Now that the Reinhardt-Rogoff deficit scare dream team’s been debunked yet again — and this time over a fundamental assumption in their theses, not a mere spreadsheet error — there is no need to freak out over the deficit, unless it’s to ask why we’re still cutting rich folks’ taxes.

According to a new study by the Federal Reserve, American households have regained less than half of the wealth lost during the recession. While the wealthiest have actually gained since the crash the 99% are still not nearly whole.

The Food Chain Workers Alliance has a goal of nothing less than full rights and fair wages for the 20 million workers who grow, harvest, process, pack, ship, cook, serve, and sell food in the US. Founded in 2009, the Alliance brings together 11 organizations representing workers throughout the food supply chain. It is organizing across sectors, building solidarity between workers in different industries. It is pushing for policy changes and educating and activating consumers so that we can all better align our food purchases with our principles. The Alliance also draws attention to the ways in which institutional racism in the US and around the world has produced a food system reliant on the exploitation of immigrants and people of color.

In What Then Must We Do?, political economy professor Gar Alperovitz slowly and deliberately nudges readers off the traditional course of political activism assumed to bring about progressive change – elections, legislative fights, protest actions, firing the twin engines of grassroots Democratic groups and organized labor – arguing that these methods have failed. He finds readers at that moment of despair, when the best efforts we’ve known to create the space for change have failed. Indeed, he doesn’t believe that these efforts can reverse what is now a decades-long march of structural economic, environmental and political decline. “Absent major national shocks,” he writes, “the capacity for fundamental political change is limited in the American context.”

I used to think that if only America’s political leaders could see the unemployed in the media, and hear their stories they would act. I don’t believe that anymore.

Hoping for change? The evidence now indicates that youth unemployment in America has now surpassed Europe and other developed countries, marking a stark turnaround from previous trends. The United States has become a land of diminishing opportunity for the young.

I came across this story and it took my breath away. Not because any of this is particularly shocking, given the general information about how hard it has been for the long-term unemployed to get work, and the battle over extensions of unemployment benefits. What made me unravel was the prospect that for some of this demographic — and the Baby Boomer bulge falls squarely in here — being seen as that 47% — you know, the leeches on the government that Mittens gleefully cooed about with disdain in the now-infamous undercover video.

What the long-term unemployed — the seasoned workers in their 50s — have been told is that if you just go back to school and brush up your skills, you’re going to be part of the recovery. Well, if you listen to these headhunters, it doesn’t matter how many hours in the gym you put in to stay fit, or how many skills-building classes you take, or how much hair dye/Grecian formula or even Botox you purchase, you all are screwed.

If you think being jobless is tough, try applying for unemployment benefits. In Florida, simply filling out the form requires considerable talent and endurance. According to a recent ruling by the federal Department of Labor, the state’s new online application process is so fraught with arbitrary obstacles that it violates federal civil rights protections.

From the school cafeteria to rural tomato farms, and all the way to pickets at the White House, people are challenging the ways in which government programs benefit big agribusiness to the detriment of small- and mid-sized farmers. Urban gardeners, PTA parents, ranchers, food coops, and a host of others are organizing to make the policies that govern our food and agricultural systems more just, accountable, and transparent. They are spearheading alternative policies on the local, state, national, and international levels.

Don’t you think it’s time to do something about the schools to prison pipeline?