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For Immediate Release
November 7, 2007
Contact:
Tim Rusch, Demos
Tel: 212-389-1407 Email: trusch@demos.org
Gennady Kolker, Demos
Tel: 212-389-1408 Email: gkolker@demos.org
The Squandering of America: How Our Politics Undermines Our Prosperity
By Robert Kuttner
http://www.squanderingofamerica.com
"If I could assign one book to all the presidential candidates it would be this one. Robert Kuttner, perhaps the most insightful economic commentator in the country, has done it again."
-Barbara Ehrenreich
New York, NY--America's promise of economic prosperity with stability is at risk--a stark new reality underscored by wide evidence of growing inequality, teetering household finances, and mounting problems in domestic and global financial markets. In The Squandering of America: How Our Politics Undermines Our Prosperity (Knopf; November 6, 2007), renowned journalist and Demos Distinguished Senior Fellow Robert Kuttner offers an insightful and timely critique of the factors that have contributed to this broadly felt insecurity--and outlines modern policy and market solutions for revitalizing America's economy.
As Americans continue to work longer hours to maintain income levels and cope with rising costs, the prospects of ordinary families seems grim. Kuttner demonstrates how the American economy is "shaped by financial elites and their speculative excesses." He debunks alarmist claims about federal expenditures on programs like Social Security and Medicare and exposes the genuine dangers: unchecked deregulation, hedge funds and private equity abuses of the market, and America's dependence on foreign central banks. He describes how the globalization of commerce and the rules of international trade have been engineered to serve the financial interests of industrialized nations and their corporate counterparts around the world.
"The Squandering of America" presents a real challenge to political and financial leaders of both parties. Kuttner is tough on the greed of Wall Street and its narrow vision of what makes the economy run; he is also deeply concerned about how our economy leaves our society less equal and less democratic--and more vulnerable to systemic shocks and risks. "The same speculative excesses that caused the Great Crash of 1929 are repeating themselves," Kuttner warns, and the solution is in a more a responsible, managed form of capitalism.
Kuttner addresses the systemic failures that characterize today's political and financial landscape:
§ Over the past three decades, American families have experienced a decline in living standards. Dramatic price increases in the hallmarks of middle-class life--college tuition, health insurance and homeownership, as well as eroding retirement protection and increased risks of job loss, have led to a highly unstable household economy. Meanwhile, "equalizing institutions" such as progressive taxation, social investment, public education, and rights of collective bargaining, have all been dramatically reduced.
§ Deregulation of the financial industry coupled with the growth of hedge funds, private equity firms, and the bundling and re-selling of often high-risk mortgage debt as investment vehicles have resulted in speculative abuses and rampant conflicts of interest that put both people's livelihood and the entire economy at risk.
§ The government's blind embrace of laissez-faire principles and its corporate bail-out policies have made it the agent rather than the principal of financial elites.
§ The globalization of commerce has been used by business interests less to promote free trade than to escape the necessary constraints of the balanced regulation that delivered widespread abundance in the decades after World War II.
§ The path of managed capitalism--one that gives ordinary people economic opportunity, financial security, and a fairer share of prosperity--has been taken off the table as a plausible alternative. With fewer countervailing institutions to offset the immense political power of economic elites to set the agenda, issues that affect the lives of ordinary Americans are largely outside mainstream legislative debate.
With eye-opening research and poignant up-to-date analysis, Kuttner offers readers a new way to look at the role of capitalism in everyday life. With financial markets in crisis and public opinion supporting a more active role for government, Kuttner offers a new economic model for a new age. As Kirkus Reviews put it: "Kuttner argues for a saner, more managed system of American capitalism--that he does so in a manner that is not only refreshing but reassuring is a testament to both his broad understanding of history and his impressive grasp on the inner workings of modern American capitalism."
About the Author: Robert Kuttner is co-founder and co-editor of The American Prospect magazine, as well as a Distinguished Senior Fellow at Demos, a national, non-partisan public policy center. He was a longtime columnist for Business Week, and continues to write columns in the Boston Globe. Bob's magazine writing has appeared in The New York Times Magazine and Book Review, The Atlantic, The New Republic, The New Yorker, Dissent, Columbia Journalism Review, and Harvard Business Review. For four decades, Bob's intellectual and political project has been to revive the politics and economics of harnessing capitalism to serve a broad public interest. He has pursued this ideal as a writer, editor, teacher, lecturer, commentator and public official.
Members of the Press: To schedule an interview with Robert Kuttner, or obtain a review copy of "The Squander of America," please contact Timothy Rusch at trusch@demos.org, (212) 389-1407 or Gennady Kolker at gkolker@demos.org, (212) 389-1408.
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