started about how the relationship would work," says Casey. "[But] our tenure-track faculty have been amazing allies." Among the benefits of working in conjunction with tenured faculty, he says, is that the most vulnerable faculty members may be shielded from retaliation. "I mean, my boss was out here today on the picket line," Casey notes. "That's pretty remarkable." (Department heads at UIC are not included in the union, but many have expressed support for the strike.)
Many labor activists are hailing today's walkout as a historic development whose impact could extend beyond Chicago. For example, faculty members at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC), the flagship campus in the state system, are currently in the midst of their own union drive. And many of those professors have their eyes on UIC as a bellwether for the rest of the state.
Given the expanding ranks of NTT faculty at Urbana-Champaign, UICUF's ability to secure a higher wage floor for equivalent positions at UIC "would be a huge boost for us here," Susan Davis, a professor in the Department of Communication at Urbana-Champaign and a member of the pro-union Campus Faculty Association, tells In These Times via e-mail.
Davis also points out UIC higher-ups could be taking a hard line in contract negotiations with UICUF in an attempt to stem the tide toward faculty unionization at other campuses. "We think the administration is playing hardball with UICUF in part because they could set a dramatic precedent for the University of Illinois as a whole," she continues.
Spokespeople for UICUF estimate more than 1,000 faculty members participated in the first day of the strike and that about half of all classes were cancelled. More than 200 people, including students, attended a midday rally on Tuesday. The group chanted, "Chop from the Top!" and "No Contract, No Peace!" while many marched with distinctly professorial picket signs, such as "I Teach, Therefore I Am (Exploited)" and "The Inductive Method: No Contract, No Work!"
Campus service and maintenance workers represented by SEIU Local 73, who are in the midst of their own contentious contract negotiations and could strike in March, also came out to demonstrate solidarity.
"We're hoping that this will show us a way towards a stronger contract," says Michael Schmitt, a member of the union's bargaining team, who says the $13 to $17 an hour wages in Campus Parking Services aren't enough for him and his co-workers to make ends meet. Though other campus unions have clauses in their contracts that prohibit them from striking in solidarity with faculty, many still attended pickets during their free time on Tuesday.
Faculty strikes are distinct from those at other workplaces in that they don't actually cut into the university's bottom line—though they can disrupt day-to-day business on campus, students have already paid tuition for the classes being cancelled. Therefore, faculty strikes are most often a short-term, symbolic tactic aimed at gaining public attention and support, says Herbert.
UIC faculty members insist, however, that their two-day walkout is a warning to the university before bargaining sessions resume again on Friday. "We're out here today to show urgency," says Casey. "If we don't see any progress ... we will go out on indefinite strike."
Wednesday, Apr 30, 2014, 8:10 pm
College Adjuncts Union Scores Victory at Maryland Institute College of Art
BY Bruce Vail Email Print MICA adjuncts celebrate after filing their petition to unionize. (SEIU 500)
BALTIMORE—Part-time college faculty members at the historic Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA) scored an impressive win on Tuesday when they voted overwhelmingly to bring a labor union on campus for the first time since MICA's opening in 1826.
When I speak of shareholder class this article does a good job showing what this means. You and I may have pension funds but with boom and bust of bubbles lose most of what we gain every five years. This is not really being a shareholder. Neo-liberals and neo-cons work for the shareholder class and that is at most 5% of the US population. Also, you can see how the people controlling these global corporations are increasingly becoming the same 1% and-----the banks.
So, labor has to fight across industry and not only for one corporation. I shout out that we do not want labor unions taking the structure of global corporations as they expand overseas to organize and that is what we are seeing. Demand your labor union works locally and remains controlled locally. It is this International status of unions like the AFL-CIO and SEIU that has them paired to neo-liberal pols.
UPS, FedEx owned by most of the same monopoly banks
Highlights the need for industry-wide organizing, unionizing FedEx workers
By Dave Schneider and Dustin Ponder
Jacksonville, FL – Despite 'competing' as the world's two largest parcel delivery and shipping companies, UPS and FedEx are owned by many of the same banks. According to NASDAQ's ownership summary of both companies, 12 of the top 20 owners of UPS and FedEx are the same banks, investment groups and financial institutions.
Both multi-billion dollar corporations are under 'institutional ownership', which means that a majority of their shares are owned by financial institutions, banks and other large monopoly corporations. According to NASDAQ's ownership summary of UPS on April 11, nearly 71% of UPS shares are owned by institutions. FedEx, a smaller company than UPS, actually had greater institutional ownership, with 83.94% of the company's shares owned by institutions, according to NASDAQ.
However, most of the largest institutional owners of both UPS and FedEx have substantial interests in both companies. For instance, Vanguard Group Inc., a Pennsylvania-based investment bank that manages nearly $2 trillion in assets, is the single-largest owner of UPS and the third largest owner of FedEx. Vanguard Group is a massive financial institution that boasts the largest ownership in many other large, well-known corporations including Apple, Exxon Mobil and Microsoft.
Primecap Management Company, based in Pasadena, California, is the largest owner of FedEx, holding nearly 19 million shares of the shipping company, according to NASDAQ. However, Primecap is also the 16th largest owner of UPS stock, holding more than 6.3 million shares, also according to NASDAQ.
In all, 60% of the top 20 owners of both UPS and FedEx are the same banks, investment groups and financial institutions.
Institutional ownership is incredibly common among the largest 500 publicly traded companies.
Despite this fact, companies like UPS stress to workers the need to "compete" against rival workers in their industry, like those at FedEx. UPS's collective bargaining agreement includes an entire article on competition that states: "The Union recognizes that the Employer is in direct competition with…other firms engaging in the distribution of express letter, parcel express, parcel delivery, and freight, both air and surface."
The company leverages this poison pill of competition to justify subcontracting union work and undermining union standards. It creates an adversarial relationship between workers of UPS and FedEx, when in reality the owners at the top are united in extracting the most profit possible from workers at both companies. When the owners of UPS and FedEx are one in the same, 'competition' means which management team can exploit their workers the most and extract the most profit for the banks that own the whole industry.
A prominent argument used by UPS claims that workers must accept concessionary contracts to remain 'competitive.' They argue that employing tried-and-true militant tactics, like striking as the Teamsters did successfully in 1997, will result in FedEx stealing UPS's customers. Historically, the union movement addressed this by organizing entire industries, instead of single worksites or employers. This meant one industry, one union, and at times - one contract. At its best, this method of organizing and bargaining takes wages out of competition and sets industry-wide standards to prevent subcontracting and a race to the bottom through 'competition.' Tactically, if the 1% owners of both brands are united, then to combat them and win, workers across the entire industry must also unite.
The attempts of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters to organize FedEx have been foiled by U.S. labor law, which misclassifies workers and stifles their ability to unionize. FedEx Ground drivers are misclassified as independent contractors and are legally barred from union representation, even though in practice, they are effectively workers directly employed by the company. FedEx Express drivers are also misclassified under the Railway Labor Act (RLA), as opposed to the National Labor Relations Act. The company claims their employees are 'airline' workers, and thus would need to unionize nationally all at once. The RLA also places many more restrictions on workers' rights, including the ability to strike. It also forces the workers into binding arbitration, which often serve the interest of the boss instead of the workers.
The banks and financial institutions that own both UPS and FedEx are united in their push for lower wages, part-time poverty jobs, fewer benefits and weaker contracts. To effectively fight their race to the bottom, union workers at UPS must organize FedEx workers, regardless of the legal fictions created by politicians in Washington.
Dave Schneider and Dustin Ponder are both rank-and-file Teamsters and members of Part-Time Power at UPS, which is a national group for UPS part-timers.
All across the nation nurses have been out protesting the most of any union. They are on the front-lines of the Affordable Care Act and the Obama/neo-liberal cuts of almost $1 trillion from Medicare. We all know those cuts were allowed to be designed by health corporations and hit the patient access and health industry labor.....nurses for one. If health industry and education industry are going to be drivers of the 21st century economy then driving these groups to poverty is not a solution for a healthy economy or quality health service. It's not meant to be say neo-liberals----it's all about the corporate profits!
Did you know there is actually growing unemployment for nursing after decades of being told there were shortages? So much for this 'growth' industry. It is a combination of staff layoffs and importing immigrant labor to work in the health field that has this strong middle-class employment under attack.
In Baltimore, it is Johns Hopkins who makes a living recruiting foreign health care workers to the US to replace US workers and they do it to exploit these immigrant workers. I have a friend who works in Hopkins' research labs from the Middle East who says she is simply used to do the most mundane of lab work-----the assembly line of lab research and has no chance of anything better. She will leave to return home after being assured a good life in America. Meanwhile, Baltimore has 50% unemployment in the black community and 36% in the general community. It is these policies that have to go and these situations permeate the health industry.
We thank the nurses unions for shouting out for patients rights and fighting for labor justice!
Private equity firms are being handed all public health especially in Maryland and not coincidentally fraud and corruption is soaring!
Using the excuse of Medicare budget cuts was the plan for dismissing staff and creating a structure for maximizing profits. Remember, the Medicare Trust is low because these same health institutions spent a few decades robbing it through fraud.
' at a time when more health care is shifting from in-patient to outpatient services'.
The Affordable Care Act is about denying most people the ability to access the most basic of medical procedures and private equity firms say----get used to it because people will be getting the only care they can afford at home.
Nurses walk out at Quincy Medical Center
By Robert Weisman and Jessica Bartlett | Globe Staff and Globe Correspondent April 12, 2013
QUINCY — Hundreds of nurses marched in a drizzly chill Thursday, carrying signs, waving union flags, and drumming on plastic bins in a 24-hour strike to dramatize their complaints about staffing levels they say compromise patient safety at Quincy Medical Center.
They called in big political guns, notably US Representative Stephen F. Lynch, the South Boston Democrat who is running for US Senate, at a noon rally. They even rolled out an inflatable Cerberus, the three-headed dog that guards the gates of the underworld. The private equity firm that owns the hospital's parent, Steward Health Care System, is named after the mythical creature.
"The dog came out of retirement," said David Schildmeier, spokesman for the Massachusetts Nurses Association, who said the hellhound's only previous appearance was at a protest last year outside the New York headquarters of Cerberus Capital Management, which formed the Steward hospital and doctors group in 2010.
Inside the hospital, doctors and administrators said it was largely business as usual — except that they canceled elective surgeries for the day and brought in about 60 replacement nurses. They also hired trucks with billboards proclaiming the union was living in the past. Nurses stood in the street trying to block the trucks and attach their own signs to the vehicles.
"In today's economy, nurses sitting by empty beds making $52 an hour is not feasible," said Daniel Knell, who took over in 2011 as president of Quincy Medical Center.
Barry Chin/Globe Staff
Dr. Nissage Cadet (left) and hospital president Daniel Knell discussed the strike.
At the end of the day, nothing was resolved. Nurses were set to return to their jobs Friday morning without a contract. And there was no agreement between the two sides on the basic facts of what prompted the unusual one-day strike. While the nurses cited inadequate staffing, management insisted the union was pushing for higher wages and benefits.
The walkout took place against a backdrop of looming cuts in government funding for Medicare and Medicaid, the public insurance programs for older and low-income people.
"There is a lot of pressure being put on the hospitals," Lynch told more than 200 nurses and their supporters. "The reimbursement rates are not there. They are being put under pressure to reduce costs, and they are looking at making nurses work longer hours with fewer nurses on staff. That's not the way we need to be going."
The strike got underway at 6 a.m., when unionized nurses walked out of the hospital to join nurses from Norwood Hospital, Morton Hospital in Taunton, and other Steward-owned and nonprofit hospitals who came to show their support.
"We need to bring it to the community to support the issues," said Paula Ryan, a recovery room nurse at Quincy Medical who chairs the union local. "It's been a long time coming. It's been a struggle every day, nurses trying to provide the better care."
Regulators from the state Department of Public Health showed up before dawn to make sure replacement nurses were certified and had been trained by hospital officials. A contingent of Quincy police officers — paid for by Steward — kept watch at the protest. "The financial impact for today alone is exceptional," Knell said. He warned the hospital could be hurt further if patients chose to go to competing hospitals in Boston, Milton, or Weymouth because of what he said were false charges of safety problems.
"If the community doesn't support the facility because of the rhetoric, it could do financial damage to us," Knell said.
Nurses authorized the strike last month after their negotiators failed to reach agreement with Steward on a new contract. Their last contract expired before Steward acquired the bankrupt hospital in October 2011. Through an understanding between labor and management, they have been working under the terms of a separate Steward contract with union nurses at Steward-owned Carney Hospital in Dorchester.
A nurse from another Steward hospital waved a sign outside Quincy Medical Center to drum up support.
The union was notified in February that the hospital will close a 40-bed medical surgical floor and lay off 30 nurses who worked there along with 40 technicians, orderlies, and laborers, though the cuts have yet to take effect. Union officials contend that will aggravate already overcrowded conditions, but hospital officials insist there are often empty beds.
Steward and Cerberus executives are more interested in making money from their for-profit community hospitals than caring for patients, union members said. But hospital officials said the Quincy strike was part of a national union effort to inflate wages and keep staffing unnecessarily high at a time when more health care is shifting from in-patient to outpatient services.
"I consider nurses as our colleagues, and I value the work they do for patients," said Dr. Nissage Cadet, chief of surgery at Quincy Medical Center. "But health care is changing, and that's the right thing for patients. Steward came in and bailed out a hospital that was about to close in months. The quality of the institution has never been this good."
On the picket line, however, nurses said conditions have gotten so bad that patients are being "boarded" in the emergency department for long periods while waiting to see a doctor. Department nurse Kathleen LeBretton said such episodes happen two to three times a week.
Hospital officials insisted they only board psychiatric patients in a section of the emergency room while they await transfer to other hospitals because Quincy Medical does not have psychiatric beds.
The nurses were supported by Dr. Robert Noonan, a private practice physician who sometimes works with Quincy Medical Center. "There was a patient last month who was a patient of mine in her 80s," he said. "The closed surgical floor was full, and she was boarded in the emergency room for 18 hours."
Hospital officials contended the nurses and their backers were making false claims in an effort to get more money.
"I've been a nurse myself," Knell said. "And when I took my oath to take care of my patients, I meant it. I don't know that I would ever walk away from the bedside of my patient for financial reasons."
These agreements are often small gains for the union members but what is most important is the citizens of the state and communities coming out to say enough is enough. The workers cannot bear any more of the cuts designed to save money to be sent to corporate subsidy rather than people's paychecks.
For those not liking unions we need to remember everyone benefited from the policies built on union activism. It is the only organized group which advocates for workers and I would suggest that what most people do not like about unions has more to do with bad union leaders and not the mission. We need strong labor policy and law enforcement to reverse this wealth inequity and rebuild a healthy economy so everyone should be fighting for these issues.
We do need to see these unions fighting for the losses of the economic crash and fraud----we do not want to simply pretend we are starting again in the 1960s as union members lose these decades of accumulated wealth to corporate fraud and public malfeasance. It is not public sector benefits and wages emptying government coffers---it is the corporate fraud and government corruption.
PROTECTING UNION MEMBER'S WEALTH IS AS IMPORTANT.
Maryland is privatizing its Maryland Transportation Authority piece by piece and are now handing buses to VEOLA----busting wages, benefits and unions themselves all under neo-liberal control of government.
Friday, Apr 11, 2014, 1:01 pm
With Solidarity in Spades, Vermont Bus Drivers' 18-Day Strike Results in Big Win
BY Jonathan Leavitt
An outpouring of students, community members and allies from other unions turned out to support the strike. (All photographs by Jonathan Leavitt.)
At 6am on March 17, St. Patrick's Day, 40 bus drivers and a dozen community members defied negative-10-degree weather to picket outside the Chittenden County Transportation Authority (CCTA) bus garage in Burlington, Vt. The action marked the beginning of nearly three-week-long transit strike over concessionary contract demands that would capture the imagination of much of Vermont and culminate in victory.
"Management misjudged us," said CCTA driver Jim Fouts, speaking to In These Times from the impromptu victory rally on April 3. "We don't drive together, we don't have a lunch room to eat together," said Fouts. But on the picket line, he says, "we turned into icicles together and we started to get to know one another."
Traven Leyshon of the Vermont AFL-CIO leading Teamsters 597 members and supporters in chants on a negative 10 degree picket line. (Full disclosure: The author was part of the strike's solidarity committee and is a member of the Vermont Workers' Center, which supported the strike.)
After months of failed negotiations and working without a contract since June 30 of last year, drivers voted 54-0 on March 12th to reject CCTA management's final contract offer. Drivers could not stomach monitoring disciplinary procedures that they saw as "abusive," such as being tailed by supervisors, reviewed via bus videotapes, and suspensions of as long as a month. The added demand that drivers work eight hours over the course of an exhausting 13.5-hour "split shift," which could be extended through forced overtime to 15 hours, sparked concerns among bus drivers and community members that CCTA management's demands risked "community safety."
A new generation of strikers St. Patrick's Day fell on a Monday, a school day, and the temperature was negative 5 degrees, but at 7a.m., a steady stream of parents dropped off their students to march the picket line. Seventy-one Burlington High School (BHS) students walked the proverbial mile in another's shoes, shoulder to shoulder with their bus drivers in a show of solidarity that harkens back to a much older, bolder labor movement. The students accompanied the bus drivers every foot of the circuitous 2.3-mile bus route from the Cherry Street picket line to the front office of the high school, where administrators greeted the students with applause and excused absences. The handmade signs students carried would paper the lobby for the duration of the strike.
"This is Vermont, and even record cold temperatures cannot keep us away from supporting the workers of our state," says Sabine Rogers, a senior at BHS. "Students showed how much they support fair working conditions and how much they support the work that you bus drivers do each and every day."
"As we started to walk, we went from a fairly quiet group to chanting with a bullhorn and really getting into it," says BHS senior Henry Prine. "One quiet student told me he doesn't like loud noises or large crowd, but it was such an incredible experience. He fell in love with organizing in that moment."
BHS Students on the picket line beside their CCTA drivers.
Prine detailed the prefigurative movement-building BHS students did before the strike. Through his student delegate position on the school board, Prine convinced the body to pass a resolution stating the school district would not hire scab bus drivers to cross picket lines. Prine says that as negotiations broke down and a strike appeared imminent, he began talking with other seniors ("and underclassmen too") about ways BHS students could take an even more powerful public stand. The students drafted a petition calling on CCTA management to meet the drivers' demands, and Mayor Weinberger and the Burlington City Council to support the bus drivers." According to Prine, the petition drew more than 500 signatures in one day's time. "That's more signatures than people get to keep the hockey program," he says.
This petition would be presented to Democratic Mayor Miro Weinberger in a March 10 City Council meeting by ten BHS student organizers. Weinberger and his City Council allies had earned a reputation as anti-labor for gutting Burlington's Livable Wage Ordinance despite popular support for policies to reduce the growing disparity of wealth.
Rogers, motivated by her experience on the strike line, would build out a student carpool in solidarity with drivers, using some dusty ward maps to collectivize students' overlapping routes to school. In the strike's final week, students organized teachers to host bus drivers in their classes. Striking drivers presented labor history and origin story of their job action to 80 students in four classes in the three days leading up to the strike settlement.
Rogers believes the experience transformed a culture of alienation at her school. "The solidarity and community and sense of activism that has been such a big player in this whole past few weeks—I definitely see that continuing as part of the atmosphere at BHS," she says.
'This is the movement of the people' Nine days into the strike, the drivers would face a massively heavy lift. With the backing of Mayor Weinberger, eight of the 14 members of Burlington's City Council co-sponsored a resolution calling for the contract negotiations to enter "binding arbitration."
According to a statement in responde to the resolution by the Vermont Federation of Nurses and Healthcare Professionals (a local of AFT Vermont), binding arbitration decreases the likelihood of a favorable outcome for workers and communities by placing "all decision-making in the hands of a third party, someone with no relationship to the workplace or community directly affected by his or her decision" and who is not accountable for the results.
To speak against binding arbitration, 150 drivers and supporters marched upon the City Council's March 26 meeting, chanting "We are the union, the mighty, mighty union!" After they filed into the chamber, City Council President Joan Shannon informed the crowd that the customary public comment period at the beginning of the meeting would be delayed by a special executive session. At that point, the entire driver solidarity march assembled outside the chamber door and unleashed perhaps the most boisterous rally City Hall has ever seen.
Bus drivers, other unions and community solidarity activists lead a speak-out in Burlington City Hall on March 26.
The hallway and steps leading to City Hall's second floor and the Mayor's office were suffused with swelling throng of students, members of United Electric (UE), the Vermont Workers' Center, the Vermont State Employees Association, Vermont National Education Assocaition (Vermont NEA), the newly formed Vermont Homecare United (a local of ASFCME) and many bus drivers. Loud applause and chants of "What do we want? Fair Contract! When do we want it? Now!" resounded in hallway's marble and into the City Council chamber in a scene many would compare to the 2011 occupation of the Wisconsin Capitol by pro-union protesters.
"Where is the freedom? Where is the chance?" bus driver Noor Ibrahim, an immigrant from Somalia, asked the impromptu rally. "I was told there is a chance here in this country. Where is the right of the poor people? [CCTA management] are misusing the money of the taxpayers. From now on we have this strike as experience, we don't need to back down."
Noor detailed how three years ago his wife was pregnant and "the doctor said the baby wasn't moving." He set up an appointment on his day off so he could support his wife, even filling out the vacation paperwork as an extra precaution. Less than 24 hours before the appointment, he said, CCTA's management told him he would have to work. "When I asked them, they said 'We don't care about you, we don't care about your family all we care about is the bus moving,' " said Noor.
As drivers continued telling personal stories like these and the raucous rally spilled over into public comment, two of the eight resolution sponsors, Karen Paul and Tom Ayers, pulled their names off. Councilor Paul was evidently moved by the driver's stories; she introduced a successful amendment to "remove the resolution from the agenda" entirely, adding, "I've learned a great deal tonight. If we go forward with the agenda, I'll remove my name from the resolution." By the council meeting's denouement, the focus had shifted from binding arbitration to a discussion led by progressive councilors of whether or not to sanction CCTA management.
"This is the movement of the people," Nigerian CCTA driver Ade Fajobi told In These Times. "The voice of everybody changed the votes of City Council."
'Every step you take on your picket line is our step' On Saturday, March 29, the 12th day of the strike, an all-night, 18-hour negotiation session broke down, yet again, over CCTA management's demand to increase drivers' split-shifts 12.5 to 13.5 hours. "They basically tossed the same pile of dung back in our faces," said Jim Fouts. In response, hundreds of supporters gathered at Burlington City Hall, beneath a 12-foot wide bright blue banner reading "Work With Dignity" and "Fair Contract Now." A massive University of Vermont (UVM) feeder march and brass band joined, and Vermont residents lent their voices to the drivers' cause.
A brass band joins the picket line on the second day of the strike.
"By using your right to strike, you're creating a stronger movement of workers," said Amy Lester, a member of Vermont NEA and the vice-president of the Vermont Workers' Center. "Your strength is our strength. Your courage is our courage. Your momentum is our momentum. Every step you take on your picket line is our step. We all have your back, keep fighting and don't give up."
To loud applause, FaRied Munarsyah, a Workers' Center member and 20-year CCTA rider, called for "temporary replacement managers." Michelle Gałecki of UVM's Student Climate Culture said, "Livable jobs and public transportation is a green issue, but it's also a human rights issue."
"We have been swallowing this pain for the last ten years," said Noor Ibrahim, from the steps of City Hall, with dozens of CCTA bus drivers behind him. "We cannot live in this hostile environment. We deserve respect."
Chief Steward Mike Walker, driver Noor Ibrahim, and many more drivers leading the March 29 march.
Just days later, after threatening picket line-crossing scab drivers, CCTA management would finally capitulate. CCTA agreed to a contract with language limiting monitoring and discipline, reducing "forced overtime" to 13.5 hours a day instead of 15, and maintaining drivers' split shifts at the current 12.5 hours. Though drivers conceded an increase from 13 to 15 part-time drivers, the union was able to win language preventing CCTA from using retirement or termination to reduce the entire bargaining unit slowly to part-time status. On April 3, inside the local VFW's Eddie Laplant ballroom, drivers voted 53-6 to adopt the new contract.
A growing movement for work with dignity According to James Haslam, director of the Vermont Workers Center, "In the current context of the attack on public transit, the public sector and the labor movement nationally, this is a tremendous victory for work with dignity that benefits all working people in the long haul."
Indeed, the solidarity unionism that blossomed in Vermont's late-winter snow could be—like the Chicago Teachers Union, Portland Teachers Union or Boeing Machinists—another harbinger of rebirth for rank-and-file reform movements buttressed by community solidarity.
The successful 18-day job action "really shows what happens when a few people speak out and continue to speak out towards a common goal of having a strong union," said driver Jim Fouts in the bus terminal, in the afterglow of the victory celebration. "When I first came here the union was weak, because it was a business-as-usual union. Then some activists started saying, 'This is wrong. We can vote on things. This is supposed to be a democracy.' And really it was a bottom up movement to change our union."
According to former drivers Chuck Norris-Brown and Scott Ranney, a reform caucus with the local solidified over breakfasts in local restaurants in the spring of 2009, around a petition circulated amongst drivers that helped win stewards elected by drivers, not merely appointed by Teamsters higher-ups. The caucus, nicknamed the Sunday Breakfast Club, soon began coordinating with Teamsters for a Democratic Union (TDU), a national, independent rank-and-file movement within the Teamsters. In 2011 contract negotiations, Breakfast Club members did the shopfloor organizing and the local outreach to community members and other unions to build public support. "A seed was sown which kept the Teamster Local to the grindstone, and almost all of the community action that resulted in major support for the recent drivers strike was based on earlier Sunday Breakfast Club contacts and strategies," says Ranney, who also believes the caucus empowered rank-and-file members and paved the way for the unanimous rejection of the concessionary contract.
Tearing up, Fouts describes how Local 597 followed the advice of a Labor Notes organizer Ellen David Freidman, to build power and beat back concessions: " 'Turn enemies into neutrals, you turn neutrals into activists and you turn activists into leaders,' " he quotes. "That's what we did."
"We won this fair contract because of our unity and the tremendous support from our community," says Rob Slingerland, CCTA bus driver and spokesperson for the drivers.
Many drivers, even in the midst of the victory party, said they'd already begun reciprocating the solidarity unionism they experienced from other unions during their strikes. "We were talking about solidarity with other unions before we even went over our contract today," says Slingerland. He says that drivers have already volunteered to join marches on the boss at Vermont's HowardCenter, a counseling and medical-services center where workers are in the process of unionizing with AFSCME. "We got the help and now we've got to give the help," he says. "Vermont is so small, but this movement is so big."
Slingerland described an "umbrella of fear," his co-workers used to work under and how the victorious strike changed workplace power relations and gave drivers a sense of dignity. "A lot of drivers have discovered the power that they have within as a person," said Slingerland, "you put that together as a group and you end where we are today, with a victory."
AFSCME is a sponsor of In These Times. Sponsors have no role in editorial content.
Striking bus drivers lead the March 29th community solidarity march with hundreds of supporters. .
I listened to someone tell me that Maryland Assembly passed laws to fight widespread wage theft and I had to remind them that Maryland passes laws but they do not enforce laws. It's like saying policy makes health care stronger or public education stronger while defunding and deregulating these institutions. Please stop listening to what neo-liberals and neo-cons say------and look what they do. Remember, they work under 'tell them what they want to hear and then do what you want' politics of autocracy.
Let's take a look at unemployment in the US to remind ourselves----we must have citizens earning enough money to be able to consume to fuel the economy. We must have policy that has Federal, state, and local governments using public money to hire small and regional domestic businesses to do work to rebuild a domestic economy. Global corporations expanding overseas only hire overseas and make their profits overseas.
THIS IS THE PROBLEM WITH UNEMPLOYMENT.
REMEMBER, UNEMPLOYMENT IN THE US AND MARYLAND IS 36% BECAUSE GLOBAL CORPORATIONS CONTROL OUR ECONOMY AND USE HIGH UNEMPLOYMENT TO KEEP US WORKERS DESPERATE AND TO MAXIMIZE PROFITS.
Below you see the latest scheme by neo-liberal pols working for wealth and profit-----having the public become the Human Resources Department for corporations by having taxpayers fund all job training that should be done by corporations. THESE WORKERS MUST BE JOB-READY ON DAY ONE. All of the education funding that helped the working/middle class go to 4 year universities now go to subsidize corporate profit in job training programs.  I listen to neo-liberals telling me the poor need computer skills to do a job as if poor children aren't the top users of computer gaming-----needing lots of computer knowledge. They simply need access to computers. There is no skills deficit-----we have US college grads with STEM degrees among the unemployed. Neo-liberals and neo-cons are simply using this as excuses to spend public money building structures that bring foreign students to the US to train to work overseas.
The problem today with the policy of a New Deal infrastructure funding bill is that neo-liberals are ready to send all that Federal funding to global construction corporations who will be allowed to bring labor from the nations these corporations are headquartered. There will be little US employment from a infrastructure bill created by neo-liberals. This is what Trans Pacific Trade Pact TPP is all about!
IF YOUR POL IS NOT SHOUTING THAT REBUILDING A DOMESTIC ECONOMY AND GETTING RID OF GLOBAL CORPORATIONS IN YOUR STATE-------THEY ARE NEO-LIBERALS AND NEO-CONS.
In Maryland that is why elections have been captured so as to silence an candidate with a platform to do that----
Wednesday, Feb 5, 2014, 11:33 am
Who's Really To Blame for Unemployment?
BY Michelle Chen Working In These Times
Though some protesters at an 'Unemployment Olympics' event in Tompkins Square Park, N.Y. blamed joblessness on 'the boss,' a new report suggests that the economic climate is more at fault.
Guided by the mythology of the "American dream"—the idea that, given the opportunity, the deserving will excel and rise above their peers—politicians often attribute unemployment to a mystical "skills gap." If people can't find a job, the logic goes, they clearly weren't fit to be hired. As a consequence, many legislators tout specialized training programs or education reforms as possible solutions to America's seemingly intractable jobs crisis. But a new study shows that blaming the "skills gap" for unemployment makes about as much sense as blaming a mass famine on "excess hunger."
A recent analysis by the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute shows that elevated unemployment is due to a general lack of demand in the job market, fueled by overarching economic decline. In other words, this is not a problem that can merely be addressed by retraining workers or revamping the education system.
In the report, economist Heidi Shierholz outlines this economic imbalance by comparing unemployment at different levels of education. Her results reveal that workers are suffering across the board:
Workers with a college degree or more still have unemployment rates that are more than one-and-a-half times as high as they were before the recession began. In other words, demand for workers at all levels of education is significantly weaker now than it was before the recession started. There is no evidence of workers at any level of education facing tight labor markets relative to 2007.
Moreover, the report continues, there are no specific job sectors that appear to be especially "tight." So it's not that the economy especially favors, for example, radiologists or software engineers; bosses seem to be shutting the door on workers of all sorts:
T]he unemployment rate in 2012 in all occupations is higher than it was before the recession. In every occupational category demand for workers is lower than it was five years ago. The signature of a skills mismatch—workers in some occupations experiencing tight labor markets relative to 2007—is plainly missing.
Indeed, when comparing the job-opening-to-job-seeker ratio across different categories, EPI found that "unemployed workers dramatically outnumber job openings in all sectors. There are between 1.4 and 10.5 times as many unemployed workers as job openings in every industry. ... In no industry does the number of job openings even come close to the number of people looking for work."
They found similar evidence of stagnation in the number of hours that people are working and in wage rates—both of which also suggest that there has been no significant jump in demand for more labor in specific job areas.
And this isn't the first time we've seen research debunking the "skill gap" rhetoric. Last year, various analyses of the so-called STEM fields (high-paying professions geared toward science, technology, engineering and math) showed that these much-hyped occupations, which policymakers and the media have tended to revere as potential saviors for U.S. industry, are not exactly lacking qualified U.S. applicants. Rather than hire those skilled workers, however, many managers are opting to fill their openings with "guestworkers," who are essentially brought in on employment visas as a reliable supply of temporary labor linked to specific firms. According to EPI, these guestworkers are also generally paid less attractive wages than their peers in comparable positions.
In addition, a recent study focused on Wisconsin workers came to similar findings about supply and demand in the workforce. After crunching the 2012 numbers on jobs that require various levels of education, urbanologist Marc Levine concluded in that report, "Even if every unemployed person were perfectly matched to existing jobs, [more than] two-thirds of all jobless workers would still be out of work." That's a gap that no amount of extra training will fill.
Schierholz does note that in a dynamic, churning economy, there will always be some "mismatch" between job-seekers and job openings; individuals typically get turned down for positions for which they lack the right skills or experience. But these specific incompatibilities are not enough to explain the dramatic rise in unemployment in the past few years. And the issue before lawmakers now, she says, is how to curb those plummeting jobs numbers.
Rather than focus on grooming workers for specific sectors as a jobs program, EPI therefore recommends another $600 billion stimulus from Washington to help restore state budgets after the deep cuts that severely undermined opportunities and income among public servants during the recession. Another solution for workers would be a New Deal-style launch of infrastructural construction projects, which could immediately create job openings and pump aggregate economic activity. Extending unemployment benefits could also help re-energize the slumped economy, EPI says, by keeping those without a steady income from falling further into poverty.
However, thanks to the current legislature's general reluctance to take measures that smack of expanding welfare or enact proactive policy interventions to create government-supported jobs, Schierholz isn't optimistic that Congress will actually put these stimulus reforms into action.
"We actually could do this. The economics is pretty straightforward," she tells In These Times. Unfortunately, she adds, "Generally, a big fiscal expansion is just not in the cards. So we are instead going to be languishing in this sluggish recovery for a while. It's going to be four or five years before we get back to something that looks like health in the labor market."
So when viewed in historical context, what is commonly deemed the "skills gap" in Washington looks more like a gap in knowledge about how the economy actually works. If legislators' idea is to break out of America's downward spiral, they shouldn't blame workers for not having what it takes to "deserve" to be employed. Instead, policymakers ought to acknowledge the fundamentals of matching people with jobs: it's not just about their usefulness to the economy, but whether the economy is healthy enough to make use of them.
When labor is marginalized by global corporate power it compromises positions that will in the end kill the unions. The American people will not support unions if the leaders are pushing the policies of global corporations that take the US to the level of developing countries-----as Trans Pacific Trade Pact does. Each election I see the AFL-CIO and other major unions backing the very neo-liberal candidates breaking down the US Constitution and handing control of the economy to global corporations. They are backing the worst of economic and development projects all under the guise of 'creating jobs'. If I have to listen one more time to union leaders say-----'but they promised jobs'.
WE NEED LABOR UNIONS TO PROTECT THE AMERICAN PEOPLE. STAND FIRM AGAINST BAD PUBLIC POLICY AND RUN REAL LABOR AND JUSTICE CANDIDATES FOR GOODNESS SAKE!
The threat of loss of union rights being made by neo-liberals will pale to the American people losing faith in union leadership. The Democratic Party is a tent of labor and justice. If labor turns on justice they will lose as well.
STOP ALLOWING GLOBAL CORPORATIONS AND THEIR POLS DIVIDE AND CONQUER. WE NEED JOBS BUT NOT ANY JOB. WE NEED TO BE BUILDING AN ECONOMY THAT WILL CREATE A HEALTHY FUTURE.
Gambling and fossil fuels----fracking and natural gas exporting all to create jobs?????? REALLY?
FRACKING AND NATURAL GAS IS NOT CLEAN FUEL------EXPORTING RAW ENERGY RAISES THE COSTS IN THE US AND DOES NOT SUPPORT BUILDING ENERGY INDEPENDENCE. IT IS BAD POLICY.
When labor union leaders become the mouthpiece for all neo-liberal and neo-con policy-----they are worthless to the American people and they will lose support. In Europe it is labor unions that are successfully protecting the citizens of Europe as best they can.
THE AMERICAN PEOPLE NEED STRONG UNIONS BUT WE NEED GOOD UNION LEADERSHIP!
Web Only / Features » February 4, 2014
Angering Environmentalists, AFL-CIO Pushes Fossil-Fuel Investment
Labor's Richard Trumka has gone on record praising the Keystone pipeline and natural gas export terminals.
BY Cole Stangler Email Print Trumka's comments come at a sensitive time, as trade unions and leading environmental groups have sought to build political partnerships with each other in recent years.
The nation's leading environmental groups are digging their heels in the sand by rejecting President Obama's "all-of-the above" domestic energy strategy—which calls for pursuing renewable energy sources like wind and solar, but simultaneously expanding oil and gas production.
But it appears the AFL-CIO, the nation's largest labor federation, won't be taking environmentalists' side in this fight, despite moves toward labor-environmentalist cooperation in recent years. On a recent conference call with reporters, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka endorsed two initiatives reviled by green groups: the Keystone XL pipeline and new natural gas export terminals.
"There's no environmental reason that [the pipeline] can't be done safely while at the same time creating jobs," said Trumka.
In response to a question from In These Times, Trumka also spoke in favor of boosting exports of natural gas.
"Increasing the energy supply in the country is an important thing for us to be looking at," Trumka said. "All facets of it ought to be up on the table and ought to be talked about. If we have the ability to export natural gas without increasing the price or disadvantaging American industry in the process, then we should carefully consider that and adopt policies to allow it to happen and help, because God only knows we do need help with our trade balance."
The call came amidst a series of three speeches by the AFL-CIO leader pushing for more investment in energy and transportation infrastructure. Trumka did not specifically praise Keystone and natural gas exports during the first speech, at the UN Investor Summit on Climate Risk on January 15, and it is unclear whether he will in the remaining two. But the labor leader's comments on the conference call were enough to peeve environmentalists.
The anti-KXL camp has long argued that construction of the pipeline will facilitate the extraction of Alberta's tar sands oil, one of the dirtiest fossil fuels on the planet. Many also oppose Keystone XL on the grounds that its route crosses the Ogallala Aquifer, one of the world's largest underground sources of fresh water. "We invite President Trumka to come to Nebraska and visit with farmers and ranchers whose livelihoods are directly put at risk with the Keystone XL pipeline," says Jane Kleeb, executive director of Bold Nebraska, which has organized local opposition against the pipeline. "To say the pipeline will not harm our water is ignoring real-life tragedies witnessed by all of us with the BP explosion, the Enbridge burst pipe into the Kalamazoo River and tar sands flowing down the street in Mayflower, Arkansas."
Brendan Smith, co-founder of the Labor Network for Sustainability, a group that works with labor unions and environmental groups to fight climate change, took issue with Trumka's argument that Keystone would create jobs. "There is plenty of work that needs to done in this country, and we can create far more jobs fixing infrastructure and transitioning to wind, solar and other renewable energy sources," says Smith. "Why build a pipeline that will significantly increase carbon emissions and will hurt our economy when there is a more robust and sustainable jobs agenda on the table?"
Trumka's measured support for the KXL and natural gas export terminals is likely a nod to the AFL-CIO's Building and Construction Trades Department (BCTD), whose relations with the parent labor federation have been, at times, fraught with tension. Many of the BCTD-affiliated unions enthusiastically support the pipeline: After the State Department released its final environmental analysis of the KXL, the head of the Laborers International Union of North America called for the president to approve the project while blasting "extremists in the environmental movement."
Liquefied natural gas exports, meanwhile, are shaping up to be the next site of blue-green conflict. While environmentalists condemn plans to build export terminals nationwide, the BCTD and some of its affiliates have supported them. This appears to be the first time that Trumka has publicly sided with the BCTD on the issue.
Recently, the BCTD has gone head-to-head with environmentalists in Maryland over a controversial plan by energy giant Dominion Resources to convert a liquefied natural gas import terminal at Cove Point in Lusby, Md. into an export terminal. BCTD argues that the project supports thousands of well-paid jobs. Last November, BCTD head Sean McGarvey signed an "open letter" crafted by Dominion that appeared as a full-page ad in both The Baltimore Sun and The Washington Post and attacked the "misinformation being thrown about by those who would undo the project."
Opponents such as the Chesapeake Climate Action Network (CCAN), an environmental group that works in Washington D.C., Maryland and Virginia, disagree. They say most of the jobs created by Cove Point and other proposed liquefied gas export terminals across the country will be temporary, limited to the construction process. And while the gas industry and the White House tout natural gas as a clean alternative to oil and coal, the environmental impacts are just as severe, argues CCAN Director Mike Tidwell. "When it comes to U.S. natural gas and climate change," Tidwell says, "the worst possible thing you can do with that gas is frack it, pipe it, liquefy it and send it to Asia to light it on fire. The life cycle, the greenhouse gas emissions of that process makes that gas almost certainly as bad as coal, if not worse, in terms of the impact on the climate. We would be better off if India burned [its] own coal than [took] our gas from Appalachia."
Like Smith, Tidwell believes that job creation and an environmentally friendly agenda are not mutually exclusive. "Nobody's saying that there should be no jobs," Tidwell says. "I think it's the fossil fuel industry that convinces labor that either you have dirty, fossil fuel jobs or you have no jobs. They're the ones that create that dichotomy, and I can understand why our friends in the labor movement feel like they gotta hang onto every last job they have because they're under assault from the Republican Party, they're under assault from the same corporations that are telling them fossil fuel jobs are good."
Trumka's comments come at a sensitive time, as trade unions and leading environmental groups have sought to build political partnerships with each other in recent years. After Obama's November 2012 re-election, the Sierra Club and the CWA helped found the Democracy Initiative, which successfully pushed for a change in Senate's filibuster rules. The move is designed to limit GOP obstructionism on modest liberal initiatives. In September 2013, at its most recent convention, the AFL-CIO passed a resolution to build "enduring labor-community partnerships," which led to speculation that progressive groups like the Sierra Club could earn a spot on the federation's executive council.
On February 10, Trumka will face a test of how his call for energy investment affects these ties. He is scheduled to deliver a pro-infrastructure investment pitch at the annual conference of the Blue-Green Alliance, a group composed of environmentally minded unions, including the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) and the AFL-CIO-affiliated Communications Workers of America (CWA) and United Steelworkers (USW), as well as environmental groups such as the National Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and the Sierra Club.
The Blue-Green Alliance did not respond to requests for comment.
After that, Trumka will peddle his message of labor-energy industry cooperation to the business community. The AFL-CIO president is scheduled to speak on February 27 at Harvard Business School as part of a two-day-long event called "America on the Move: Transportation and Infrastructure for the 21st Century." Trumka will appear in the closing plenary, "Call to Action," alongside Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx, the keynote speaker, and Tom Donahue, president of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
He may get a warmer reception there. America's Natural Gas Alliance, an industry group that represents gas exploration and production companies, says it appreciates the labor leader's call. "We share Mr. Trumka's support for expanding infrastructure and exporting natural gas," says Dan Whitten, a spokesperson for the organization. "We know that exporting natural gas can make a substantial difference in reducing our trade imbalance. And to the extent that it adds jobs, we like that too."
Meanwhile, in an email to In These Times, Dean Hubbard, director of the Sierra Club Labor Program, was careful not to criticize Trumka's recent remarks.
"We share much more in common with the labor movement than the few things that we disagree on," Hubbard writes. "We are standing together to create millions of new clean energy jobs, protecting workers and communities affected by the transition from dirty fuels, jointly working toward fair trade, and—as allies in the Democracy Initiative—fighting back against the big corporations trying to sell out workers and the planet. There is no doubt about it: Friends do not always agree on everything. But we are partners in the progressive movement focused on building on our common ground to secure a safer planet, a stronger economy and a better future for all Americans."
Maryland neo-liberals have as a central tenet the privatization of all that is public----the public private partnership. This is a direct attack on what is the strongest union left and it is deliberate. They are deliberately dismantling the public sector to hand control of public policy and oversight to the very global corporations killing democracy. It is why we have no voice in public policy or in our communities.
If labor unions and justice organizations are supporting neo-liberals as they do in Maryland----that is the problem. We cannot support the breakdown of our public sector and still say we are labor and justice. Stop allowing neo-liberals to corrupt institutions that should be working for the citizens of Maryland. This happens because too much power falls to the few -----it is up to ALL CITIZENS to come out to help labor and justice organizations so they can fulfill their missions. Do not allow them to be blackmailed by threat to their very existence as happens in Maryland.
IF YOU STAND SILENTLY AS ONE GROUP LOSES ITS RIGHTS AND JUSTICE-----EVERYONE WILL. AN INJUSTICE TO ONE WILL BECOME INJUSTICE FOR ALL. THAT IS WHAT IS HAPPENING NOW!
There is no public savings in these deals----it simply moves wealth to corporations and impoverishes the citizens. Add the dismantling of oversight and you have rampant private contractor fraud and government corruption.
THIS IS HOW THIRD WORLD SOCIETIES OPERATE!
Friday, Jun 6, 2014, 5:57 pm
Privatizing Government Services Doesn't Only Hurt Public Workers
BY David Moberg Email Print
A coalition of workers rally against privatization in Washington, D.C.
If you want to understand how privatization of public services typically works, Grand Rapids, Michigan is as good a place as any to start.
The state operates a nursing home for veterans in the town. Until 2011, it directly employed 170 nursing assistants, but also relied on 100 assistants in the same facility provided by a private contractor. The state paid its direct employees $15 to $20 an hour and provided them with health insurance and pensions. Meanwhile, the contractor started pay for its nursing assistants at $8.50 an hour—still billing the state $14.99—and provided no benefits for employees. This led to high worker turnover, reduced quality of care, and heavy employee reliance on food stamps and other public aid.
Yet despite the evidence from this useful—albeit unplanned—experiment, which showed that any savings the state made through privatization came at the expense of workers and their clients, the new conservative Republican state government decided in 2011 to complete the privatization of the provision of nursing aides to the home.
The experience with privatization at the Grand Rapids nursing home is in many ways typical among the rapidly growing ranks of public agencies in which the staff of private contractors replace government employees. And according to a new report, "Race to the Bottom: How Outsourcing Public Services Rewards Corporations and Punishes the Middle Class," privatization policies around the country have greatly contributed to the nation's growing economic inequality and to a decline in the quality of public services.
The report, released on June 3 by In the Public Interest (ITPI), a resource center on privatization, concludes that in most cases, privatization policies lead directly to cutbacks in government investment in skill development and to reductions in workers' pay and benefits. In turn, workers have less income to invest in their households, their children and their neighborhoods—leaving individuals and their communities poorly served in the present and ill prepared for the future.
Regardless of level of government, the story of privatization remains much the same. Elected leaders, often under legislative or political pressure from voters, try to reduce spending or taxes by relying on contractors for services instead. This way, politicians can attempt to avoid responsibility for the pay cuts and worker eliminations that almost inevitably result from privatization.
Government privatizers turn over huge swaths of public service work to private contractors—jobs such as corrections officers, nursing aides, teachers, school support personnel, clerks, waste haulers, food service workers and many others. Nobody knows precisely how much government work is now subcontracted, but New York University professor Paul Light estimates that there are about three times as many federal contract workers as civil service employees, with millions more at the state level.
Privatizers frequently claim that they charge governments low rates because they are especially efficient. In many cases, however, public employees are at least as efficient as private contract ones. Instead, if contractors' operational cost is lower, the savings stem from the comparatively low salary their employees receive. For example, the median private corrections worker in the United States earns $29,000 a year compared with $38,000 to $39,000 for, respectively, the median state or local officer working in comparable positions. Furthermore, a a Demos study last year estimated that about two million federal contract or other publicly funded workers earned less than $12 an hour, more than the number of low-wage workers at Walmart and McDonald's combined. Even if advocates of privatization admit that the savings through contracting result from lower pay, not greater efficiency, they typically argue that governments pay above-market wages. Contracting out saves money for taxpayers by eliminating that premium, they say.
But when governments properly account for all of their costs, sub-contractors are often more expensive than public employees. For example, the nonprofit watchdog Project on Government Oversight found that using contractors cost the federal government more than civil service employment in 33 of 35 occupations, resulting in billions of dollars total.
Those costs stem from a variety of sources. Governments must frequently hire an additional layer of supervisors to make sure contractors meet legal and other requirements. In addition, poorly paid contract employees often collect public assistance from supplemental nutrition programs, Medicaid and other aid for the needy, whose costs should be attributed to the contract.
Contracting out public work also rolls back critical progress toward equality on the basis of gender, race and income. Whatever their shortcomings, public employers in recent decades have opened up more opportunities and paid fairer wages to both African Americans and women than the private sector. For several decades, the ITPI report says, direct government employment of public service workers has provided a "ladder of opportunity" for many workers. Public jobs have opened up opportunity, especially where unions have bargained for contracts and influenced public policy. They have played an especially important role for women and African Americans, who still suffer disadvantages in the job market and are most hurt by cuts in public service pay and benefits.
For example, women comprise 57 percent of all government workers. And African Americans are 30 percent more likely than all other Americans to work in the public sector. Compared with black workers in the private sector, black public employees earn 25 percent more.
Cutting public service pay, therefore, compounds the inequities of income in America, replacing the ladder of opportunity upwards with a "downward spiral." And though this downward shift may most negatively impact African Americans and women, "it hurts all workers," says economics professor Daphne Greenwood of the Colorado Center for Policy Studies.
Economists argue over the degree to which broad forces such as technology development or globalization account for rising inequality in the United States, says Jared Bernstein, a senior fellow at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. But privatization, he says, is one major cause of increased inequality that "smart policy" could easily reverse.
As some first steps toward that smart policy, In the Public Interest recommends that governments require contractors to show that their cost savings come from innovation and efficiency, not wage and benefit cuts. Contractors should be required to provide a living wage, health insurance and other benefits, ITPI also suggests. Though the McNamara-O'Hara Service Contract Act is designed to guarantee that federal contract workers in service work earn close to the prevailing wage in comparable jobs, both its coverage and enforcement are inadequate. Governments should collect and share detailed information on private contractors and their performance, ITPI says, in addition to preparing social and economic impact analyses in advance of any contract.
Mary Sparrow, a former custodian at the Milwaukee County Courthouse in Wisconsin, might have benefitted from such revisions. She was laid off in 2009 in the depth of the Great Recession after a private contractor, MidAmerican Building Services, won a contract to clean the building. The company told her she could keep the job—but not the pay. They offered her $8 an hour, instead of the $14.29 she had been making, and none of her former benefits. She and her husband have scraped by since, she said at a press conference at the release of the ITPI report, her voice cracking with emotion—buying health insurance with unemployment insurance payments, exhausting life savings for their children's college to cover myriad expenses, contending with health worsened by stress, and watching former co-workers relying on food banks.
"Only the contractors come out ahead, not the middle class, the front-line workers," Sparrow told the assembled crowd. "Milwaukee County or any county that privatizes will not see the promised cost savings. Privatizing has a devastating effect on our communities, not only on what we earn but what we spend, even on basics like housing and medication. This has been awful for us, and I hope any city, any state, will think twice before privatizing."
All across America immigrant groups were organized to come out for the Senate immigration bill not realizing it was a market-based bill with a goal of preparing for Trans Pacific Trade Pact and the flooding of US economy with global corporations and their nation's labor force. It has nothing to do with justice for Hispanics here in the US. In fact it will make conditions worse for immigrants already here in America. The Path to Citizenship leads nowhere for 90% of immigrants. It was all a ploy by neo-liberals to use Hispanics here in the US to push for the Trans Pacific Trade Pact policies. The national leaders pushing this immigration bill knew this but are tied to neo-liberals. Here in Maryland, O'Malley and the Maryland Assembly knew this as they brought bus-loaded of immigrants to Annapolis to shout for the Senate immigration bill.
Neo-liberals and neo-cons work for wealth and profit which includes exploiting workers---they will never produce policy that promotes labor rights. If they do it will not be enforced.
All Americans should be fighting this because they goal is to bring all US wages down to third world levels----no only working class----but middle-class. Remember, in third world countries even doctors, lawyers, and Indian chiefs are at poverty!
Features » April 1, 2014
The Immigration Movement's Left Turn Advocates are moving away from the "pathway-to-citizenship" compromise—and are demanding a moratorium on deportations.
Deportations are expected to reach the 2 million mark in early April, and activists are campaigning fiercely at the gates of detention centers, border checkpoints and congressional offices to show the White House they will not let the Obama administration's reach that milestone without a fight.
Who will be the Obama administration's two-millionth deportee? The question haunts neighborhoods, schools and workplaces from Phoenix to Philadelphia.
And as the Obama administration continues its en masse removal of undocumented immigrants, that unlucky distinction could go to any of the roughly 11 million undocumented people who call the U.S. home—a carwash worker nabbed for a broken taillight; a field laborer who has overstayed her work visa; or a youth donning a cap and gown, deliberately crossing the path of the border patrol in a show of civil disobedience.
Last month in Alabama, immigrant rights advocates organized one such action by forming a human chain outside the Etowah County Detention Center, chanting "not one more"—the rallying cry of a wave of anti-deportation actions that have swept the nation over the past year, gaining political currency as a social media campaign, a slogan at street demonstrations, and more recently, a political salvo in Washington, where more conciliatory policy demands from inside the Beltway have sputtered.
One protester at the Etowah rally, Gwendolyn Ferreti Manjarrez, declared, "I am tired of living with the fear that my family or any family can be torn apart at the seams for living our everyday life."
Such pleas reflect exhaustion and exasperation with Washington, which has maintained an immigration-reform gridlock since the Senate reform bill all but died in Congress last year.
Faced with deafening silence in Congress and constant waffling in the White House, a growing number of advocates have joined the chorus calling for a moratorium on deportations. Even prominent centrist Latino organizations like the National Council of La Raza—NCLR lobbied hard for "compromise" legislation last year—have condemned Obama as "deporter in chief."
Demands for a moratorium on deportations are not unprecedented: Advocates are proposing an extension of the White House's Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program—a temporary executive reprieve for undocumented young people issued in 2012—to undocumented adults. Supports say their proposal would allow families to stay together in the run-up to future reform. The undocumented community and its allies argue that if Obama could exercise his discretion on enforcement for a sympathetic category of undocumented immigrants—primarily youth pursuing a college education—he could do the same for their undocumented parents and neighbors.
In January, the Arizona-based group Dream Action Coalition, an advocacy group for the Dream Act legislation on which DACA was modeled, blasted Obama for punishing families for Congress' failure to pass reform. Presenting the reform movement as a multigenerational struggle, the group stated in an "Open Letter to the Immigrant Rights Movement": "We can't wait while we see our families being taken into detention centers for months and even years while our children are being traumatized. … Let's together hold President Obama accountable for every deported parent."
Obama has acknowledged the crisis and in recent weeks signaled he planned to ease deportations, but stopped short of fully halting detentions and removals. The president instead ordered the Department of Justice to review deportation policy "to see how it can conduct enforcement more humanely within the confines of the law." Following a mid-March meeting with pro-immigrant advocates, he reportedly vowed to take executive action by summer if the Republican House members continued to stonewall on reform. Still, amid stiff Republican opposition, Obama promised to soften his approach without indicating whether he would order a full-on DACA-like deferral of deportations.
Even Senators Harry Reid and Chuck Schumer, two leading Democrats who crafted the failed compromise bill, now endorse a deportation freeze as a stopgap measure. Schumer has also threatened to use a parliamentary maneuver known as a "discharge petition" to force a vote on a reform bill on the House floor, similar to the Senate proposal. But due to widespread House GOP opposition, this tactical measure would likely fail under Republican opposition.
But while Congress dithers, grassroots activists say the current enforcement regime doesn't need to be made more "humane"—it needs to end, full stop.
"We need to make sure that there is affirmative action," says Erika Andiola, an Arizona-based undocumented activist with the Not One More campaign. Andiola's advocacy is a matter of survival: She has campaigned publicly to defend her mother from deportation, and for the past few years, she has watched her state roll out some of the harshest anti-immigrant policies in the country. Indeed, the fight against deportations has foregrounded the struggles of besieged communities that have seen coworkers and family members swept up by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) over the past six years.
Grassroots activists are staking out a place at the negotiating table by establishing their own "blue ribbon commission" to draft a progressive set of policy recommendations, informed by their legal experiences fighting congressional lethargy and the federal enforcement dragnet. Andiola notes that she and fellow activists began calling for a deportation freeze months ago, long before many mainstream groups. "We don't want people to negotiate for us," she adds. "We want to be able to be the ones putting the cards on the table, since we're the ones that have our families in detention and many times our families have been in deportation proceedings."
Far from Washington, direct actions are escalating. A wave of hunger strikes has begun to spread, both inside and outside of detention centers. In early March, hundreds of immigrants at a Tacoma, Washington detention center began refusing meals and menial jobs assigned to detainees.
Shortly afterward, detainees went on hunger strike at a Conroe, Texas facility, accusing the management company, GEO, of inhumane, overcrowded conditions. Exasperated by the ongoing legal limbo, they also demanded due process of law, including "true and transparent information" on how their cases were being reviewed and processed. (TruthOut later reported that some participants had allegedly been placed in isolation as punishment.) Grassroots pro-immigrant groups, including the National Day Labor Organizing Network and Puente Arizona, have joined faith, labor and community organizations in various cities to coordinate solidarity hunger strikes.
Some have escalated protests by confronting ICE directly at the border. Since last fall, dozens of undocumented activists with the Bring them Home campaign have staged several unauthorized border crossings, voluntarily entering federal custody to protest deportations and dramatize the often hidden violence of family separation.
Activists are also using the web to mobilize people: Not One More has led petitions for the release of individual detainees, while Presente.org's Obama Legacy Project catalogues the administration's record of mass incarcerations and enforcement crackdowns.
Beyond the harrowing deportation numbers, activists want to stop the enforcement programs that have enabled ICE to partner with local police to apprehend immigrants. Secure Communities or SCOMM, the flagship joint enforcement initiative, has been sharply criticized for giving police departments wide latitude to apprehend immigrants—often just for minor suspected infractions—fingerprint them, and share that information with Homeland Security, which then screens them through a central database to check their immigration status, and eventually funnel them into federal detention. In the impacted communities, ongoing federal crackdowns feed into an overarching climate of discrimination, fraught with racial profiling by police and xenophobic sentiment roiling in racially divided neighborhoods and workplaces.
Although ICE announced back in 2011 that the administration would prioritize the deportation of serious criminals, more than 30,000 immigrants still languish in detention on a given day (thanks in part to a "bed quota" that legally mandates that detention centers fill to a certain capacity).
According to national data, many detainees are being held for misdemeanors and other non-violent offenses, such as traffic violations or marijuana possession. An analysis of ICE data by Syracuse University researchers, shows that of the roughly 350,000 detention orders issued during fiscal year 2012 through early 2013, two-thirds involved no serious criminal convictions.
Reflecting growing frustration with draconian federal enforcement measures and the stagnation of federal reform efforts, some local lawmakers have acted affirmatively on their own to protect immigrants in the absence of legislative progress. In contrast to states that have ramped up their enforcement policies, San Francisco, California and Connecticut have passed legislation to block local police from cooperating with ICE enforcement, except in cases involving an immigrant with a serious prior conviction.
Growing resistance to the Obama administration's deportation regime contrasts sharply with last year's relatively cautious debate around "comprehensive immigration reform" legislation. The Democrats' agenda centered on incremental legalization, with an emphasis on "desirable" immigrants—high-demand workers in agriculture and STEM fields, as well as childhood arrivals—and harsher border security and enforcement measures. (There was little discussion of the social implications of harsher enforcement tactics.) Some activists rejected the Senate bill outright, opening a sharp rift within the immigrant rights movement between the Beltway organizations that supported a compromise in order to achieve a "pathway to citizenship," and more radical groups such as Puente Arizona and Families for Freedom, which have centered their advocacy around resistance to the draconian immigration enforcement.
But now it seems that within the reform movement, the divergence on the importance of citizenship has been eclipsed by the convergence on calling for administrative action on deportation. Not One More is planning a nationwide day of action on April 5—roughly coinciding with the date when the two-millionth deportation is set to take place—with demonstrations planned in more than 40 cities
Migrant rights advocate Prerna Lal, who is formerly undocumented herself, says via email that she found the current political terrain for immigration reform "encouraging," with the wave of direct actions opening space for "the disenfranchised and directly-impacted [to take] bold actions to declare themselves as 'undocumented and unafraid' leaders in their own communities." In the broader push for congressional action, she added, "It is critical to remember that legislation such as Comprehensive Immigration Reform legislation or the DREAM Act is often merely a response to placate these actions."
Until lawmakers go back to the table to hammer out a reform bill, the best advocates can hope for is a temporary reprieve from the White House. Any kind of deferred action, for adults or youth, is just that—a deferral. But it buys time for undocumented individuals to keep working to shift the political climate, away from the obsession with border security and toward a reform approach that reflects a broader culture shift as immigrant communities become more deeply woven into a transborder, globalized social landscape.
Maybe no one understands this vision for an evolving nation better than the more than 30,000 people languishing in detention each day. Oscar Quintero, a detainee at Etowah who protested from inside the detention center in solidarity with the rally outside, recorded a brief statement that was later broadcast online by Detention Watch Network:
This is basically a concentration camp for immigrants. This is what it is, a human warehouse. They treat us like chickens. They are treating us like cattle. The reality is that as Latinos, if we do nothing, if we don't unite, and we don't make others listen to us, these abuses will continue, and families will continue to be separated.
For a man separated from his community by concrete walls and a labyrinth of legal barriers, Quintero's voice managed to carry over the hurdles of politics and resonate with his supporters outside. On the eve of the two-millionth deportation, his words undertook the border crossing that countless others remain as determined as ever to make.
There is a tremendous silence in Maryland as regards TPP and Maryland is ground zero for implementing it. They are not waiting for Congress to pass it----the Maryland Assembly and Governor O'Malley and Rawlings-Blake of Baltimore are installing it.
Maryland is one state that has spent the last few decades building the very structures that mirror Trans Pacific Trade Pact and neo-liberals are handing all of our economy over to global corporations and policy that works for them. So, if Maryland pols signed the letter mentioned in this article-----
WHERE IS THEIR VOICE IN THIS STATE? DO YOU HEAR YOUR POLS EDUCATING THE CITIZENS OF MARYLAND AGAINST TPP? THERE IS SILENCE.
This is how you know who needs to be replaced in private non-profits----in labor unions------in justice organizations----and especially media. All leaders know what is being pushed in Maryland and we need to have people in labor and justice organizations and non-profits that educate the citizens.
TPP: A Thoroughly Predatory Pact
by Ron Forthofer / July 12th, 2014 Dissident Voice
U.S. transnational corporations are working behind the scenes to change the rules governing them. You may say 'big deal, this doesn't affect me'. However if you use the internet, view movies, take pharmaceuticals, want a clean and safe environment, believe in democracy, etc., you likely will be negatively impacted.
Media's Failure to Inform
Negotiations on the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), based on the fatally flawed NAFTA model, currently involve twelve nations in the Pacific region and have been underway since 2010. Mainstream media's coverage about these negotiations has been essentially nonexistent. When mentioned, the media reports that the negotiations are about trade instead of being about easing rules governing transnational corporations.
Why the Lack of Transparency?
This May, Senator Elizabeth Warren said: "From what I hear, Wall Street, pharmaceuticals, telecom, big polluters and outsourcers are all salivating at the chance to rig the deal in the upcoming trade talks. So the question is, Why are the trade talks secret? You'll love this answer. Boy, the things you learn on Capitol Hill," Warren said. "I actually have had supporters of the deal say to me 'They have to be secret, because if the American people knew what was actually in them, they would be opposed.'"
Undue Corporate Influence on U.S. Negotiating Positions
In 2012 Senator Ron Wyden, Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee's Subcommittee on International Trade, Customs, and Global Competitiveness, whose office is responsible for conducting oversight over the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) and trade negotiations, said: "Yet, the majority of Congress is being kept in the dark as to the substance of the TPP negotiations, while representatives of U.S. corporations—like Halliburton, Chevron, PHRMA, Comcast, and the Motion Picture Association of America—are being consulted and made privy to details of the agreement."
In a May 2012 letter, thirty law professors from multiple countries involved with the TPP negotiations made the same point about corporate representation. They said:
The only private individuals in the US who have ongoing access to the US proposals on intellectual property matters are on an Industry Trade Advisory Committee (ITAC) which is dominated by brand name pharmaceutical manufacturers and the Hollywood entertainment industry.
There is no representation on this committee for consumers, libraries, students, health advocacy or patient groups, or others users of intellectual property, and minimal representation of other affected businesses, such as generic drug manufacturers or internet service providers. We would never create US law or regulation through such a biased and closed process.
Investor-State Dispute Settlements Threaten Sovereignty
In June 2012 a draft of the TPP's Investment Chapter was leaked. According to Lori Wallach, director of Public Citizen's Global Trade Watch: "Via closed-door negotiations, U.S. officials are rewriting swaths of U.S. law that have nothing to do with trade, and in a move that will infuriate left and right alike, have agreed to submit the U.S. government to the jurisdiction of foreign tribunals that can order unlimited payments of our tax dollars to foreign corporations that don't want to comply with the same laws our domestic firms do. U.S. trade officials are secretly limiting Internet freedoms, restricting financial regulation, extending medicine patents and giving corporations a whole host of other powers."
State legislators are greatly concerned about the threat to states' ability to maintain their sovereignty and to protect rules protecting their citizens. For example, Maine State Representative Sharon Treat, one of the drafters of a July 2012 letter from 130 members of state legislatures from all 50 states, said: "The U.S. government should not be negotiating trade deals that undercut responsible state and federal laws enacted to protect public health and the environment, preserve the stability of our financial system, or make sure working conditions are safe and healthy."
In addition, the National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL) strongly opposes this investor-state dispute resolution process. Its position is:
NCSL will not support Bilateral Investment Treaties (BITs) or Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) with investment chapters that provide greater substantive or procedural rights to foreign companies than U.S. companies enjoy under the U.S. Constitution. Specifically, NCSL will not support any BIT or FTA that provides for investor/state dispute resolution. NCSL firmly believes that when a state adopts a non-discriminatory law or regulation intended to serve a public purpose, it shall not constitute a violation of an investment agreement or treaty, even if the change in the legal environment thwarts the foreign investors' previous expectations.
NCSL believes that BIT and FTA implementing legislation must include provisions that deny any private action in U.S. courts or before international dispute resolution panels to enforce international trade or investment agreements. Implementing legislation must also include provisions stating that neither the decisions of international dispute resolution panels nor international trade and investment agreements themselves are binding on the states as a matter of U.S. law.
More Financial Deregulation
Given the recent financial crisis, it's alarming that financial deregulation will likely be pushed in the TPP. A letter from 100 economists to the TPP negotiators expressed concern and stated:
We, the undersigned economists, write to you regarding the capital transfers provisions in the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPPA). We are concerned that if recent U.S. treaties are used as the model for the TPPA, the agreement will unduly limit the authority of participating parties to prevent and mitigate financial crises.
They went on to point out the importance of capital controls. "While capital controls and other capital management techniques are no panacea for financial instability, there is an emerging consensus that they are an important part of the macro-economic toolkit. Indeed, all G-20 leaders endorsed the following statement at the 2011 Cannes Summit:
Capital flow management measures may constitute part of a broader approach to protect economies from shocks. In circumstances of high and volatile capital flows, capital flow management measures can complement and be employed alongside, rather than substitute for, appropriate monetary, exchange rate, foreign reserve management and prudential policies.
Fast Tracking of the Agreement
President Obama has sought trade promotion authority ('fast track') to get TPP through Congress. Fast track usurps Congress's constitutional authority over trade issues. Congress would have a very limited time to debate the deal and would not be allowed to make any changes. Fortunately, Congress has not yet abrogated its responsibility over trade issues. It is important to keep pressure on Congress to deny Obama this authority.
Represent Public Interest, not Transnational Corporations
Let your representative and senators know that you want them to oppose both fast track and the TPP. If they fail to do this, they are sending a clear message to voters.
IT IS WOMEN AND CHILDREN THAT MAKE UP THE BULK OF FAMILIES FACING THE DISMANTLING OF OUR DEMOCRACY AND PUBLIC PROGRAMS AND SERVICES. IT IS NEO-LIBERAL POLITICIANS WORKING WITH NEO-CONS DOING IT!
I want to continue one more day on private non-profits and commissions and health care in Maryland. Remember, large sectors of Marylanders are not accessing health care----having a longevity 30 years less than affluent communities shows this. Having the worse VA system in the nation shows this. The clinic care system built to keep Marylanders out of hospitals offer almost no access to basic medical procedures.
IT IS A DISASTER AND IT IS BECAUSE PEOPLE HAVING NO MORALITY OR ETHICS ARE CREATING THESE POLICIES ONLY AIMED AT MAKING A FEW EVER MORE RICH.
The average citizen working for these organizations are not bad people----they just want jobs. Each time you create a private non-profit or commission for health care you have eliminated the public sector employees that would do that job. You eliminate the public's ability to see what is happening and the accountability tasked to our government to serve and protect.
DO YOU HEAR YOUR POLITICIANS SHOUTING THIS? IF NOT, THEY ARE NEO-LIBERALS WORKING FOR WEALTH AND PROFIT AND NOT YOU AND I!
Yesterday we saw the commissions filled with the health executives writing the law and regulating themselves. Let's look at the front lines where the health care is delivered----or, in Maryland, not delivered. This is where the fraud and corruption fills the system. Again, it is not the average staff doing this---they are being told to do this. I spoke at length about the dismantling of the VA to private non-profits and showed they were receiving the money and doing nothing. Medicaid and Medicare is handled just the same. Remember, in Maryland Medicaid and Medicare is handled the same as private insurance so none of the requirements of coverage or accountability have occurred for a few decades. Billions of dollars are lost as fewer Medicare patients enter the hospital but Medicare bills per patient climb.....THAT IS FRAUD CAUSING THOSE BILLS TO CLIMB.
Below you see the private non-profit that took over yet another duty of public health and it has been at it for 15 years---the very years that gave Baltimore the 30 year longevity difference. If you look today health access has never been worse so we know this organization is not doing its job! Remember, the people affected are not only black and brown or unemployed and impoverished or working poor. Middle-class families with expenses that take money that would go for health care are included in these stats.
DO NOT ALLOW PREJUDICE OF CLASS OR RACE SKEW YOUR THOUGHTS ON HEALTH ACCESS----THIS AFFECTS EVERYONE.
Our Organization Enroll In Benefits
HealthCare Access Maryland (HCAM)
is a nonprofit agency that plays a critical role in strengthening Maryland's health care delivery system. Working with both government and private-sector support, HCAM helps residents enroll in public health care coverage, navigate the complex health care system and connect to educational and other resources.
HCAM was established in 1997 as Baltimore HealthCare Access to initially assist with the Medicaid transition to managed care. What began as a small organization with 40 employees, a $3 million budget and two core grants has grown steadily.
Funding has grown to $23 million and the agency has earned more than 30 major grants, including a $7.9 million grant from the Maryland Health Benefit Exchange (MHBE) as part of the State's efforts to implement health care reform in Maryland and help uninsured residents gain access to affordable health care.
The number of programs offered has grown from the original two to 19, allowing HCAM's 200 employees to help connect over 125,000 clients each year to health insurance and care and to vital community resources through a variety of programs serving the uninsured, under-insured and vulnerable populations of the state.
As a 501(C)3 not-for-profit organization, HCAM is overseen by a committed board of directors and supported by public and private sector grants, as well as corporate and individual donations. This unique funding allows us to provide a variety of specialized services for the residents of Maryland in four areas of expertise:
Navigation of the health care system
Education and advocacy
HCAM's expertise in these areas led the agency to broaden its reach and help provide services to people throughout the state. To signify this expanded focus, the organization changed its name in 2011 from Baltimore HealthCare Access to HealthCare Access Maryland.
The agency's ability to help people live healthier lives has been recognized by others in our field. The agency is the proud recipient of Maryland Nonprofits' Seal of Excellence, a designation that recognizes HCAM's reputation for delivering high-quality programs and services in a fiscally responsible way.
Although HCAM specializes in health care access, we continue to serve the needs of our clients beyond just helping them obtain an insurance card. We serve children, pregnant women, parents, childless adults and youth in foster care, as well as those with addiction issues, immigrants, individuals recently released from jail and the homeless.
HCAM's work to implement health care reform in Maryland
Throughout its 15-year history, HCAM has become a critical player in strengthening Maryland's health care delivery system, earning a spot as a public health leader in the state and working with policymakers, nonprofit organizations and elected officials on innovative approaches to improving the health of all Marylanders.
In the Spring of 2013, HealthCare Access Maryland (HCAM) received a $7.9 million grant from the Maryland Health Benefit Exchange (MHBE) as part of the State's consumer assistance program to implement the Affordable Care Act and help uninsured residents learn about, apply for and enroll in health insurance. HCAM was selected as the State's Central Region Connector, serving Baltimore City, Baltimore County and Anne Arundel County.
As the Central Region Connector, HCAM will organize services across the region and has partnered with 17 organizations to provide outreach, education and eligibility determinations and to facilitate enrollment of the nearly 217,000 uninsured residents in the region into Medicaid, the Maryland Children's Health Program (MCHP) and subsidized and non-subsidized qualified health plans.
Baltimore is ground zero for Medicaid and Medicare spending and as we know the money is not getting to the people. Johns Hopkins and University of Maryland Medical Center are handling many of these groups so that is where you start your search. Since Johns Hopkins has captured all public policy and creates all the private non-profits that are then funded to work in these low-income communities----that is who is charged with overseeing this distribution only THERE IS NO OVERSIGHT! THERE IS THE PROBLEM. If we had a public health department filled with employees whose job it is dispensing money and providing oversight and reporting to the citizens of Baltimore----this would not be happening.
If you have followed me these few years you know I do not like Sharfstein and Barbot. They were appointed to dismantle all public health and build more of these private non-profits and
THEY HAVE BEEN VERY BUSY! NO WONDER SHARFSTEIN COULDN'T ROLL OUT THE STATE HEALTH EXCHANGE----HE'S TOO BUSY MAKING SURE MARYLAND HAS NO PUBLIC HEALTH. Slander you say----no, all you have to do is look at who is doing the work of public health and you see nothing but private non-profits. The people supposedly served all complaining they cannot access care. The money is flowing but not where its supposed to------
DID YOU KNOW THAT JOHNS HOPKINS BUILT A GLOBAL CORPORATE EMPIRE THESE FEW DECADES THAT MEDICARE AND MEDICAID FRAUD WAS THE WORSE-----just saying there's likely a link!
This should anger everyone as this looted Medicare Trust is now being addressed by limiting more access to most people....you and I!
Healthy Baltimore 2015 Last month, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation issued the second annual County Health Rankings. As it did last year, Baltimore City ranked last in the state.
One statistic in particular stuck out: 14,887. That's the number of years of potential life lost before the age of 75. Put simply, far too many Baltimore City residents are dying before their time.
Statistics like these give great urgency to the work we do to improve the health of our city, our neighborhoods and our residents. It also makes clear that traditional medical or public health approaches aren't working and it's time to try something different.
That conversation starts today with the release of Healthy Baltimore 2015.
This comprehensive health policy agenda highlights 10 priority areas that account for the greatest morbidity and mortality in Baltimore. These areas were chosen because there are evidence-based interventions proven to make a difference. The plan looks at the relevance of where we live, work and play on health outcomes, as oftentimes they play as significant a role in making us sick as they do in keeping us healthy.
The city has set ambitious, yet reachable, improvement goals for the following priority areas:
1. Promote access to quality health care for all.
2. Be tobacco free.
3. Redesign Communities to Prevent Obesity.
4. Promote Heart Health.
5. Stop the spread of HIV and other STIs.
6. Recognize and Treat Mental Health Disorders.
7. Reduce Drug Use and Alcohol Abuse.
8. Encourage early detection of cancer.
9. Promote Healthy Children and Adolescents.
10. Create Health Promoting Neighborhoods.
For more information on the specific indicators we will use to measure progress in these areas, please view the full Healthy Baltimore 2015 report.
As you can see, there is much work to be done. Healthy Baltimore 2015 makes clear that we all play a role in improving the health of our city.
Over the course of the next several weeks to months, we will work with partners throughout the city to flesh out a 3-pronged approach to moving the needle for each of the leading indicators, including policy development; prevention, quality, and access; and community engagement. Later this spring, senior leaders within the department will visit communities around the city to share this plan and the updated neighborhood health profiles. We hope communities will put this information to use in designing new strategies and interventions for tackling the top priorities they identify for creating health promoting environments.
Let me be clear: the health department alone cannot successfully execute Healthy Baltimore 2015. We welcome all motivated neighborhood leaders, individual citizens, academic institutions, community-based organizations, business owners and the media to join us in this effort as partners in health.
Partners can contribute to the success of Healthy Baltimore 2015 in many ways. These varying levels of engagement include, but are not limited to:
Communication – displaying or distributing health information materials within each of the ten priority areas.
Facilitation – actively participating in interventions such as incorporating wellness at work programs into the business day.
Integration – actively considering the potential health impacts of pending business or policy decisions.
To become a partner, please email me at health.commissioner@baltimorecity.gov. Together, we can reshape the landscape to make Baltimore City a place where all residents realize their full health potential. Posted by Oxiris Barbot, M.D. at 8:37 AM
Using Maryland for the divide between wealthier counties and poor counties we need to be clear-----while the poorest were excluded from accessing health in Maryland these last decades it is now coming higher up the economic scale....The Affordable Care Act is designed to make preventative care the only care 80% of Americans can afford and percentage is rising soon to 90%. We will see with these forced re-negotiations of corporate and public sector health benefits that the middle-class will now be the ones forced out of care because they cannot afford co-pays and deductibles or once they pay the health insurance premiums they have no money for the health care itself. THAT IS THE GOAL....
IT'S LIKE AUTO INSURANCE....YOU PAY AND PAY FOR COVERAGE AND IF YOU USE IT, THEY HIKE YOUR RATES OR CANCEL YOUR POLICY.
That is what is coming. Below you see the other factor that will keep most people out of basic medical care----the need for a primary care doctor to access specialists and their care. Activists have tried for decades to have medical school training be made free. Get rid of the medical grads high tuition debt and you get lots of people in doctoring less motivated to earn $500,000 or more. THIS ONE POLICY HAS CREATED THIS SHORTAGE AND AGAIN---IT IS DONE DELIBERATELY. If corporations and the rich are paying no taxes and receive all revenue that is collected as corporate subsidy----where does all that free money for medical schools come from? No, say corporations its better to simply exclude most people from health care access to maximize corporate profits.
FREE MEDICAL SCHOOL PAID FOR BY SIMPLY RECOVERING TRILLIONS OF DOLLARS IN HEALTH INDUSTRY FRAUD AND STOPPING IT IN THE FUTURE FLOODS THE MARKET WITH PRIMARY CARE DOCTORS.
But then say health corporations we cannot pretend to need to bring third world doctors to the US that are used to high levels of fraud and corruption and not bothering with the Hippocratic Oath and HIPAA regulations and who have no rights as citizens so as to be exploited by these growing US global health systems!
What is being said here is nothing new----we have been shouting it for decades----they simply are pretending they are working on this solution as they dismantle all the avenues to address this.
Primary care access a key to health disparities among counties ■ An annual ranking of counties based on health status found that gaps between the healthiest and unhealthiest regions of states are wide — and getting wider.
By Jennifer Lubell — Posted April 1, 2013 AMED NEWS.com
Washington If you're a resident of Howard County, Md., chances are fairly high that you have insurance, enjoy good health and have relatively easy access to a primary care physician. Take a short car ride to Baltimore, however, and the situation for residents is much more grim.
In Howard County, ranked as Maryland's healthiest in the most recent County Health Rankings and Roadmaps survey, only 9% of residents are uninsured, and just 8% are considered in poor health. There's one primary care physician for every 577 patients. In Baltimore City, the unhealthiest county in the state, the uninsured rate is nearly twice as high, and there's only one primary care doctor for every 985 patients — a combination that means a significant access-to-care problem.
The comparison underscores a key finding in the 2013 survey: Gaps between the healthiest and unhealthiest counties in individual states are large and continue to grow. The survey highlighted the fact that residents in the healthiest counties are 1.4 times more likely to have access to a primary care physician than those in the least healthy counties. Unhealthy areas also had higher rates when it came to a host of other negative indicators of overall health, including child poverty, teen pregnancy and premature death.
This is the fourth year that the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health have surveyed the health of every county in the U.S., ranking them on a state-by-state basis to gauge the factors determining the health of residents. All survey measures use figures or percentages that take population into account so that a county such as Howard, with a population of less than 300,000, can be compared with Baltimore City's population of more than 600,000.
The rankings are set up so that every state has a healthiest and unhealthiest county despite the overall health of the state. But health outcomes can vary widely within a state, said Patrick Remington, MD, MPH, professor and associate dean at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, during a teleconference to discuss the 2013 rankings. Louisiana and Mississippi are two states that often rank last in the nation on overall health. But when researchers dig into each state, they find as much variability among individual counties in Louisiana and Mississippi as they do in Vermont, a state that ranks relatively high nationally on patient health outcomes, he said.
Competition drives improvement Dr. Remington said promoting the results of county rankings has made a difference, "sparking action all over the country as people from all sectors join forces to create new possibilities in health — county by county."
One of those areas is New Orleans, which has been trying to rebuild its infrastructure after Hurricane Katrina in 2005, said Karen B. DeSalvo, MD, New Orleans health commissioner and senior health policy adviser to the city's mayor. Orleans Parish typically has ranked in the 60-62 range in a state that has 64 counties, Dr. DeSalvo said. "So we've been at the bottom of the pack in one of the more unhealthy states in the country. What we're excited about this year is we've jumped up to number 48, so that's a big leap."
In addition to overhauling its education system and making improvements to parks and playgrounds, the city has spent seven years on an initiative to develop its primary care infrastructure.
"We had essentially no neighborhood-based primary care before Katrina. People were reliant upon hospital-based services, especially those who were uninsured and underinsured," Dr. DeSalvo said.
Since then, the city has responded by working with 25 organizations, ranging from small clinics to large hospital systems, to build access to primary care and outpatient mental care, with a particular focus on patient-centered medical homes and health information technology. The initiative has received financial support from philanthropic sources as well as some federal demonstration program funding to expand access to primary care rapidly. "This is a true public-private partnership," she said.
Dr. DeSalvo said the renewed focus on building strong primary and preventive care at the neighborhood level probably has reduced unnecessary hospitalizations and led to improvements in screening rates for such conditions as diabetes and breast cancer.
Improving patient-reported measures and clinical outcomes is one of the strategic goals recently adopted by the American Medical Association. The AMA is focusing on promoting quality and safety, reducing unwarranted variation in care, and fostering appropriate use of limited health care resources.
Other factors leading to poor health The fact that fewer physicians and dentists practice in certain communities obviously contributes to poorer health in those areas, said Bridget B. Catlin, PhD. She's a senior scientist at the University of Wisconsin Population Health Institute and director of the County Health Rankings and Roadmaps survey. But, as she and other health care observers pointed out, lack of access is just one of many problems that go hand in hand with poor health among residents. In addition to measuring clinical care outcomes, the survey analyzes health behaviors, social and economic statistics, morbidity, and such physical environment elements as air and water quality.
"Other key factors that influence the health of a community are education, employment, income, and whether people smoke or have access to healthy foods and places to exercise. Some of these factors probably also influence physicians' decisions about where to practice," Catlin said. "In particular, there is a widespread need for health care providers in rural areas."
At least in Maryland, the health gap between the highest- and lowest-ranking counties largely comes down to socioeconomic conditions, said Brian Avin, MD, a neurologist and the president of MedChi, the Maryland State Medical Society. Howard County, a suburb of Washington, is one of the most affluent areas of the nation, "so whatever social factors you want to create, Howard is going to be the highest and Baltimore City is going to be the lowest," he said. There's much more poverty and unemployment in Baltimore, as well as more people on Medicaid or going without insurance, generating more uncompensated care cases. "Obesity, smoking, any individual feature you're going to look at is going to be worse when you're not getting basic care."
Howard County also has been trying to get all of its population insured, whereas no such strategic initiative exists in Baltimore City, Dr. Avin said.
Baltimore has a policy of replacing school athletic courts and community center athletic courts with 'greening' development moving all of this to private non-profits like YMCA located too far for most to reach. I literally had to fight for an athletic court for an elementary school of 300 students----Johns Hopkins Homewood wanted to make it a park. Parks and playgrounds across the city have been neglected as the city dismantled its Parks department and handed the funding to a private non-profit. So school grounds have grass up to your knees, broken glass all because the city does not collect revenue from corporations and the rich and any that is collected go to projects connected to the same. Baltimore City schools often have no recess and most schools have no athletic teams. The tiered funding leaving these low-income schools run as businesses make it impossible to address these disparities so NOTHING is being done to actually address health issues ------they simply say they are doing so.
Private wellness non-profits are going into poor neighborhoods telling people to eat better and scolding when people explain that living in poverty places survival over preparing a good meal or even having a living space that allows it. So, we are seeing these national private non-profits coming in to talk the talk of better health to communities now being kept from accessing any health care but preventative care.
There are some good programs-----Food stamps being used at Farmers Markets is a good thing. If you are creating an environment of deeper and wider poverty as neo-liberals and neo-cons are doing today----none of this will end in data having better results and THEY KNOW THIS.
EXPANDED AND IMPROVED MEDICARE FOR ALL SIMPLY ALLOWS EVERYONE TO GET ALL THE CARE THEY NEED AND THAT IS THE BEST PREVENTATIVE MEDICINE AND YOU PAY FOR IT BY ENDING HEALTH INDUSTRY FRAUD AND PROFITEERING.
Below you see the vestige of a city no caring for families and with that goes health. Day care is where children receive healthy exposure and access is critical to a family working and having low-incomes. So, if you do not provide a system of day care-----and you are closing and defunding parks and playgrounds-----YOU DO NOT CARE ABOUT WELLNESS. None of this information is new and Johns Hopkins is behind the redirecting of money and the lack of oversight and accountability and is the one charged now with the most responsibility in these Maryland health care reforms....THE OPPOSITE OF WHAT IS NEEDED FOR REAL CHANGE.
Below you see middle-class families saying OMG!!!!! and it is all centered on the corporations/ rich taking all the revenue through fraud and corruption in the City of Baltimore and this expands across the State of Maryland.
Day care shortage frustrates parents in Baltimore. Costs can top tuition at University of Maryland, College Park
The Children's Choice Learning Center, housed in the… (Karen Jackson, BALTIMORE…)July 14, 2013|By Tricia Bishop, The Baltimore Sun
In five months, the downtown Baltimore day care attended by Celine Plachez's youngest son is slated to close, yet she's not looking for a backup. She can't stomach it.
She searched before he was born, calling about a dozen places, some of which said they wouldn't have an opening in the foreseeable future. Others were so expensive, they cost more than tuition at the University of Maryland, College Park. And a handful were just plain unacceptable in terms of quality.
So she's devoting her energy to finding a way to keep open the Children's Choice Learning Center, housed in the Social Security Administration building on North Greene Street.
"Call me crazy — I refuse to look. I want to fight," said Plachez, a scientist who lives in Federal Hill. "We can make it happen. It's not impossible, it's not unrealistic."
Plachez's response to the center's planned closure highlights a frustrating reality: At a time when the city is trying to attract and retain families — and more women work than ever before — there's a lack of high-quality, affordable, regulated child care in Baltimore.
The shortage is particularly pronounced for children younger than 2, like Plachez's son, who require a higher, 3-1 ratio of children to staff under state law, making their care cost-prohibitive for many facilities.
For some who live or work in the city, the situation has significant consequences.
Rachel Winer Sticklin of Canton is postponing having a second child until the first is out of day care because her family can't afford to pay for two at once.
Judy O'Brien of Otterbein started looking for a spot two years before her newborn needs it, knowing she faced long waiting lists at many places.
And Jana Gauvey of Federal Hill brings her kids to Baltimore County, where she works in marketing, for their care.
"There weren't that many options close to our home," Gauvey said.
Others, particularly those with low incomes, are putting their kids in informal, unregulated city settings — often in the homes of neighbors operating babysitting businesses — in the hope that the financial savings won't equate to inadequate care.
Not enough spaces
Roughly 13,300 Baltimore children younger than 2 have mothers who work, and many of them need some kind of child care, from relatives, hired sitters or centers, according to a Baltimore Sun analysis of state data. Licensed facilities can accommodate at most 20 percent of them.
The surrounding counties face a similar issue, though only Anne Arundel County's case is as severe. In Howard County, for example, licensed facilities can handle up to 35 percent of the children under 2 who might need care; in Baltimore County up to 27 percent can be accommodated.
The quality of care is also thought to be less variable in the counties. A greater percentage of children enter kindergarten fully prepared in the counties than in Baltimore.
"In most cities, there is always a shortage of infant and toddler care, mainly because it's expensive to do it right," and Baltimore is no exception, said David W. Andrews, dean of the Johns Hopkins University School of Education. "The ratios of adults to children [here] just don't make it a very profitable scenario unless you're able to charge upward of 17, 18, 19 thousand per kid."
There are also a "number of consequences associated with" doing it wrong, Andrews said.
Studies increasingly show that the early years are crucial to a person's development. Ninety percent of brain growth happens before age 5, and the first three years of life are particularly important. Young children and infants are primed for learning, educators said, and their environment has a lasting impact.
Studies show that while parents have a strong influence on young children, day care effects can linger. Children in the highest-quality programs — where kids feel comfortable, stimulated and cared for by a stable staff — do the best years later in terms of social and academic development, and even health and economic prospects. Those who receive poor care are more likely to wind up in the criminal justice system, act out or drop out of school.
Yet early childhood education in the United States receives the least public investment of any schooling, leaving parents to bear much of the financial burden.
The average cost of full-time infant care at a Baltimore center, as opposed to a home-based site, is about $11,560, according to data from the Maryland Family Network, a private nonprofit that advocates for children and families.
That figure, which factors in the highest- and lowest-quality care options, is 40 percent higher than the average cost of tuition and fees at a state university — $8,220 in 2012. And it's roughly 30 percent of the median household income in the city before taxes.
"It's a real struggle for most parents," said Steve Rohde, the network's deputy director of child care resource and referral services.
This article shows the mechanism that creates all this disparity and dysfunction. A Baltimore global corporation headquartered in the Enterprise Zones that allow corporations to pay no taxes starve Baltimore's coffers for a few decades causing all of the crumbling of infrastructure and closing of facilities geared towards keeping citizens healthy. All money is directed to boosting profits for this global corporation that adds almost nothing to the economy of Baltimore.
IT IS A HUGE SUCKING MACHINE AND CORPORATE SUBSIDY IS ITS BEST ACHIEVEMENT.
So, here we have our Baltimore media giving this global corporation recognition for 'donating' a playground so it can write the costs of donation from any taxes that might be left to pay again starving government coffers. Rather than consistently paying taxes so general funds can be distributed equitably across the city-----we have corporation simply selecting where they want their tax deduction to go.
THIS IS JOHNS HOPKINS DRIVING THESE POLICIES AND HOPKINS IS NEO-CONSERVATIVE WORKING FOR GLOBAL CORPORATE WEALTH WITH POLITICIANS RUNNING AS DEMOCRATS CREATING ALL THESE POLICIES.
The point is this-----the structures in place that have the public sector dismantled and complete control of policy given to corporations will never end with health policy that does what they say it will do. They will simply create private non-profits that for the most part pretend to be doing something. Remember, more and more people are falling into this abyss so we need the middle-class to WAKE UP and care about where these policies lead.
The taxes this corporation should have paid for a decade or so would have built dozens of playgrounds across the city.
If city employees were being paid to build this playground they could afford to live more healthily!
June 10, 2014, 7:13 p.m. EDT
Baltimore-Based Global Education Company Builds New Playground for Local School
BALTIMORE, June 10, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- Laureate Education, Inc., the world's largest higher education network, today built and donated a playground at The Historic Samuel Coleridge-Taylor Elementary School in Baltimore. Nearly 300 of Laureate's most senior executives from around the world came to Baltimore to build the playground. Laureate, formerly known as Sylvan Learning Systems, relocated its global headquarters to Baltimore in 1996, the first company to do so in more than twenty years. Laureate was the first company in the Harbor East neighborhood, a key part of Baltimore's federally designated empowerment zone. In the 18 years since moving to Baltimore, the company has grown from employing 300 people at the headquarters to more than 2,700.
More than 100 local volunteers joined Laureate executives and students to build the playground, in partnership with KaBOOM!. The playground will be accessible to nearby residents.
"It's a great honor to give back to the community that has given me -- and Laureate Education -- so much," said Douglas L. Becker, Laureate's founder, chief executive officer, and a Baltimore native. "We are committed to doing work that is here for good in every community in which we operate."
"The Historic Samuel Coleridge-Taylor Elementary School really is the center of this community and this new playground will help foster that sense of community that we cherish," said the school's principal, Dr. Harold A. Barber.
"Congratulations to Baltimore's own Doug Becker and Laureate Education on their 15th anniversary," said Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake. "I'm so grateful that this Baltimore-based global company continues to invest in the local community in ways that benefit the people of this great city. The students of the historic Samuel-Coleridge Taylor Elementary School and members of the neighboring community will truly enjoy the new playground more than you will ever know. Thank you."
When public justice is dismantled------when the public sector is dismantled with no oversight and accountability----when corporations take over all those functions and can act with impunity-----
SPYING AND SURVEILLANCE IS AN ATTACK ON OUR RIGHTS TO PRIVACY AND FREEDOM AND OUR CIVIL RIGHTS. IF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT SUSPENDS RULE OF LAW----THE EXECUTIVE POSITION OF GOVERNOR OF MARYLAND CAN STAND FOR PUBLIC JUSTICE-
Do you hear any candidates in this Maryland governor's race shout out about this huge NSA/SPYING INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX DRIVING MARYLAND'S ECONOMY????? CINDY WALSH FOR GOVERNOR IS THE ONLY ONE!
NEO-CONS AND NEO-LIBERALS WORK FOR GLOBAL CORPORATE RULE!
SAIC is a Johns Hopkins corporation Enterprise as Hopkins now refers to itself. It is almost fully funded by Federal money and it includes a massive super-computer on the Hopkins campus that receives all data collected from every avenue of society-----building profiles on every individual. The goal is to integrate to such an extent that corporations will know every aspect of a person's life before hiring or in keeping that person employed. This is totalitarianism. From grocery receipts that let corporations know how many packs of cigarettes or alcohol you buy----there goes the health insurance rates; to SMART METERS that tell when you are home and know how much disposable income you have as regards rates for utilities and waste pickup; to every movement by car and public transportation knowing where you go and with whom you speak. THIS IS A SURVEILLANCE SYSTEM THAT WOULD MAKE STALIN GREEN WITH ENVY. It is indeed what autocratic societies do.
Below you see how these systems are being tested-----they are being installed in cities like Oakland and Baltimore as a social unrest indicator as the poor are driven to third world conditions and lose all their rights as citizens. Remember, many of these poor are the former middle-class and many of today's middle class will be these poor-----DO NOT THINK IT IS OK BECAUSE THIS IS TARGETING THE WORKING CLASS AND POOR. AN INJUSTICE FOR ONE BECOMES INJUSTICE FOR ALL.
Baltimore's Chief of Police Batts was in Oakland for the short time he oversaw Johns Hopkins SAIC installation in that city and he is now here in Baltimore doing the same. You see, Batts is mostly a contractor----working with SAIC installing a business structure-----just as Baltimore School Superintendent Alonzo was in Baltimore to install the corporate structure for privatized K-12. This is why what are public appointees are paid as if they are business executives.......THEY ARE BUSINESS EXECUTIVES. Privatizing the police means creating a surveillance society and simply have the same kinds of computerized stations as with the drones overseas-----the drones having the capacity of striking/disabling/or reporting on any one person. Below you see it is Occupy Oakland who is being used as the development phase. KEEP IN MIND----IT IS SAIC AND NOT OCCUPY OAKLAND THAT THE AMERICAN PEOPLE FIND TO BE THE THREAT!
Below you see an article with references that show you to what extent Johns Hopkins SAIC partnered with Wall Street plan on developing all across the country. Right now it seem NYC, Oakland, and Baltimore are ground zero for development. All of the republicans shouting Constitutional Rights are right. All of the labor and justice shouting Constitutional Rights---are right. None of this is legal and hundreds of billions of dollars of taxpayer money are being funneled to this Johns Hopkins Enterprise. Hopkin of course still calls itself a private non-profit for tax and taxpayer funding purposes.
California, Corporate, Intelligence Fusion Centers Oakland Domain Awareness Center SAIC Proposal and Emails
The following documents include the Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC) proposal to the City of Oakland for the construction of the Joint Domain Awareness Center as well as emails and weekly updates on construction progress. The documents were obtained via public records requests made by members of Occupy Oakland's Privacy Working Group and originally posted online at Oakland Privacy. For updates on the center's construction follow @OaklandPrivacy on Twitter.
SAIC Proposal for Oakland Domain Awareness Center 167 pages December 10, 2012 Download
(PDF 13.2 MB) City of Oakland, Port of Oakland, SAIC Emails and Progress Reports 261 pages July 2012-September 2013 Download
(PDF 42.9 MB)
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NDAA Critic Stranded In Hawaii After Turning Up On No-fly List
17 October, 2012, 20:15
Wade Hicks was en route to a US Navy base in Japan to see his wife when armed military guards informed him that they had other plans. Hicks, an American citizen with no criminal record, had just been put added to a federal no-fly list.
After being escorted off his plane during a routine re-fueling stop on the Pacific Island of Oahu, Hicks, 34, was left stranded in Hawaii this week. In an interview, he suggests that his opposition to a newly-created law that allows for the indefinite detention of US citizens at military prisons without charge or trial could be to blame for his mistreatment.
"I was very, very vocal about the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) and I did contact my representative" about it, Hicks tells talk show host Doug Hagmann. "I do believe that this is tied in some way to my free speech and my political view."
According to Hicks, he has little reason to believe otherwise. He tells Hagmann that he formerly worked as a contractor for the US Department of Defense and has undergone extensive background checks in order to obtain an enhanced license that allows him to carry a concealed firearm. Hicks says he also holds on to a special identification card issued by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), the US Homeland Security Department sub-agency that administers pat-downs and screenings at airports across the country. An investigation carried out by Hagmann has led him to locating no criminal history for the man whatsoever.
My campaign for governor has been censured by public and private media and it is no coincidence that it is always NBC channel 4 in Washington that handles the Maryland debates. The NBC reporter covering a Montgomery College debate I was part said to me when she heard of my platform of civil rights, civil liberties, and Rule of Law said to me----NO ONE WANTS TO HEAR ABOUT THAT----and indeed no one did because I was completely removed from any media coverage.
David Seaman, Critic of NDAA & SOPA, Dismissed by Business Insider After NBC News Complaints
By Connor Adams Sheets@ConnorASheets
on January 16 2012 5:01 PM
'Seaman, infuriated by Quintano's move, wrote an article for Business Insider Sunday alleging that his being blocked amounted to censorship due to his opinions about the controversial legislation. NBC Universal has gone on the record as being in support of SOPA, as Seaman reported in a previous article'.
You know you are dealing with neo-cons and neo-liberals when a your state is being made into ground zero of totalitarian surveillance and warfare. From drones, to cyber (security), to security personnel-----that is Maryland's economy and all of higher education in Maryland focuses on these degree paths at the expense of humanities and liberal arts----
TAKING OVER A NATION'S ECONOMY WITH ENGINES OF REPRESSION IS MORE THAN A CANARY IN A CAGE.
NSA Building Quantum Supercomputer
An undated aerial handout photo shows the National Security Agency (NSA) headquarters building in Fort Meade, Maryland.
Voice of America News
VOA News January 03, 2014 12:55 PM
Quantum computers that can perform vast numbers of calculations simultaneously may be closer to science fiction than reality, but previously unpublished documents indicate the secretive U.S. National Security Agency is working hard to build a real quantum supercomputer, powerful enough to decode virtually every form of encryption now known.
Such a computer, many times faster than today's fastest machines, could easily solve codes now considered "unbreakable" - the type of ciphers currently used worldwide by scientific and financial institutions and governments to protect their data.
The basic principle of quantum computing is a physical phenomenon that is not yet fully understood: certain subatomic particles can simultaneously exist in two different states. A conventional computer works with binary "bits" of information that are represented as either zero or one; quantum bits could be both zero and one simultaneously.
In theory, that quirk of physics will allow quantum computers to skip through much of the elaborate mathematical computations necessary to solve complex encryption keys.
Documents made public by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden show the code-breaking agency is spending nearly $80 million on a secret research program called "Penetrating Hard Targets."
NSA would not comment on this week's disclosures by Snowden, who has been living in asylum in Russia since last year, after exposing secret U.S. diplomatic cables and worldwide surveillance activities.
The U.S. government is said to be competing against quantum-computer research efforts by the European Union and Switzerlands, but experts in the field say practical exploitation of such systems is years if not decades in the future.
Below you see two articles----one from a right-leaning group and the next by a left-leaning group. Neo-liberal media will try to make the right's concerns fear-mongering. The neo-con media will say we need to get crazy people off the street:
BOTH GROUPS ARE RIGHTLY CONCERNED ABOUT THE PROVISIONS IN THE AFFORDABLE CARE ACT THAT ATTACHED HOME HEALTH WITH REQUIRED SOME VISITS FROM CARE PROVIDERS.
The Affordable Care Act uses outpatient involuntary treatment with home visits by care providers in a broadly defined way that can be expanded to include anything. Addiction is a very subjective diagnosis----and it includes a huge number of mental health categories. Add to that social services and domestic and child welfare cases------ALL BEING MONITORED BY PRIVATE HOME HEALTH CORPORATIONS---and you have a serious attack on privacy and civil liberties.
Anyone can have a diagnosis of mental illness and addiction attached to them. Involuntary treatment whether it is home treatment, forced taking of drugs----IS TOTALITARIAN AND IT IS BURIED IN YOUR AFFORDABLE CARE ACT.
Have you heard your pols shouting against the extreme level of personal privacy and civil rights violated in the ACA in the guise of mental health and social services? Indefinite detention to home with visits from a corporate employee? OH REALLY?????
Remember, if this was still a first world Rule of Law Equal Protection nation----we may not be fearful of abuses. This is a second going to third world suspended Rule of Law with no equal protection making and preparing to enforce these laws. These ACA programs all aim at working class and poor families and in a third world nation---that is 90% of the population.
NEEDLESS TO SAY----IT IS JOHNS HOPKINS HOME HEALTH CARE CORPORATION THAT LEADS IN THE BALTIMORE AREA!
'Joshua Cook said that while the administration would claim the program only applies to those on Medicaid, the new law, by its own definition, has no such limitation'.
Report: Obamacare provision will allow 'forced' home inspections by gov't agents
Citing the Heath and Human Services website, a report posted Wednesday at the Freedom Outpost says that under Obamacare, government agents can engage in "home health visits" for those in certain "high-risk" categories.
Those categories include:
• Families where mom is not yet 21;
• Families where someone is a tobacco user;
• Families where children have low student achievement, developmental delays, or disabilities, and
• Families with individuals who are serving or formerly served in the armed forces, including such families that have members of the armed forces who have had multiple deployments outside the United States.
According to HHS, the visits fall under what is called the "Maternal, Infant and Early Childhood Home Visiting Program" allegedly designed to "help parents and children," and could impact millions of Americans.
Constitutional attorney and author Kent Masterson Brown said that despite what HHS says, the program is not "voluntary."
"The eligible entity receiving the grant for performing the home visits is to identify the individuals to be visited and intervene so as to meet the improvement benchmarks," he said. "A homeschooling family, for instance, may be subject to 'intervention' in 'school readiness' and 'social-emotional developmental indicators.' A farm family may be subject to 'intervention' in order to 'prevent child injuries.' The sky is the limit."
Joshua Cook said that while the administration would claim the program only applies to those on Medicaid, the new law, by its own definition, has no such limitation.
"Intervention," he added, quoting Brown, "may be with any family for any reason. It may also result in the child or children being required to go to certain schools or taking certain medications and vaccines and even having more limited – or no – interaction with parents. The federal government will now set the standards for raising children and will enforce them by home visits."
According to Cook, the program will require collection of a massive amount of private information including all sources of income and the amount gathered from each source.
One of the areas of emphasis mentioned by HHS is the "development of comprehensive early childhood systems that span the prenatal-through-age-eight continuum."
Last session, Cook added, South Carolina State Rep. Bill Chumley introduced a measure that would make the forced home visitations illegal in his state. The measure passed in the House but died in the Senate.
In 2011, he noted, HHS said $224 million would be allocated to support these home visiting programs.
' "I simply don't think that involuntary commitments are going to be an effective tool toward stemming mass shootings," says Jeff Deeney, a social worker in Philadelphia who writes about mental health for The Atlantic.
Deeney says just a tiny fraction of mentally unstable people are a threat to public safety'.
The Divide Over Involuntary Mental Health Treatment
By Kirk Siegler Originally published on Thu May 29, 2014 12:19 pm
Listen	3:56
Involuntary commitment to a hospital for mental illness can be a lengthy and complex process. A California law makes mandatory outpatient treatment an option. iStockphoto
The attacks near the University of California, Santa Barbara, are renewing focus on programs aimed at requiring treatment for people who are mentally ill as a way to prevent mass shootings and other violence.
In California, a 2002 law allows authorities to require outpatient mental health care for people who have been refusing it. Proponents argue that this kind of intervention could prevent violent acts.
But counties within the state have been slow to adopt the legislation, and mental health professionals are divided over its effects.
Do Family And Friends Know Best?
The story behind Laura's Law begins in 2001. In rural Nevada County, near Lake Tahoe, 19-year-old Laura Wilcox was shot and killed by a 41-year-old man with a history of mental illness. He had walked into the county's behavioral health center and opened fire.
Tom Anderson was the county's chief public defender at the time and represented the gunman in court. He recalls that the man's family had tried to alert mental health officials numerous times before the shooting.
"[Officials] were declaiming privacy issues and stuff and wouldn't communicate with the family," Anderson says. "He ... started amassing guns and setting up booby traps around his house, and he had this psychosis of he was going to be attacked any minute."
Now Nevada County's presiding judge, Anderson is also a vocal advocate for Laura's Law, which was passed by the state Legislature in 2002. The law allows counties to compel outpatient treatment for people whose family or friends are concerned about their mental state. It's seen as an intermediate step before someone is forced into inpatient psychiatric care.
Anderson says this tool could be one way to prevent future violent incidents, including mass shootings. And, he says, the patients often respond positively.
"The beauty of the program — the wonderment of it to me — is that roughly about 60 percent of the people that they do outreach to, where they go out to intervene after a person has been referred, voluntarily accept services at that time," he says.
A Question Of Rights
So far, only two California counties — Nevada County and Orange County — have gone forward with implementing Laura's Law. And the state hasn't allocated any funding to it.
The legislation is controversial. There are concerns that involuntary treatment could make mentally ill people vulnerable to civil rights abuses.
"You do have to be conscious that even though these people are mentally ill, they do have rights," says Steve Pitman, board president of the Orange County chapter of the National Alliance on Mental Illness.
Pitman, whose brother dealt with mental illness for 50 years, says family members need more power to intervene and force treatment. He says they're the ones who often know what's really going on, while police or a county mental health official may have just a few minutes to drop by for a welfare check.
"The problem in so many of these cases is that when they're interviewed to see if they meet those kind of threshold requirements, they don't give off any signals of being a danger to themselves or others," Pitman says. "Somebody who's experienced in these kinds of things knows all the right answers to give. They don't want to go to the hospital, so they say all the right things."
That scenario echoes Elliot Rodger's alleged behavior prior to the Santa Barbara incident, in which he allegedly killed six people, then himself.
But Pitman and others are cautious about linking policy changes like Laura's Law too closely to recent mass shootings. For one thing, they say, intervention cases that fall under Laura's Law may take weeks, if not months, to fully implement. And that may be too late.
"I simply don't think that involuntary commitments are going to be an effective tool toward stemming mass shootings," says Jeff Deeney, a social worker in Philadelphia who writes about mental health for The Atlantic.
Deeney says just a tiny fraction of mentally unstable people are a threat to public safety.
"I think what we don't have that people want so desperately is the program that stops nonviolent non-offenders from committing their first violent crime because of a mental illness," he says.
Deeney wants to see the conversation shift away from involuntary treatment programs like Laura's Law and toward preventive measures at high schools and college campuses.
TALKING ONE MORE TIME FOR NOW ON THE DISASTER OF PRIVATIZING PUBLIC HEALTH THROUGH PRIVATIZING UNIVERSITIES AND THE EFFECTS OF AFFORDABLE CARE ACT. WE CAN SEE TRANS PACIFIC TRADE PACT IN THE WAY THE PRIVATIZED PATENT SYSTEM AND THE LACK OF FDA OVERSIGHT IS MAKING OUR HEALTH SYSTEM DANGEROUS!
ALL OF MARYLAND CANDIDATE'S FOR GOVERNOR WILL CONTINUE THIS GLOBAL CORPORATE STRUCTURE FOR HEALTH CARE EXCEPT CINDY WALSH FOR GOVERNOR
I listened to a NPR------corporate media all the time----report on the escalating problem of medical procedures and devices passing FDA approval and failing and sometimes killing the American people. The numbers are soaring as the FDA is now working to send these products to market for profit and allowing the failures to be discovered after the fact by harming the citizens of America. This NPR article looked at one medical procedure that was approved by the FDA after a supposed 'clinical trial' of a few hundreds of people. The entire process looked to be filled with false data and sketchy connections with who and how the medical research was conducted and if any of the results were reproducible or if the efficacy was real.
ERGO-----THE ENTIRE PUBLIC HEALTH CLINICAL TRIAL PROCEDURE IS BEING DISMANTLED AND THE GENERAL PUBLIC WILL NOW BE THE TEST SUBJECTS. IF HARM IS DONE-----TOUGH LUCK AND WE WILL ALLOW THE BAD MEDICAL PROCEDURE TO CONTINUE REGARDLESS IN ANOTHER FORM.
This is what a corporate state looks like and it is Trans Pacific Trade Pact already in action as Obama has filled his Federal agencies with the same kinds of people that Bush did-----people committed to global corporate control of all public policy.
THIS IS WHAT YOUR ELECTIONS FOR GOVERNOR AND MAYOR ARE ABOUT-----WE THE PEOPLE MUST WIN THESE ELECTIONS!
What is happening as well is that Obama and your neo-liberal Congress person sent hundreds of billions of dollars to higher education under the guise of building stronger education but what they are building are corporate university research facilities complete with patenting of research done at this university. Most institutions receiving those hundreds of billions to build their corporate R and D? Ivy League universities like Johns Hopkins. What this policy does is make these universities corporations that receive tons of public taxpayer money to subsidize research in the guise of education while it is simply a patent machine for corporate R and D. When you see BIOPARK outside of Johns Hopkins or University of Maryland Medical System in Baltimore (a quasi-institution, not public so they say) ---you are seeing the public subsidizing with what is called education funding the profits of what are now corporations.
More important is combining this with the fact that the clinical trial structure and fast FDA approval of these patented procedures, devices, or medications that are simply rubber-stamped and you have ABSOLUTELY NO PUBLIC OVERSIGHT OF ANY OF THE HEALTH INDUSTRY ACTIONS. Remember, universities----especially public universities ------were the one institutions charged with making sure the data and research of products protected the people. These corporate structures built by neo-liberals like O'Malley and neo-cons like Erhlich are now doing just that.......creating an unaccountable and fraudulent system in our medical research structure.
OBAMA AND NEO-LIBERALS IN CONGRESS-----ALL MARYLAND POLS ARE NEO-LIBERALS------DELIBERATELY SENT MONEY TO BUILD WHAT THEY KNOW WILL HURT AND/OR KILL CITIZENS IN THE NAME OF CORPORATE PROFIT.
This is what Trans Pacific Trade Pact and the Affordable Care Act is all about.....consolidating the health industry into global corporate health systems that are deregulated and unaccountable and that will do harm without a second thought in pursuit of profit. This is what the Maryland Health reform has done these several years under O'Malley and Rawlings-Blake in Baltimore-----created the structures to allow all this to happen and with no oversight or accountability structures.
SEE WHY CINDY WALSH FOR GOVERNOR OF MARYLAND AND HER PLATFORM MUST BE KEPT OUT OF THIS ELECTION????
'The 510(k) loophole
Although the FDA requests clinical data in about 10% of cases, one concern over the 510(k) system is that testing is insufficient and so products that are either unsafe or ineffective could be released to market'.
Please read below to the 510 loophole.....it has made the FDA just as the SEC----working for corporate interests against the people's interests. That is what a corporate state does.
How does the FDA 'approve' medical products?
Thursday 20 February 2014 - 8am PST
Written by David McNamee Medical News Today
You may have seen medical products that claim to be "FDA cleared," "FDA registered," "FDA listed" or "FDA approved" - but what do these labels mean? You would be forgiven for feeling confused.
In this feature, we look at what the differences in Food and Drug Administration (FDA) classification actually mean, what you need to be aware of as a consumer and what the future holds for the regulation and classification of medical products in the US.
Though you may see labels on a wide variety of medical products - from implantable defibrillators to smartphone apps - bearing legends such as "FDA registered," in reality these claims are often disingenuous. But regulation over the correct terminology is rarely enforced.
Class 1, 2 and 3 In truth, the only products that the FDA specifically "approve" are drugs and life-threatening or life-sustaining "Class 3" medical technology (such as defibrillators). These are submitted to a rigorous review process called "pre-market approval" (PMA), to prove that the benefits of the products outweigh any potential risks to the health of the patient.
The only products that the FDA specifically "approve" are drugs and life-threatening or life-sustaining "Class 3" medical technology. Scientific evidence from clinical trials must be provided by the manufacturers demonstrating the safety and effectiveness of their product. Just 1% of products pass PMA.
Over-the-counter drugs are monitored by the FDA, but they are submitted to a less rigorous testing procedure, especially if they are assumed to be safe.
Vitamins, herbs and supplements are not tested by the FDA unless they are an active ingredient in a drug that requires FDA approval - so manufacturers of supplements are not allowed to claim that their products can treat any specific disease, only that they "promote health."
Despite this, some supplement companies are known to illegally claim their supplements are "FDA approved." It is thought that the FDA are unable to intervene in every instance due to limited resources.
Low-risk medical devices, such as stethoscopes and gauze, are known as "Class 1" and are exempt from FDA review.
"Class 2" medical devices are defined as not life-sustaining or life-threatening, though this category covers a wide spectrum of devices, from X-ray machines to some exercise equipment.
The level of scrutiny attached to Class 2 devices is much lower than Class 3. The devices do need FDA "clearance" before they can be marketed and sold, but rather than submit their products for clinical trial, the manufacturers are required instead to convince the FDA that their products are "substantially equivalent" to products that have been previously cleared by the FDA.
Substantially equivalent means that the device has the same intended use and approximate technical characteristics as an existing product.
Products that pass this clearance process may be referred to as "FDA cleared" or "FDA listed," but this is not the same as "FDA approved," which only relates to the prescription drugs and Class 3 devices that have passed PMA.
This approval method for Class 2 devices has been the subject of mounting controversy. The process is known as "510(k)" - named after its section in the law.
The 510(k) loophole
Although the FDA requests clinical data in about 10% of cases, one concern over the 510(k) system is that testing is insufficient and so products that are either unsafe or ineffective could be released to market.
Under 510(k), devices that have passed clearance, but have later been found dangerous or ineffective and are recalled, are not automatically removed from the FDA's list of cleared products. Another worry about this process is that the more "substantially equivalent" (but not identical) products are listed, the more a chain grows of FDA-cleared products that increasingly move away from the original product.
But perhaps the most concerning feature of 510(k) is that devices that have passed clearance, but then have later been found dangerous or ineffective and are recalled, are not automatically removed from the FDA's list of cleared products.
This is a loophole that allows any new products bearing the same faults to remain eligible for FDA clearance through 510(k).
In a 2012 report, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) recommended that 510(k) be replaced with an "integrated pre-market and post-market regulatory framework that effectively provides a reasonable assurance of safety and effectiveness throughout the device life cycle."
But these recommendations - though popular with consumer advocacy groups - were rejected by the FDA.
A congressman (now senator) for Massachusetts, Ed Markey, campaigned for the reform of 510(k) and proposed a 2012 bill to close the loophole.
But the bill was not passed. It received opposition from medical device manufacturers and members of Congress who claimed that the existing FDA review processes are already too time-consuming and unpredictable, compared with other countries, so inserting more safeguards and regulatory steps would have the effect of strangling innovation.
Medical News Today spoke to Dr. Michael A. Carome, director of the non-profit consumer rights organization Public Citizen's Health Research Group, about 510(k).
Dr. Carome cites a report that Public Citizen issued in 2012 highlighting "a concerted lobbying campaign intended to weaken the already lax regulatory oversight of medical devices."
"For example, in 2011 the medical device industry spent $33.3 million on lobbying, raising its total to $158.7 million since 2007. This lobbying campaign has been very successful and has generally drowned out calls for stronger medical device regulation from consumer advocates like Public Citizen."
Carome also sees a second obstacle in the FDA itself, "which has been very resistant to proposals to strengthen or replace the 510(k) system."
"The FDA seems beholden to the medical device industry and the mantra that promotion of 'innovation' is the most important goal in the regulation of medical devices," he adds.
More recently, Sen. Markey wrote to the FDA, appealing directly for them to reform 510(k).
Sen. Markey was satisfied with the FDA's response, announcing in December 2013 that database modifications proposed by the agency "will help decrease the dangers and increase the awareness of medical devices that may be made based on flawed models."
Dr. Carome feels, though, that the FDA's proposed measures "fail to adequately address the underlying flaws in the 510(k) premarket clearance process."
The central issue remains that new Class 2 medical devices found to be "substantially equivalent" to recalled but previously cleared devices are still obliged - by law - to be cleared by the FDA, despite whatever flaws the devices contain.
"The slightly improved transparency provided by FDA's revised database for 510(k)-cleared devices does not close this dangerous loophole in the existing law that threatens patient safety," Carome concludes.
But what are the Class 2 devices that have caused patient safety concerns?
Carome points to the DePuy metal-on-metal Articular Surface Replacement (ASR) hip implant - an "example of a medical device heavily promoted as being innovative and better than earlier types of devices."
In November 2013, DePuy - an orthopedics company owned by Johnson & Johnson - announced a $2.5 billion settlement to resolve more than 8,000 of 12,000 public liability claims filed in US courts after their metal-on-metal hip was recalled in 2010. The ASR was found to shed metallic debris as it wears, causing pain and injury to the patient.
The Myxo ring In 2008, a surgeon named Dr. Patrick McCarthy at Chicago's prestigious academic medical center, Northwestern Memorial Hospital, was found to be installing a device he had invented - the McCarthy Annuloplasty Ring - into the hearts of cardiology patients without the informed consent of the patients.
"If you are planning to receive a medical device in a US hospital, there is no way to confirm whether the device is FDA approved, investigational or registered," says Dr. Rajamannan. Concerned patients were even more alarmed when they discovered that the ring had also not been submitted to the FDA for review.
"There are no guideposts for us. You don't learn about this stuff in med school," McCarthy was quoted by the Chicago Tribune as saying, when questioned on why he had bypassed FDA approval.
The ring's manufacturer, a company called Edwards Lifesciences, later falsely claimed that the device was exempt from the 510(k) process and so did not require FDA clearance.
When a concerned colleague of McCarthy's, Dr. Nalini Rajamannan, contacted the FDA, an investigation was triggered, which ultimately saw the ring cleared for use - despite having already been sewn into the hearts of 667 patients.
But further controversy surrounded the FDA's clearance, which simply relied on a clinical study Dr. McCarthy himself had written as evidence that the ring - now rebranded "Myxo dETlogix" - was safe and effective.
Dr. Rajamannan - who was co-author on that study before withdrawing when she learned that the patients involved were not giving informed consent - later wrote a book detailing the controversy and continues to campaign on behalf of patients installed with the Myxo ring.
Speaking to Medical News Today, she says that the concerns over the Myxo device have still not been addressed by the FDA:
"The FDA has written a formal letter stating that they would not be investigating the matter any further. These heart valve rings that are being cleared under the 510k process for Edwards Lifesciences are associated with over 4,000 adverse events and over 645 deaths."
"The other major heart valve manufacturers have less than 20 events for their rings in the FDA database."
What does the future hold for FDA regulation? As we have shown in this feature, the confusion over the various stages of FDA "approval" and "clearance" is not limited to patients. These examples show that FDA classifications and processes can also - naively or wilfully - be misinterpreted by manufacturers and medical professionals.
The concerns from doctors, patients and consumer advocacy groups on the lack of regulation of medical products and the conflicts of interest within those regulatory processes remain.
Dr. Carome recommends that the IOM's 2012 guidelines be implemented and suggests that more of the Class 2 products sped through to market under 510(k) need to be reclassified as Class 3, for which the PMA process is much more stringent.
"Manufacturers do heavily promote their devices as being new and innovative, and many health care providers and patients believe that a 'newer' or 'innovative' device must be better," reasons Carome. "However, in most cases, there is no evidence that the newer medical devices are any better than older devices or other less-invasive treatments that don't involve a medical device."
"It is a real safety problem," agrees Dr. Rajamannan, who adds: "If you are planning to receive a medical device in a US hospital, there is no way to confirm whether the device is FDA approved, investigational or registered."
"The patients in the US are at major risk and the FDA is doing nothing to help the patients."
As I said, Maryland TV is plastered with injury law firms gathering patients that are victims of this horrendous system. As we all know, the injury lawyers get all the money in the end and the patients are harmed for life. This is what a third world nation looks like----citizens cannot even seek medical help without being fearful the procedures are happening in their interests and not for profit.
In Maryland, the Maryland Assembly has passed laws that make it as hard as possible for the public to seek justice in medical malpractice and it does not require medical malpractice insurance---meaning doctors prone to bad practices would love to come to Maryland. NONE OF THESE POLICIES ARE DEMOCRATIC----YET MARYLAND IS CALLED A 'PROGRESSIVE' STATE. It is a neo-liberal/neo-con state.
New Jersey Personal Injury Blog FDA Failed to Properly Test Medical Devices before Approval
By Blume Donnelly Fried Forte Zerres & Molinari
CNN recently reported that a review of recall data from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) found that the majority of the 113 Class III medical devices that were recalled between 2005 and 2009 for serious, life-threatening dangers, did not undergo the FDA's more rigorous pre-market approval process, also referred to as "PMA." Instead, the agency cleared the devices using a less stringent process known as the 510(k) process, under which clinical testing is not required. This discovery brings to light that many medical products that were given clearance, such as automated external defibrillators (AEDs), artificial hip joints, and heart valves, were marketed to and used on consumers without undergoing clinical testing in advance.
Under FDA policy, all Class III devices are required to undergo the PMA premarket approval process, including clinical testing, in order to determine if "sufficient valid scientific evidence" is found that the medical device is safe for its intended use.
However, a report from the Government Accountability Office in 2009 discovered that approximately 66 percent of all Class III devices were approved using the less demanding 510(k) process instead of the PMA because it was "less burdensome". An additional study, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association's Archives of Internal Medicine, found that approximately 71 percent of the 113 medical devices recalled between 2005 and 2009 were given approval through the 510(k) process.
Many believe the reasons for the shortcomings in testing are because the agency does not have the necessary funding and staff to conduct a clinical study for all medical devices requiring same. While a medical device's manufacturer does pay for a fraction of the expenses related to a PMA approval, the majority of the cost falls to the FDA, which is under-funded. Choosing to approve a medical device under the 510(k) process is much less expensive.
The FDA has admitted that the 510(k) approval process needs to be toughened, and has stated it intends to take action to improve the process in 2011. Additionally, the FDA has stated it will evaluate all remaining Class III devices slated for the 510(k) process to determine if the device should undergo the PMA process. As a result, there may be dangerous medical devices on the market that have not received proper government approval.
If you believe that a defectively designed or manufactured medical device may have seriously affected your health or the health of a loved one, contact a New Jersey product liability attorney at Blume Goldfaden. Call 973-635-5400 to schedule a no-cost consultation with one of our lawyers.
Keep in mind that a republican Bush slashed funding for most Federal agencies as a way to make oversight and accountability go away. So, when Obama makes an increase of 2-3% he is doing nothing towards rebuilding these agencies. In fact, much of the funding that makes it to these agencies is simply lost in private outsourcing with all its fraud and corruption.
When they say 'it's the sequestration and the national debt'
WE SAY----NO, IT'S THE FAILURE TO RECOVER TENS OF TRILLIONS OF DOLLARS IN MASSIVE CORPORATE FRAUD THIS LAST DECADE.
This funding status quo simply keeps our Federal agencies in a mode of 'doing no harm' to corporate profits.
STOP ELECTING NEO-LIBERALS! DO YOU HEAR YOUR POLS SHOUTING TO BRING BACK TENS OF TRILLIONS OF DOLLARS IN CORPORATE FRAUD! MARYLAND POLS LOVE FRAUD AND CORRUPTION SO THERE IS NOT A WORD
Once again republican think tanks are crying foul but they are the ones behind all of the dismantling of these agencies creating the fraud and corruption and loss of trillions of dollars. Their figures are right---$900 billion from Medicare will be taken from the patient's care and not hospital profits.
Reaction to Obama's 2015 HHS funding:
Various health care providers and organizations have responded to the proposal, with many calling for increased funding for health-related agencies and initiatives.
The Federation of American Hospitals criticized proposed funding cuts to Medicare, with FAH President and CEO Chip Kahn saying they would "further threate[n] seniors' access to vital hospital services" and noting that both Republicans and Democrats oppose such reductions (Demko/Zigmond, Modern Healthcare, 3/4). According to National Journal, the group is hoping to persuade Congress against the cuts by touting a new study estimating over $900 billion in Medicare savings over the next 10 years through cost cutting resulting from changes to the way providers deliver care (Ritger, National Journal, 3/4).
American Hospital Association President and CEO Richard Umbdenstock said the proposal contained some "problematic policies" that would hurt hospitals' abilities to improve the health care system and place patients' at risk of losing access to services (Demko/Zigmond, Modern Healthcare, 3/4).
Kasey Thompson, president and chair of the Alliance for a Stronger FDA and vice president of policy, planning and communications for the American Society of Health-System Pharmacists, called for additional FDA funding, saying, "Given that FDA regulates about 25 cents of every dollar of the gross domestic product, it does not have enough money to fulfill its public health mission."
Alliance for a Stronger FDA Deputy Executive Director Steven Grossman added that the group plans to ask Congress for more FDA funding (Lee, Modern Healthcare, 3/4).
The proposed increase in NIH funding also generated backlash. Research! America President Mary Woolley in a statement said that the U.S. "simply cannot sustain [its] research ecosystem, combat costly and deadly diseases ... and create quality jobs with anemic funding levels that threaten the health and prosperity of Americans," adding, "These funding levels jeopardize our global leadership in science -- in effect ceding leadership to other nations as they continue to invest in strong research and development infrastructures" (Viebeck, "Healthwatch," The Hill, 3/4).
This is how crazy things have gotten. California is indeed ground zero for this university as corporation model starting with Stanford and now consuming all public universities. Remember, California had the best education system in the world----I had the pleasure of attending California schools at all levels-----but this move to corporatize has ruined the entire higher education system and they are now creating the tiered higher ed as they are in Maryland with working and middle class being tracked into vocational K-career college.
This is critical to health care because these large universities whether public or private are the source of public protections for health. If the data is corrupt at universities-----no one is watching the health corporations either. So, if you think funding universities by making them corporations is a good idea----THINK OF ALL THE FACTORS CONNECTED TO THIS.
It is interesting to note that Governor Brown-----who will try to run for President as a 'progressive' on his old record as a real progressive in the 1970s---appointed Napolitano-----HEAD OF HOMELAND SECURITY WITH NO EDUCATION BACKGROUND as Chancellor of California Higher Education School System.
THE CONTINUED USE OF INSIDERS FILLING APPOINTED POSITIONS AT ALL LEVELS.
When they talk of 'start ups from this university research' they do not tell you that 9 times out of ten those start-ups that are successful are simply absorbed into global corporations. IT IS A PIPELINE. Keep in mind that these corporate universities sell this corporate structure as funding schools but it is this structure that has student tuition sky high subsidizing this research and patenting process. Maryland has done the same to its universities as this article shows in California and it is where all public funding for education is now going. Johns Hopkins has had so much money funneled to it from our Congress neo-liberals that it owns much of the land in Baltimore's downtown and city center and it is all simply businesses connected to Hopkins. THIS IS HOW YOU BUILD A GLOBAL CORPORATION THAT CONTROLS A REGION----
Patent-reform legislation spurs controversy among universities
Tina Pai/Staff By Tahmina Achekzai
Last Updated April 28, 2014
In 1994, Michael Doyle, then the director of a computer lab at UCSF, patented software that allowed doctors to view embryos online — the first "interactive" application on the web.
A few years later, the University of California licensed a patent to a company Doyle created called Eolas, which, claiming rights to the idea of embedding interactive content on web pages, sued Microsoft in a multimillion-dollar lawsuit.
The university, a co-plaintiff in the case, took a $30.4-million cut in what is now widely regarded as a classic case of "patent trolling."
This week, Congress is marking up legislation in hopes of combating patent trolls — companies that purchase patents not to commercialize a product but to reap licensing revenue.
The UC system holds nearly 4,000 U.S. patents that have led to thousands of inventions and hundreds of startup companies. The University of California leads the nation's universities in patent development, but pending legislation may change that.
Politicians vs. trolls
Traditionally, researchers apply for patents that give them full ownership of their idea or invention and then sell the rights to outside companies, hoping to take their discoveries from the lab to industry. But when the inventions seem to have little hope for commercialization, "patent trolls" may step into the picture.
Trolls, more formally known as patent-assertion entities, will find and subsequently sue businesses they accuse of infringing patent rights. Serving as a middleman between inventors and businesses, trolls collect licensing fees, a portion of which the inventors may receive.
According to the 2013 White House Patent Assertion and U.S. Innovation Report, suits filed by patent trolls tripled from 2010 to 2012, at which point they comprised 62 percent of all patent-infringement cases.
Experts say that because it costs millions of dollars to ascertain what a patent covers, companies faced with these lawsuits may choose to settle rather than to fight.
In November, Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., introduced a bill hoping to increase transparency within the patent system and to curb the emerging trend of patent trolling.
The bill would require any patentee who has filed a lawsuit to disclose any financial interests. It also requires the Federal Trade Commission to exercise authority over the misuse of demand letters: notices to companies claiming restitution for breach of license.
Academic qualms
Though the legislation is designed to serve as a deterrent to patent trolls attempting to sue other parties, universities worry it will invariably impede their efforts to enforce their own patent rights.
Earlier this month, the Association of American Universities — of which the UC system is a part — signed a joint letter addressed to Leahy outlining its concerns. The letter was also signed by the Association of University Technology Managers, made up of representatives from "technology transfer" offices at many universities who guard university research.
"Much of the legislation that is currently under discussion in Washington goes far beyond what is necessary simply to prevent that abuse of the patent system," said David Winwood, the vice president for advocacy at the Association of University Technology Managers.
Of particular concern among both universities and members of Congress is the possible addition of a fee-shifting provision, which would require the losing party in a lawsuit to cover fees and expenses incurred by the opposing party.
Carol Mimura, UC Berkeley's assistant vice chancellor of intellectual property and research industry alliances, explained that the threat of incurring additional fees could discourage universities from filing lawsuits against actual infringers.
"The provision favors large, deep pockets, not the little guys," Mimura said in an email. "Big companies and deep pockets create a David and Goliath situation that discourages investment, as opposed to encouraging it."
While the university protects its employees, co-inventors are sometimes undergraduate students who are not protected and would have to pay for the damages. As a result, she said, they may be discouraged from filing patents — and, consequently, inhibited from advancing "innovation."
Gary Falle, UC's associate vice president for federal government relations, argues Congress needs to take a more "balanced approach" when addressing patent abuses.
"The UC is the lead in the nation in the number of patents (awarded annually), and we want to make sure that is protected," said Falle. "We just want to make sure that the patents the university is awarded are able to move into technology, commercialization and innovation."
Trimming the troll
Yet Robin Feldman, a law professor at UC Hastings College of the Law who researches patent trolling issues extensively, believes the legislation is vital to the abused patent system.
Feldman suggested universities might have underlying incentives in opposing the legislation. She noted that universities, while not filing patent lawsuits directly, may deliberately ally with nonpracticing entities to increase revenue.
"They do appear to be feeding the patent trolls at least to some extent," she said. "There's so much pressure on universities to find funding sources, and it is difficult for them to resist the temptation to sell to those who won't make any products."
Still, according to Mimura, UC Berkeley only licenses patents to commercial entities in accordance with university patent policy. And, despite what history may suggest, Mimura said the University of California does indeed support patent reform and has even reached out to Sen. Dianne Feinstein thanking her for support of patent reform.
In regard to current legislation efforts, the UC system only wants to shift the discussion in the right direction, Falle said.
"We believe that addressing bad behavior by stopping those who send multiple demand letters in the hope of extracting fees out of fear will be the focus of reform — not shutting down the entire patent system that is the goose that laid the golden egg," Mimura said.