*Aside from disparities in pay between genders and racial groups, overall economic inequality is contributing the poor health and "excess death" of those unfairly placed in the lower end of the continuum of wealth. Unnatural Causes examines and explains that problem.
Researchers found that the most significant wage disparity was among couples in which both spouses share the traditional belief that the man is the primary breadwinner and the woman should be the homemaker. That wage gap was 25 percent.
Housewives don't get paid at all so that wage gap was an average. And women are paid only 80% of what men are paid for the same work.
The study took into account job complexity, hours worked, starting salary, industry of employment, and education level so I challenge you to offer an alternative interpretation of the findings other than that it pays to be sexist, unless you're a woman who holds 'traditional' values.
Women with traditional views of gender roles suffer the most from income inequality, earning about $1,500 dollars less per year than women with egalitarian views, who are already making 20% less than their male counterparts.
Maybe I'll get cuter, though.
The original text of the Paulson Plan contained this troubling clause:
Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency.Something obviously must be done about our downward-spiraling economy but the fact that an appointed official (let alone a Bush appointee) is being given this sweeping power and will not be held accountable in any way is disconcerting to say the least.
There's a simple explanation. Too many people bought too many things with money they did not actually have, like houses. The economic growth that this produced was, in large part, illusory and divorced from the growth of the real economy, which produces the things that the market economy values. In this case, they grossly overvalued them and regulators let them securitize and sell this leveraged debt around the world. AIG insured the debt securities against losses but could not actually cover them. And the dominoes continue to fall...
Don't worry, though; Hank is going to bail out the entire market.
Although pollsters' techniques have gotten more sophisticated since the Dewey debacle, the measurement of public opinion is still difficult and one cannot draw too strong of conclusions from them. The most likely cause of inaccurate survey results is sampling error, which introduces biases that cannot be generalized.
One possible example of this is that a classmate of mine pointed out that she could not be polled because, like many people under the age of 30, she does not have a land line. Therefore, younger people may be underrepresented in the samples polled during this Presidential election, which would understate the level of support for Obama.
Another problem with survey research that may actually inflate Obama's poll numbers is that people do not like to admit that they are racist. In the abstract, most Americans agree with the statement that America is ready for a black President but, when 2/3 of black Americans say that no real progress has been made in ending racial discrimination, this indicates that racism still exists in practice. And this discrimination will surely impact Obama's electoral 'job interview' for the Presidency, even outweighing the economic woes that favor his candidacy.
Given that racial discrimination is often perpetrated and experienced in everyday life, the divergence of opinion between white and black Americans about race relations is unsurprising and suggests that, in many cases, the dominant group is unaware of their perpetuation of racism. Both the obvious and insidious forms of racism will influence the outcome of this year's Presidential election, a testament to how far we actually are from realizing our nation's ideals.
One last note on survey research: Regrettably, my skepticism about poll results cuts both ways so, when it puts Obama in the lead, I have to take that good news with a grain of salt.
*In May of this year, Alaska Governor Sarah Palin sued the U.S. government in an attempt to block the listing of the polar bear as a "threatened species" under the Endangered Species Act. Fortunately, her attempt was unsuccessful. This is the first species listed as "threatened" due to global climate change, which she does not believe is man-made.
You are asleep on the couch, dear, with a book in your lap and I am supposed to be working on a paper for school. But I'm not.The paper anniversary is perhaps the most poetic of anniversaries. It represents the fragility and tenuousness of a couple's marriage after only one year together. Each successive year in the procession of traditional anniversary gifts represents the more durable nature of the relationship that time together should produce. I certainly hope it has for us.
One word sums up probably the responsibility of any vice-president, and that one word is 'to be prepared'.She is simply not prepared to be next in line for the Presidency. Just six years ago, she was the mayor of a town with fewer than 7,000 residents and is currently serving her first term as Governor of Alaska, a state flush with oil revenue. In the Republican primary, Palin ran against and defeated the man who had given her an opportunity in statewide politics. That should concern McCain somewhat.
I am not part of the problem. I am a Republican.Although the political context is different, this quote encapsulates McCain's attempt to present himself as a 'change' candidate. Republicans controlled the House, Senate, and White House for the first six years of Bush's Presidency and McCain voted with his party over 90% of the time. But he's not part of the problem. He's part of the solution.
Votes are like trees, if you are trying to build a forest. If you have more trees than you have forests, then at that point the pollsters will probably say you will win.We'll see who ends up with more trees than forests.
