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Puerto Rico Files for Bankruptcy

AJ Vicens Mother Jones
The Day After Trump Admin Brags About Blocking Funds "They wanted a bailout. We wouldn't give it to them."

From Bad to Worse for Puerto Rico

Joseph E. Stiglitz and Martin Guzman Project Syndicate
The plan by the oversight board for Puerto Rico will depress the economy further and fuel a debt spiral, in which Puerto Ricans, US taxpayers, and in the long run, even the creditors will lose

The Perfect Storm, of Logistics

Sergio Bologna il manifesto
The shipping companies have been transporting goods at a loss. They put too many ships into service and they continued to order increasingly larger ships at. The shipyards competed fiercely for the orders and built the ships at bargain prices, although they are technological jewels. With the increase in freight capacity, freight rates plummeted, volumes grew but the income per unit of freight transported decreased. Then, China slowed exports creating the perfect storm.

Trump Casinos' Tax Debt Was $30 Million. Then Christie Took Office.

Russ Buettner New York Times
But the year after Governor Christie, a Republican, took office, the tone of the litigation shifted. The state entertained settlement offers. And in December 2011, after six years in court, the state agreed to accept just $5 million, roughly 17 cents on the dollar of what auditors said the casinos owed.

books

Our Universities: The Outrageous Reality

Andrew Delbanco New York Review of Books - July 9, 2015 Issue
In higher education, whether as affordable land-grant state colleges, tuition-free municipal universities, grants to children of the poor or need-blind admissions, access to learning was at least prized as a right, not a privilege. As tuition and administration costs soar, the number of low-paid adjuncts explodes and financial aid collapses, college funding shifts from the public purse to student debt. Wither democracy or plutocracy?

Why Chicago Won't Go Bankrupt - And Detroit Didn't Have To

Saqib Bhatti In These Times
Detroit's bankruptcy wasn't inevitable. Neither is Chicago's. But the austerity hawks don't want you to know that...When cities and states borrow money by issuing bonds, the lenders are typically high-wealth individuals, who purchase the bonds to get a tax break. It is a perverse system through which, rather than paying their fair share in taxes, the wealthy are instead able to lend that money to us, charge us interest for it, and then claim a further tax break on it.
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