Author: Robert Reich

The U.S. labor department recently announced that the consumer price index, a basket of products ranging from gasoline and health care to groceries and rents, rose 6.2% from a year ago. That was the nation’s highest annual inflation rate since November 1990. Republicans are hammering Biden and Democratic lawmakers over inflation – and attacking his economic stimulus plans as wrongheaded. “This will be a winter of high gas prices, shortages and inflation because far left lunatics control our government,” Marco Rubio, the Republican senator from Florida posted via Twitter on November 11. A major reason for price rises is...

A lot has been said about the filibuster these days. But here is one thing about this old Senate rule that most people might not know: the filibuster actually violates the Constitution. 41 Senate Republicans, who represent only 21 percent of the American population, are blocking the “For the People Act,” which is supported by 67 percent of Americans. They’re also blocking an increase in the minimum wage to $15 an hour, supported by 62 percent of Americans. And so much else. Even some so-called moderate Democrats, like Joe Manchin and Krysten Sinema, have outsized power to block crucial...

I am old enough to remember when the Republican party stood for limited government and Ronald Reagan thundered “Government is not the solution to our problem, government is the problem.” Today’s Republican party, while still claiming to stand for limited government, is practicing just the opposite: government intrusion everywhere. Republican lawmakers are banning masks in schools. Iowa, Tennessee, Utah, Texas, Florida, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Arizona and South Carolina are prohibiting public schools from requiring students wear them. Republican states are on the way to outlawing abortions. Texas has just banned abortions after six weeks of pregnancy, before many women even...

Much of the news from Republicans in Congress has been about their attacks on the agenda of Democrats, with abundant false claims of scary “socialist” policies. We do have socialism in this country — but it is not policies promoted by Democrats. The real socialism is corporate welfare. Thousands of big American corporations rake in billions each year in government subsidies, bailouts, and tax loopholes—all funded on the taxpayer dime, and all contributing to higher stock prices for the richest 1 percent who own half of the stock market, as well as CEOs and other top executives who are...