Product Description

In The Conscience of a Liberal Paul Krugman, one of the US’s most respected economists and outspoken commentators, lays out his vision of a New Deal for a fairer society. After the Second World War it seemed that, in the West, society was gradually becoming more equal. Welfare States had been established in many countries, there was a general reduction in income inequality and in America Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal seemed to ensure strong democratic values and broadly shared prosperity. So what went wrong? Why, in the past thirty years, has the gap between the poor and the super-rich become such a gulf? Why are we so disillusioned with the political system? And what can be done about this huge economic inequality and bitter polarization? Krugman argues that the time is ripe for another era of great reform. Here he outlines a programme for change, explaining what can be done to narrow the wealth gap. And he shows how a new political coalition can both support and be supported by reform, making our society not just more equal but more democratic. The Conscience of a Liberal promises to reshape public debate and become a touchstone work.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #65369 in Books
• Published on: 2009-01-29
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 320 pages

About the Author
Paul Krugman writes a twice-weekly column for the op-ed page of the New York Times. A winner of the John Bates Clark Medal who was also named Columnist of the Year by Editor and Publisher magazine, he teaches economics at Princeton University.

Customer Reviews

Reclaiming America
Why is it that the most powerful nation in history, one capable of landing men on the moon, is incapable of providing 15 per cent of its populace with little more than the most basic of healthcare? Why does it not provide a more generous welfare system? Why does it have such a massive gulf between its richest and poorest citizens?

A key reason, according to Paul Krugman in this well-argued polemic, is the "movement conservatives" who, starting back in the sixties, conspired to conscript the organisational muscle of the Republican Party in order to elect into power a number of placemen whose role was to wipe out the gains of the New Deal. This process was by no means straightforward. The job would have been much easier had Dewey won his expected landslide presidential victory in 1948. Instead it was Truman who triumphed and was thereby able to consolidate the gains of the New Deal to the extent that his successor, Eisenhower, a Republican, inherited well-entrenched institutions which were difficult to dismantle.

As a result, during the period from the mid-forties to the sixties or early seventies the US underwent what Krugman refers to as the Great Compression, when through a combination of New Deal legislation and union activism lower end wages rose as those in the higher bracket were more or less frozen.

In the fifties, he points out, the largest employer in the US was General Motors, and the mean wage of its workers was the equivalent then of $40,000 now. The movement conservative insurgency changed all this, starting with the Reagan presidency which saw, for example, striking air traffic controllers handcuffed and sacked, with the result that today's largest US employer, Wal-Mart, pays the equivalent of $18,000 at the mean. Just think, he muses, what would be the impact of even a small rise in that mean. One thinks, for example, of the positive impact of Henry Ford's philosophy of paying his assembly line workers well above the norm.

Unfortunately he omits to mention the role of the unions in undermining the stability of GM and the other Detroit former-leviathans, and there is space here for a plea for the unions to be a little more responsible and less selfish themselves, but he is nevertheless right that unions can be and have been a force for good, raising the bar for everyone, not just their own members. This is not an opportunity available at non-unionised and anti-union Wal-Mart.

But though there could certainly be a little more soul-searching in that vain, generally there is little to fault in Krugman's argument.

History, as it turns out, has been pretty generous to him. True, perhaps it's a little early to proclaim, as he does on page 264, "we're not in the midst of a great depression". But he at least called the outcome of the 2008 elections right (though this is by party, not by candidate; at time of writing the book, John Edwards had not yet had to excuse himself from the running, and Barack Obama was just another candidate).

Time will tell whether Obama takes up the challenge of using universal healthcare as the vanguard of the new New Deal, as Krugman proposes. Still, perhaps the very fact that we can ask that question is proof at least that Krugman's contention that the US is at last moving into a post-racial politics where it will become increasingly difficult to employ the kind of "dog whistle" tactics the movement conservatives were able to exploit in the past in order to divert a critical fraction of the popular vote away from progressive policies.

Nevertheless, he is ultra-realistic about the challenges inherent in such an undertaking, not least in overcoming the vested interests which have in the past been able by a variety of means to prevent change, particularly the exploitation of the residual prejudices of slavery and segregation.

Well articulated political argument
The conscience of a liberal is a very interesting read on the economic and social evolution of XXth century America. The language is clear and the thesis well articulate.

It is, as actually stated by the author, a partisan book which helps explain how democrats can and should regain power. The author uses two main arguments:
1. The society as it is today has not evolved as a natural reaction to technology changes, immigration or development of international trade but it is the fruit of a conservative political will.
2. The resulting model is actually less American-friendly than the more egalitarian model democrats put in place after the New Deal. It has created a large income gap and on average has impoverished the population.

enjoyable- maybe a little facile?- but definitely worth buying.
Krugman's clarity and wit are themselves worthy of a Nobel prize. Since he is presenting his thesis so directly, doubts cross one's mind as to whether some of his arguments are facile. However, Krugman -presumably- has already thought through the objections. After all, as a top Economist, he spends his time working through the dreary details.
I think it is worth buying Krugman's books- especially at this sort of price point- because in a few years time we can come back to them and see how well his thinking stands up.
My guess is he will come out well- perhaps way ahead of the competition.