Mike Alberti

Mike Alberti has worked for Remapping Debate since its launch. He has been our chief correspondent, and is currently a senior contributing reporter.  Mike graduated with a B.A. in English from Vassar College in 2009. He has previously contributed to The Colorado Springs Independent, The Independent Weekly in Durham, N.C., and The Weekly Beat in Poughkeepsie, N.Y. He is originally from Albuquerque, N.M.

ma@remappingdebate.org
Life getting shorter for women in hundreds of U.S. counties
Original Reporting | By Mike Alberti | Gender equity, Health
New study shows shocking, regionally focused departure from upward trend in life expectancy in period from 1987 to 2007. The new trend is the largest decline in life expectancy in the U.S. since the flu pandemic of 1918, but it is unique in that it is not the result of a specific disease. More
If only tech solved things like it used to
Original Reporting | By Mike Alberti | Economy, Income inequality, Labor
Won't technological gains eventually supplant short-term worker pain with broadly shared prosperity as was once reliably the case? Actually, many say, there is no more common or dangerous mistake than taking a past pattern and projecting it into the future regardless of changing external factors. The impact of tech gains is largely contingent on policy choices regarding how benefits from those gains are distributed and what adaptations are made to remedy tech-driven dislocations. More
Should universal care advocates bite their tongues on single-payer?
Original Reporting | By Mike Alberti | Health care
In the year since the passage of the Affordable Care Act, there has been a resurgence of interest in moving the United States into a single-payer model for health insurance, both to contain costs and to increase quality and access to care. But some groups — like AARP, the nation’s largest organization representing seniors — have not joined the fray, because they believe that by supporting measures that go above and beyond health care reform, they will effectively be undermining it. According to advocates who continue to press for a single-payer system, however, the acquiescence of those sympathetic to pro-access arguments has had a significant impact on narrowing the debate over how the health care system in the U.S. should work — and on moving the center of gravity of that debate further to the right. More
Are the new jobs good jobs? Well, we're not sure…
Original Reporting | By Mike Alberti | Employment, Income inequality
As employment begins to pick up, many wonder whether the new jobs being created pay as well as the old ones, a question economists say is vital for understanding the condition of the labor market. But, oddly enough, the Bureau of Labor Statistics does not track the occupational wages of new hires. Without that data, a variety of policy decisions are being made in the dark. More
Layoffs of 4,000 teachers a better choice than minor increase in tax rate for wealthier New Yorkers?
Original Reporting | By Mike Alberti | Education, NYC
New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg has painted his decision to fire more than 4,000 teachers as the only budgetary course open to him, but it turns out that an increase of less than one-half of one percent on the income tax rate paid by wealthier New Yorkers would raise more revenue than the Mayor's budget saves by firing the teachers. More
Deficit-reduction advocates assess proper limits of bond market power
Original Reporting | By Mike Alberti | Budget deficit, Markets
In a follow up to last week’s article on the tendency of policy-makers to prioritize the interests of investors over the interests of citizens, Remapping Debate reached out to several economists and other experts who are associated with calls for deficit reduction to get their views on whether and to what extent the bond market needs to be “heeded.” And we ask, “If the fears of higher interest rates or a debt crisis are rooted in the prospect that capital will flee from U.S. Treasury bonds, are those fears constraining the policy decisions available to elected officials? And are there ways to mitigate that danger without running the risk of compromising the interests of the public?” More
S&P: do what we want and no one gets hurt
Original Reporting | By Mike Alberti | Budget deficit, Markets
In the wake of a recent warning by Standard and Poor’s that the failure to rein in the federal deficit puts U.S. creditworthiness at risk, several economists and social scientists are wondering whether the issue of “how well are we reassuring markets” has completely trumped the issue of “how well are we serving the interests of our citizens.” If so, they ask, can political decision making in the U.S. fairly be characterized as “democratic” at all? More
GOP advances in attempts to "repeal" climate science
Story Repair | By Mike Alberti | Environment
Votes in both houses of Congress last week demonstrate strong support for the denial of climate science, despite the sweeping scientific consensus that supports it. While some Republicans have been frank about denying the science, many other Republicans (and some Democrats) attempted to frame the votes to amend the Clean Air Act and strip the Environmental Protection Agency of its authority to regulate greenhouse gases as responses to EPA “overreaching.” In fact, the charge of overreaching appears to be largely an attempt to obscure the fact that some members of Congress are unhappy that EPA went ahead and used the authority the Supreme Court has confirmed that the Agency possesses. The charge also diverts attention from the decision made by some members of Congress that action on climate change is less important than protecting the short-term interests of local industries. More

Pages