04/16/2012
Hence, to revolutionize public education, which is largely under state and local jurisdiction, reformers must get state and local governments to adopt their agenda as basic policy; they must counter the teachers’ unions’ political clout. To this end, ed reformers are shifting major resources—staff and money—into state and local campaigns for candidates and legislation.
04/12/2012
In this guest blog post, historian Molly Michelmore considers why the Internal Revenue Code came to be so baffling. Her answers may surprise you.
04/03/2012
Beyond the Resource Curse Edited by Brenda Shaffer and Taleh Ziyadov 512 pages | 6 x 9 Cloth 2012 | ISBN 978-0-8122-4400-7 | $69.95 | £45.50 "Beyond the Resource Curse… READ MORE
03/16/2012
A new CNN report on California's history of forced sterilizations includes an interview with Christina Cogdell, author of Eugenic Design: Streamlining America in the 1930s. According to the report, in… READ MORE
03/08/2012
Lucretia Coffin Mott’s record of leadership in the women’s movement and in transatlantic abolitionism make her an ideal figure to remember on International Women’s day, even though Mott has long… READ MORE
02/14/2012
Congratulations to Robert Darnton and Teofilo F. Ruiz, Penn Press authors and 2011 National Humanities Medalists. The National Endowment for the Humanities created the National Humanities Medal to honor "individuals… READ MORE
01/31/2012
Mitchell Silber, author of The Al Qaeda Factor: Plots Against the West and Director of Intelligence Analysis for the New York Police Department, was a guest on yesterday's episode of… READ MORE
01/25/2012
On Sunday, the anniversary of the Roe vs. Wade decision, U.S. Representative Michele Bachmann made her first public appearance since pulling out of the presidential race on January 4. At a protest against abortion at the Minnesota State Capitol, the conservative congresswoman was in her element as she rallied the faithful.
Bachmann’s last-place finish in the Iowa caucuses and subsequent withdrawal from the presidential running had undoubtedly disappointed that audience.
Outside of those circles, many observers viewed Bachmann’s candidacy as a manifestation of our collective political dysfunction. Yet any relief at her poor showing needs to be tempered by caution.
01/05/2012
It may seem, then, that the Recourse Rule offers us no lessons. It failed only because of unavoidable human ignorance. The regulators did not anticipate a nationwide housing bubble. Prescience about the bubble was rare, and nobody can be blamed for lack of omniscience. Testifying before the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, former FDIC Chair Sheila Bair expressed regret for the Recourse Rule and admitted that regulators had not understood the risks. Neither had most investors.
However, the danger of a fallible regulator is much greater than the danger of a fallible investor.
A prudent response to our fallibility is to spread our bets. The Recourse Rule contradicted this principle by encouraging all banks to invest in one category of “safe” assets. Herd behavior is always a danger in markets, but this particular herd was corralled by the regulators.
12/22/2011
My Storm: Managing the Recovery of New Orleans in the Wake of Katrina Edward J. Blakely. Foreword by Henry Cisneros 208 pages | 6 x 9 | 8 illus. Cloth… READ MORE
