The economy may be booming but it doesn’t look that way to those who have student debts. Wages are stagnating and tuition as well as interest rates are also rising. For students still in school or contemplating higher education it adds up to daunting prospects. Jerome Powell the head of the Federal Reserve is beginning to acknowledge student debt as an economic concern. For one thing the total amount of student debt is $1.5 trillion. Indeed when those young people cannot afford (more…)
Governance
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Hail The Caravan
As an immigrant I know what it’s like to leave all you know for the unknown. We had visas, we weren’t penniless, we flew to the US and regardless I felt fear. When you emigrate everything familiar is gone and you don’t know how it will be replaced, nor do you know what will happen next. I heard and read about the caravan from Central America and I can’t help thinking about those courageous people who are willing to walk a couple of thousand miles or more in search of some safety, in search for some opportunities out of assured poverty and violence, in search of better lives for their families. They banded together to avoid the criminals who prey on migrants, (more…)
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The Free Speech of Prisoners
Incarcerated people are usually American citizens—with the exception of the many immigrants detained for lack of visas or other papers—and as American citizens one would expect that they would be subject to the provisions of the Bill of Rights which includes freedom of speech. But that may not necessarily be so. The issue came up when a weekly debate club in Statesville Correctional Center in Crest Hills, Illinois, was suspended without explanation. They had been debating the pros and cons of (more…)