Although the economic boom of the 1990s helped the poor, the gap between the poor and the wealthy in the United States has continued to increase. Ample evidence exists to validate perceived trends in wage, income, and overall wealth disparity, but there is little agreement on the causes of such inequality and what might be done to alleviate it.

This volume draws together a panel of distinguished scholars who address these issues. Their findings are surprising, suggesting that factors such as trade imbalances, immigration rates, and differences in educational resources do not account for recent increases in the inequality of wealth and earnings. Rather, the contributors maintain that these discrepancies can be attributed to workplace demand for high-skilled labor. They also insist that further research must examine the organization of industry in order to better understand the concurrent devaluation of manual labor.

Addressing a topic that is of considerable public interest, this collection helps move the issue of increasing economic inequality in America to the center of the public policy arena.

Contributors: Donald R. Deere, Claudia Goldin, Lawrence F. Katz, James P. Smith, Franco Peracchi, Gary Solon, Eric A. Hanushek, Julie A. Somers, Marvin H. Kosters, William Cline, Finis Welch, Angus Deaton, Charles Murray, Kevin Murphy

Finis Welch is the Abell Professor of Liberal Arts and Distinguished Professor of Economics at Texas A & M University and emeritus professor of economics at UCLA.