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Foley Talks Border Security With Lou Dobbs

Aaron Wiener — Mon, 04 Oct 2010 22:20:33 +0000

TWI’s Elise Foley made an appearance last week on Lou Dobbs Radio, discussing immigration reform and border security with the notoriously anti-illegal immigration host. It’s a worthwhile debate the whole way through, but it’s particularly amusing to note Dobbs’ increasing frustration as he tries, without much success, to get Foley to agree that border security has deteriorated under the Obama administration.

Listen to the full audio clip here.

Taxing the Super-Rich, Ctd.

Annie Lowrey — Thu, 23 Sep 2010 13:17:18 +0000

Yesterday, my friend Reihan Salam and I recorded a Bloggingheads video, where we talked mostly in broad terms about taxes, fairness and economic growth. You can watch the whole thing here:

In the diavlog, I argue again that we should impose a millionaire’s tax, because income inequality has increased so egregiously over the course of the past decade. But I also note that it might not be a bad idea to tax extraordinary wealth since its accumulation through the financial sector has proven economically destructive to the middle class.

That argument gives me occasion to cite this paper by Steven N. Kaplan and Joshua Rauh, “Wall Street and Main Street: What Contributes to the Rise in the Highest Incomes?,” via Matt Yglesias. The authors try to determine who is really rich. And they find our country’s billionaires come not from railroads, or tech companies, or manufacturing, but from finance.

We estimate that the professionals in hedge, VC, and PE funds include roughly the same number of individuals in the top 0.1% of the AGI income distribution as the top nonfinancial executives. While we do not estimate precise distributional changes over time for this sector, we show that these industries are significantly larger today than ten and twenty years ago and, therefore, that their employees must represent a larger fraction of the top brackets than before.

We also find that hedge fund investors and other “Wall Street” type individuals comprise a larger fraction of the very highest end of the AGI distribution (the top 0.0001%) than CEOs and top executives. In 2004, nine times as many Wall Street investors earned in excess of $100 million as public company CEOs. In fact, the top twenty-five hedge fund managers combined appear to have earned more than all five hundred S&P 500 CEOs combined (both realized and ex ante). This trend accelerated after 2004. In 2007, it is likely that the top five hedge fund managers earned more than all five hundred S&P 500 CEOs combined.

The problem is: A lot of Wall Street types themselves argue that the sector shifted from productively allocating risk and free capital, to destructively concentrating risk and soaking up capital. Consider an argument recently made by the founder of Vanguard, a huge mutual fund. John Bogle said: “The innovation in the productive part of our economy adds value to our society. The financial sector, by definition, subtracts value.”

Then, there is Paul Volcker, former chair of the Federal Reserve. “I wish someone would give me one shred of neutral evidence that financial innovation has led to economic growth — one shred of evidence,” he argued last year. He then said the biggest innovation in the industry over the past 20 years had been the ATM.

Taxes are an easy corrective — a financial transactions tax being the most obvious fix, but a high tax on excessive income seeming like it might help too.

Zwick Discusses National Organization for Marriage’s Funding

Sarah Laskow — Tue, 21 Sep 2010 15:21:08 +0000

Public News Service called up TWI’s own Jesse Zwick to hear more about the financial support the Knights of Columbus are giving the National Organization for Marriage, a nonprofit group fighting same-sex marriage initiatives.

The Knights of Columbus, a Catholic fraternal society, “mainly were, once again, the largest donor to the cause in Maine, but they simply funneled that money through the National Organization for Marriage and as a result, had not received as much publicity,” Zwick told the radio service.

Listen to the whole story here:

Restuccia on the Gulf Oil Spill and Claims Process

TWI — Tue, 07 Sep 2010 16:03:09 +0000

If you can’t get enough of Andrew Restuccia’s coverage of the Gulf oil spill and claims process, check out these recent radio appearances to hear more of his insights into those stories.

On KCRW’s To The Point this past Friday, Restuccia discussed the claims process for victims of the oil spill. (His segment begins at 45’02″.)

And at the end of August, he also spoke to Michigan radio host Ed Brayton of Declaring Independence about the oil spill in that state and the one in the Gulf.

Lowrey Talks Small Business Bill on MSNBC

Sarah Laskow — Mon, 02 Aug 2010 17:51:22 +0000

If you were on your way out of town Friday evening, you might have missed TWI economy reporter Annie Lowrey on MSNBC, discussing Republican obstruction of a Senate bill that would help small businesses. Not to worry: we have the clip for you, below the jump.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Lowrey Discusses Unemployed Netroots on MSNBC

Sarah Laskow — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 14:28:14 +0000

Last night, TWI’s Annie Lowrey talked to Chris Hayes, guest host of MSNBC’s The Rachel Maddow Show, about the burgeoning political consciousness of unemployed Americans — what she’s termed the “unemployed netroots.”

Lowrey wrote about this phenomenon yesterday at TWI. According to her reporting, untold numbers of unemployed Americans are beginning to organize through “a system of highly trafficked, influential blogs and sites connecting the jobless and updating them, often in minute detail, about the ins and outs of Congress’ work on unemployment issues.”

“When legislators go home for the August recess, unemployed people are going to go to their rallies and ask them questions about [these issues] — and they’re doing it with union backing,” Lowrey told Hayes last night.

Watch the whole video here:

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Lowrey and Salam Talk Unemployment on Bloggingheads

Aaron Wiener — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 13:21:52 +0000

It ain’t uplifting, but it’s arguably the most pressing issue facing the country right now, so after the jump, check out TWI’s Annie Lowrey and the omnipresent Reihan Salam discussing the unemployment crisis on bloggingheads.tv:

Lowrey Tells Tale of GOP Jobless Benefits Obstructionism on MSNBC

Aaron Wiener — Fri, 02 Jul 2010 01:13:31 +0000

Earlier this evening, Annie Lowrey made an appearance on MSNBC’s “The Ed Show,” guest-hosted by The Nation’s Chris Hayes, to discuss her piece today on the Senate’s nine-month effort to extend unemployment benefits — and GOP’s maneuvers to kill any extension that added to the country’s budget deficit. Check out the video after the jump, in which she details the stages of a battle that still has no conclusion:

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Lowrey and Konczal Talk Money on Bloggingheads

Aaron Wiener — Thu, 27 May 2010 14:23:00 +0000

TWI’s Annie Lowrey makes another appearance on Bloggingheads.tv today, discussing all things financial with Rortybomb’s Mike Konczal: regulatory reform, Blanche Lincoln’s derivatives proposal, Fannie and Freddie and the economic impact of the oil spill. Check out the video after the jump:

Lowrey Talks Political Irony on Bloggingheads

Aaron Wiener — Mon, 10 May 2010 20:42:25 +0000

TWI’s Annie Lowrey and the Heritage Foundation’s Conn Carroll recorded an episode of Bloggingheads.tv that went up today. The theme? The political ironies of the day: Could the oil spill sink climate legislation? How does the Greek bailout affect the Obama presidency? How are amendments to financial regulatory reform bringing the left and right together?

Check out the video after the jump: