The Preston Model’s Big Step Forward

Jay OwenGreen Prosperity, Transforming Finance, Latest Headlines

The latest from The Next System Project

How Public Finance Can Stomp Out Fossil FuelsNext System Project Research Director Thomas M. Hanna and climate researcher Johanna Bozuwa write in their latest article for Jacobin that “asserting public control over the financial system is essential if we want to prevent catastrophic climate change.” Otherwise, Green New Deal projects will be “held hostage to the whims of private finance.” Democratizing finance to advance the green transition not only involves creating public banking institutions but also requires democratizing the Federal Reserve so that it is no longer subservient to the private banking industry.Read more…

Vote Us Into Netroots Nation

The Next System Project wants to take the fight for public ownership to Netroots Nation, the nation’s largest gathering of progressive activists taking place this July in Philadelphia. It will be our debut at Netroots, and getting our public ownership panel on the agenda depends in part on your vote. Help us by voting for our panel, “Organizing for Public Ownership: Why and How,” to be included in the Netroots Nation agenda, and encourage your friends to do the same, before March 11.

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The Preston Model’s Next Stage

Aditya Chakrabortty broke the news in The Guardian that the city of Preston in the United Kingdom is launching the next stage of its democratic economy model, under the leadership of Democracy Collaborative senior fellow Matthew Brown: creating an incubator for worker-owned cooperative businesses. “Think of it as a socialist Dragons’ Den,” Chakrabortty writes, in which 10 co-ops will be given a kickstart in a rent-free space before being given an opportunity to succeed on their own. It’s the latest step in Brown’s effort to economically revive Preston from the bottom up, centered on the economic and political empowerment of its residents.

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This Automation Segment Needs A Reboot

HBO “Last Week Tonight” host John Oliver’s usually erudite take on news trends missed some steps when he took on automation in the workplace, wrote Next System Project research associate Adam Simpson. His “darkly entertaining” tutorial on how technology is upending the job market “doesn’t actually get at the sources of the problem: workers will have little if any say in how their lives will be forced to change by automation and that automation in the service of unchecked demand and growth will have severe environmental consequences.”

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