The Ryan Debt Plan

here are the basics

the plan has drawn praise from The Economist, but scorn from liberal commentators

Krugman thinks the projected unemployment rate is absurd (even more)

Before it was released, Dionne wondered if Obama would stand up for the poor, and now Krugman wonders the same thing

Conservative reaction is more more muted, perhaps because the plan could be risky for Republicans

Obama will address the issue this week, but nobody's quite sure what he'll say

More Poverty Policy Links

This magazine issue includes articles about: physiological stress and the achievement-income gap, poverty and childhood development, and some policies that can combat these problems

Here's the article we discussed in class on Wednesday on the distribution of wealth in the US (it's quite short)

A NYT debate: should we care about rising wealth inequality?

A lot of millionaires don't feel all that rich

Unlike federal income taxes, lower-income workers pay a higher percentage of their income to state taxes than do higher-income workers.  Tennessee has one of the highest ratios.

Paul Krugman writes that we seem to have forgotten about the unemployed in our current political battles

here's a long essay on which kinds of income inequality might matter and which kinds might not

here are a whole bunch of charts on poverty and inequality: some are useful and some are not

here's an interactive graph that explores changes in income inequality over time

Interactive Activities

First, look at this interactive graphic on class mobility in the United States.  To get an estimate of wealth, you can estimate your family's home value here


Then, do this simulation -- it's a bit on the melodramatic side, but will help you think through some of the daily decisions confronted by the working poor: http://playspent.org/

Poverty Policy Links

Over the past 30 years, men have become more likely to earn low wages while women have become less likely

Here's some background (and part 2) on an experiment to pay the poor for certain behaviors ("conditional cash transfers") that had some success in Brazil and Mexico.

Here's an interesting graphic displaying the minimum wage versus the poverty level

Does failing to provide a child with breakfast make a parent negligent?

The US doesn't do very well on some measures of equality and prosperity and, by some measures, may have among the lowest income mobility of any advanced nation, though this differs by race, despite the fact that Americans believe we're among the highest and most equal

Ed Policy Links

-Here's an excellent synopsis of the current situation with NCLB, courtesy of the The Economist.  You should read it.

-The liberal Nick Kristof argues that we must pay teachers more if we ever want to achieve the same results as other countries, where teachers are higher paid and held in higher esteem.  The conservative Mike Petrilli argues that we should actually pay most teachers the same (meaning newer teachers would be paid more and senior teachers less) since teacher usually reach peak effectiveness after about 3-5 years.

-This piece decrying a new policy in Chicago requiring schools to serve breakfast at the beginning of first period (which will, according to the author, waste valuable class time) stands in stark contrast to this recent brief journal article entitled "Why Education Researchers Should Take School Food Seriously" (which discusses research linking nutrition and educational performance).

-Florida has a new law that essentially does away with teacher tenure

Education Policy Links 3-16-11

For many, "teacher quality" is at the heart of the debate over how to improve schools and close the achievement gap.  A number of reforms are being tried in order to recruit, train, and retain better teachers and fire worse teachers -- one of these is a new charter school in NYC that pays its teachers $125K per year (60 Minutes Video).  The Economist cheers many of these recent reforms, while Diane Ravitch is decidedly more skeptical.

Here's a quick summary of a few of the aspects of NCLB that we discussed in class on Monday.  Cheating on tests is another unintended consequence we didn't discuss.

Robert Samuelson points out that Americans actually don't do too poorly on international assessments if we compare by racial sub-group, arguing that we have a larger problem with culture than with schools.

Incentive pay for teachers is popular reform nowadays, but a just-released evaluation of school-based incentive pay found no positive effects.  The first randomized experiment of performance pay in schools found similar results last fall.

Potential Nuclear Crisis in Japan

Here's a primer on the situation.

Here's an interactive diagram of what's happening

Here's some more background on nuclear meltdowns

Here's the conversation that CNN's been referencing on-air

Update: And here's further evidence that this could be a focusing event that results in fewer nuclear power plants in the future: an editorial in the NY Times arguing that we should be cautious about building and maintaining nuclear power plants.

Update (3-21): Here's a summary of the problems with each reactor -- the situation finally seems to be improving, though it's certainly not over