The financial crisis of 1929 that triggered the Great Depression has been endlessly studied. Still there is little consensus regarding what caused it. This article claims that wage stagnation and exploding inequality fueled three dynamics that set the stage for a financial crisis. First,...

The Protestant ethic has been depicted as declining in America between 1870 and 1930, due to new affordable consumer durables and less rewarding industrial work. This article re-examines this period and finds that the Protestant ethic did not so much decline as become transformed. The work ethic...

The most widely embraced explanations of the financial crisis of 2008 have centered upon inadequate regulation stemming from laissez-faire ideology, combined with low interest rates. Although these widely-acknowledged causal factors are true, beneath them lie deeper determining forces that have...

Since 2008, the U.S. economy has been mired in the second worst economic crisis in its history. Conceivably, massive government spending could bring the economy out of this slump as massive war spending ultimately ended the Great Depression of the 1930s. However, a far superior strategy exists:...

Purpose – The manipulation of fears generated by 9/11 resulted in restrictions of civil liberties. Although this danger to freedom has been descriptively addressed, its deeper causes and dynamics have not received extensive treatment. This article reassesses the political reaction to 9/11 in...

Purpose – Whereas a combination of unique historical conditions and a specific set of public policies in the United States enabled labor to significantly increase its relative power during the quarter century following World War II, this halcyon period for labor was followed by a period of...