Seeing the 1980s as a period when the rich grew richer but the poor poorer, the essays in this volume explore the disparities in wealth and income, comparing the fortunes of American households with those in other industrialized nations. They also discuss policies to counteract growing inequality.

Seeing the 1980s as a period when the rich grew richer but the poor poorer, the essays in this volume explore the disparities in wealth and income, comparing the fortunes of American households with those in other industrialized nations. Demographic and structural changes, saving behaviour, earning gaps, gender, education and race are analyzed in these essays, and methodological and measurement issues explored. The book also discusses policies to counteract growing inequality and proposes remedies.

The Jerome Levy Economics Institute of Bard College - Acknowledgements - Notes on the Contributors - Introduction
D.B.Papadimitriou - PART 1: INCOME AND WEALTH DISTRIBUTION IN THE USA - Factors Affecting Household Saving Behaviour: an Introductory Analysis
J.N.Morgan &
F.T.Juster - Comment
R.B.Avery - The Relationship between Poverty and Household Type
J.R.Rodgers - Comment
R.Blank - PART 2: INTERNATIONAL COMPARISONS - International Comparisons of Earnings Inequality for Men in the 1980s
G.W.Green, J.Coder &
P.Ryscavage - Comment
H.M.Wachtel - International Comparisons of Household Inequalities Based on Microdata with Decompositions
S.Zandvakili - Comment
A.S.Blinder - Adjustment, Growth and Income Distribution: the Case of Indonesia
E.Thorbecke - PART 3: POLICY PERSPECTIVES - Economic Justice to the Working Poor Through a Wage Subsidy
E.S.Phelps - Comment
T.Karier - Growing Inequality as an Issue for Economic Policy
P.S.Sarbanes - Causes of and Possible Responses to the Recent Rise in Income Inequality
L.A.Rapping - The Widening Wage Distribution and its Policy Implications
R.Blank - Income Inequality and the Underclass
I.S.Sawhill - Index