UnfairNation

UnfairNation the PodcastSeason 2 | Episode 6 Making movies is hard work … that increasingly doesn’t pay enough. The last few years have seemed like the golden age of entertainment. There’s been more shows to watch than people to watch them and more ways of watching your favorite shows than ever before. But while this era of “Peak Entertainment” has provided tremendous opportunities, the profits fr...

Does documenting the police help make them better? We are a violent country by almost all measures, including the number of citizens in the United States who are assaulted or die at the hands of police.  In this episode, I’m talking to someone who is looking to end police brutality by shedding light on how the Los Angeles Police Department responds to calls. My guest William Gude has been running...

This episode continues our conversation about why running for public office is important, but it is a little different - it’s a recording of a live conversation I had with Amy McGrath, who ran for both the U.S. House of Representatives and then for the Senate against Mitch McConnell. This episode also contains an introduction from former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa. As you’ll learn, Amy...

It’s been a while since I recorded an episode, so apologies for that, but I think you’re going to like the changes we’ve made over the last few months. First, I’m making episodes a little shorter - just the right length to listen to on a three mile run, and because this podcast is a great cure for insomnia, you can also use it to knock out at night. Second, we’re now recording UnfairNation at Ariz...

To proponents of defunding the police Arif AliKhan says that police departments as functional units still have a unique role to play in our society. To those who defend the police at all costs he says that the police need to be reformed, perhaps significantly. This is a balanced and pragmatic approach that may find limited traction in our current times. But it comes from a place of deep experience...

We're back from a bit of a break and informally starting a new season!  The decline of worker power over the last four decades has been fundamental and transformational according to my guest Anna Stansbury, a Ph. D. candidate at Harvard University. She argues that the long-term decline in worker power may have been caused by a number of related trends, including a decline in labor unions and ruthl...

Hey! We're trying something different here while we take a bit of a break: answering your questions! If this resonates with you, we'd love to answer more of your questions. You can ask them on Twitter, Facebook or Instagram by tagging your post with #UnfairNation OR you can sign up for Ehsan's newsletter by going to UnfairNation.com and just reply to any newsletter with your questions! Some topics...

We are all waiting for that one, miracle vaccine to be developed so that we can go back to work and so that no more lives have to be lost to COVID. But our guest today explains why the pharmaceutical industry has deeper, older and broader problems - which will affect who ends up getting a COVID vaccine when it comes out and how expensive it will be. Her name is Merith Basey and she's a public heal...

I hope you all are doing well and staying safe. Maybe, if you find it within yourself to do so, you are protesting police brutality, or amplifying the voices of those who are. I hope you are doing something, because a revolution in policing needs to happen, and our nation needs to be on the right side of it. My guest today is going to talk to us today about these protests, as well as health inequi...

Today's episode is a story about a hospital across the bay from one of the wealthiest neighborhoods on the planet and why, despite all that money, it couldn't afford to stay open. The heroic effort to keep this hospital open has chilling lessons for all of us, especially today as Americans become increasingly sick and die from COVID. The story comes to us from my guest Eric Zell. Eric is a consult...

We‘ve always been able to buy a first-class upgrade on a flight, but what happens when you can buy medical care, admissions to elite universities and high-school sports championships? This episode’s guest talks about the rise of this “Velvet Rope Economy” and what it means for the 99% (those of us making less than several million a year). His name is Nelson Schwartz and he’s an award-winning econo...

Militant groups, domestic terrorists and white supremacists (they play in the same little league division) are all finding that the rise in discrimination and hate crimes against Asian-Americans during the COVID-19 pandemic is helping their cause. In fact, they are capitalizing on the hatred. Some are going beyond Asians and blaming their old "go-to" groups such as Jews and Muslims for the virus....

When you hear the word "prepper" what do you think of? Is it someone living in the rural south, a proponent of more gun rights, and distrusting of the federal government? My guest Dr. Anna Maria Bounds wants to disabuse of you that notion. After spending years with the disaster prepper community she learned that they are nothing like that stereotype.  In this episode of UnfairNation, Dr. Bounds di...

Everyone's heard of 3-D printing, but not everyone has printed something ... in 3-D themselves. My guest Gabriel Krieshok thinks that they can, even without owning a 3-D printer. In another "remote episode" (since we have no other choice BUT to be remote) we talk with him about what 3-D printing is and how anyone can get started printing their own models and objects. We also discuss how communitie...

The Coronavirus has come and like you, we are also at home socially distancing ourselves from the rest of humanity. That's why this is our first "remote" podcast with former police officer and current professor, Tom Nolan. We've had to make do with a somewhat patchy online connection but all of Tom's excellent thoughts on race, policing and crime in low-income neighborhoods still come through clea...

The holidays are over, as are most hotel stays. But even though January is a slow month for hotels, our podcast keeps chugging along! We've brought Ari Greenberg into the studio this episode to talk about hotels, home-sharing services like AirBnB and the brewing conflict between them. We also discuss how people have chosen to respond to growing AirBnB rentals in their neighborhoods and what, if an...

Qudsiya Naqui is an attorney in Washington D.C. specializing in immigration policy and access to justice. She was born with leber congenital amaurosis, a degenerative condition that affects the retina and worsens with age. In this episode Qudsiya shares the story of how she lost her vision and learned to not only live in the world around her, but begin to demand changes to make the world conform t...

Two-day delivery is not "free". All that #BlackFriday convenience is coming at the expense of worker safety. Two stunning stories this week revealed that not only are Amazon warehouses dangerous places to work, but that Amazon dodged workplace safety regulations for years. In this inaugural episode of UnfairNation I interview Kimberly Bernhard, a brilliant student I worked with at the Internationa...