Editorial published in the Detroit Free Press by Michael Shpunt, Research Director at Michigan Citizen Action.

Every year, thousands of sports and music fans in Michigan engage in a practice that many likely don’t know is illegal: buying and selling tickets above face value.

It’s a law that is largely ignored and does little to protect consumers, which is why lawmakers need to pass House Bill 5108. This bill would bring Michigan in line with the majority of the country by repealing the state’s ban on selling a ticket for higher than face value, ultimately allowing consumers to buy and sell event tickets on a fair and open market at any price they choose.

                                                                                         Read more.

Talk about kicking someone when she’s down: A woman who lost her job when the AJ Wright distribution center in South Bend shut down was told her unemployment benefits will be trimmed by more than 10 percent, thanks to the mindless federal budget cut known as the “sequester.” Meanwhile, major corporations continue to get huge tax subsidies from Washington to ship jobs overseas.

This indiscriminate, across-the-board reduction in federal spending has also denied cancer treatment to seniors, stopped Meals on Wheels deliveries, imperiled education for our youths, and is projected to have cost our country 1.6 million jobs by this time next year, according to the                                                               Congressional Budget Office.

Editorial from the Detroit Free Press

August 21, 2012

One of the casualties of the presidential campaign could be the potential for a constructive look at Medicare.

Both candidates are busily assailing the other's ideas for controlling Medicare costs, essentially as a way to scare up votes from seniors.

The Romney-Ryan ticket says President Barack Obama's health reform changes to Medicare will cut $700 billion from the program. Obama says Rep. Paul Ryan's budget turns Medicare into a voucher system that will leave seniors short when it comes to covering medical costs.

For the record, Obama's criticisms are closer to the mark, and Romney and Ryan are talking absurdities. The president's health reforms extract savings from Medicare mostly by cutting reimbursements to hospitals and from the Medicare Advantage program.

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