Real-World Economics Review

The favorite bogeyman of the Right, Social Security insolvency, is rearing its ugly head once again. Obama's deficit commission has been told that no solution is off the table, and Dean Baker notes it wouldn't be the first time that a Democratic administration went forward with plans that a Republican couldn't sell to the American people. Baker joins us via Skype to remind us once again that Social Security is solvent for many years, and that there are simple fixes for it if there are...

"...Obama's two lead appointees, his co-chairs, are both on record saying they want to cut Social Security. This should have people very very worried. That isn't a balanced commission." Economist Dean Baker interviewed on Democracy Now, 19 July 2010 For the rest of the interview, go to http://www.democracynow.org/blog/2010/7/19/part_ii_social_security_under_attack_cuts_proposed_higher_retirement_age_suggested More from Dean Baker:...

President Doug Holtz-Eakin and Dean Baker on Bloomberg July 16th talk with Peter Cook about the potential expiration of tax cuts enacted in 2001 and 2003.

What is happening in Toronto? What is happening to financial reform? And what is going to happen to the many people who won't get their unemployment benefits extended? Dean Baker, co-director for the Center on Economic Policy Research, clears some of the questions and claims that economic changes are a mixed bag. Perhaps these changes brought positive things such as greater transparency, but this hardly negates rampant inequality or a problematic lack of change in how Wall Street operates...

Joining Laura Flanders on The Nation on Grit TV, Dean Baker, co-director of the Center on Economic Policy Research, says that though Obama's financial reforms may ultimately result in greater transparency in the way banks and big corporations do business, the changes will do little to combat rampant economic inequality and unemployment. What is sorely needed, Baker argues, is a fundamental change in the way Wall Street operates. Dean Baker is part of a Nation forum on inequality to be...

CEPR Co-Director Dean Baker discussing and signing copies of his latest book, Taking Economics Seriously, at the Politics and Prose bookstore in Washington, D.C. on June 23, 2010.

Dean Baker discusses his book, "Taking Economics Seriously," and focuses on Health Care systems.

Among the crowded ranks of economists and market watchers, Dean Baker stands out. Baker presciently called the housing bubble when he published The Run-up in Home Prices: Is It Real or Is It Another Bubble? in 2002. So does our guest Baker see the so-called housing recovery now? "No. I mean I think people that are saying that just aren't paying attention to what's in front of their eyes," says Baker, an American economist and co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research....

PFC Baker is a wounded warrior at the WTU in Fort Lewis, WA and is a big supporter of Operation Ward 57. Operation Ward 57 is a non-profit organization dedicated to supporting wounded soldiers, their families, and those who aid in their recovery. To learn more about Operation Ward 57 go to http://www.operationward57.org

The big economic news this morning was that 16 countries that use the euro and the International Monetary Fund have agreed to create a nearly $1 trillion rescue fund to support the euro and keep the problems in Greece from spreading. Here in the U.S., the Dow might be climbing, but people are still struggling to find employment and recovery, Dean Baker reminds us, is still a long way off. Meanwhile, the people who created the crisis are trying to use the deficits they caused to force cuts...