“David Kotz gives an insightful and original account of the origins of the economic crisis. He attributes it to a massive upward redistribution of income. This in turn led to a surge in debt, financial crisis, and huge excess capacity. His outline of possible paths of recovery should give readers much to consider.”—Dean Baker, Center for Economic and Policy Research, Washington, D.C.

“Here is the carefully researched backstory to how the heyday of right-wing economic policies came about, and why it is ending. Kotz provides the most compelling explanation to date of how a coalition of U.S. business interests dismantled the institutions and norms that had underpinned the long period of shared growth from the end of the Second World War to the early 1970s. He goes on to show how the return to a more free-market version of capitalism allowed them to hold down wages and expand their wealth, while setting the U.S. economy on course for the financial shipwreck of 2008. This is a convincing account of a sorry chapter in the history of the U.S. economy, now coming to a close.”—Samuel Bowles, Santa Fe Institute, author of Microeconomics: Behavior, Institutions, and Evolution

“Professor Kotz provides an instructive analysis of the neoliberal form of capitalism prevailing in the United States—its origins, its modus operandi, its critical weaknesses, and its future prospects. Particularly illuminating is his history of the U.S. economy, showing how successive institutional forms of capitalism have resulted in a crisis that can only be resolved through significant institutional change.”—Thomas Weisskopf, University of Michigan