The financial crisis reveals a need for a public credit rating agency that is not in the pay of issuers, according to M. Ahmed Diomande, James Heintz, and Robert Pollin.

This paper provides some empirical evidence on issues raised by the global antisweatshop movement. We first consider the relationship between wage and employment growth, finding no consistent trade-off between them. We then measure the share of labour costs in the production of garments in the...

This report considers a proposal to reinstate the New York stock transfer tax (STT)that was phased out between 1979 and 1981. The proposal under consideration would reinstate the tax at half the rate that prevailed at the time of its repeal. The revenues from such a tax, at around $3.5 billion...

In December 2010, the FAO food price index surpassed its previous peak of June 2008, and prices have been maintained at this high level through September 2011 (i.e. as of this writing). This pattern in food prices is creating justified fears of a renewal or intensification of the global food...

Pollin and Heintz examine the factors contributing to the recent run up in gas prices for consumers. They find that to a significant extent, this is the result of the economy moving out of a deep recession, into a recovery, which has increased the demand for gasoline. But a major additional...

This Research Brief reviews the available recent evidence on trading costs and trading “elasticities” in U.S. financial markets and elsewhere, in order to inform ongoing discussions as to the viability of establishing a financial transaction tax (FTT) for U.S. financial markets....