The Big Idea
Outside contributors’ opinions and analysis of the most important issues in politics, science, and culture.
President Trump’s nominee has written about how religious views and judicial views intersect — and sometimes collide.
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission reported that sexual harassment complaints rose 13.6 percent last year.
The best way to curb greenhouse gas emissions and remove gases from the atmosphere is by storing carbon in natural ecosystems.
It will be considered unthinkable 50 years from now.
The latest in The Big Idea
Steve Pearlstein, author of Can American Capitalism Be Saved? and Bhaskar Sunkara, editor of the socialist journal Jacobin, debate.
Give your business to companies that promote slower delivery and consolidated shipments.
We analyzed ex-felons with voting rights. Their party affiliation is more mixed than you might think.
The faulty legal logic behind Trump’s birthright citizenship proposal.
Our government is run by rich people — and it benefits them the most.
Why the world needs a Paris climate agreement for labor to help unions.
The Supreme Court faces a legitimacy crisis. Here’s what we can do about it.
Religious “blue laws” achieve many of the same goals as progressive labor unions.
The government has a buyout plan, but it needs to be bigger — and better coordinated.
Workers walked out of McDonald’s restaurants to protest sexual harassment.
Ten years since the financial crisis and millions of American men aren’t working.
McCain’s work on campaign reform cemented his image as an iconoclast.
Why many Catholic Church accusers are legally barred from bringing their case to court.
“Socialists” and Republicans forget different parts of this lesson.
Much of the campaign NDA is probably enforceable. But the First Amendment also comes into play.
The failed drug war and Trump’s war on immigrants share many features. To change course, we need to change institutions.
Solving the “wage puzzle”: It’s not about inequality.
A Yale professor explains the sociology of the living-while-black incidents.
Single-payer health care, a jobs guarantee, and free college would require massive tax hikes. There’s no way around it.
Seventy-three years after the first use of the atomic bomb in wartime, commitment to arms control is fading.
Four cities have just filed suit, arguing that Trump’s attempts to undermine the law violate the Constitution.
The roots of the war over “religious liberty” — the subject of a new Justice Department task force — explained.
Why two prominent historians were right to resign from the University of Virginia’s Miller Center.
The research linking passing a drug test to performing better at work is weak.
In the developing world, elites often place allegiance to one another above the public good. Now we’re seeing that happen here.
Five questions Democrats should ask the Supreme Court nominee as threats to Obamacare bubble up from lower courts.
Michael Kimmage argues for reengagement with Russia, and had written about his high hopes for Helsinki. Then Trump started talking.
What unions can do after the shock of the Supreme Court’s Janus decision.
We ignore history, and evidence, if we conclude Putin’s hyper-nationalist authoritarian regime rules through fear alone.
Russia is poised to hack again. Here’s how the media should respond.
The war on sex work continues.
Centrists want to co-opt the phrase and apply it to something weaker than a single-payer system.
We can’t solve our climate-change problems by having fewer babies.
Hype about the “gig economy” aside, Americans are becoming more attached to their jobs and communities, not less.
How swimming pools became a flashpoint of racial tension in America.
Roe is a much-criticized decision. Most of the criticism is dead wrong.
Even conservatives have historically embraced programs that trade military service for naturalization. That may be why the administration is targeting them.
She’s not compromising, and she’s not pulling her punches.
A former top immigration official offers solutions.
A decision in favor of American Express will make it easier for big tech companies to pressure workers, suppliers, and customers.