Guarantee Economy

* Book: The Guarantee: Inside the Fight for America's Next Economy. Natalie Foster. 2024

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Description

"AI, the pandemic, and wars have plunged Americans into a constant state of economic anxiety. In my work at @economicsecproj and beyond, I’ve been documenting the growth and explosion of economic guarantees that have the power to level the playing field ... . "The Guarantee: Inside the Fight for America’s Next Economy" makes the case that our government, the government of the wealthiest country on earth, must take responsibility for ensuring that every American’s basic needs are met. We’re talking about fundamental needs like housing, health care, a college education, dignified work, care for elders and children, an inheritance, and an income floor below which no one falls. During the pandemic, we saw glimmers of all of these guarantees: we saw monthly checks to families, a moratorium on evictions and student debt, and the development and distribution of a free vaccine to name a few. Not since The New Deal have we seen such a nimble and far-reaching response from the US government. This policymaking is evidence of a great shift, a sea change, the first real opportunity we’ve had in decades to re-think and re-tool America’s economic policy. This shift is thanks to years of hard work by dedicated change makers, people who have been steadily laying the foundations of a new framework for American economic and social policy I call The Guarantee Economy.

(https://twitter.com/nataliefoster/status/1767681565541409202)

Examples

• @DarrickHamilton's work on economic rights.

• Tara Raghuveer @tararaghuveer, a sociology student at Harvard turned community organizer, whose work with tenants in Kansas City

@KCtenants is foundational to a Homes Guarantee.

• Astra Taylor (@astradisastra) whose improbable trajectory from the Occupy Wall Street protests to advising the White House on the abolition of student debt—her work building @strikedebt is part of the mandate for a College Guarantee.

• Ady Barkan (@beahero), the young father who used his last years on earth battling a grave disease to advocate for a Health Care Guarantee — to ensure that everyone has access to affordable, high-quality health care.

• Michelle Miller (@michelleimiller) the West Virginia native who started @teamcoworker, a platform for workers to organize that has become a key part of the movement for a Good Work Guarantee.

• @MichaelDTubbs and @aisha_nyandoro who are demonstrating the power of the Income Guarantee and whose real world demonstrations paved the way for the expanded Child Tax Credit.