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Inequality Matters: The Growing Economic Divide in America and Its Poisonous Consequences
Since the 1970s, the U.S. economy has been sending more and more of its rewards to fewer and fewer people. Once seen as a global exemplar of egalitarianism and middle-class opportunity, America has become the most unequal of developed nations―a land where corporate leaders earn hundreds of times the pay of average workers, and the only population group growing faster than millionaires is the uninsured. Statistics aside, this quarte-century-long trend has changed the texture of American life in ways that threaten our deepest values. Drawing on the best and latest research, the contributors explore issues such as the real story the numbers tell about how America has changed; dimensions of inequality (education, health, and opportunity); causes of inequality, looking past the usual suspects of technology, trade, and immigration; the persistence of racial disparities; the erosion of democracy and community; and inequality as a moral and religious problem. Not just a catalog of inequality's ills, the book concludes with a plausible and hopeful policy path―beyond redistribution―to a more just and humane economy.
With contributions
With contributions
328 pages, Paperback
First published January 6, 2006
About the author
James Lardner
16 books1 followerJames Lardner has written extensively about business, technology, the financial sector, and the role of regulation. His work has appeared in The New Yorker, The Washington Post, and The New York Review of Books, among other print and online publications. He was a senior fellow at Demos, a center for public policy based in New York City and a staff writer for the journal Remapping Debate, sponsored by the Anti-Discrimination Center. He was a member of the Washington, D.C., police force.
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
July 29, 2020
Published in 2005 but sadly still very relevant now. Some insightful pieces, and some that are just okay. Nothing particularly off-putting for me.
March 17, 2026
Inequality is worldwide. Is it human evil or human nature?
The message of "Inequality Matters" is that inequality is a man-made phenomenon, especially egregious in the United States, that demands to be redressed through public policy.
There are several questions at play here. Is the observed inequality a result of moral failings - greedy rich or lazy poor - or simply of the way society functions? Are inequalities inexorably tied to issues of minority status? Is it peculiar to the United States, or is it a theme that plays itself out, albeit with different nuances, in every society? Was Jesus' observation that "the poor will always be with you" simply a reflection on the dynamics of the way society works? Have public policy solutions been tried, and how have they fared?
Inequality can be observed in every ethnically diverse society worldwide. The caboclos of Brazil, the criollos of Argentina, the North African immigrants of the French banlieus, the Turks in Germany, and the West Indians in Great Britain manifest the same kind of economic inequality as Blacks, Hispanics and Native Americans in our society. Though the authors do not attempt to do so, it might be more instructive to analyze societies in which there is relative equality.
Tribal peoples experience equality in material goods. There are very few to go around. However, any time a source of revenue such as oil, casinos or tourism appears, inequality seems to rear its head. Chiefs get rich. It has happened all over the Americas and Africa where westerners have introduced money to pay local people for resources. I saw it first hand living among the Kayapo Indians in the state of Para. The cash income the tribes got from gold and mahogany went to airplanes, junkets and prostitutes for the chiefs, and the rest of the tribe complained bitterly about the inequality.
The Europe of the fifties and sixties was quite socialist and egalitarian. There were, of course, the rich, but the social safety net provided adequately for the poor. That safety net has frayed, as has the societal consensus, with the influx of immigrants and the observation that the taxes of the Caucasian rich were flowing to social benefits for the non-Caucasian poor.
America has elevated individualism, or rather, narrow self interest, to be acknowledged as our greatest virtue. Perversely, these writers see self-interest to be a virtue in those who do not succeed but a vice in those such as the owners of Wal-Mart, everybody's whipping boy, who do. They cheer the Horatio Algers as they rise from the slums, but condemn them for being rich.
It is no surprise to me that on average the groups within society who do better than mine, namely the Jews and the North Asians, have longer histories of civilization than mine. They learned (or evolved) to succeed in highly complex societies. Today, members of every traditional society on earth are being asked to play the Western European economic game. Is it any surprise that we, with thousands of years' practice, do a bit better than the newcomers? The tragedy is that the world is too connected for Africans and Native Americans to remain tribal. An anthropologist friend laments that missionaries in the Amazon are training "princes of the forest to be peons in Manaus." But they are, and the Indians voluntarily emigrate to Manaus. For what it's worth, New York Times' science writer Nicholas Wade provides an insightful account of how the tribes of mankind have evolved since the dawn of agriculture in his recent "Before the Dawn." It is also worth mentioning Amy Chua's analysis in "Worlds on Fire" of those minorities such as the Chinese and Jews who seem always to do better than their host societies.
Communism was relatively egalitarian. Chinese all wore Mao jackets. Most people were poor. Walt Kelly had his Russian character claim "the shortage will be divided among the peasants" and his Castro character say "they will dine on the Cuban delicacy, azucar y tobaco." The disappearance of egalitarianism has been one of the most traumatic transitions since the end of the Cold War. East Germans have had difficulty adjusting to a society in which there are more profound differences. Russia and China now have billionaires, affluent middle classes, and hoards of left-behinds. Inequality may be inevitable in a market economy.
Marxism, European socialism and our own Great Society were valiant attempts to curb social inequality. Marxism failed everywhere it was attempted, Europe is becoming more polarized by inequality, and in 1994 a Democratic President signed legislation to undo much of the welfare state that had been put in place twenty years earlier by another Democrat. Why is inequality so intractable? This book touches on a couple of theses.
Free people operate in a free labor market. The level of compensation a person's labor will command is a function of that person's education, ability, and personal attributes such as congeniality and attractiveness. Race, class and gender may also play a role, but such a role could only be statistically proven by controlling for the first-mentioned factors. Liberals have not attempted this statistical analysis, and conservatives who have (not surprisingly) find that race, class and gender play little role.
The poor assume the burden of children more often and at earlier ages. Given that in every society these fecund poor are more likely than others to be minorities, some degree of inequality is built in. This isn't "blaming the victim." It is an observation of fact.
Education is supposed to be the great equalizer, the facilitator of social mobility. Bill Moyers is certainly correct in his observation that the schools that the poor attend are certainly worse than those of the affluent. They are worse materially, as he acknowledges. Their teachers have less preparation. As almost any teacher will tell you, there is more to the story. Poor kids more often don't want to be in school, are disruptive, are violent, and don't learn. They are served by a legion of teachers whose skills are not adequate to get them transferred to better schools, and a handful of saints who feel a social mission. I know many of those saints. They labor long and savor their few victories, kids rescued from poverty. And I know saints who have left disillusioned, scared and physically injured. The collapse of school discipline (read "Judging School Discipline") has done the poor inestimable harm. The great disruptions of school busing (read "Forced Justice") and decades of bipartisan programs in the Elementary and Secondary Schools Act, the latest incarnation of which is NCLB, have made almost no statistically measurable impact. New York City is now throwing billions of dollars at the problem. Will it work? History says, probably not.
It is amusing to find one author, Robert Frank, complain that the middle class must commute in unsafe, 2500 pound Honda Civics which can be ground under the wheels of a Navigator or Excursion. He is allied with Rush Limbaugh in advocating "for sheer self defense, you might want a bulkier - and costlier - car." I write this as a guy who drives a 2800lb Prius, the object of Limbaugh's constant derision.
The bottom line is that the inequalities documented here are very real. They are certainly not unique to America. They are probably a function of how complex societies work, certainly not the mere result of a malign self-interest on the part of the rich.
The message of "Inequality Matters" is that inequality is a man-made phenomenon, especially egregious in the United States, that demands to be redressed through public policy.
There are several questions at play here. Is the observed inequality a result of moral failings - greedy rich or lazy poor - or simply of the way society functions? Are inequalities inexorably tied to issues of minority status? Is it peculiar to the United States, or is it a theme that plays itself out, albeit with different nuances, in every society? Was Jesus' observation that "the poor will always be with you" simply a reflection on the dynamics of the way society works? Have public policy solutions been tried, and how have they fared?
Inequality can be observed in every ethnically diverse society worldwide. The caboclos of Brazil, the criollos of Argentina, the North African immigrants of the French banlieus, the Turks in Germany, and the West Indians in Great Britain manifest the same kind of economic inequality as Blacks, Hispanics and Native Americans in our society. Though the authors do not attempt to do so, it might be more instructive to analyze societies in which there is relative equality.
Tribal peoples experience equality in material goods. There are very few to go around. However, any time a source of revenue such as oil, casinos or tourism appears, inequality seems to rear its head. Chiefs get rich. It has happened all over the Americas and Africa where westerners have introduced money to pay local people for resources. I saw it first hand living among the Kayapo Indians in the state of Para. The cash income the tribes got from gold and mahogany went to airplanes, junkets and prostitutes for the chiefs, and the rest of the tribe complained bitterly about the inequality.
The Europe of the fifties and sixties was quite socialist and egalitarian. There were, of course, the rich, but the social safety net provided adequately for the poor. That safety net has frayed, as has the societal consensus, with the influx of immigrants and the observation that the taxes of the Caucasian rich were flowing to social benefits for the non-Caucasian poor.
America has elevated individualism, or rather, narrow self interest, to be acknowledged as our greatest virtue. Perversely, these writers see self-interest to be a virtue in those who do not succeed but a vice in those such as the owners of Wal-Mart, everybody's whipping boy, who do. They cheer the Horatio Algers as they rise from the slums, but condemn them for being rich.
It is no surprise to me that on average the groups within society who do better than mine, namely the Jews and the North Asians, have longer histories of civilization than mine. They learned (or evolved) to succeed in highly complex societies. Today, members of every traditional society on earth are being asked to play the Western European economic game. Is it any surprise that we, with thousands of years' practice, do a bit better than the newcomers? The tragedy is that the world is too connected for Africans and Native Americans to remain tribal. An anthropologist friend laments that missionaries in the Amazon are training "princes of the forest to be peons in Manaus." But they are, and the Indians voluntarily emigrate to Manaus. For what it's worth, New York Times' science writer Nicholas Wade provides an insightful account of how the tribes of mankind have evolved since the dawn of agriculture in his recent "Before the Dawn." It is also worth mentioning Amy Chua's analysis in "Worlds on Fire" of those minorities such as the Chinese and Jews who seem always to do better than their host societies.
Communism was relatively egalitarian. Chinese all wore Mao jackets. Most people were poor. Walt Kelly had his Russian character claim "the shortage will be divided among the peasants" and his Castro character say "they will dine on the Cuban delicacy, azucar y tobaco." The disappearance of egalitarianism has been one of the most traumatic transitions since the end of the Cold War. East Germans have had difficulty adjusting to a society in which there are more profound differences. Russia and China now have billionaires, affluent middle classes, and hoards of left-behinds. Inequality may be inevitable in a market economy.
Marxism, European socialism and our own Great Society were valiant attempts to curb social inequality. Marxism failed everywhere it was attempted, Europe is becoming more polarized by inequality, and in 1994 a Democratic President signed legislation to undo much of the welfare state that had been put in place twenty years earlier by another Democrat. Why is inequality so intractable? This book touches on a couple of theses.
Free people operate in a free labor market. The level of compensation a person's labor will command is a function of that person's education, ability, and personal attributes such as congeniality and attractiveness. Race, class and gender may also play a role, but such a role could only be statistically proven by controlling for the first-mentioned factors. Liberals have not attempted this statistical analysis, and conservatives who have (not surprisingly) find that race, class and gender play little role.
The poor assume the burden of children more often and at earlier ages. Given that in every society these fecund poor are more likely than others to be minorities, some degree of inequality is built in. This isn't "blaming the victim." It is an observation of fact.
Education is supposed to be the great equalizer, the facilitator of social mobility. Bill Moyers is certainly correct in his observation that the schools that the poor attend are certainly worse than those of the affluent. They are worse materially, as he acknowledges. Their teachers have less preparation. As almost any teacher will tell you, there is more to the story. Poor kids more often don't want to be in school, are disruptive, are violent, and don't learn. They are served by a legion of teachers whose skills are not adequate to get them transferred to better schools, and a handful of saints who feel a social mission. I know many of those saints. They labor long and savor their few victories, kids rescued from poverty. And I know saints who have left disillusioned, scared and physically injured. The collapse of school discipline (read "Judging School Discipline") has done the poor inestimable harm. The great disruptions of school busing (read "Forced Justice") and decades of bipartisan programs in the Elementary and Secondary Schools Act, the latest incarnation of which is NCLB, have made almost no statistically measurable impact. New York City is now throwing billions of dollars at the problem. Will it work? History says, probably not.
It is amusing to find one author, Robert Frank, complain that the middle class must commute in unsafe, 2500 pound Honda Civics which can be ground under the wheels of a Navigator or Excursion. He is allied with Rush Limbaugh in advocating "for sheer self defense, you might want a bulkier - and costlier - car." I write this as a guy who drives a 2800lb Prius, the object of Limbaugh's constant derision.
The bottom line is that the inequalities documented here are very real. They are certainly not unique to America. They are probably a function of how complex societies work, certainly not the mere result of a malign self-interest on the part of the rich.
July 21, 2022
This is a political tract, and is based on a superficial and myopic premise. Sometimes the premise is a bit of colossal disingeneousness, to ignore facts and logic, e.g., inequality's main component is that different attitudes, i.e., tribal mores/kultur, and the lack of intellectual curiosity, produce dramatically different outcomes in human affairs. You have to ask yourself, why would a book about "inequality" ignore the role of such, and old-fashioned "ambition" ? Moreover, the rise of China and India in just a few decades, are worldwide counterweights to the premise of inequality....
October 31, 2011
Excellent assortment of essays explaining the causes and consequences of economic inequality. This book was written in 2005, so it's interesting to read the book knowing that the 2008 financial crisis was forthcoming and realizing that we could have avoided it.
April 12, 2013
Tremendous... the lineup of authors in this book know their stuff. This volume is a troubling look at inequality in the US in all its various manifestations... yet each of the authors offers reason for hope. A must read if you're interested in this subject.
nonfiction-reviewed
January 15, 2018Everyone deserves clean air, clean water, and a safe place to live as well as access to quality education, healthcare, and food. Yet, only the wealthiest Americans are guaranteed these necessities of life. Everyone else must get along as best as they can with the odds stacked against them.
Inequality Matters uses a series of essays to illustrate some of the problems and probable causes of the growing inequality in the United States. This is not a new phenomenon. Even though the book was published in 2005, it is still relevant to today because many of the issues covered are just getting worse. Money in politics rises to the top of the root cause of many, if not most, of the other issues.
This excerpt written by James Lardner pretty much sums up it up for me.
“Once we stop thinking about growing inequality as a divine or natural thing, Americans can gain the ability to look at it squarely, and then to recommit ourselves to the work of making the country in which we live more like the one we carry in our hearts.”
Inequality Matters uses a series of essays to illustrate some of the problems and probable causes of the growing inequality in the United States. This is not a new phenomenon. Even though the book was published in 2005, it is still relevant to today because many of the issues covered are just getting worse. Money in politics rises to the top of the root cause of many, if not most, of the other issues.
This excerpt written by James Lardner pretty much sums up it up for me.
“Once we stop thinking about growing inequality as a divine or natural thing, Americans can gain the ability to look at it squarely, and then to recommit ourselves to the work of making the country in which we live more like the one we carry in our hearts.”
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November 1, 2020Good book.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
August 13, 2024
bill moyers thank you for that forward
would love to see a reunion book for 2025
would love to see a reunion book for 2025
March 1, 2011
I would say this is the book equivalent of Capitalism: A Love Story, which I also had to watch in conjunction with reading this book. Both, I quite liked, but they also both left me with a righteous rage and no place to channel it. After exploring our problems and our divisions of class and wealth in America and provoking me into a frothing pile of anger--tell me what to do! Voting and writing your representative just don't cut it sometimes. I would have given the book five stars if it had clearly outlined the steps of action you can take to reverse the problems discussed in the book.
February 26, 2011
not a very balanced attempt to investigate the problems or causes of income equality in the US...guess I should have known based on the title. a good book if you are looking for fodder for arguments w/ republican friends.
August 15, 2011
Excellent collection of essays on the debilitating inequality in America. Forward by Bill Moyers is a must read in itself.
January 23, 2016
This book is a must read for anyone contemplating the future of America.
April 21, 2014
It was okay. A lot of the essays were a bit repetitive.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews