What Families Need to Get By: EPI’s 2015 Family Budget Calculator

The income level necessary for families to secure an adequate but modest living standard is an important economic yardstick. While poverty thresholds help to evaluate what it takes for families to live free of serious economic deprivation, EPI's Family Budget Calculator offers a broader measure of economic welfare.
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'Cadillac tax' could wreck popular medical accounts

The Cadillac tax, set to begin taking effect in 2018, will cap for the first time the open-ended tax break employers receive for providing their workers with health benefits.
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Recession confirmed as Canada's GDP shrank in 2nd quarter

Canada's economy expanded in June but declined by 0.1 per cent for the second quarter as a whole, meeting the bar of what is legally defined as a recession. The economy expanded by 0.5 per cent in June, Statistics Canada said. But that slight monthly uptick wasn't enough to offset the contraction in the previous two months, which means for the second quarter as a whole, the economy shrank.
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From Goats to Luxurious Wraps: Pashmina in Pictures

Let's give a round of applause to the goats! Mind you, they are no ordinary goats. The shaggy, wide-horned beasts produce pashmina, a luxuriant material that can fetch as much as $200,000 for a shawl in Paris boutiques.
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T-Mobile CEO lashes out against 'data thieves'

T-Mobile CEO John Legere says a small fraction of his customers are "stealing data," and he is putting his foot down -- hard. In an open letter to T-Mobile customers with an unusually furious tone, Legere said that some customers are using special software to skirt past T-Mobile's data limits. He said if they continue to abuse the network, they'll be kicked off T-Mobile's unlimited data plans.
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The Death and Life of Atlantic City

Inside the multibillion-dollar casino that was supposed to turn things around. By Nick Paumgarten.
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Escaping the tragedy of the commons through targeted punishment

Failures of cooperation cause many of society's gravest problems. It is well known that cooperation among many players faced with a social dilemma can be maintained thanks to the possibility of punishment, but achieving the initial state of widespread cooperation is often much more difficult. We show here that there exist strategies of ‘targeted punishment’ whereby a small number of punishers can shift a population of defectors into a state of global cooperation. By Samuel Johnson.
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