Joseph Stiglitz has a new book on what he thinks an evidence-based progressive economic platform should look like. I admit, I haven’t read the book, but I have read this Axios summary of the book. And here is my summary of that summary:

• “the government should spend as much money as it takes to bring the economy to full employment.” Nicely put.
• strong antitrust action, including against social media companies
• a federal job guarantee, but no universal basic income or explicitly race-based reparations
• the ability to opt in the Medicare
• (optional) mortgages provided by the government (well, don’t we have something close to this already? I guess it’s just that private banks get their cut before they hand it over to an “implicitly” government-backed lender. I guess you could cut out the middleman.
• Higher education funded by a progressive tax on post-graduation earnings: “Graduates earning more than $30,000 might pay 1% of their income toward repaying their student loans; those on seven-figure salaries might pay 4%. After 25 years, the loans are forgiven.” He doesn’t specify this has to be public schools only, although it seems to me this would blur the distinction. And if this federal program existed, is it possible states would reduce or end their funding for state schools and blur the distinction even more?

This all sounds good to me. Add some serious research spending and it just might work. The jobs guarantee might work, but would have to be coupled with a stronger disability, mental health and substance addiction safety net than we have now.