Dean Baker
The Guardian Unlimited, December 3, 2012

Here's a roundup of labor market research reports released over the past two weeks:

Center for American Progress

Workers Deserve Equal Access to Paid Leave and Workplace Flexibility
Sarah Jane Glynn and Jane Farrell

Working Parents’ Lack of Access to Paid Leave and Workplace Flexibility
Sarah Jane Glynn

Latinos Least Likely to Have Paid Leave or Workplace Flexibility
Sarah Jane Glynn and Jane Farrell

Center for Economic Policy and Research

More Good Jobs
Shawn Fremstad

Debt, Deficits, and Demographics: Why We Can Afford the Social Contract
Dean Baker

Demos

State Guaranteed Retirement Accounts
Teresa Ghilarducci, Robert Hiltonsmith, Lauren Schmitz

Retail’s Hidden Potential: How Raising Wages Would Benefit Workers, the Industry and the Overall Economy
Catherine Ruetschlin

CNN and much of the Spanish language press regaled in an apparent “aha!” moment last week when, in an interview with CNN’s Erin Burnett, WikiLeaks’ founder Julian Assange referred to Ecuador as an “insignificant country.” CNN en español immediately report

Today's New York Times has a piece by Steven Erlanger on the "Young, Educated and Jobless in France" that gets most of the facts right, but still might leave its readers with the wrong idea about the real labor-market challenges facing Europe and the Unit

Dean Baker
Truthout, December 3, 2012

Robert Samuelson is angry that President Obama doesn't agree with him that Social Security and Medicare should be cut. Who does Obama think he is, disagreeing with Samuelson and the Serious People?

Just to be clear on the playing field here (Samuelson seems confused), not only does President Obama oppose cuts to these programs, his opponent Governor Romney also argued against cuts to Medicare. And polls consistently show that the vast majority of Republicans, conservatives and even self-identified Tea Party supporters also oppose cuts to Social Security and Medicare. So President Obama is defending a position that has the support of the vast majority of the American people regardless of political or ideological affiliation.

Samuelson gets a lot of other items in his piece wrong as well. When complaining about Social Security and Medicare he tells readers:

"The young will pay more and get less."

Actually, this is not true. Near retirees will have paid in to Social Security at current tax rates through almost their whole working life and will have to wait until age 67 to retire with full benefits. Younger workers will be able to anticipate longer life expectancies which means that they will likely get a slightly better return on average on their Social Security taxes. In terms of return on Medicare, if we care about outcomes, they almost certainly will do better with this program as well. Since Samuelson provides no sources, it is not clear what he thinks he is talking about.

He is also upset that:

"Supporting retirees is now the federal government’s main activity."

To people who not ideologues, this makes sense since the government can provide retirement income and health care benefits far more efficiently than the private sector. Apparently Samuelson wants to waste resources and have slower growth just so he can feel good about having a smaller government.