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THE RED TAPE CHRONICLES

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HomeThe Restless Project

The Restless Project

Cybercrime / Privacy

Not an April Fool’s joke: Montana might as well be Manhattan at this point

April 1, 2024 Bob Sullivan 0

Housing costs are rising fastest in — Montana, Utah, and South Carolina? That must be some kind of joke, right?  Sorry, there is no punchline. Only American families, getting punched in the gut. The economy is doing so well, why are Americans so pessimistic? I keep reading variations of this [Keep reading]

Gotchas / Consumer

When we treat workers like server space, (almost) everyone loses

February 23, 2024 Bob Sullivan 0

The $15 minimum wage battle cry always rang hollow to me.  I know, $15 sounds like a lot to people who grew up in the 1970s or 80s (the minimum wage was $3.35 when I got my first job. Come to think of it, this would be a fun first [Keep reading]

Gotchas / Consumer

Gotcha Capitalism on the run! If you hate hidden fees, now’s the time to pay attention

February 1, 2023 Bob Sullivan 0

More than a decade ago, I started writing a column on everyday consumer frustrations called The Red Tape Chronicles — my mailbag overflowed with rage.  Piled high in my inbox every day were missives about mysterious late fees, overcharges, surprise interest rate hikes, and really all manner of sleazy, sneaky [Keep reading]

Gotchas / Consumer

Want to fix America’s housing crisis? Build 7 million homes, fast

November 28, 2022 Bob Sullivan 0

America’s housing market is crazy, which makes most Americans crazy. Fixing it would require something like 4 million new homes to drop out of the sky tomorrow. Or perhaps 7 million. And even that wouldn’t really restore the U.S. social contract with the middle class. If you really want to [Keep reading]

Gotchas / Consumer

Is our ‘long’ national inflation nightmare over? Not so fast

August 10, 2022 Bob Sullivan 1

Is the long national inflation nightmare over? Well, that’s a $64 trillion question. Today brought news that the Consumer Price Index rate of increase was flat last month — the first pause in that measure of rising prices since 2020.  Wall Street reacted to the news with predictable restraint and [Keep reading]

Gotchas / Consumer

Housing prices far outpace incomes — even in smaller U.S. cities now. Restless Project, the pandemic edition

November 5, 2021 Bob Sullivan 1

Americans are mad. They feel like they’re getting ripped off all the time — I’ve made a career chronicling this — but I don’t think they are quite sure who to be mad at. There’s a long list of culprits, but here’s one that’s often overlooked.  Even people with good [Keep reading]

Gotchas / Consumer

Are you living below the ALICE line? 43% of Americans can’t cover the basics

May 18, 2018 Bob Sullivan 1

Two-thirds of all jobs in the country are low-paying at less than $20 an hour or $40,000 a year About 43% of households, or about 51 million, don’t earn enough to cover the basics. Asset Limited, Income Constrained, Employed, or ALICE, is a worrisome group for America What’s the minimum amount of money you [Keep reading]

Gotchas / Consumer

Forget lattes, avocado toast: Young folks are spending half their money on rent. That’s the problem

May 17, 2018 Bob Sullivan 0

It’s an age-old question: Is life harder or easier for today’s young people? Well, score a “win” for the millennials. Younger adults are spending a stunning amount of money on rent — $93,000 by age 30, according to a new study. More important, rent sucks up about 45% of their [Keep reading]

Cybercrime / Privacy

Tech’s dark side takes the spotlight with tales of the Infocalypse; is there a glimmer of hope?

February 13, 2018 Bob Sullivan 2

If you think fake news is bad, wait until fake news video becomes a thing. Or until an entire generation of kids hacked by Silicon Valley’s attention-mining tools comes of age.  Or until Facebook throws up its hands and realizes it simply can’t stop the Frankenstein it has created. We’re [Keep reading]

Red Tape Wire Service

Why you need Thanksgiving to run a country (and why women should probably hate Amazon)

November 21, 2017 Bob Sullivan 2

One of the themes of my Restless Project is that American consumers today are subject to major forces they can neither see, nor understand, nor plan for, and that’s a great source of day-to-day anxiety. Examples are all around us.  Here’s one: Pew recently found that 46 percent of Americans [Keep reading]

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About me

BOB SULLIVAN is a veteran journalist and the author of four books, including the 2008 New York Times Best-Seller, Gotcha Capitalism, and the 2010 New York Times Best Seller, Stop Getting Ripped Off! His latest, The Plateau Effect, was published in 2013, and as a paperback, called Getting Unstuck in 2014. He has won the Society of Professional Journalists prestigious Public Service award, a Peabody award, and The Consumer Federation of America Betty Furness award, and been given Consumer Action’s Consumer Excellence Award.

Bob Sullivan

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