Teacher strikes, credit unions & more
The strange thing about freelancing for different outlets is you can start working on pieces at very different times, turn in your rough drafts at very different times, but then they all get published seemingly at once. I have three stories out this week, that I started in early February, mid-March, and late March respectively. I’m excited to see them all finally up and out, and to share them here.
In the new issue of The Washington Monthly I have a little profile of Alex Tabarrok, a prominent libertarian economist at George Mason University who published research showing federal regulation can’t explain some of the negative trends happening in the economy. I write why that’s a pretty notable thing, especially coming from him.
In The Atlantic I wrote about virtual charter schools teachers in California who threatened to go on strike, winning pay raises, reduced class sizes, shorter work days, and an end to at-will employment. We’re in the midst of this massive teacher uprising in red states like West Virginia, Oklahoma, Arizona and Kentucky — and I tried to situate the significance of this recent online charter standoff with all of them.
And for HuffPost, I wrote about community development credit unions, and their potential to act as not only an alternative to pay-day lending, but also as a new vehicle for low-income communities to mobilize politically.
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In other news, yesterday marked the 50th anniversary of the Fair Housing Act. Pretty important law IMHO. I want to recommend this New York Times op-ed by Walter Mondale, former VP and co-author of the 1968 legislation. Stay tuned for some other fair housing pieces soon.