In this week’s episode, we tackle Poverty, by America, a recent bestseller written by Princeton sociologist Matthew Desmond. Though we found this book compelling in some ways, it fell short of the providing the sort of serious analysis of poverty, and solutions to poverty, that we think is needed.

Show Notes

Road to Wigan Pier, by George Orwell

Desmond’s New York Times article

Desmond’s 2018 paper

EPI study on poverty and wages

Explainer from the Census on the two main US poverty measures

The argument for using a relative poverty measure for the US

Credits

The podcast’s theme music was made by our youngest brother Tate.

Cover art by Arthur Santoro.

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