Gene Sperling

“Timely and important . . . It should be our North Star for the recovery and beyond.” —Hillary Clinton “Sperling makes a forceful case that only by speaking to matters of the spirit can liberals root their belief in economic justice in people’s deepest aspirations—in their sense of purpose and self-worth.” —The New York Times When Gene Sperling was in charge of coordinating economic policy in the Obama White House, he found himself surprised when serious people in Washington told him that the Obama focus on health care was a distraction because it was “not focused on the economy.” How, he asked, was the fear felt by millions of Americans of being one serious illness away from financial ruin not considered an economic issue? Too often, Sperling found that we measured economic success by metrics like GDP instead of whether the economy was succeeding in lifting up the sense of meaning, purpose, fulfillment, and security of people. In Economic Dignity, Sperling frames the way forward in a time of wrenching change and offers a vision of an economy whose guiding light is the promotion of dignity for all Americans.

Economic Dignity

Dan Magee

[Teddy Roosevelt] later wrote that "we must protect the crushable elements at the base of our present industrial struc-ture" and "industry, therefore, must submit to such public regulation as will make it a means of life and health, not of death or inefficiency."

What distinguishes Roosevelt from so many ingrained in privilege and laissez-faire ideology-including many conservatives today who profess to care about the dignity of work-was his willingness to adjust his worldview to fit the actual struggles of working families...The former laissez-faire adherent had come to realize that "it is only by a slow and patient inward transformation such as these laws aid in bringing about that men are really helped upward in their struggle for a higher and a fuller life."

Economic Dignity quotes

Join the club