Plutocracy in America: How Increasing Inequality Destroys the Middle Class and Exploits the Poor

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A hard-hitting analysis of how the disparity between wealth and poverty undermines the common good.
The growing gap between the most affluent Americans and the rest of society is changing the country into one defined―more than almost any other developed nation―by exceptional inequality of income, wealth, and opportunity. This book reveals that an infrastructure of inequality, both open and hidden, obstructs the great majority in pursuing happiness, living healthy lives, and exercising basic rights.
A government dominated by finance, corporate interests, and the wealthy has undermined democracy, stunted social mobility, and changed the character of the nation. In this tough-minded dissection of the gulf between the super-rich and the working and middle classes, Ronald P. Formisano explores how the dramatic rise of income inequality over the past four decades has transformed America from a land of democratic promise into one of diminished opportunity. Since the 1970s, government policies have contributed to the flow of wealth to the top income strata. The United States now is more a plutocracy than a democracy.
Formisano surveys the widening circle of inequality’s effects, the exploitation of the poor and the middle class, and the new ways that predators take money out of Americans’ pockets while passive federal and state governments stand by. This data-driven book offers insight into the fallacy of widespread opportunity, the fate of the middle class, and the mechanisms that perpetuate income disparity.
Review
Formisano has written an obituary for a way of American life that is coming to an end.
― Times Higher Education
Sebbene l’orientamento politico-culturale dell’autore sia evidente fin dall’introduzione, la massa rilevante di dati e informazioni sostiene la validità della sua tesi
― Ricerche di Storia Politica
An accessible overview of recent trends in economic inequality. Formisano has a gift for presenting abstract information in compelling, even gripping, terms.
―Angus Burgin, Johns Hopkins University, author of The Great Persuasion: Reinventing Free Markets since the Depression
Review
An accessible overview of recent trends in economic inequality. Formisano has a gift for presenting abstract information in compelling, even gripping, terms.
-- Angus Burgin
Book Description
A hard-hitting analysis of how the disparity between wealth and poverty undermines the common good.
About the Author
Ronald P. Formisano is the William T. Bryan Chair of American History at the University of Kentucky. His most recent book is For the People: American Populist Movements from the Revolution to the 1850 s.

tags: Business & Economics, General, Economic Conditions, History, Americas (North; Central; South; West Indies), Political Science, Political Ideologies, Democracy, History & Theory, American Government, Social Science, Sociology, Poverty & Homelessness, Social Classes & Economic Disparity

isbn:9781421417400, amazon:1421417405, google:xBQ0CgAAQBAJ