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In this book, MIT economist Peter Temin offers an illuminating way to look at the vanishing middle class. Temin argues that American history and politics, particularly slavery and its aftermath, play an important part in the widening gap between rich and poor. Temin employs a well-known, simple model of a dual economy to examine the dynamics of the rich/poor divide in America, and outlines ways to work toward greater equality so that America will no longer have one economy for the rich and one for the poor.

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Peter Temin is Professor of Economics Emeritus at MIT. He is the coauthor of Keynes: Useful Economics for the World Economy (MIT Press) and of The Leaderless Economy.

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