Ineteconomics

The AI Boom Runs on an Even More Dangerous Machine (Part 1)

08/10/2026 Ineteconomics Analysis

AI is powered by more than algorithms – underneath is a flawed, decades-old corporate operating system that redirects gains away from workers. The good news: It doesn’t have to be this way. Part of “AI and the Future of the American Worker,” a series on how artificial intelligence is impacting labor, power, and the meaning of work.
Thomas Ferguson isn’t easily surprised. He’s spent decades following the trail of money through America’s economy and political system, exposing patterns people like Jeff Bezos might prefer you didn’t see.

To Fix Health Care, Treat It as a System: Memorandum to Senator Ronald Wyden and Democratic Members of the Senate Finance Committee

08/04/2026 Ineteconomics Analysis

Senate Finance Committee Democrats are seeking evidence and proposals to shape health-care legislation. Their critique of insurers has merit, but reforms confined to insurance risk leaving hospitals, conglomerates, and much of the system’s extraction untouched, sets the stage for further disappointment.

Memorandum to Senator Ron Wyden, Ranking Member, and Democratic Members of the Senate Finance Committee

08/04/2026 Ineteconomics Analysis

Senate Finance Committee Democrats have invited outside evidence and proposals for their next health-care agenda. Their critique of insurers has force, but the remedies leave most of the system untouched, risking further disappointment unless reform reaches hospitals and entire conglomerates.

Social Security and the Vanishing Paycheck

07/26/2026 Ineteconomics Analysis

Social Security runs on the paycheck. But a growing share of American wealth now comes from profits, assets, and ownership. The program that ended old-age poverty was never built for an economy that pays people this way.

Big Money and the Maine Election: Round 2

07/15/2026 Ineteconomics Analysis

The upheaval in Maine's Senate race has focused attention on candidates and party leaders. Less noticed is what the campaign finance data reveal about the state's Democratic Party and its structural dependence on national organizations and large out-of-state donors.

On the US-EU Debate: A Response to Paul Krugman

07/13/2026 Ineteconomics Analysis

A response to Paul Krugman's recent essay on U.S. and European productivity opens onto a broader question. If the standard metrics point in conflicting directions, perhaps the problem lies less with the economies than with the measures themselves.

Big Money, the Maine Senate Race and US Party Competition: A Tale in Two Pictures

06/30/2026 Ineteconomics Analysis

What can one Senate race reveal about the hidden machinery of American politics? In Maine, donor patterns expose how campaign finance can shape party competition, political narratives, and the choices voters are asked to make long before ballots are counted.

Happy Birthday, America. Our Best Tradition Is Taking on the Powerful.

06/29/2026 Ineteconomics Analysis

We’ve inherited a stubborn reflex for resisting fatcats, oligarchs, profiteers, and anyone who tries to run roughshod over us.
“If you’re a billionaire, why are you a billionaire?”

~American singer-songwriter Billie Eilish

“This land was made for you and me.”

~American folk singer-songwriter Woody Guthrie

A Preface to Alessandro Roncaglia’s Essay on Adam Smith

06/23/2026 Ineteconomics Analysis

As America marks 250 years of independence, Adam Smith is again being pressed into service as a founding myth. A deeper reading of The Wealth of Nations reveals a far richer thinker than today’s easy invocations of markets and liberty suggest.

Adam Smith and the Moral Foundations of Political Economy

06/23/2026 Ineteconomics Analysis

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