Podcast (attitude): Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: RSS
Part One:
We speak with Kristian Hernandez, reporter for the Center for Public Integrity. He has been researching “copy & paste” legislation, whereby some source (often hidden) drafts “model” legislation on a particular topic, and then gets various state legislators to sponsor verbatim clones of these bills in their own legislatures. We’re all aware of ALEC, the right-wing group which engages in similar tactics. But apparently, there are many smaller groups which operate — under the radar — in specific subject areas.
One such group is called Project Blitz. It is pushing a “model” adoption bill, through which several states have authorized private, religious foster care agencies to discriminate against potential adoptive families based on their religious beliefs. E.g., a Protestant Evangelical agency told a Catholic mother that she would be a perfect mentor for children, but they refused to let her adopt a child because she believed in the wrong religion.
Part Two:
We also talk to Michael Klein, Professor of Economics at Tufts University and the director of EconoFact. We discuss serious employment problems that still exist in the U.S. economy today, 12 years after the Great Recession. The unemployment rate has come down, but that only measures the number of people who are actually looking for a job but can’t find one. Prof. Klein is more worried about the “labor participation rate,” which examines people who are *not even looking* for jobs. There are many reasons why workers might decide to disengage from the labor market, and policy-makers should focus more attention on addressing this growing problem.
