Crunch

TABLE OF CONTENTS

1 The Big Squeeze
Why Do I Feel So Squeezed?
Econ-Noir
All Is Not As It Appears: Measuring Economic Outcomes
Whatever Happened to the Cleavers?
The Health Care Squeeze
The Medical Industrial Complex
Health Care Reform
Poverty Amid Plenty: The Whats
Poverty Amid Plenty: The Whys
Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?
The ABCs of Worker Pay
What's So Bad About Inequality?
All Education, All the Time

2 Don't Know Much About GDP
Gross Domestic Product
Unemployment: Wall Street vs. Main Street
Underemployment
Making Better Doughnuts
Inflation
What's a Recession?
Blowing Bubbles
The Night of the Living Wage (and Other Scary Stories)
Your Textbook Got It Wrong

3 Political Economy 202
Social Insecurity
Economists in Chief
The Fed
The Budget Deficit (Part 1)
The Budget Deficit (Part 2, in Which a Nobelist Agrees with Me)
The Economy and the Military
Guns or Butter
A New WPA?
'Please Remain on the Line'

4 The World Ain't Flat As All That
What's Right and Wrong About Globalization?
Outsourcing
The Conscience of a Shopper
World Trade
Globalization and Greed
How the Capitalists Killed Capitalism
Undocumented Workers
The Not-So-Great Immigration Debate
What's So Bad About a Labor Shortage?
The Mighty Dollar
Can Economists Save the Planet?

5 The Reconnection Agenda
Easing the Squeeze
Health Care
Immigration
Education
Globalization
What's Left?

Conclusion: The Lesson of the Rink

Notes
Acknowledgments
Index
About the Author