Hillary Readies Platform
Hillary Clinton toiling over an economic platform and message. NYT: "...she is expected to embrace several principles. They include standard Democratic initiatives like raising the minimum wage, investing in infrastructure, closing corporate tax loopholes and cutting taxes for the middle class. Other ideas are newer, such as providing incentives to corporations to increase profit-sharing with employees and changing labor laws to give workers more collective bargaining power ... Behind many of these proposals is a philosophy ... inclusive capitalism, that contends that a majority of Americans do not want to punish the rich; they just want to feel that they, too, have a chance to succeed."
Rich hoarding money in stock buybacks, argues Nick Hanauer in The Atlantic: "...despite this extra $1 trillion a year in corporate profits ... our nation can no longer seem to afford even its most basic needs ... Where did all this money go? ... stock buybacks—more than $6.9 trillion of them since 2004 ... these buybacks drain trillions of dollars of windfall profits out of the real economy and into a paper-asset bubble..."
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HuffPost's Robert Kuttner lays out what could throttle the recovery: "The first danger is increased pressure on the Federal Reserve to raise interest rates to fend off (still imaginary) inflation ... Critics of low interest rates cite the risk of more financial bubbles ...If you want to discourage bubbles, how about proper regulation of Wall Street?"
CFPB preparing to crack down on payday lenders. NYT: "The rules are expected to address expensive credit backed by car titles and some installment loans that stretch longer than the traditional two-week payday loan ... The rules, a major initiative for the consumer bureau, will test the mettle of an agency that faces an increasingly skeptical Republican Congress, including some officials who have called for it to be dismantled."
Greece Digs In
"Defiant Greek PM sets up EU clash with bailout rejection" reports Reuters: "In his first major speech to parliament since storming to power last month, Tsipras rattled off a list of moves to reverse reforms imposed by European and International Monetary Fund lenders: from reinstating pension bonuses and cancelling a property tax to ending mass layoffs and raising the mininum wage back to pre-crisis levels."
Europe doesn't understand debt, argues NYT's Paul Krugman: "... no nation has reduced its ratio of total debt to G.D.P ... You might think our failure to reduce debt ratios shows that we aren’t trying hard enough ... But we have, in fact, had unprecedented austerity ... the situation is not improved if efforts to reduce debt end up pushing the economy into deflation and depression."
Obama Prepares To Veto Keystone
Veto won't be end of debate. The Hill: "Often presidents have vetoed bills simply by issuing a written statement outlining their objections. That’s the route Obama is likely to take on Keystone, given how deeply the legislation divides his own party ... For Keystone opponents, the focus isn't on Obama’s veto — it's on what comes next ... protests to pressure Obama into rejecting the project once when the results of an interagency review process, now in the hands of Secretary of State John Kerry, reach the White House."
Republicans ducking climate rule fight. Politico: "The House GOP plans to steer clear of a showdown over the greenhouse gas rules in a broad energy package that it will unveil this week, raising questions about whether Republicans are grasping for a workable plan to stop the carbon dioxide regulations that EPA will issue later this year."
