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Samuel Stein’s (2019) book uses New York City as a case study for gentrification and urban development. Kathyrn Loeb (John Jay MA) reviews it in the Review of Radical Political Economics:

“In Capital City, Samuel Stein looks to instill hope in a profession and practice that overthe past eighty or so years has led to some of the worst entrenchments of global capital—urban planning. He focuses on the urban planner as a nice person trying to do good while operating in a system where they literally cannot win. The stranglehold of financialized real estate on urban planning, federal policy, and the incentive structure for local government cannot be untangled by a nice person trying to do good. This has placed urban planners at the center of a series of contradictory directives, navigating thorny political issues, and ultimately working to uphold the regime of capital while displacing the working class through gentrification. By confronting the politicalforces underlying these economic structures, Stein hopes to show a way forward for planners that
can undo these destructive dynamics and build a better future.”

“Commentators have written off voters’ concerns as mere vibes or the result of misleading media coverage. But a more careful look suggests that there is something to voters’ perception that they are worse-off economically. Although wages have more than kept pace with inflation, especially at the bottom, wages are not the only source of income. The withdrawal of pandemic-era welfare policies has left many people materially worse off than in the first year of the Biden administration, even as their paychecks have grown.”

Full article at Barron’s.

“Robert F. Kennedy told his children that physical courage was important because it served as preparation for the much more difficult and essential test of moral courage. If confirmed as secretary of health and human services, his son and namesake will need both. Implementing Kennedy’s agenda to “Make America Healthy Again” will require confronting extremely powerful and entrenched interests: not just Big Food, Big Ag, and Big Pharma, but also the Intelligence Community—more on which in a moment.”

Article at Compact Magazine

Eric Seligman (JJay Economics MA ’22) and  Brian Nam-Sonenstein write on the relationship between economic justice and mass incarceration.

“Money is power in the United States, and mass incarceration plays a major role in determining who can wield power and who can’t. As we’ve noted repeatedly over the years, it is no coincidence that the poorest and most vulnerable communities are also the most policed. The criminal legal system erects significant barriers to employment and the ballot box, economically and politically weakening entire communities. The criminal legal system erects significant barriers to employment and the ballot box, economically and politically weakening entire communities. Importantly, this arrangement impacts all workers: employers use this massive class of disadvantaged people to threaten all workers with replacement and increasingly risky unemployment if they dare to demand better wages and conditions. Mass incarceration also weaves a narrative that pits people with similar economic interests against one another, reducing systemic inequality to matters of individual choice. Fortunately, understanding mass incarceration as the wealthy’s preferred economic policy clarifies that ending it is necessary for all movements for justice and equality — all working people benefit from solidarity with criminalized people.”

Read the full article at the Prison Policy Initiative.