The Missing Middle: Working Families and the Future of American Social Policy

Hard-working middle-class families have not fared nearly as well as the wealthy in the booming '90s. Harvard sociologist Skocpol has written an astute book that offers a diagnosis of the problem and a prescription for correcting what she convincingly characterizes as the unconscionable treatment of the middle class. The diagnosis implicates both ends of America's political spectrum and casts the press as a willing accomplice. The study is well documented with an array of provocative facts that highlight the urgency of her case. For instance, statistics on the percentage of American children living in poverty relative to other industrialized nations are startling. In a sophisticated analysis, Skocpol argues that the conservative far right has, with malice aforethought, undermined the major social programs in America by limiting their benefits to a small percentage of the population, making them vulnerable to attack in budget battles, or, alternatively, by depicting programs like Social Security as creations of monolithic and powerful lobbies with narrow interests, such as the American Association of Retired Persons--when in fact, according to Skocpol, they represent a consensus of a broad range of Americans. In Skocpol's view, the left has retreated in the face of this strategy and failed to build the coalitions necessary to enact and maintain programs sufficiently broad-based to help working-class families. In her final chapter, Skocpol proposes programs that could end the damage caused by the neglect of working-class families, urging advocates of social support programs to go on the offensive with bold new proposals. This is a very smart book, and it is a pleasure to see its cogent arguments unfold. (Feb.)