 | Summaries and Customer Reviews are supplied by Amazon.com | Despite its enormous wealth, the United States leads the industrialized world in poverty. One Nation, Underprivileged unravels this disturbing paradox by offering a unique and radically different understanding of American poverty. It debunks many of our most common myths about the poor, while at the same time provides a powerful new framework for addressing this enormous social and economic problem. Mark Robert Rank vividly shows that the fundamental causes of poverty are to be found in our economic structure and political policy failures, rather than individual shortcomings or attitudes. He establishes for the first time that a significant percentage of Americans will experience poverty during their adult lifetimes, and firmly demonstrates that poverty is an issue of vital national concern. Ultimately, Rank provides us with a new paradigm for understanding poverty, and outlines an innovative set of strategies that will reduce American poverty. One Nation, Underprivileged represents a profound starting point for rekindling a national focus upon America's most vexing social and economic problem. |
Average Customer Rating:   Different version?? I ordered this book a month ago However, I guess I received the older version of same book.. no It Is the same book I think, I am not sure because I haven't comapre the book with other book that has the Picture on the cover that I expected.
Seller thought that If the meterials are same then there is no problem sending different covered book?
It was upsetting me the fact that I received the book with the different cover on which looks like published in 10 years ago
I am keeping the book anyway because I need the book for my school
but I am pretty sure when I try to sell the book to the bookstore or someone eles they won't willing to pay me the same price as "used book" because the book that I received looks really really old. A great read If you care about poverty in the United States, this is a book you should own. It's well-written and very, very good. It includes a lot of good information that I haven't encountered elsewhere. It's a great buy for the Kindle, also. Informative and easy-reading This book provides information, both statistical and anecdotal, on the structural perspective of poverty. Inspirational and eye-opening, Rank reminds us that our social, economic, and political systems are to blame for the existence of poverty in America. Intelligent, well-researched but utterly out of touch book This is a book on American poverty. It is written by an academic. It is well-researched and intelligently written. There is no question, but that Rank knows his material.
That said, the substance of the book is utterly out of touch with reality. The book essentially makes two arguments. First, Rank argues for what he calls a "new paradigm" for understanding poverty. He argues that, instead of viewing poverty as the fault of individuals who do not work hard enough, we should view it as the fault of our social and economic system.
This, of course, is not a new argument. This would have been a genuine "new paradigm" if the book had been published in, say 1910. By the early 21st century, there is nothing remotely new about this thought.
Second, Rank argues that the American people ought to care about the poor. His assumption is that that we do not care, because, if we did care, we would vote for massive social welfare programs, which would fix the problem.
Professor Rank, were you living in a cave for the last forty years? The American people do care about the poor. We voted for President Lyndon Johnson, in 1964, who did all of the things that you want. It is a complicated story, but the short answer is that the whole thing did not work out as planned. In my opinion, the American people still care about poverty, but the problem is that no one has a plausible program for solving the problem. This book does not help to fill that gap. Strong Argument What I really enjoyed about this book was its organization and the strength of its arguments. It begins by laying out the extent and reasons for poverty in America. Then it shifts to developing several lines of reasoning as to why poverty is such an important issue that affects us all. And finally, the last third of the book talks about what can be done to effectively address poverty. I particularly enjoyed the last chapter that talks about what an individual can do in their daily life to create a positive change with respect to reducing poverty. I definitely plan to use the arguments in this book in the future.
I also appreciated the blending of solid research evidence with the sense of social justice and values that the author brings to bear. Overall, very well done, and very important!
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