LABOR, ECONOMY & THE CLIMATE - page 6

The Supreme Court heard arguments on Tuesday in a case that could shield non-heterosexual Americans from discrimination in the marketplace. Justices listened to opening proceedings in Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission. At hand, is whether a baker in Colorado can be penalized for refusing to make a wedding cake for a same sex couple. Earlier this week, Justices showed an interest in pumping the brakes on civil rights. On Monday, the majority-conservative body declined to take up a case out of Houston that… Keep Reading

Congressional Republicans are hoping to avert an impending government shutdown this week, with Washington engrossed in tax reform. The House Rules Committee is scheduled to meet on Tuesday afternoon to set the terms of debate over a bill that would fund the government for two weeks. The United States government runs out of short-term funding on Friday. The committee vote is set to come one day after the House is expected to advance a watershed tax reform plan. Early Saturday morning, Senate Republicans approved of… Keep Reading

Senate Republicans’ $1.4 trillion tax bill was narrowly passed out of the Budget Committee in a party-line vote, clearing its final hurdle before what will likely be contentious consideration in the full upper chamber. As with its passage earlier this month out of the Senate Finance Committee, the legislation was approved by the budget panel on Tuesday in a 12-11 vote, without first holding a hearing on its impact. The committee’s ranking member, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) lashed out at the hastiness with which the bill… Keep Reading

A Republican member of the National Labor Relations Board revealed the names of more than a hundred more former clients and committed to recusing himself from matters they might have before his agency. William Emanuel disclosed a more complete list of firms who employed his legal services in the past two years, after prodding from Democratic Senators. Before his appointment to the NLRB, Emanuel worked as a partner for Littler Mendelson, a law firm that specializes in union-busting consultancy. The lawmakers had noted that while… Keep Reading

One block west of the White House, the Trump administration is currently engaged in a battle with federal officials resisting a Republican attempt to undermine the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Meanwhile, a few blocks West on Pennsylvania avenue, the President is getting a helping hand from Democrats on Capitol Hill. Though the temporary appointment of Mick Mulvaney signals doom for the CFPB (the top White House economic aide has described the watchdog agency as “a sick, sad joke”), legislation, with liberal support, could do much… Keep Reading

Medical providers that offered suboptimal care and, sometimes, abuse to veterans were often never reported to agencies charged with overseeing their practices. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) issued an audit of the Veterans Health Administration (VHA) on Monday, revealing procedural failures that allowed health care practitioners to continue seeing patients, despite being accused of serious wrongdoing. Concluding that veterans may be “at increased risk of receiving unsafe care,” the report calls into question the management of the nearly 40,000 doctors and nurses that staff Department of… Keep Reading

Records on roughly one percent of outstanding auto loans in the United States were plagued last year by inaccuracies caused by a software company’s negligence. Source code used by Conduent Business Services was buggy for years and the company knew it, according to details of a consent order released Monday by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. The CFPB said that Conduent data last year alone was off for “over one million of the more-than 6.4 million consumer accounts” that the company oversees. Bureau officials noted… Keep Reading

A massive overhaul of the US tax code that showers benefits on business owners and high income earners passed out of the House of Representatives on Thursday. The measure was approved mostly along party lines in a 227-205 vote, shortly after President Donald Trump arrived on Capitol Hill for a meeting with Republican lawmakers. Not a single Democrat supported the bill. Thirteen Republicans voted against it. During debate over the legislation, Democratic House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) accused her colleagues on the other side of… Keep Reading

A Republican lawmaker defended the lack of a federal prohibition on usury by citing economic problems in East Germany before its 1989 collapse. Rep. Warren Davidson (R-Ohio) was attacking a proposal to cap consumer interest rates in the United States at 36 percent. The legislation was introduced during a House Financial Services Committee meeting on Wednesday by Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), the ranking Democrat on the panel. “That’s what they experienced on the other side of this [Berlin] Wall that had held them captive behind… Keep Reading

Senate Democrats are on the verge of helping Congressional Republicans scale back key banking regulations signed into law after last decade’s massive financial crisis Moderate liberals on the Senate Banking Committee are working with Chair Mike Crapo (R-Idaho) to hash out a proposal that would relax rules on speculation and oversight of some of the country’s largest banks. Bloomberg reported on Tuesday that Sens. Jon Tester (D-Mont.), Joe Donnelly (D-Ind.), and Heidi Heitkamp (D-N.D.) are at the heart of efforts to revise the framework established… Keep Reading