A year ago today I wrote about financial regulation . As the G20 meeting on April 2 approaches, the topic is more relevant than ever.

I argued last year that when the last piece of the Glass-Steagall wall between banking and non-bank financial institutions was torn down in 1999,...

When the Berlin Wall came down in 1989 and the Soviet Union disintegrated, many of us looked forward to a Peace Dividend, a reduction in military spending that would allow more U.S. Government spending on public needs like health care or education, or tax cuts, or a combination.

We got...

As the Democratic administration wrestles with huge U.S. economic problems, officials can take comfort in the fact that they have an easy act to follow. The numbers are in, and under Bush 43 only four U.S. states beat the average long-term growth rate. The four "winner" states that did better...

At dinner this week I had a chance to quiz Georg Kell about the UN's Global Compact. Georg is Executive Director of the UN Global Compact. What is his mission? He told...

Public concern is fully warranted over the high and rising 8.1 percent unemployment rate reported for February. In fact, the true pain is closer to double what is reported. The Bureau of Labor Statistics routinely provides the data to report the higher rate. The standard unemployment rate averaged 5.8 percent...

The U.S. financial meltdown has created a worldwide crisis. Ironically, worldwide scared money is still flowing into U.S. Treasury obligations as a safe haven. This permits more U.S. borrowing, but by drying up credit overseas creates financial crises in other countries.

I've been posting for several years on pieces...

The U.S. economy lost 651,000 more jobs (nonfarm payroll) in February, says the BLS, for a cumulative loss of 2.6 million in the past four months. The unemployment rate rose from 7.6 to 8.1 percent.

These numbers were anticipated by the stock market to some extent yesterday. The market is...

If you thought the inflation dragon was has been reliably slain (or at least temporarily exiled) by the St. George of reduced demand, consider that the record increase in unit labor costs in the fourth quarter of 2008 was revised up.

The BLS announced today revised...

Dennis Blair, Obama's director of national intelligence, told the Senate Intelligence Committee on Friday that based on reports from the nation's 16 intelligence agencies, the global recession is now the country's top security concern.

Unrest overseas, he says, would be a threat worse than terrorism. He said:

The longer...

My San Francisco friend Michael Phillips advised me today by email that he is telling his colleagues to worry less about big powerful multinationals and more about despots of rogue states. ...

Four of HuffPost's staffers were on offer at Manhattan's 92nd Street Y February 5. This panel discussion is billed as giving the lowdown on "How they choose the stories that make the news" and "their insights into blogging, including what blogs they link to and why, what content gets blogs...

President Obama is committed to creating five million new green jobs via subsidizing energy alternatives and conservation with an estimated $100 billion of the stimulus bill. The same kind of commitment is occurring at the New York State and City levels. On January 26 New York's Governor David Paterson

BBC News is running a medical care story today that has implications for U.S. medical care. Residents who are put on a shorter 48 hour/week limit, in accordance with European Union regulations, made 33 percent fewer medical errors than those...

Thank you if you contacted BBC about allowing the U.S. Health Care show produced by Panorama to be downloadable in the United States. It worked. Just received this message from BBC Panorama:

Dear John, Thank you for your email. Due to high demand, we have now made the programme available...

As the Congress considers a stimulus package, let the new job numbers be heard throughout the Capitol, as reported by the Bureau of Labor Statistics this morning. Unemployment rates in December were higher for every state and the District of Columbia, whether measured in comparison with November or with the...

My sister Brigid Marlin lives in the UK and a few days ago was watching a BBC program on health care in the United States. Brigid is not a public affairs junkie so I was interested when she sent me an email reporting that the program was a shocking portrayal...

The environmental blog Grist has poked fun at some defenseless departing Bush 43 officials by comparing them to Simpson characters.

It's fun during a political transition and a tradition to give the guys on the way out a...

One year ago, the United States seemed likely to get our first woman president or our first non-lily-white president. It wasn't clear which.

Today we celebrate the fact that the country has turned a corner. What can we expect as a consequence? If history is a...

Nicholas Kristof sure got my goat yesterday by starting his column with this: "What the world's most impoverished people need isn't fewer sweatshops, but more of them."

Why does a kind-hearted person like Kristof say something that sounds so mean? Because based on...