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Beyond
Neoliberalism
On Wednesday, January 15, the
Roosevelt Institute will lead an event dedicated to moving beyond
neoliberalism and building an affirmative alternate vision rooted in
progressive ideas, rules, and institutions. Highlighting two
forthcoming Roosevelt reports focused on the empirical failures of
neoliberalism and emerging alternatives, the Washington, DC,
conference will feature a panel discussion including:
- Roosevelt President & CEO
Felicia Wong
- Roosevelt Fellow Mike
Konczal
-
New York Times opinion columnist Jamelle
Bouie
- Wellesley College historian
Quinn Slobodian
- Omidyar Network principal Joelle
Gamble
Reserve
your spot today.
 A Progressive Framework for Free
College
It’s not always clear what we mean
when we say “free college.” In a new report, Suzanne Kahn—deputy
director of the Great Democracy Initiative and a Roosevelt Institute
expert on education initiatives—cuts through the noise, proposing a
progressive values framework and examining policy design choices
beyond budgeting. “Political realities and fiscal concerns will
inevitably influence the debate about free college. But by grounding
themselves in a clear framework, policymakers can ensure that those
factors influence a free college plan without compromising its core
purpose.” Read
more.
- Why this
matters: “Against the backdrop of a $1.6 trillion student
debt crisis and declining
college enrollment, free college has emerged as a
political lightning rod in today’s higher education
debate. Questions
about who should and will benefit—and what ‘free’
even means—have created a free-for-whom free-for-all, with proposals
varying both by student and institutional access,” writes Roosevelt
Editorial Manager Matt Hughes. “To evaluate these policies, and the
profound impact they’re likely to have on racial
and wealth inequality and economic and democratic
access, we need a values framework.” Read
on.
 New Ideas for Free
College
In crafting
free college plans, policymakers have much to learn from the current landscape of
public good provision in the US. In a second report, Kahn surveys
design models across the policy spectrum—including Medicaid, K–12, and
the postal mail service—and explores how components of each might be
applied to higher education policy. “Existing US social programs offer
many valuable ideas for how to provide broad access to public goods
while addressing a wide range of issues that have surfaced in the free
college debate—from credentialization to the future of historically
Black colleges and universities (HBCUs). Ultimately, the design
choices about which pieces of each model to use in the case of higher
education come down to questions of values and intent.”
Read
more.
 The Application
Barrier
Even applying for college can be
difficult, as Roosevelt Fellow Mehrsa Baradaran and high school senior
Kayla Sasser explain in a segment on NPR’s Weekend Edition. “Admissions fees, just tuition, room and
board, access—you have two different Americas essentially, right?”
Baradaran says. “You've got people who are very connected. And you
have people who are not connected. And I think there's just whole
swaths of the country that don't have access to this stuff. And this
is the class issue. It's a geography issue. But it also has to do with
race.” Listen
here.
 The
Failure of
Trumponomics
In a piece for CNN Business
Perspectives, Roosevelt Fellow Michael Linden argues why President
Trump’s Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 has been an economic flop: “The
idea that tax cuts aimed at corporations and the rich would bestow
economic gifts on all of us is flawed. Because that's not how the
economy works in real life. Corporations don't make investment
decisions based on tax giveaways. And wages don't automatically
increase with tax cuts or with productivity improvements.”
Read
on.
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