Name: Wealth and Democracy
ISBN: 9780767905343

Wealth and Democracy

"For more than thirty years, Kevin Phillips' insight into American politics and economics has helped to make history as well as record it. Now he turns his attention to the United States' history of great wealth and power, a sweeping cavalcade from the American Revolution to what he calls "the Second Gilded Age" at the turn of the twenty-first century.". "The Second Gilded Age has been staggering enough in its concentration of wealth to dwarf the original Gilded Age a hundred years earlier. However, the tech crash and then the horrible events of September 11, 2001, pointed out that great riches are as vulnerable as they have ever been. In Wealth and Democracy, Kevin Phillips charts the ongoing American saga of great wealth - how it has been accumulated, its shifting sources, and its ups and downs over more than two centuries. He explores how the rich and politically powerful have frequently worked together to create or perpetuate privilege, often at the expense of the national interest and usually at the expense of the middle and lower classes."--BOOK JACKET.

What Hacker News says

specialistJul 2023

I don't understand your objection.

You don't like the mental model (worldview)?

I gleened it from conservative economist Kevin Phillips' book Wealth & Democracy. I assume it's bog standard economic world building. Nothing I've read since has contradicted Phillips. (I'm noob, not some kind of economist. Though I did get to chat with Phillips one time and I felt like I understood his answers.)

What mental model do you prefer?

Or maybe you object to the implications ("logic") of this model. That notions like property, wealth, and government are social constructs. Just shared fictions which hopefully make the world a little bit more predictable (legible), without too much extra effort, so we can all muddle thru our daily lives.

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specialistDec 2021

Will read, thanks.

Graeber's book Debt rewired my brain. (I was also greatly influenced by Kevin Phillips' Wealth and Democracy, back in the day.)

IMHO, the advocates of MMT (modern monetary theory) don't dare nearly enough.

My current worldview:

"Governmental spending is a loan that we repay thru taxes."

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specialistJul 2021

Around 2005, I asked Kevin Phillips:

Me: According to your book, America's political parties have flipped every ~70 years. It should have happened around the time of Ross Perot, so I guess we're overdue. Do you think another realignment is emminent?

Phillips: No. It won't happen while Wall St. and finance remains in control of our political discourse.

It'll be amazing if Biden Admin is able to uncork the next cycle. But I'm not holding my breath.

Wealth and Democracy: A Political History of the American Rich [2003] https://www.amazon.com/Wealth-Democracy-Political-History-Am...

Here's a more recent account:

Lobbying America: The Politics of Business from Nixon to NAFTA [2015] https://www.amazon.com/Lobbying-America-Politics-Business-So...

Edit: I changed "Last decade" to "Around 2005". Time flies. My bad.

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specialistJun 2021

Yes, and:

The never ending struggle between wealth and democracy. Same as it ever was, including the pearl clutching and feinting spells.

This was my introduction to the nuts and bolts, written by Kevin Phillips, Reagan's economist:

Wealth and Democracy: A Political History of the American Rich [2003] https://www.amazon.com/Wealth-Democracy-Political-History-Am...

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specialistFeb 2019

"Isn't it possible that the reason their middle-class is so large is due in some part on political decisions they've made?"

The USA previously decided three times to explicitly create its middle class. The New Deal, the Homestead Act, etc. Policy choices which were hard fought and narrowly won.

Wealth and Democracy: How Great Fortunes and Government Created America's Aristocracy by Kevin Phillips

https://www.amazon.com/Wealth-Democracy-Fortunes-Government-...

Without active redistribution, accelerating inequity is inevitable.

That the rich get richer is just math. Not a value statement.

Plan accordingly.

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specialistFeb 2019

This is actually correct.

Wealth and Democracy: How Great Fortunes and Government Created America's Aristocracy by Kevin Phillips

https://www.amazon.com/Wealth-Democracy-Fortunes-Government-...

Similarly, the USA previously decided three times to explicitly create its middle class. The New Deal, the Homestead Act, etc. Policy choices which were hard fought and narrowly won.

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