Check out an illuminating New Yorker commentary about the success of government programs providing homes for homeless people. Many policy approaches to homelessness assume that society should help homeless people get other aspects of their lives in order before they transition to permanent housing. That’s the wrong order, argues the New Yorker’s James Surowiecki, with […]
Author Archives: Scott Michelman
Both funny and depressing. Either way, worth a watch (about 10 minutes) to learn about our elected leaders' relationship to science.
The Reporters' Committee for Freedom of the Press and eight news organizations submitted comments to that effect to the CFPB. The comments specifically ask the agency to abandon a proposal to disclose complaints only when the author "opts in" to having the complaints shared. "The relationship between consumers and financial institutions remains a topic of […]
This article in the Federal Times from Ruth Y. Goldway, Chair of the Postal Regulatory Commission, argues that her agency's program of having a designated public representative explicitly representing the public interest in the agency decisionmaking process improves outcomes. As Goldway explains: [T]he public representatives identify and discuss issues that would not otherwise be fully […]
The Washington Post offers this encouraging story from the Pacific Northwest, where a Seattle suburb's decision to raise the minimum wage has not caused the disruption that opponents predicted. And NPR's Planet Money has this story about a shopping mall on the boundary between two California cities with different wage laws; businesses and workers have […]
Following in the footsteps of California's new law barring the use of non-disparagement clauses and providing a private cause of action for seeking or threatening to enforce one, today Reps. Eric Swalwell and Brad Sherman (both of California) introduced in Congress the "Consumer Review Freedom Act" that would render non-disparagement clauses unenforceable nationwide. The text […]
As we have discussed, last week California passed a law barring the use of non-disparagement clauses and providing a private cause of action for seeking or threatening to enforce one, or for "otherwise penaliz[ing] a consumer for making any statement protected under this section" (that is, a statement "regarding the seller or lessor or its […]
…asks this Harvard Magazine review of The Social Machine: Designs for Living Online, by Judith Donath. The review explains: One of [Donath's] goals is to help readers recognize possibilities between real names and online anonymity. She believes pseudonyms could provide more information, not less. “We can simultaneously have a rich impression of others and privacy,” […]
by Ted Mermin (Executive Director, Public Good Law Center), guest blogger As Scott Michelman's earlier post explained, the new California law barring nondisparagement clauses in consumer contracts promises to restrain a pernicious practice before it spreads widely. That in itself is a significant victory well worth celebrating. But here's hoping (and suggesting) that the new law also serve as […]
Watch here, laugh and enjoy. (And learn.) (Note to sensitive readers: in addition to some profanity, there's a rather detailed — but hilarious — digression regarding President Lyndon Johnson's difficulty fitting his private parts into his pants.) (Note to history buffs: this is worth watching for the LBJ bit alone.)