Nick Capo

One recent afternoon, my infant daughter slept in my arms while I flipped through a backlog of magazines. I stumbled upon this article – “Dysfunctional Illinois: No Play, No Pay” – about our “enormous unfunded pension liability” (about $133 billion) in The Economist. It was disconcerting that my state government’s reputation as an inept laughingstock […]

In the United States, citizens who believe that they live in the reality-based community are happy about the recent election results, even though the pulverized wreckage of this nation’s political discourse will be harder to repair than the damage inflicted by Hurricane Sandy. There is a strong case now for ignoring the deluge of discourse […]

The Labor Department’s estimate of jobs added to the U.S. economy in May was 69,000, a number too low to keep up with population growth. But in an election year, we no longer expect a real response to unemployment from Congress. Most of us expect a governmental train wreck at year’s end, no matter who […]

One recent evening, I participated in a discussion about crime and punishment with a large group of civic-minded professionals. In such discussions, people’s thoughts inevitably explore matters of virtue and necessity, fear and profit. The broadcast media’s role in creating a cynical and fearful public, as a byproduct of the pursuit of profit, has been […]

Recently I visited Asheville, N.C., and witnessed how the 1 percent used to live. About one million people make the pilgrimage to the Biltmore House each year, and my wife and I now number among them. The Biltmore rests within an 8,000-acre estate. This house, designed to resemble a French chateau and serve as George […]

For fiction lovers, the upcoming presidential campaign, which might match Newt Gingrich against Barack Obama, promises to deliver a cornucopia of entertaining untruths. Gingrich published a book last year that accused Obama, a devout Christian with many wealthy friends, of conspiring to impose a “secular-socialist machine” upon America. Last month, Gingrich defended the large payments […]

My favorite scene in Charles Dickens’ novel Oliver Twist occurs in the second chapter. Oliver Twist is living with several dozen juveniles in a workhouse, all suffering “the tortures of slow starvation” and “so voracious and wild with hunger” that one large boy mentions his urge to eat a smaller boy. This simply will not […]

I just read Gar Alperovitz’s article, “The New-Economy Movement,” which explained how the American Sustainable Business Council and the New Economy Network are demonstrating that companies can earn solid profits without exploiting workers or destroying the planet. Companies like Gore-Tex, Seventh Generation, and King Arthur Flour are treating their workers well and proving that American […]

On May 17, 2011, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released a report entitled “Occupational Employment and Wages – May 2010.” This report summarizes the numerical skeleton of the economy we witness when walking through stores or malls. According to the BLS, “retail salespersons and cashiers were the occupations with the highest employment in 2010” […]

Our political impasse remains unchanged. When Republicans hold offices, Democrats grab their popcorn, withhold their talent, time and treasure, and watch the failures as entertainment. When Democrats hold offices, Republicans do the same. The recent congressional budget squabble demonstrated our dysfunction, and the squabbling flared up again once the Congressional Budget Office reported that instead […]

I washed two loads of laundry one weekend while trying to follow the unfolding events in Egypt, Bahrain and Wisconsin. A label on my running shorts – “Made in Egypt” – caught my attention, so I checked the rest of the labels. At the top of one stack, my Nike sweatpants from Pakistan covered underwear […]

Dear young worker: You’re in trouble. Sorry to rain on popular culture’s positive-thinking parade, but reality is composed of facts. Our wealthiest 1 percent already receives about 24 percent of our country’s annual income, but they asked for and received another $700 billion in tax cuts. The Republican Party also claims it can balance the […]