How to Save the Underclass

The outstanding moral problem of our time is the emergence of an underclass, provoking both pity and an angry political backlash. Robin Marris finds that a slowdown in growth is the root cause, leading to a collapse of the labour market for unskilled men in particular. Fashionable solutions such as lower wages or welfare reform benefit those already well-off, and exacerbate growing income inequality. He employs statistical, sociological and psychological analysis and new developments in 'brain science' to show how the creation of an open society with increased equality of opportunity risks creating an unnecessarily excessive meritocracy. The solution is restoring national and international priority to the objective of growth. If this fails, damage limitation is essential. We must learn to live with the welfare state.

Table of Contents:
Preface - The Problem and its Causes - Education, Employment and Earnings - The Truth about the Growth Slow-down - The Significance of Trade - Meritocracy and Welfare - The Way Ahead

About the Author :
Robin Marris

Review :
'This is an important question, the important question of our age. Robin Marris is often dead on target and he never lets you take the easy way out.' - Professor Robert M. Solow, Massachusetts Institute of Technology 'Robin Marris has produced a highly welcome serious discussion of one of the quintessential social and economic problems of the 20th century, and shown us how the 21st century could do better.' - Michael Young, (Lord Young of Dartington), author of The Rise of the Meritocracy 'A highly enjoyable and stimulating read - a sustained feat of creative thinking.' - Bill Martin, Chief Economist, UBS Limited 'If [Mr Blair] doubts the connection between demand management and his beloved social agenda, [he] should read two highly accessible books published by distinguished neo-Keynesian economists in the past few months - Full Employment: A Pledge Betrayed by John Grieve Smith and How to Save the Underclass by Robin Marris. For anyone who wants to understand what really caused both the mass unemployment and the social dislocation of the 1980s, these two slim volumes are worthy a library-full of books about stakeholding, communitarianism and the like.' - Anatole Kaletsky - Times