Corporate Responsibility & Accountability

How to Swim Against the Current

Jim Hightower & Susan DeMarco : Economic Policy

People are wriggling free of the fetters of corporate culture.

2007

Rapture Rescue 911: Disaster Response for the Chosen

Naomi Klein : Environment

Gone are the days of equal protection. Intense natural disasters like the California wildfires are being met with a new model: privatized disaster response.
Travails of the Super-Rich

Barbara Ehrenreich : Wages & Hours

Just in time for Labor Day, a new report on the gap between the boss and the average worker is a gleefully malicious attack on the richest CEOs.
Whole Foods CEO Sows Wild Oats

Matthew Blake : Corporate Consolidation

America's favorite natural grocery chain is looking like just another greedy, antiunion corporation.
Blackstone's Bell

Doug Henwood

Is the private equity boom about to go bust?
Hedging Bets

Jordan Stancil : Ethical Economics

Why would anyone trust a hedge fund?
Will Congress Reform Wretched Executive Excess?

Morton Mintz : Ethical Economics

Outrage over excessive rewards for incompetent executives could spark the Democratic Congress to action.

2006

Draining the Gene Pool

Lisa M. Hamilton : Agriculture

A plant gene that could protect organic crops from contamination from genetically engineered seeds is out of reach to most organic farmers, thanks to an agribusiness patent.
Coffee, Tea or Another Airline Merger?

Nicholas von Hoffman

As US Air seeks to create a mega-airline by gobbling up Delta, the evidence mounts that a free market in the sky just doesn't work.
Reform Comes to the Boardroom

Kelly Candaele

Corporate America needs the discipline of democracy to help rid it of some very bad habits. And shareholder activists are pushing the SEC to shore up their rights.
Buffet's Billions

Nicholas von Hoffman : Health Care Policy

What Warren Buffett's gift of billions to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation lacks in imagination, it makes up for in safety. If only they had the guts to tackle the real problems.
Enron Rules Still Apply

: Enron

True reform in the wake of the Enron scandal means tightening the standards of corporate law so that executives who abuse their power are held accountable for their crimes.
Watching What You Say

Tim Shorrock : National Security Administration (NSA)

How are AT&T, Sprint, MCI and other telecommunications giants cooperating with the National Security Agency's warrantless surveillance program?
The End of the Internet?

Jeff Chester : Internet & New Media

Telephone and cable companies are crafting strategies to transform the free and open Internet to a privately run service that would charge a fee for virtually everything we do online. Can we stop them?

2005

Titans of Trash

Heather Rogers : Energy

Gas-guzzling SUVs take a lot of blame, but landfills make stealthy stealthy contributions to climate change. While they should be developing innovative waste disposal strategies, corporate-owned landfills use techniques that generate heat-trapping methane that accelerate global warming.
The Disappearing Flu Vaccine

Nicholas von Hoffman : Medicine/Drugs

Flu vaccine is in short supply this season, and the reason is that drug companies can't make as much money protecting us from disease as from developing expensive treatments for niche illnesses.
On the Wal-Mart Money Trail

Liza Featherstone : Wal-Mart

As the nation's wealthiest family, the Waltons could be a force for social good. But when they choose to spend their fortune lobbying for pet projects, tax cuts and charter schools instead of providing a living wage for their workers, they are dangerous (and costly) to the nation.
Say It Ain't So, Big Leagues

Dave Zirin : Sports

Strip-mining the Dominican Republic for talent, Major League Baseball periodically plucks one lucky boy from his home and family and gives him a dream for a better life. But what happens the other 99 left behind in "baseball factories," still hoping?
Asbestos Liability Scam

William Johnson & Kate Levin : Congress

The Senate will soon consider the Fairness in Asbestos Injury Resolution Act (FAIR) that is anything but for the workers whose health has been impaired by asbestos. It's a move by major corporations to significantly reduce their liability.
Scamming the States

Greg LeRoy : Supreme Court

Companies like Boeing, Dell and Daimler-Chrysler know how to extort tax cuts and subsidies from states eager to keep jobs from fleeing. But taxpayers, community groups and even a Supreme Court review are pushing back on corporate giveaways.
A Devil's Dictionary of Business

Nicholas von Hoffman : White-Collar Crime

Had your fill of spin and flimflam about the greatness of corporate America? Here's the real truth about money, high finance and low, commerce, clever tricks, globalism and globaloney.
How to Curb Corporate Power

Ralph Nader : Corporate Consolidation

As corporations consolidate, they grab power from the public. Here are seven modest proposals to give power back to the public and avoid another Enron.
Sins & the Citi

William Greider : Banks & Banking

Where is the public's outrage over corruption in US finance and banking?
A Big Win for Human Rights

Daphne Eviatar : Law & Justice

Unocal's settlement with Burmese villagers may spur better corporate conduct.
Message in a Bottle

Alexander Cockburn : India

In India, Coca-Cola's plants bring foul water and toxic sludge.
The New Colossus

William Greider : Progressives, Liberals, & The American Left

Why public pension funds might be the real progressive power.