Jacob Hacker Paul Pierson on Engineered Inequality Moyers Company. BILL MOYERS. This week on Moyers Company. PAUL PIERSON. I think a lot of people know that inequality has grown in the United States. But saying that inequality has grown doesnt begin to describe whats happened. JACOB HACKER. Its not the haves versus the have nots. Its the have it alls versus the rest of Americans. BILL MOYERS. AndLINNEA PALMER PATON. Learn how to hack in just five days on this accelerated Certified Ethical Hacker CEH course. Youll study the tools and techniques used by cyber criminals to hack. This is supposed to be a government run by the people and if our voices dont matter because were not wealthy, thats really unacceptable and its dangerous. FundersBILL MOYERS. Welcome. Im glad we could get together again. I look forward to your company from week to week here and online at Bill. Moyers. com. Its good to be back. Bill Moyers dives into one of the most important and controversial issues of our time How Washington and Big Business colluded to make the superrich richer and turn. For one of my first columns upon returning to Lifehacker, I have masochistically decided to address one of the trickiest questions I get asked as a sex therapist. We begin with the question that haunts our time Why, in a nation as rich as America, has the economy stopped working for people at large even as those at the top enjoy massive rewards The struggle of ordinary people for a decent living, for security, is as old as the republic, but its taken on a new and urgent edge. Instead of shared prosperity our political system has now produced a winner take all economy. BUD FOX. How much is enough Gordon BILL MOYERS. Hollywood saw it coming. GORDON GEKKO. The richest one percent of this country owns half our countrys wealth five trillion dollars. One third of that comes from hard work, two thirds comes from inheritance, interest on interest accumulating to widows idiot sons and what I do stock and real estate speculation. Its bullshit. You got 9. American people have little or no net worth. I create nothing I own. We make the rules, pal. The news, war, peace, famine, upheaval the price of a paper clip. We pull the rabbit out of the hat while everybody else sits out there wondering how the hell we did it. Now, youre not naive enough to think were living in a democracy are you, BuddyBILL MOYERS. That, of course, was Michael Douglas as the wheeler dealer Gordon Gekko, responding to his protg, played by Charlie Sheen in the movie Wall Street, 2. Back in the late 8. Oliver Stone, himself the son of a stockbroker, saw something happening before it reached the mainstream. Before the rest of us knew what hit us. That little speech about the richest one percent and the demise of democracy proved to be prophetic. Flesh and blood Americans are living now every day with the consequences. AMANDA GREUBEL. My name is Amanda Greubel. I am 3. 2 years old, born and raised in Iowa. Ive been married for ten years today to my high school sweetheart, Josh. Hes the High School Band Director in the same district where I am the Family Resource Center Director. We have a five year old son Benen, and our second child on the way in December. Like a lot American families, we have a lot of debt mortgage, two vehicles, and because we both have masters degrees, a lot of student loan debt. BILL MOYERS. Amanda Greubel was invited to testify last summer at a Senate hearing on how Americans are coping in hard times. When the state cut funding for local school districts, Amanda Greubel and her husband feared they might lose their jobs. At the last minute, they were spared, although her salary was reduced by 1. AMANDA GREUBEL. 1. It means that even though I would rather shop at local grocers, I shop at Wal Mart for groceries because thats where the lowest prices are. Sometimes the grocery money runs out before the end of the month, and then we have to be creative with whats in the cupboard and that was a fun challenge at first, but the novelty wears off after a while. It means that most of our clothing comes from Goodwill, garage sales, and the clearance racks because we try not to spend full price on anything anymore. It means that when my son brought me the snack calendar for his classroom and I saw that that month was his week to provide snacks for 1. I was scared because I knew that it would stretch the grocery budget even further. And we didnt have roast beef or pork chops in our house that month. This past spring our son was hospitalized for three days, resulting in 1. Then a problem with our roof required 1. Even though wed been setting aside money every month for emergencies like that, we still didnt have enough. And so weve spent the last few months catching up. And finally, this change in our finances meant giving very serious consideration to whether it was even a good idea for our family to have another child. Thankfully, life has a way of reminding us through our sons brief illness and hospitalization that some things are more important than money and that well figure it out. BILL MOYERS. She told the senators how the sour economy has affected her students and their parents. AMANDA GREUBEL. If my family with two Masters degrees is struggling, you can imagine how bad it is for other people. The past few years our school district has seen our percentage of students on free and reduced lunch increase steadily. In a community that has a reputation of being very well off, over 3. Ive sat with parents as theyve completed that eligibility application, and they cry tears of shame, and they say things like I never thought Id have to do this, and Ive never needed this help before. They worry that their neighbors will find out and that their kids will be embarrassed. And its my job to reassure them that reaching out for help when you need it is no problem its not a shame, its not anything to be embarrassed about. Kids dont necessarily tell their parents when theyre afraid, because they see that their parents are stressed out enough already and they dont want to make it worse. Sometimes their clothing becomes more tattered and we see parents cut the toes off of tennis shoes to accommodate a few more months worth of growth, and let those shoes last just a little bit longer. When kids dont have enough to eat or they worry about losing their homes they cannot concentrate on learning their math facts, or their reading strategies. And in some cases financial concerns lead to or exacerbate issues such as domestic violence, child abuse, substance abuse, and physical or mental health conditions. All of the things that are ailing our families right now are so interconnected. I may have been called on to be the voice of struggling families today, but there are millions more out there who want and need to be heard by you. And I would ask that you not only listen, but that you then come back here and do something. Because it was your commitment and your passion for public service that brought you here in the first place. BILL MOYERS. Our once and future middle class is in trouble. Their share of the nations income is shrinking, while the share going to the top is growing. Wages are at an all time low as a percentage of the economy, and chronic unemployment is at the highest level since the Great Depression, but the richest Americans now hold more wealth than at any time in modern history. This gross inequality didnt just happen. It was made to happen. It was politically engineered by powerful players in Washington and on Wall Street. You can read how they did it in this book, Winner Take All Politics, by two of the countrys top political scientists, Jacob Hacker and Paul Pierson. They were drawn to a mystery every bit as puzzling as a crime drama How Washington Made the Rich Richerand Turned Its Back on the Middle Class.
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