The Politics of Rich and Poor: Wealth and the American Electorate in the Reagan Aftermath

I think this book should be required reading for understanding the US political system. Published in 1990, it explains A LOT about the US political/economic system historically; reading it now gives insight into the current era. Kevin Phillips is a brilliant writer -- I recommend his next two books, Boiling Point and Arrogant Capital, as further explanation of what is going on these days.

This book does the job. It properly points out how the Reagan administration tore this country apart to serve the interests of the rich. I might have only one criticism of Phillips's work: His consistent mention of the post Civil War era and the 1920's as parallels to the 1980's. It would have been great to have an entire chapter dedicated to that, then have the rest of the book focused exclusively on the 80's. It would have made the attack more efficient. No major complaints, however. This book is excellent.

Although Kevin Phillips wrote this book back in the late 1980s, many of its socio-economic descriptions are accurate for the 21st Century. The book was required reading in many colleges when it was first published and the author's prediction about the characteristics of the economic times were on target and may have been exceeded in 2011.Phillips would do well writing an update to the Politics of Rich and Poor. Its narrative is still relevant today.

Kevin Phillips wrote this over 20 years ago, and though the situations have changed, all the dynamics are the same, and this book should have been read by today's leaders and MAYBE we'd have avoided some of the worse pitfalls of the recent financial disasters. He foretells the divide between rich and poor, which has escalated in the past 20 years.

It took some time to receive this novel, however, sometimes that just happens. Thank you for the novel.

This is an old take on a currently popular theme. The 1990 political analysis blames inequality on the Reagan administration along with a sociological bias blaming the top 0.5% income earners. Both biases have long ago been shown to be wrong. The anti-rich rhetoric boomerangs on the middle class as the author switches his attack from the top 0.5% to the middle deciles as convenient to his data. He makes the usual egalitarian error of substituting taxable income for consumption. The book contradicts itself with data in the appendices.The trend away from equality predated Reagan and continues unabated to the present. The syndrome is graphically shown with data presented by Thomas Piketty in 'Capital in the Twenty-first Century.' The construction that inequality is a product of middle class promotion is wishful thinking and out of touch with both reality and the rest of the text. Phillips is fond of banal aphorisms like a happier worker is a more productive worker. Highly paid labor is efficient labor is backwards Its efficiency that earns higher pay. The government attempt to pay ahead of productivity is not working and the failed experiment is impossible to reverse.He says that the 1% wants to cut wages and budget. The worst error is contention that macro policy of the central bank (Fed) favors the 1%. It does only because the super rich are the only ones able to cope with the currency devaluation that is destroying middle class savings. Lawyers are aiding rent seeking, while the 15% capital gain favors the rich, neglecting homeowners. He observes less equality of opportunity and incentive pay is overrated. He says that regulation favors the rich, neglecting to point out that rescission of Glass-Stiegall was a prime component of the Clinton administration, not Reagan. How he blames Reagan for Trade and Current Account deficits is a mystery. Another wrong contention is that we became a debtor nation under Reagan. In fact the US has not been debt free since 1841 and subsequent administrations squandered the Reagan peace dividend emanating from the end of the Cold War.What the book shows is that Reagan failed to halt the trend to inequality that started around 1965.Phillips points to consumerism. He shows a simplistic take on what he calls abad education system. It's sheer populism to say that 1% shape our policy, ignoring that legislative influence is for sale. President Obama has made no fundamental changes to either legislative or taxation policy. He observes flow of wealth from bottom to top, but misses the cause. The current stimulus program flowing into the coffers of health care and insurance executives to raise W.S. prices is a straight transfer from middle to top. The Fed acknowledged Wednesday (Sep. 17, 2014) that, as the economic recovery slowly builds, its grand experiment is now coming to an end. Instead of QE, the Fed could have given $56,000 to every household in America. If we make that poor households it's approximately a half million each. It should be clear by now that the government share is not being redistributed according to plan. Inequality is a function of government policy not the rich or party politics as Phillips and his ilk would like to promote. IT'S THE GOVERNMENT STUPID!This book is mainly useful for its bad arguments. On all sides of the issue there are many others studies of inequality available, mostly better than this one. See for example 'The Haves and the Have-Nots' by Branko Milakovic or 'Inequality in America' by Dudash, Dervis, Milsom and Stancil.