A year in a West Virginia juvenile facility costs more than $80,000 per child, compared with $1,000 to $33,000 per child in community programs that have reduced recidivism by up to 20 percent in other states.
There are some big winners here, but they're not the kids, nor society at large.
The big story here, to me, is the increasing power of fewer and fewer people. That's to be feared.
More to the point of the article, though, I believe this can be largely explained by affinity effects. You trust people like you. The upper class closes rank, leaving the lower and middle classes to help each other out:
Since 2009, a rising economic tide has mainly lifted yachts. During the recovery, the gap between the rich and the poor has widened. Both in terms of incomes and wealth, the rich got richer. Meanwhile, the poor and middle class either saw their earnings and wealth stagnate or fall off.
And yet amidst all that, something odd happened. Even during the downturn and recovery, the poorest Americans upped their charitable giving. Meanwhile, the highest-income people gave less and less, the Chronicle of Philanthropy reported this week.
Documentary waiting to be made: cronyism, a deal for a few hundred unmarked silencers inflated from $10k to $1.6M, and a reticent judge. Secrecy concerns meets corruption in the national security state.
Each February, we hold up civil-rights heroes and the black innovators and writers and artists who have made so much possible for this generation. We say, look at what the best of us have achieved. We conjure W. E. B. Du Bois, who once wrote, “The Negro race, like all races, is going to be saved by its exceptional men.” We ask much of our exceptional men and women. We must be exceptional if we are to be anything at all.
...
Before, since, and during Du Bois’s time, the “Negro” has been a problem demanding a solution. Historically we are, of course, quick to neglect examining how this problem began. We are, it seems, still looking for that solution even as some declare the United States is embarking upon a post-racial era. We forget that we should not only measure black progress by the most visibly successful among us, but also by those who continue to be left behind.
At Al-Azhar University in Cairo, Students Against the Coup organized a march to demand the release of their arrested colleagues and the return to school of those who were expelled last year. The students also protested against the strict policies of the new security company and destroyed its office on campus. Later, police entered the campus, arrested five students and closed several streets in the vicinity.
At Ain Shams University, students protested the long queues at the gates and the new procedures implemented by Falcon, in collaboration with the university’s guards, who closed the doors to Zafarana castle in the middle of campus, as well as the faculties of science and computer science.
At Cairo University, students organized a march that toured campus and chanted against Falcon and military rule, which they said has led to a state of chaos. Falcon security personnel fled the scene and five CSF and Special Forces tankers entered the campus to disperse the protest, arresting several students.
For those who never had any economics or are in high level policy positions, an over-valued dollar has an enormous effect on the balance of trade. If the dollar is over-valued by 20 percent it has roughly the same impact as imposing a 20 percent tariff on all U.S. exports and providing a 20 percent subsidy on imports. There is nothing in policymakers' bag of tricks that can come close to having the same impact on trade as a reduction in the value of the dollar. Anyone who argues otherwise (think of people pushing the TPP or TTIP) are either showing their ignorance or not telling the truth.
President Obama has pledged that he will not put American boots on the ground in order to degrade and destroy the Islamic State. But he has already sent 1000-1500 troops to Baghdad to provide (in the words of a June 30 letter to Congress) “support and security for U.S. personnel and the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad.”
On Thursday, October 16, Governance Studies at Brookings will host FBI Director James Comey for a discussion of the impact of technology on the work of law enforcement. Law enforcement officials worry that the explosion in the volume and the means by which we all communicate threatens its access to the evidence it needs to investigate and prosecute crime and to prevent acts of terrorism.