We Can Do Better

In this episode, we talk with Mara Heneghan about something called “Public Pharma,” which can fix our current prescription drug prices.  Mara is director of the Health and Political Economy Project at the New School’s Institute on Race, Power and Political Economy, where she works on health-focused policy and programs. Polling consistently shows a disturbing fact: 4 in every 10 Americans report sk...

This week, we are doing something different from welcoming an outside guest. For our episode on the week of the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, we are going to talk about an article Fran recently published on the website Common Dreams: Reclaiming the Pursuit of Happiness: Let’s Celebrate the Declaration’s 250th by Ending Poverty ( https://www.commondreams.org/o...

In this episode, we talk with Catlin Nchako of the topnotch research and policy institute Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. Catlin and his colleagues are documenting the devastating impact of the Trump/Republican “One Big Beautiful Bill Act.” As Catlin told us, the law has already pushed 3.5 million people off of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) aka Food Stamps program.....

Stephen Semler is a self-described “producer of charts & policy analysis for the working class.” As the author of the newsletter Polygraph and a co-founder of the Security Policy Reform Institute, he is the best there is at explaining how the arms industry has used piles of campaign money to take over U.S. budgets via Congress and Presidential administrations, and the price we all pay for this...

Sister Emily TeKolste is an organizer for NETWORK Advocates and Lobby for Catholic Social Justice, https://www.networkadvocates.org/ and https://networklobby.org/ . Sr. Emily tells us about her journey through activism and service to become a Sister of Providence and organizer for economic justice. Sr. Emily tells us how “giving up billionaires for Lent” is part of the program linking multi-faith...

Devon Gray is the president of End Poverty in California, EPIC, https://endpovertyinca.org/ In this episode, we talk with Devon about EPIC’s work to change the narrative about poverty, focusing on amplifying the voices of workers through its #Listen2Workers campaign. Check EPIC’s website and social media, @EndPovertyCA ,  for direct conversations with fast food workers, child care providers, gig d...