Are you financially better off when the president is a Republican or Democrat?

According to a new book, Bulls, Bears and the Ballot Box: How the Performance of Our Presidents Has Impacted Your Wallet, the answer is not what is widely believed.

In an analysis spanning 80 years and 13 presidents—from Herbert Hoover to George W. Bush—authors Lew Goldfarb and Bob Deitrick show, in their words,

the GOP theory of Republican economic dominance is no more than a myth. Period.

A new study finds that when states raised the minimum wage in recent recessions, their economies suffered less job loss than those that did not (click on chart at left to expand).

A new project labor agreement (PLA) between Southern California construction unions and NBC Universal for a major redevelopment of the company’s movie and television studios and the Universal City theme park in Los Angeles will create about 13,000 local construction jobs.    

The PLA reached between the Los Angeles/Orange Counties Building and Construction Trades Council and NBC Universal on the 10-year project in the east San Fernando Valley was announced yesterday.

Happy 77th birthday, Social Security. As we celebrate Social Security's anniversary, let’s remember it has never missed a check. Despite Congressman (now vice presidential candidate) Paul Ryan's claim it’s “going broke,” Social Security has a $2.7 trillion surplus (going broke, really?) and is financially sound, despite the recession, high unemployment and stagnation of workers' income across the board. It has provided insurance against loss of wages for seniors and people with disabilities and pays out benefits in the form of survivor benefits to children who lose a working parent. 

This is a cross-post from The Huffington Post by Stan Sorscher, labor representative for the Society of Professional Engineering Employees in Aerospace/IFPTE Local 2001 (SPEEA/IFPTE).

The other day, I had lunch with an economist I respect and admire. I asked him, what would it take for China to become a modern democracy and build a strong middle class?

OK. I didn't ask him that. I told him that China would need strong institutions of civil society and a deeper sense of a social contract to become a stable modern democracy with a dynamic middle class.

Do you believe that unions and union members are too often ignored or wrongly portrayed when the media reports on the economy, business and jobs? Now you have the chance to change that and add a union member’s voice and perspective to the news. The folks who produce public radio's Marketplace want to hear from you.

How would you like a 100 percent boost in wages?

If you’re in the top 1/1000th of the U.S. income earners, you already got one. Since 1980, a household making $1.5 million in 2010 has received a pay increase of more than 100 percent, after adjusting for inflation, according to New York Times reporter David Leonhardt (click on chart at left to expand).

Leonhardt points to inequality and a long-term slowdown in the economy as behind the nation’s current woes. This economic slowdown began after the 2001 recession, which never had a strong recovery.

Republicans in Congress and the Beltway pundits who parrot them like to say the nation's unemployment crisis is in large part due to workers' lack of skills.

Once again, a new report shows they are wrong.

Data out yesterday show that although the number of jobs is increasing, there still are far fewer jobs per worker available.

This month marks the end of the federal extended unemployment insurance benefits program for 35 states with the nation’s highest jobless rates. More than half a million long-term jobless workers have lost their unemployment lifeline. Chad Stone of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP) says:

As we’ve explained previously, EB [extended benefits] will no longer be available in any state, not because most states’ economies have improved to anywhere near pre-recession conditions, but because they have not significantly deteriorated in the past three years.

With less than 100 days until the election, campaign finance is a topic that everybody in Washington, D.C., and on TV is talking about. Yet according to a recent poll by the Washington Post and the Pew Research Center, most Americans are unfamiliar with outside campaign spending and don’t know important terms and concepts.