Sandeep Vaheesan @sandeepvaheesan Twitter profile | Pikagi

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

9,204

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Legal director @openmarkets . Fellow @cplusci . Advisory council @PeoplesParity . Book Democracy in Power @UChicagoPress (Dec. 2024). All opinions are my own.

Washington, DC

https://t.co/dtSg60XHPX

Joined February 2014

Don't wanna be here? Send us removal request.

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@sandeepvaheesan

Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

28 days

My book Democracy in Power: A History of Electrification in the United States will be out on December 3. If you are interested in cooperative and public power, economic democracy, climate policy, or the New Deal, consider pre-ordering! @UChicagoPress

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Democracy in Power

Private money, public good, and the original fight for control of America’s energy industry. Until the 1930s, financial interests dominated electrical power in the United States. That changed with...

press.uchicago.edu

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@sandeepvaheesan

Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

5 months

In final rule, FTC bans non-compete clauses for *all* workers!

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

2 years

Canceling $10,000 in student debt while ending the moratorium on loan payments is a good example of bad policy and bad politics

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 years

If you believe unionization is solely about wages and benefits, organizing by Google workers might puzzle you. If you recognize unionization is about injecting democracy into autocratic workplaces, organizing by all workers makes perfect sense.

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Sandeep Vaheesan

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1 year

In hindsight, it is surprising this investigative reporting didn't happen soon after Antonin Scalia's death in 2016 at a wealthy businessman's giant ranch

@GregTSargent

Greg Sargent

1 year

Get ready for this: The best investigative reporters in the country are now going to be digging into the corruption of the Supreme Court, and the whole right apparatus behind the right wing judicial takeover, for many months to come.

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 years

"Fintech" sounds cool. The alternate name--credit and payments with fewer consumer protections and more surveillance--is honest though.

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 months

"Unaccountable bureaucrats" at agencies - Answerable to president, Congress, courts, and (in notice-and-comment rulemakings) public - Subject-matter expertise Nine bureaucrats in robes - Life tenured and effectively accountable to no one - No subject-matter expertise

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

1 year

Just when you think private equity firms cannot be any more socially destructive, you read this

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

6 months

"It seems to me to be equally plain that no business which depends for existence on paying less than living wages to its workers has any right to continue in this country." - FDR

@austinahlman

Austin Ahlman

6 months

Minneapolis’s mayor on the supposedly dangerous precedent set by the ride share ordinance: “Are we now planning to set a minimum wage for every industry?”

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 years

In the 1950s, investor-owned utilities attacked electric co-ops as "socialistic" and launched a propaganda campaign against them in corporate mouthpieces like Reader's Digest. Good illustration of how the Red Scare's true target was the New Deal, not mythical Soviet infiltration.

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 months

Since they are throwing the *sitting* president a desperately needed lifeline, AOC and Sanders should have demanded Biden do things now--most notably end the American-Israeli war on the Palestinians--in return, instead of seeking "promises" to do things in 2025

@JStein_WaPo

Jeff Stein

3 months

Scoop: In WH mtg, Sanders pressed top aides for Biden to outline 100-day agenda for working class - including medical debt forgiveness Sanders & AOC threw Biden huge political lifeline, want progressive agenda at center of campaign See Biden as best chance for their policies --

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Sandeep Vaheesan

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4 years

New Deal state >> neoliberal state

@JamesSurowiecki

James Surowiecki

@JamesSurowiecki

4 years

In 1947, New York City vaccinated 5 million people against smallpox in two weeks. How can we be so much worse at this 75 years later?

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 years

Breaking up Facebook and Google is necessary but that alone is a conservative remedy that preserves their socially destructive methods of moneymaking. Abolishing their basic business model (targeted advertising built on mass surveillance) should be the end goal.

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

5 months

And it makes existing non-competes null and void for everyone except senior executives

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 months

I wish we had more of this innovation and investment and less of the Silicon Valley variety, i.e., figuring out new ways to break laws, spy on us, and waste energy

@hallaboutafrica

James Hall

@hallaboutafrica

3 months

Ready to be unwrapped. Tanzania enters a new age of high-speed rail as service from Dar es Salaam to Morogoro starts Friday, cutting travel time from 4hours to 1hr40 minutes. The new trains in the photo will be used when Dar es Salaam to Dodoma service begins July 25.

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 years

So much of contemporary Silicon Valley innovation is just "appwashing"--presenting predatory business models as socially beneficial because they are offered through an app

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 years

Do neoliberals like this Big Tech lobbyist realize that their fellow neoliberals are responsible for the United States not having adequate state capacity to deliver public services and works?

@AlecStapp

Alec Stapp

4 years

“Can you build a tunnel under a highway in one weekend?” is a good litmus test for state capacity. (The Netherlands passes, the US does not).

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

5 months

A Democrat attacks very reasonable product safety standards using right-wing talking points

@RepMGP

Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez

5 months

A new rule mandating finger-detection technology in table saws could raise costs by hundreds of dollars and result in a government-mandated monopoly. I introduced a bipartisan bill to protect consumer choice and block this mandate until the patents for this tech are made public.

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

1 month

Social priorities China: Hit renewable energy capacity target six years early United States: Waste lots of energy to power copyright infringement machines that produce bad art

@edzitron

Ed Zitron

1 month

Microsoft has spent twice as much in Capex on generative AI in the last quarter than Chinese's biggest tech firms have in the last six months *combined.* This shit is so stupid. I want it to stop. It's so wasteful.

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3 years

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

2 years

Airline executives making $30 million a year should be able to anticipate and plan for things like Chicago and Denver are cold and snowy in December

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 years

Imagine being horrified by the prospect of spending more money on things that make life better for people everywhere and less on things designed to kill people outside the U.S. . . .

@NikkiHaley

Nikki Haley

4 years

Time to face the harsh reality, socialist Bernie Sanders will become the chairman of the Sen Budget Committee. He has vowed to use his position to enact his progressive agenda on healthcare, climate, infrastructure spending, & cutting defense spending. @standamericanow

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 years

Mainstream economists are eternally afraid of a small risk of 5% annual inflation but are conspicuously silent about the 10,000% overnight increase in wholesale electricity prices in Texas last week

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 years

A revealing fact about the antitrust community: Many scholars and previously even the FTC were convinced that Uber had succeeded exclusively due to its app, instead of primarily through its large-scale lawbreaking and predatory pricing

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 months

U.S. Chamber of Commerce official: Because some workers have exceptional tolerance for high temperatures, the federal government should continue to let people unnecessarily suffer and die on the job from extreme heat

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 years

Instead of recognizing that Jeff Bezos' wealth is the result of legal entitlements that allow him to run Amazon and control many markets, mainstream economists believe he is millions of times more productive than the average person is

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 years

On many issues, centrist wonks favor the solution that is both bad policy and bad politics

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 months

FDR in March 1937

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 months

Elite liberal lawyers deserve a lot of blame for telling the public for years that the Supreme Court is a basically decent and honorable institution. But this term's decisions were merely a culmination of what the Court has been doing since the 1970s--re-empowering oligarchy.

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 years

I still can't quite believe that the Department of Justice did not sue a single monopolist between 1999 and Oct 2020 (the Google case)

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 years

The Obama administration, in which Summers served, showed similar hostility to aiding distressed homeowners, while extending unlimited public support for big banks

@LHSummers

Lawrence H. Summers

4 years

To those who say $2,000 checks not optimal, but better than nothing: what is limiting principle? How about $10,000 checks? More? Hard to justify support for near-universal giveaways when income losses fully replaced, w/ no liquidity problem for most.

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 years

During his time in the Obama administration, Larry Summers expressed this extremely right-wing view (and kept his job) “One of the reasons that inequality has probably gone up in our society is that people are being treated closer to the way that they’re supposed to be treated.”

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 months

Fingers crossed we are on the verge of federal action against what appears to be one of the most harmful price-fixing schemes: third-party assisted collusion among landlords in cities across the country

@KhushitaVasant

Khushita Vasant

@KhushitaVasant

4 months

SCOOP: DOJ’s #antitrust investigation into algorithmic price-fixing into rental housing market deepens with a dawn raid on a property management company ⁦ @JusticeATR ⁩ #cartel

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Sandeep Vaheesan

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18 days

The "sea of evidence" in which we are supposedly drowning: "We found the average upzoning would result in a 0.8% increase in housing supply in the short to medium term after the change, three to nine years after the upzoning." This was a meta-study btw.

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Yonah Freemark: An interview about land use and zoning

Yonah Freemark is the research director of the Land Use Lab at the Urban Institute. His research focuses on the intersection of land use, affordable housing, transportation, and governance. He has...

triangleblogblog.com

@JeremiahDJohns

Jeremiah Johnson 🌐

@JeremiahDJohns

18 days

We are drowning in a sea of evidence that says that cities that liberalize zoning end up building more housing and lowering rents. You are living on another planet.

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 years

I suspect most neoclassical economists exclude the creation and maintenance of property rights, enforcement of contracts, and chartering of corporations from their definition of "government intervention"

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 months

According to the attorney general of D.C., 60% of large apartment buildings in the city and 90% in the metro area are part of the RealPage-coordinated rent-fixing scheme. This collusion is likely a major contributor to the local housing crisis.

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 years

Law school trains and, even more importantly, socializes students to be aspiring judicial clerks and judges (instead of civil servants, administrators, legislators, public advocates, etc.). It's a big problem for lawyers in an (aspirationally) democratic society.

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 months

A class action lawsuit estimated as many as *20 million* rental units in the U.S. may be part of a collusive arrangement in which landlords raise rents and let more units sit empty to increase profits. This cartel is an underrated driver of unaffordable housing and homelessness.

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 years

A common belief among progressives, including lawyers, is that bad Supreme Court decisions are divided ones--previously 5-4 and now 6-3. In reality, many bad rulings are 9-0, such as AMG Capital Management v. FTC this week.

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 years

Critics of "cancel culture" are generally silent about at-will employment--and its adverse effects on free speech--because they support top-down control and seek to preserve hierarchical systems in the face of popular discontent

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 years

This action alone, which marginalized the Free File program and left millions of Americans at the mercy of Intuit every tax season, should disqualify Renata Hesse from government positions

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@sandeepvaheesan

Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 years

Imagine if the federal government funded municipal broadband utilities to compete against Comcast. That is what the Public Works Administration did in the 1930s for cities that were frustrated with the high rates and poor service of power companies.

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@sandeepvaheesan

Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

6 months

Truly love the cover @chadzimmerman_ and his colleagues designed for my book. Deeply grateful for all their work and support.

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

2 years

At all levels, the Democratic Party appears to favor people who exude careerist ambition and treat every elected or appointed position as merely a stepping stone to something bigger, instead of a public responsibility that should be taken seriously and done well

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

2 years

The only state in the U.S. where all electric utilities are either cooperatives or publicly owned

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

2 years

What should tarnish academia's reputation but doesn't: Not mythical "nutty left-wing professors of underwater basket weaving" but the many glorified corporate lobbyists umm "libertarian scholars" who teach in economics departments and law schools

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

2 years

Just cancel it all and use it as first step toward fixing financing of higher ed

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 years

Legal scholars: The law grants Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, and Elon Musk entitlements to run and derive great wealth from Amazon, Facebook, and Tesla Mainstream economists: These individuals are actually millions of times more productive than the rest of us

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 months

Opposing predatory lending should be the bare minimum for any purported economic populist. But J.D. Vance sounds just like a lobbyist for payday lenders.

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@sandeepvaheesan

Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

1 year

Democrats, please stop asking your political opponents to do your work

@thehill

The Hill

1 year

Democrats ask chief justice to investigate Clarence Thomas trips: "It is your duty"

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 years

"Few people will ever search for and buy things on their smartphone." - FTC economists in 2012

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

9 months

Hochul sides with bad employers and loses any claim to be "pro-worker." This ban would have pressured firms to retain workers by offering good pay and fair treatment, instead of using non-competes clauses.

@BLaw

Bloomberg Law

9 months

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul will veto a bill to ban non-competes after facing intense opposition from Wall Street, hospitals, and business groups.

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

1 year

TLDR: Let's ignore Amazon's unfair competitive practices, alleged in great detail by the FTC, and instead assume the FTC is suing the company for offering lower prices and better service Being an Econ 101 bro means never having to take facts seriously

@BrianCAlbrecht

Brian Albrecht

@BrianCAlbrecht

1 year

The FTC's complaint against Amazon makes an Econ 101 mistake: confusing a shift of a curve for a movement along a curve. Fellow Econ 101 teachers, our time has come! A 🧵

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

6 months

Finally read this complaint carefully. Damning stuff--RealPage helps landlords jointly raise rents in Phoenix, Tucson, and cities across the country and contributes to the housing crisis. This should be a national scandal.

@AZAGMayes

AZ Attorney General Kris Mayes

7 months

Yes, it's outrageous! From our @arizonaago complaint, here are two maps showing multifamily apartments where RealPage is allegedly collecting and sharing pricing and occupancy information in the Phoenix and Tucson areas. Camaron - thank you for sharing this.

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@sandeepvaheesan

Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 years

In oral argument in NCAA v. Alston, Clarence Thomas just asked the NCAA's lawyer (Clinton era solicitor general Seth Waxman) why the "amateurism" principle (benign name for collusive wage suppression) applies to players, but not to coaches. A very good question.

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

2 years

The First Circuit's decision last week that workers, regardless of employment classification, can organize and strike for better terms and conditions of work (without violating the Sherman Act) may be the most important and best antitrust development in 2022 so far

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 years

Believe it or not, former public servants can feed their families and live comfortably without becoming corporate lobbyists

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

5 months

My read of the initial reactions to FTC non-compete ban: Everyone seems to love it, except for Big Law attorneys, corporate lobbyists, and their favorite antitrust professors

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 years

When neoclassical economists claim they are "non-ideological," recall what they consider government "intervention" (and hence suspect): Intervention: Consumer protection, labor, and minimum wage laws Not intervention: Property rights, contract enforcement, and corporate charters

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

22 days

To paraphrase Keynes, mainstream economists take great pride in being precisely wrong rather than roughly right

@LeistenEcon

Matthew Leisten

24 days

Re: heterodox vs not. I don't care how radical your conclusions are. I just care your methods are sound, your assumptions are formal and sensible, and your proofs are correct. The problem is a lot of heterodox econ just isn't that formal.

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

2 months

Beshear and Cooper >>> Kelly and Shapiro

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

6 months

This is a great idea. The drivers and cars didn't go anywhere, they are still in Minneapolis. If the people who do the work get financing, they could establish a democratic alternative to the VC-run Uber and Lyft.

@maxnesterak

Max Nesterak

6 months

Inbox: Minneapolis City Council will consider giving $150,000 to transportation network companies to replace Uber and Lyft

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

5 years

Elite law school faculties are principally made up of the ideological equivalents of Amy Klobuchar and John Kasich and yet are somehow "leftist" in the eyes of right wingers.

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

2 years

An idea for improving Shark Tank: Instead of Mark Cuban and some other rich people deciding whether to invest in mostly trivial business ideas, have a modern Harold Ickes award federal grants to fund projects proposed by state and local governments

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 years

The end goal of neoliberal attacks on unions, occupational licensing, and other forms of non-corporate market governance is to Uberize all work arrangements

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@sandeepvaheesan

Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

1 month

Between Bill Clinton supporting the demolition of public housing and Barack Obama letting millions lose their homes to foreclosures, these two Democratic presidents contributed greatly to the nation's chronic housing crisis

@EliseJoshi

Elise Joshi

1 month

Bill Clinton saying we need more affordable housing when he proudly dismantled public housing in the city he's speaking in...can we please move on from him.

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

1 month

Just honestly saying "We fully support the destruction of Gaza and its people" would be better than this condescending nonsense

@politico

POLITICO

1 month

Pete Buttigieg applauded Kamala Harris for her stance on the “fiercely challenging and painful issue” of the war in Gaza, saying she's displayed the “kind of nuance doesn’t go onto a bumper sticker” ⬇️

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 months

The moral courage displayed by these law students is such a refreshing change from the relentless careerism commonly seen in the legal profession

@prem_thakker

Prem Thakker

4 months

New Columbia Law Review statement—the student board has voted to refuse to work until: (1) Rabea Eghbariah’s Article is published online without qualification or disclaimer, and (2) CLR’s Board of Directors commits to complete editorial independence of the journal

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@sandeepvaheesan

Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 years

Delighted to share that I am writing a book for @uchicagopress on the successes and shortcomings of cooperative and public power in the United States (working title Democracy in Power) and how they can inform the #GreenNewDeal today. I am excited to work with @chadzimmerman_ !

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 years

Obama since leaving office: 1. Helping install Tom Perez as DNC chair 2. Endorsing Macron for French presidency (in first round)* 3. Reassuring Theresa May that she would keep her majority against Corbyn's insurgency 4. Orchestrating centrist consolidation against Bernie Sanders

@washingtonpost

The Washington Post

@washingtonpost

3 years

Former president Barack Obama says he supports Sen. Joe Manchin III’s effort to scale back a sweeping voting rights bill in hopes of securing some Republican support

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Sandeep Vaheesan

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4 months

I imagine this is why Frum is actually against AMLO and Sheinbaum

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@davidfrum

David Frum

4 months

The news from Mexico is ... not good. Latest in @TheAtlantic

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 years

Someone who is "a public servant at heart" probably wouldn't choose to be Uber's chief legal officer and lead its fight against labor and employment rights for drivers

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

1 year

The post-1970s antitrust revolution is an underappreciated culprit in the Great Regression. For instance, the growth of poorly paid, precarious jobs (fast food, Uber, Amazon, etc.) was brought to us by Supreme Court decisions like Sylvania.

@highbrow_nobrow

The Intellectualist

@highbrow_nobrow

1 year

‘The Great Regression’

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

19 days

In @HarvardBiz , @brian_callaci and I offer our thoughts on housing. The RealPage-orchestrated collusion among landlords shows we need a *lot* more than just upzoning to make decent and affordable housing universal.

The Market Alone Can’t Fix the U.S. Housing Crisis

Unaffordable housing is a drag on regional and national economies. In areas where housing costs are high, employers end up effectively transferring significant sums to landlords as the cost of...

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@sandeepvaheesan

Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 months

In this very good article, Brett Christophers explains how the Obama administration not only failed to assist distressed homeowners but also facilitated the transfer of their properties to private equity firms like Blackstone

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The Role of the State in the Transfer of Value from Main Street to Wall Street: US Single‐Family...

After 2007, many US households suffered significant financial losses when their mortgages were foreclosed upon and homes repossessed. Much of this lost value ended up in the hands of institutional...

onlinelibrary.wiley.com

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@sandeepvaheesan

Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

1 year

If you excluded its debt obligations, Lehman Brothers looked strong on September 14, 2008

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@sandeepvaheesan

Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

1 year

I really hope concentration in land ownership, particularly in cities, is soon a big topic in empirical economics research

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 months

The New Dealers expanded the housing stock and improved its quality, while also raising labor market standards. They didn't say, "Does everyone really need a toilet? Latrines are cheaper and fine." Let's follow the New Deal model and make it universal this time.

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 years

Mostly forgotten radicalism of the New Deal: In addition to the Rural Electrification Administration extending credit to electric cooperatives, the Public Works Administration gave loans and grants to municipalities to take over investor-owned utilities.

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@sandeepvaheesan

Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

2 years

The Secretary of Transportation has consumer protection and antitrust powers to stop and remedy the airlines' misconduct and negligence. Buttigieg appears uninterested in using them.

@SecretaryPete

Secretary Pete Buttigieg

2 years

As travelers look to rebook due to Southwest's cancellations, other airlines should cap fares on these routes to help people who need to get home. I'm encouraged to see several airlines have now committed to this step – all of them should.

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@sandeepvaheesan

Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 years

Great excerpt in U.S. v. Google on how Google shares its monopoly profits with Apple. Google pays billions for exclusive pre-installation on Apple devices--payments that are as much as one-fifth of Apple's annual net income.

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@sandeepvaheesan

Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 years

A neoclassical economist when observing a few get very rich thanks to particular configurations of property, contract, corporation, consumer protection, and antitrust rules: Markets are natural and efficient and must not be modified through state action!

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@sandeepvaheesan

Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

2 years

Amazing! The FTC proposes a complete ban on non-compete clauses--no carveouts tied to income or occupation. This blanket prohibition would protect *all* workers.

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FTC Proposes Rule to Ban Noncompete Clauses, Which Hurt Workers and Harm Competition

The Federal Trade Commission

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 years

If a CEO says "technology" three times, his corporation doesn't have to follow laws he finds annoying or inconvenient

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

2 years

What Keynes said about Ricardianism applies equally to neoclassical economics

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 months

With Democrats like these . . .

@TedNesi

Ted Nesi

3 months

. @GovDanMcKee has vetoed the bill that would have prohibited noncompete agreements in RI

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@sandeepvaheesan

Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

2 years

"The Uber files reveal for the first time that [the late Alan Krueger] was paid about $100,000 for a study that was widely quoted in support of Uber as a creator of good jobs precisely because it operated outside the rules."

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Uber paid academics six-figure sums for research to feed to the media

High-profile professors in Europe and the US were engaged as part of lobbying campaign, leak shows

www.theguardian.com

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 years

This is the chief legal officer of Uber, a company famous for scrupulously abiding by the law

@tonywest

Tony West

4 years

A former colleague from the Obama Administration just shot me a text: “remember when we abided by the Hatch Act?” We were all so quaint and naive back then, following the law and such.

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 years

In @WIRED , I argue the Biden administration should do more than just litigate the antitrust suits against Facebook and Google. To tame corporate dominance, the FTC should enact bright-line rules to restrict mergers and outlaw unfair competitive practices

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Antitrust Litigation Isn't Enough. Biden Needs to Go Further

Antitrust suits, like the one filed against Facebook, are long, costly, and often ineffective. The next president can fix the system—without Congress.

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@sandeepvaheesan

Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

2 years

How it started How it's going

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 years

The current Antitrust Division has correctly recognized that Uber's misclassification of workers is unfair competition--not the type of competition the law should condone

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@sandeepvaheesan

Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 years

These "private" entities are actually publicly charted corporations dependent on a host of state granted privileges

@justinamash

Justin Amash

4 years

The First Amendment prohibits government censorship and protects private censorship. In a free society, Twitter and Facebook are allowed to make horrible decisions with respect to content moderation, and you are allowed to tell them off and use another service.

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@sandeepvaheesan

Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 years

Traditional cab companies offered apps too (remember Hailo?) but they generally complied with labor and employment laws and municipal cab regulations and didn't have the luxury of losing billions of dollars year after year

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@sandeepvaheesan

Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

6 years

Me, dumb and unsophisticated: We should discount the opinions of economists who are paid by big businesses to say monopoly is okay and who have been consistently wrong in their predictions. You, smart and savvy: AD HOMINEM!

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@sandeepvaheesan

Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

1 month

This little guy had a very good first day of elementary school!

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

5 months

FTC staff spent years reviewing the evidence on non-competes, thinking about the agency's statutory authority, and identifying more targeted methods of protecting business information. They did not just wake up one morning and say, "Hey, let's ban non-competes for everyone!"

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@sandeepvaheesan

Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 years

So-called pro-worker conservatives refuse to offer one important thing: power on the job Student debt cancellation would give millions more power to walk away from bad jobs and to work in public service, subsidized apprenticeships would not do that

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@sandeepvaheesan

Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

3 years

Good piece by @zachdcarter on the economist Joan Robinson. Two critical points in it: - Employer power is the norm - Breaking up large firms and other antitrust measures, while valuable, are no substitute for unions (and, I'd add, a federal job guarantee)

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Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 years

The more I read about renewable energy the more I realize addressing climate change is principally a matter of politics, not technology

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@sandeepvaheesan

Sandeep Vaheesan

@sandeepvaheesan

4 years

Neoclassical economists pushed these bad ideas. Given their poor track record and methodology (not to mention the corruption of many practitioners), maybe we should stop listening to them?

@BrankoMilan

Branko Milanovic

4 years

The bottom line is: Many things that were believed in the 1990s turned out to be wrong: from transition economics, to deregulation of the financial sector, to privatization of pensions, to "trade leading to peace". Hard to think of a decade that was so wrong.

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