Amidst a modest crowd of aging baby boomers and at least one world-renowned economist, Professor Robert Pollin lambasted the economic policies of both the Clinton and Bush administrations Thursday at House of Our Own bookstore.
Pollin, who is a professor of economics and co-director of the Political Economy Research Institute at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, engaged the crowd in a discussion heavily critical of what he called "neoliberal economics" after promoting his new book, Contours of Descent: U.S. Economic Fractures and the Landscape of Global Austerity.
Proponents of neoliberal economic policies, which aim to deregulate markets and reduce restrictions on trade, "believe in free markets when it suits them," according to Pollin.
"They rely on free markets when that suits the interests of big business," he said, "but insist on government protection when that suits their interests."
That contradiction in policy, Pollin argues, has taken a devastating toll on income distribution, real wages and poverty in the United States, as well as other areas of the globe.
Citing a favorite statistic indicative of income inequality, Pollin said that in 2000, the ratio of the average CEO's income to the average employee's was over 400-to-1, up from just 30-to-1 in 1993.
But Pollin claims that the blame cannot fully be placed on Democrats or Republicans.
"The Clinton experience was really bad for most people," he said. "The prosperity was almost entirely driven by the stock market. The imbalance in the social system was so severe and there was no improvement in the poverty rate."
To make matters worse, under Clinton, firms were accruing debt at a disturbing rate. "We were on the cusp of a serious recession," Pollin said, adding that in 2000, "Clinton handed over the most precarious financial situation of the last 50 years."
Pollin also argued that President Bush has failed to correct the Clinton administration's mistakes, choosing instead to proceed with a neoliberal agenda that relies primarily on cutting taxes for the rich.
Bush "converted a national emergency and a recession into an excuse to cut taxes," he said.
After speaking and reading excerpts from Contours of Descent, Pollin opened the floor to the audience for a question-and-answer session, which quickly degenerated into a group discussion.
Most notable among the participants was Edward Herman, emeritus professor of Finance. A friend of Pollin for at least 25 years, Herman lauded Contours of Descent as a personal favorite "because he gives Clinton a good going over as well as Bush."
Others in the audience were ecstatic at having been given the chance to chat with a highly regarded economist such as Herman.
"It was a wonderful opportunity to have Ed Herman here participating in the discussion," House of Our Own owner Debbie Sanford said. "If we had known, maybe more people would have come."
