Pinched: How the Great Recession Has Narrowed Our Futures and What We Can Do About It

by Don Peck

What lies on the other side of Great Recession? While the most acute part of the economic crisis is past, the downturn's most significant impact on American life remains in the future. The personal, cultural, and political changes that result from severe economic shocks build slowly. But history shows us that, ultimately, downturns like this one profoundly alter the character of society.
 
Don Peck's Pinched keenly observes how the recession has changed the places we live, the work we do, and even who we are--and details the transformations that are yet to come.  Every class and every generation will be newly minted college graduates, blue-collar men, affluent professionals, exurban families, elite financiers, middle-class retirees.
 
The crash has shifted the course of the economy.  In its aftermath, the middle class is shrinking faster, wealth is becoming more concentrated, twenty-somethings are sinking, and working-class families and communities are changing in unsavory ways.
 
We sit today between two eras, buffeted, anxious, and uncertain of the future.  Through vivid reporting and lucid argument, Peck helps us make sense of how our society has changed, and why so many people are still struggling.
 
The answers to these questions reveal a new way forward for America.  The country has endured periods like this one before, and has emerged all the stronger from them; adaptation and reinvention have been perhaps the nation's best and most enduring traits.  The time is ripe for another such reinvention.  Pinched lays out the principles and public actions that can help us pull it off.

Genres: Nonfiction, Economics, Business, Politics, History, Money, Journalism

223 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2011

Reviews

[Deedee · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not really a review, but NOTES
From the book:
p. 32 "I think a middle class life is gone forever for alot of people."
p. 33 "Since 1993, more than half of the nation's income growth has been captured by the top 1 percent of earners, families who in 2008 made $368,000 or more.
Causes: technology and trade
p. 34 "a college degree is not the kind of protection against job loss or wage loss than it used to be"

Previous economic downturns:
1880-1900; 1930-1940; "1970's"

Millenials:
p. 78 "In nearly every way, the Great Recession has delayed the ability of young adults to reach the milestones that society has always associated with full adulthood "

Housing:
p. 85 "In 2005, nearly one in four new mortgages was an interest-only adjustable-rate loan. In 2006, 20 percent of all new mortgages were subprime, up fourfold since 1994."
p. 86 "At the beginning of 2011, roughly one in four homeowners was underwater - their house was worth less than the principal still outstanding on their mortgage."
Continuing middle class magical thinking about real estate.

Plutocracy:
Oct. 2005: "the top 1 percent of households earned as much each year as the bottom 60 percent put together, they possessed as much wealth as the bottom 90 percent" and, not surprisingly, their economic and social interests are different from the rest of Americans

Long-term Affects:
Long-term unemployment harms the country as well as the individuals involved -- increased crime, decreased "family formation" (meaning: married couples with minor children) -- current twist: unwed parenthood

Solution:
Address Medicare - he advocates a voucher system, with p. 160 "the growth in annual voucher payments strictly limited to a rate below that at which medical costs have historically grown"

Increase infrastructure spending (employs those idled in the construction industry)

Get people moving: short run: government should p. 164 "do everything it can to get the housing market running smoothly again"; long run: faze out the home mortgage interest deduction; additionally: government financial assistance to relocate the unemployed to where there are jobs

"Wage insurance" to replace some income when people take a job paying less than the one they lost; job-training coordinated with hiring industries; tax credits for hiring the longterm unemployed

We can't wish away globilization so we have to adapt.
spend more on R&D (and less on Medicare)
reduce regulation (Sarbanes-Oxley bad)
increase immigration of p.173 "creative, highly educated, highly skilled immigrants"
improve education (and punish bad teachers)
p. 180 " the subsidization of low-wage work as a means of social inclusion " (like the Earned Income Tax Credit )
loosen zoning regulations to counter the p. 181 "geographic segregation of society by income and education"
don't soak the rich - but raise taxes on millionaires
p. 185 "we should keep money out of politics"

and, remember,
We are one nation.

Review: convincing on describing the current situation and in describing how we got there; convincing on describing the affects on individuals and communities of long-term unemployment; not as convincing as to solutions (alot of which is: more education, plus supplement the income of low-wage workers with taxpayer money).

Worth reading.

[Ed Wagemann · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you put our current economic problems into a historical context, you might conclude that we are simply in a valley in the up and down economic cycle. Huge economic downturns simply happen about every 40 years and generally follow some kind of economic boom. Over the last 150 years this pattern has been pretty clear. The economic boom of the The Industrial Age in the last half of the 19th century for instance preceeded the economic calamity of the 1890s. Then while there was a second industrial boom in the early 20th century it famously came crashing down in 1929 sending our nation spiraling into a Great depression that greatly transformed our county. From that we saw many of the New Deal socialistic mechanisms form that we still have today, from reconstruction packages to social security and so forth. The government was trying its damnedest to get us out of those hard economic times but real recovery didn't come until a new "boom" came. This time it was in the form of the military boom. Our nation saw the military industrial-complex grow to maturity during our involvement in World War II and then the Cold War. This boom had alot of steam and didnt start to fizzle until the Seventies when (largely due to the fact that the military-industrial complex was wedded to the oil industry) it suffered greatly with the energy crisis of the early 1970s and the end of the Vietnam War.

At that point, in the mid Seventies, America stagnantly found itself looking around for a new boom. Jimmy Carter seemed to think the solution was to think green, recycle, reduce usage, etc, but the economy contineud to suffer greatly until the early/mid 1980s when the next boom was starting to get its legs: the technology and information boom that provided a generation with a supply of new gadgets in the form of Sony walkmans, personal computers, consul games, cable televison, compact discs, VCRs, etc. Meanwhile Ronald Reagan was trying to rejuvenate the miliary boom by funding covert wars and defence contractors. But as the Information and Technology Boom continued to snowball into the late 1980s, the Cold War had lost its pulse. Bush Sr decided to give the military-industrial complex another shot in the arm by going to war with Iraq--which the US won overwhelmingly. The war was over quickly and Bush Sr was now married to a post WWII military boom that seemed outdated. Again America was looking toward the future and as Bill Clinton took over the white house he was right in time for the Information and Technology boom to become full blown. But another boom was building as well, the Housing boom--largely the creation of America's addiction to credit that started with the open-market, deregulation policies of Reaganomics (which actually made the Housing boom just a huge illusion that would lead to a crash).

The Housing/Real Estate crash is one of the main causes to what Pinch's author Don Peck is calling The Great Recession. The other large factors (in my opinion) being 1) Bush Jr's unfunded War for Oil in the Middle East, 2) free-trade agreements that allowed corporations to outsourcing American jobs to China/India and 3) the extreme profit-driven take-over of the health care/drug system and of our educational system (all of which stems from the systemic problem of the Corporatization of America's economic-political system).

Early in Peck's book, he lays out the grim statistics of our current Great Recesssion. During the final year of the Bush Administration in 2008 until June of 2009 the US economy shrank by 4 percent. More than 8 million Americans lost their jobs. The average house fell 30% in value and the typical household lost a quarter of its worth. The Dow lost 7,000 points and 165 commercial banks failed.

Peck also points out that by 2010, 55% of American workers had experienced job loss in some form, either actually losing thier job, getting less hours, getting a pay-cut or loss of beneits. And on top of that, the people that were losing their jobs, had a longer duration until they found another job than any other time since the Bureau of Labor Statistics started tracking that figure in 1948.
After pointing out these grim statistics, Peck goes into some specifics as to how this Great Recession has transformed America. He points out that it has widen the gap between the rich and the poor to a greater extent than ever before. Also, it has specifically crippled cities that had been falsely propped up by the housing and credit booms like Phoenix, Tampa, Las Vegas. It has shifted the demographics of the workforce from a majority of men over to a majority of women. And that there has been a change in attitudes toward Americas policies that give government aid to the poor (support has dropped from a 54% to 48% from 2007 to 2010) while support for free trade has also dropped (53% of Americans thought it was harmful in 2010 whereas 46% thought so in 2007).

Perhaps the deepest effect The Great Recession has had is that, according to Peck, it has deflated and depressed the spirit of the America people (a study sponsored by Rutgers university found that for every 100 people who went without a job for 7 months or more were, 63 were suffering from sleep loss, 46 were more likely to lose their temper quicker, 14 developed a substance dependency and the majority of them have strained relations with their family and begin avoiding social encounters with friends and acquaintances). This depression of the American pscyhe largely parallels the deflated spirit of the American people during the crisis-ridden Seventies, as they were waiting around for the next boom (which turned out to be the information and communication boom) to happpen.

So what do we do in the meantime? While we wait for the next great boom? And what if there isnt going to be a nex great boom? What if things have steadied into a sow, level, small, incrimental evolution?

Peck admits that he doesnt know the answers, but after researching the subject thouroughly he is at liberty to give his opinion, so he freely points out some remedies in the final chapter: "A Way Forward" in which he throws out a large number of remedies (be forewarned some seem pretty weak and all of them call for Big Government). Here are some of these ideas:

~Agressive deficit cuts that contain triggers that could lead to across the board spending cuts and tax increases
~Medicare overhaul that would include vouchers for seniors
~More stimulas that includes targeted aid to states, especially for infrastructure projects.
~An end to policies that encourage home ownership (thereby encouraging renting)
~Government aid to people who want to relocate or retrain for jobs
~A multi-bllion dollar Governemnt assistance program for people who lost their job and have to take a lower paying job
~Aid to employers who hire people who have been unemployed for two-years or more.
~Increased Federal investment (possibly to include a National Innovation Bank) and large tax breaks for Scientific/technological research and development
~Massive deregulation (laxing the Sarbanes-Oxley reforms)
~Increased government spening on education
~Implement a fair exchange rate, particularly with China

Overall, Pinched has alot of relevent research (lots of good statistics but with som ho-hum anecdotal evidence) and reinvorces many points worth keeping in mind. Pinched makes for a fairly accurate historical record of the Great Recession, but beyond that I didnt really see anything new or exciting in Peck's analysis or perspective while his solutions relied too heavily on Big Government spending at a time when nothing could be less popular. For these reasons and more I give Pinched a 2.5 out of 5 WagemannHeads.

[Patrick · Rating 4 out of 5]

In Pinched, journalist Don Peck paints a portrait of the middle class as jilted lover, nursing feelings of despair and betrayal. After doing everything right, the question this poor sop finds himself asking, over and over, like a funerary wail, is not “Why aren’t I good enough,” but the far more terrifying “Why aren’t I good enough anymore?” There is no easy rejoinder. The American Dream has simply moved on and taken a new name. Our hero is left with only the awareness that his best days have passed him by.

The 2008 recession permanently altered the lives of millions of Americans, neighborhoods, and even entire regions of the United States. Peck shows that many middle-class, middle-skill jobs that existed prior to 2008 will never return, opportunities that had seemed perennial just a few years ago have permanently vanished. Labor experts such as John Challenger, writing in this magazine, have encouraged job seekers in low-growth areas to strike out for more-fertile ground. In fact, much of the advice given to the nation’s unemployed and underemployed has amounted to: Be adaptable, seek training, and move. These admonishments, while sound, are also callous. People forced by market conditions to make dramatic life adjustments are rarely thankful for the opportunity to do so.

In many respects, this current state of woe represents a culmination of trends that have been building for some time. Throughout the last 10 years, however, policy makers and financiers were able to postpone their full impact. The rapid appreciation in the housing market between 2002 and 2008 created an illusory sense of prosperity in the absence of real salary growth, which has budged little from the 1970s. Since the largest asset owned by most Americans is their primary residence, many people experienced an enormous, and artificial, expansion in net worth over the last decade. The losses resulting from the housing collapse will linger for a long time, affecting consumption and investment habits for years.

“Many Americans, even those who didn’t lose their jobs, lost a decade’s sense of progress. Long deferred, a decade’s disappointment has been concentrated in the past three years,” notes Peck.

Stagnant wages and vanishing jobs, compounded by the intractable housing crisis, have metastasized into to a very literal paralysis. Nearly one in four Americans owes more on his or her house than that house is worth. Peck points out that, in Arizona and Florida, the number is one in two, and in Nevada, two in three. Many individuals who are underwater on their home loans simply can’t move to a better economic environment, even if they wanted to. They’re caught between the proverbial rock and hard place, the mountainous amount of debt they owe and the cold truth of their home’s actual value.

All of this has fundamentally changed the demographic makeup of America’s white-picket-fence suburbs, which now house more poor people than do the nation’s urban centers. It’s an ironic reversal. In the 1950s, suburban developments were sold as a means to escape city squalor, which was understood as a thinly veiled allusion to non-Caucasian neighbors. Half a century later, actual squalor in these neighborhoods pits frustrated homeowners against equally desperate renters.

“This isn’t the neighborhood that I moved into,” one frayed suburbanite complained to Peck. “It’s never going to recover to what it was.”

Contrast this predicament with the plight, or more accurately flight, of the nation’s moneyed elite. While the American poor are stuck in place, the country’s rich are increasingly transient, pursuing the opportunities of an interconnected world and less concerned than ever with the future of the republic. A growing number of America’s rich are entrepreneurs, as opposed to inheritors of wealth. Their business aspirations are global in scope; they hire labor in Thailand to market products to consumers in China, or vice versa. Not surprisingly, the American elite have more in common with their fellow entrepreneurs from Asia or Europe than they do with their compatriots back home.

But, Peck cautions, don’t assume that today’s wealthy are leading lives of leisure. They’re more likely to be attached to a BlackBerry than a polo mallet. Because they work so hard, many are resistant to the notion that fortune may have played the determining role in their success. They may well be more philanthropic than their predecessors like the Rockefellers or Carnegies, but they’re also more aware of the depths of human need in places like Ghana, Bangladesh, and Papua New Guinea (locations where the Gates Foundation has significant investments). The struggles of the shrinking American middle class continue to look paltry in comparison to the circumstances of the majority of the world’s inhabitants.

“If the transformation of the world economy lifts four people in China and India out of poverty and into the middle class, and meanwhile means one American drops out of the middle class, that’s not such a bad trade,” Peck quotes one CEO as saying.

Is the American middle class salvageable? Peck offers up a set of balanced recommendations toward that end. First, he argues for a return to the tax rates of a few decades ago, where the wealthy contributed much closer to 50% of their income to the government coffers, as opposed to the 35% they pay today. Peck dismisses the argument that increasing the tax burden on the rich would hurt the current recovery. Trickle-down economics is patently unviable in an environment where the wealthy are few and do a greater portion of their investing and consuming abroad.

Lawmakers may have overreached in their regulatory response to the 2008 market collapse, says Peck, so lessening regulations might help spur business. He also advocates a reconsideration of the nation’s current entitlement commitments, which, while popular among baby boomers, are unsustainable. Above all, only real government investment in research and development will put the country back on the road to prosperity, he argues.

Peck currently serves as a features editor for The Atlantic, and people who have followed that magazine’s coverage of the recession over the past two years and seen his cover feature story will find some aspects of this book familiar. But Pinched provides much original insight and should be considered a natural heir to Reisman, Glazer, and Denny’s The Lonely Crowd, and Thorstein Veblen’s Theory of the Leisure Class. Pinched is an excellent chronicle of the Great Recession’s hidden and long-term effects on the American psyche. In its wide scope and clear focus, it may go on to be the seminal book on this period in the country’s history.

About the Reviewer

Patrick Tucker is the deputy editor of THE FUTURIST magazine and director of communications of the World Future Society. This review was originally published in the November-December 2011 issue of THE FUTURIST.

[Sara · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a First Reads for me - I won this as a Giveaway.

This book was a quick read and it flowed well as I was reading it. Most of the book talks about the Great Recession's effect on people and our society. I have first-hand experience of this, having lost my job of 21 years during the recession and discovering that the jobs available to me after that would only pay half my previous salary. The adjustments that I've had to make to my life and the adjustments that quite a few people that I know have had to make to their lives are detailed here. I enjoyed reading about something I had actually lived through and am still living through.

Only a small part of the book is dedicated to ideas as to what we can do about this. I'm not an economist so I can't say if all of these suggestions would be economically feasible. I like the idea of the government giving some money to people who had to take lower-paying jobs but I honestly think that would be too expensive and I don't foresee that every happening. There are no easy answers and the author explains that. The best part of the book is knowing that "I am not alone" as to what I've been through and what I think and feel.

[Melissa · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't often read nonfiction but this title intrigued me. I think the author did a great job of comparing this recession to other recessions. I loved the history he outlined. I also was fascinated (and a little frightened) by his analysis of how recessions (or booms) can shape the futures of young people - young people who start their careers in the throes of a recession may never catch up to workers who start their careers during a boom.

The author did a fairly good job of leaning neither left nor right in his politics. I would bet that he is a Democrat but he did a good job of blaming both parties and offering solutions that, while leaning slightly left, will make both parties hate him!

[Sara · Rating 3 out of 5]

The problem I often have with reading a lot of books about several interconnected sociological topics is that when I do finally come across a good book that combines many of those ideas, I've already read so much about the subjects individually. This particular book does a great job of connecting history with the present recession, examining what has happened in previous recessions and in other countries. It also looks at the repercussions of a recession across a number of demographics -- race, gender, family status, region, class.

During the course of reading this book, I came to the sudden realization that I am twenty-seven years old, have been working for eleven years, and have never held a full-time permanent job; that though foreign to earlier generations, this not at all unusual for people of my generation, and the reason for this is not just one easily identifiable factor, but a combination of sociological, technological, cultural, and economic issues, none of which can be quickly fixed.

Yaay! Emerging adulthood!

[Lori Kincaid Rassati · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book. Peck's writing style made a usually-boring subject quite enjoyable. The history lesson, especially of similar economic calamities from the 19th Century, was really helpful. It's never bad to give a btdt perspective to a crisis.

But what the book really did was confirm what we already know--the haves have done pretty well in the current crisis; the have nots have done much worse; and the ranks of the have nots is growing as previously lower middle class to middle middle class households slide down the economic ladder.

Pinched reinforced that the only thing the Average Joe can do in these situations is to get a higher education and hope like hell to not have his/her position outsourced or automated.

[Samantha Plotkin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic. Pinched: How the Great Recession Has Narrowed Our Futures and What We Can Do About It reads like a long Atlantic article, perfect for shorts bursts on the subway or bus. Peck covers the issues that brought us into the Great Recession, the unequal recovery, and the changes facing modern America. Thoughtfully somber at times but with a hopeful undertone and a warning against complacency, this book is a must read for the modern American worker. Well researched and well written.

[Donat · Rating 5 out of 5]

Pinched, has been one of the most influential books that I've ever read. It was incredibly informative with an astounding amount of statistical data included and discussed. I would highly recommend this book to everyone! It really explains what is going on because of the recession on so many levels, discusses the history behind things and eventually what can be done about it all. Overall a fantastic book!

[Jenny · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very interesting. In some ways, I was less engaged than expected with his suggested solutions - the big economic picture was quite fascinating. The growing male underclass, unemployable people, the timing of entry into the job market, the two Americas, the demographics/geographics of those two Americas, political implications...a good read, for sure.

[Riki · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting book, though perhaps not the most cheerful read. The assessment the author gives of the current mess in which we find ourselves is a creditable one, and his proposed solutions for the current economic crisis are certainly worth some serious consideration.

[Jennifer Lyons]

A must read.

[Shevonda Joyner · Rating 4 out of 5]

I needed more hope at the end. Thoroughly enjoyed how easy it was to follow. Answered a lot of questions about the recession and gave me so much more information that is beneficial for me to know as a millenial/gen-z cusp. Great read!

[Ron · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was an excellent summary of the (continuing) mess that is the Great Recession. The bulk of the book examined the economic, social, and emotional fallout of the nation's worst economic crisis since the...well, you know...

It was helpful to confirm some of what I've seen for myself, see data backing it up: the changes in employment to a leaner, much meaner, lower paying environment; the stratification of society; the sad fact that many of the long term unemployed might never work again in their chosen field; people continuing to drop out of the middle class; despite announcements of a "recovery," many people still struggle, etc. etc. It compared the Great Recession to other major financial crises in US history and drew parallels between them. This is a major event; its ramifications are going to stay with us.

And I learned other things I had not considered, such as the tightening economic circumstances have sent working class kids, particularly from small towns, in disproportionate numbers to the military, creating a kind of de facto, class-based conscription, neatly dovetailing with the war on terror (conspiracy theorists unite!). So the analysis stuff was four star or better.

Where the book fell short for me, was when the author turned to "what we can do about it." I didn't see anything in there that really bowled me over, such as converting Medicare to a voucher system, and many other government based policies, programs, and incentives I have read about before. One innovative suggestion was to offer wage subsidies to bring longterm unemployed back into the work force.

The book touched on the growing populist movements on both the left and the right. It failed to extrapolate this polarization to the current dysfunction in DC. Our great leaders are running in circles, making it nearly impossible to implement any measure, much less some of the more ambitious ones outlined in the book.

So what can we do as individuals to make our way through these difficult waters? The book is silent on that. I was hoping for more personal steps we can take, rather than a laundry list of proposed government actions that don't have a snowball's chance of passing.

Still, it's a compact analysis of what's become of the country in the years following October, 2008. It is far from fun reading; I had to leaven it with more escapist fare, hence it took me awhile to get through it. Once I manned up and dove into it, it was a quick read.

Read it for that, and come up with your own answers for what to do about it. And if you come up with anything really brilliant, be sure to let me know!

[Carlos · Rating 5 out of 5]

I found this book incredibly informative and surprisingly uplifting. Peck give the reader not only a historical comparison of the previous economic crisis that have affected the US but also a sociological understanding of their human impact in terms of not only financial well-being but of race relations and gender politics, among other effects, as well. He is also able to highlight the hidden aspect of our modern culture that have come to light as a result of the crisis. His analysis of the widening gulf of the rich from the rest is not meant to create divisions but to gain an understanding of the challenges that the US will have to address if it is to bounce back from this crisis. Finally, and by far my favorite part of the book, he also attempts to give the reader an idea of the kinds of policies that might help the US recover ground. In doing so he is not dogmatic but humble in acknowledging the difficulties that underlie those suggestions and the need to draw from both sides of the political aisle. This is the first book where I feel more informed about the way in which we can grow out of this crisis and it is much more engaging than just looking back with hindsight and pointing out our errors.

[Alecia · Rating 3 out of 5]

Speaks of troubles both material and psychological experienced by average Americans.
30 pages of notes! Did he write this book or just shuffle other people's work into a single tome to sell? 
Doesn't seem to shed light on the issue. The information is common knowledge in my opinion but it may not be the case for another reader.
What we can do is misleading, first being the 'we' is policy makers not you and me average citizen 'we'. Second there aren't any ideas that haven't been brought up-just one personal opinion of this one works, and that one, and that over there. 
Readable yes, not as dry as many books on the issue, but unfortunately I can't take anything from this.
This book gets an "eh". Could be better, could be worse.

[David Glad · Rating 4 out of 5]

Better than I thought it would be. Discusses how this downturn (which politicians and "economists" insist is not a depression!) is different from previous ones and how a lot of us have come to have lowered expectations, even if the idea might be that our expectations were unrealistic to begin with. (Whether it was a college freshmen we spoke to mid-2000s decade who thought he could make $90000 out of college or for that matter some oddball character I sort of knew in very early 2008 who said he would not take a job that paid less than $60,000 even as the writing seemed to be on the wall that you would be lucky if you could even had a chance to take what you can get..)

Book tries to be upbeat, but given the situation and the content, easier said than done.

[Kim · Rating 4 out of 5]

A lot of overlap with the The Great Reset: How New Ways of Living and Working Drive Post-Crash Prosperity. Refers to the time we are in as the Great Recession, and urges different to accept the truth that life will not be the same as it was before, and find new ways to move on.

"True recovery is not simply a matter of jolting the economy back onto its former path; it's about changing the path." (p.156)

[Caren · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mr.Peck makes interesting comparisons of this recession to those of the Gilded Age (late 19th century, during the transition from an agricultural to industrial age), the stock market crash of 1920 and depression of the 1930s, and the 1970s. He points out the ways in which a prolonged downturn can affect the psyche of the country, and, in his final chapter, offers some possible ways to handle the results of the current recession. I found the book to be quite thought-provoking.

[William · Rating 5 out of 5]

Don Peck has assembled an incredible interpretation describing the change in our nation's major guidelines in attaining financial security.
The three main tenants of attaining financial security; (1) a good education, (2) saving money, (3) and buying a house have all be destroyed by financial events since the 1970s. Today, we search for a new paradigm in how to build financial security.
This was a very thought provoking book.

[The Tick · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was very well-written, but I don't feel like I learned much from it. A lot of the information in the book really wasn't new to me, except for the parts about earlier financial crises like the Great Depression. I don't know how well-read I am about this sort of thing I am compared to the average person, though.

[yaman · Rating 2 out of 5]

I wanted to give this book 3 stars because of its well written analysis and background of our current "Great Recession". I think Peck's policy recommendations are really what brought the book down for me. His recommendations were a bit hollow and unrealistic given the tumultuous political environment we are in.

[Coral · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you really want to understand the recession in a historical perspective then this is the book you want. The author talks about the invisible effects of economic downturns and how they are farther reaching than most people consider. He even offers some educated opinions about what could hasten recovery and what trends could predict who is elected president in 2012.

[Linda · Rating 3 out of 5]

The first seven of eight chapters are very good, the descriptions excellent and I kept turning the pages. But then I started the eighth chapter and realized my perspective was at right angles to the author's. All the insights and enjoyment I had from the earlier chapters vanished into vague policy prescriptions and hackneyed proposals.

[Jessica · Rating 3 out of 5]

A relatively short book on the most recent recession, would have liked it better if it had gone into more depth. Does a decent job of explaining how this recession is like (and not like) previous US recessions. Overall I felt I knew most of what this book had to say before I read it.

[Susan · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read Peck's article in the July 2011 Atlantic and picked up this book. Peck is a clear writer and lays out the economic, political, and sociological ramifications of our recession. Put into historical context this book illuminates are current economic situation. It's sobering.

[Maureen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Author Don Peck provides a basal reader for those of us who lack a finance and/or economic background. An easy to read and understand book about the great recession; why it happened and what needs to happen before it will really end.

[Doug · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't read non fiction books very much, but I liked this one. Nice comparisons to other historic recessions and depressions. Easy to follow along and understand his comparisons. And what it means for future generations was especially interesting. I look forward to more books by this author.

[Zach · Rating 4 out of 5]

A pretty understandable read on the current economy for a layman. I especially liked the chapters on how the situation is affecting males vs females, and the young vs the old. The book was recommended to me by a friend of the author, a poverty studies researcher.

[Richard · Rating 3 out of 5]

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Painted is a bleak future for most US citizens. Offered are unsatisfactory solutions. If this book does not have you wondering about the relationship between a national economy and a nation state…well you did not really read the book.
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