End of Equality

In this provocative, far-ranging work, Mickey Kaus tells why Democrats, and the liberal tradition they represent, have failed to come to grips with the profound forces dividing American society. In the process, he sets out a bold framework for a revived Democratic activism. Liberals, Kaus argues, have been obsessed with the very thing they should be trying to render less significant, namely money. Specifically, they are preoccupied with closing the income gap between rich and poor. But, as Kaus demonstrates, the rich are getting richer primarily due to deep, long-term shifts in the economy. Nothing the Democrats propose will even come close to reversing these trends. There is an alternative liberal strategy: to pursue, not money equality but social equality--equality in the way we treat each other in everyday life. Instead of attempting to suppress the inequality of money generated in the market, Kaus contends, liberals should restrict the sphere in which money matters, building a public sphere in which all Americans are respected as equals. That means restoring old "class-mixing" institutions such as the draft, and creating new ones such as a national health care system. It means absorbing the urban "underclass" into the mainstream working culture by replacing cash welfare with a WPA-style jobs program. And it means ending the class segregation of the suburbs. Kaus's proposed "civic liberalism" is anything but moderate. It's sure to be controversial. But it also offers a solution to what may be the country's gravest problem--the fracturing of society along lines of wealth and race. The End of Equality should be at the center of the debate over the future of American politics.