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Author Archives: Jason Collette

Move to Amend is Moving In Oregon

By Jason Collette on May 14, 2012

From the Main Street Alliance Website:

Main Street Alliance of Oregon has been surveying business owners throughout Oregon and is finding strong interest in electoral reform. Currently around eight in ten business owners feel the Citizens United Supreme Court decision, freeing corporations to spend unlimited sums of money in elections, is bad for small business. And seven in ten would support a constitutional amendment declaring that corporations are not people and money is not speech. Continue reading »

Student Loan Sideshow

By Jason Collette on May 8, 2012

The interest rate on subsidized Stafford Loans is set to double. If Congress doesn’t sort out its differences, seven million Americans will see their student loan rates double, creating further drag on the economy. Continue reading »

Student Loan Interest Rate is a Political Distraction

By Jason Collette on April 27, 2012

Student loan interest rates have taken center stage in the latest partisan political debate. In response to the economic crisis, the federal government reduced the interest rate for Stafford Loans from 3.4 percent to 6.8 percent. But that was only temporary. Continue reading »

New Main Street Alliance Video: Foxes Guarding the Hen House

By Jason Collette on March 14, 2012

The Main Street Alliance has a great new video highlighting the dominating role insurance companies are playing in state health insurance policy. “Foxes Guarding the Hen House” is part of MSA’s ongoing campaign to ensure that the health insurance exchanges that are created in each state work for small businesses. Continue reading »

Occupy Protests Have Shifted National Dialogue, 2012 Elections Loom

By Jason Collette on December 20, 2011

The Occupy protests that have sprouted up in over a thousand cities nationwide have had a profound effect on the political landscape. Barely four months ago, the dominant narrative was that the country is broke and we have to tighten our belts through “fiscal austerity,” with nary a mention of income inequality and who pays the price of “austerity” policies (hint: not the 1 percent). Today, even Republican presidential nominees are sniping back and forth about who is the wealthiest, and the framing of the 99 percent movement is widely used by politicians and in the media. Continue reading »

Bank of America to Charge Fee to Use… Your Money

By Jason Collette on October 7, 2011

Beginning January One, Bank of America will be charging customers $5 a month to use their debit cards. Back in 2009, small businesses banded together to fight back against ever escalating fees levied by the banks. This was a monumental win for small businesses- these fees amounted to a $16Billion a year transfer of wealth from the nation’s businesses directly to Wall Street. Click here to see how small businesses beat back the big banks. Continue reading »

Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Lacks Director: Small Businesses Economy Suffers

By Jason Collette on September 16, 2011

More than a year after the passage of the financial reform, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau still doesn’t have a director at the helm. Robert Cordray, former Ohio Attorney General, awaits confirmation, now stalled by Senate Republicans more interested in abetting the banks and gutting the bureau than in protecting consumers. This is bad not just for people looking to take out loans but for the country’s small businesses, too. Continue reading »

E-verify Hurts Local Economies

By Jason Collette on August 10, 2011

Main Street Alliance members Edgar Andrade of Bushwick, Brooklyn and Jim Houser of Portland, Oregon were joined on a press call Wednesday by Mayor Paul Bridges of Uvalda, GA to address the drastic ramifications of state-based, enforcement-only immigration laws. These laws are being enacted in states across the country, starting in Arizona and spreading to the South. Continue reading »

Oregon Action Hosts Community Forum on Oregon State Bank Proposals

By Jason Collette on January 31, 2011

On Tuesday, January 25th, in Medford, Oregon, tucked into the hills of the Southern Cascade mountains, 28 people came together to discuss a radical concept: a bank that works to pool the resources of the community rather than to extract it and send it to Wall Street investors. Their interest was piqued by the two proposals currently in the Oregon State Legislature to create a state bank, modeled after the Bank of North Dakota, that would be owned and operated by the people of Oregon. Continue reading »

Banks and Foreclosures: Where’s the Accountability?

By Jason Collette on October 21, 2010

Over the past several weeks Bank of America, Ally, and GMAC have announced that they have will be halting foreclosures in the 23 states that require a judge to sign off on foreclosures before eviction. Did this decision come from enlightened bank management who understand what is needed to stabilize the housing market and pull our economy out of the cellar? Of course not. Instead, it was done in response to the damning evidence that recently came to light that banks weren’t reading documents, were forging notarizations, foreclosing on homes that they didn’t own, and outright fabrication of loan documents. As usual the media is missing the real story during this ongoing foreclosure mess. Continue reading »

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