Noam Chomsky, Donald Corren, Recorded Books: Books
Noam Chomsky is widely regarded as the most influential thinker of our time, but never before has he devoted a major book to one topic: income inequality.
"During the Great Depression, things were much worse than they are today, but there was an expectation that things were going to get better. There was a real sense of hopefulness. There isn't today.... Inequality is really unprecedented. In terms of total inequality, it's like the worst periods in American history. But if you refine it more closely, the inequality comes from the extreme wealth in a tiny sector of the population, a fraction of 1 percent.... Not only is it extremely unjust in itself, inequality has highly negative consequences on the society as a whole because the very fact of inequality has a corrosive, harmful effect on democracy."
(Noam Chomsky, in Requiem for the American Dream)
Requiem for the American Dream is not an essay collection but an entire work of some 70,000 words, based on four years of interviews with Chomsky by the editors. Chomsky considers these to be his final, long-form documentary interviews. It is a book that makes Chomsky's breadth and depth accessible and at the same time gives us his most powerful political ideas with unprecedented, breathtaking directness. It will go down as one of his greatest and most lasting contributions.
Requiem for the American Dream is being produced in tandem with the film of the same name that was recently released in selected theaters to rave reviews and standing ovations. It will be on Netflix and touring colleges prior to the book's release.
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Audible Audio Edition
Listening Length: 3 hours and 54 minutes
Program Type: Audiobook
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Mal Warwick
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5.0 out of 5 starsExplaining "income inequality" (really the concentration of wealth) without mumbo-jumboApril 18, 2017
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For decades, economic scholars have commented on the dangers inherent in the growing concentration of wealth in Western society. Though misleadingly referred to as “income inequality” in the new media, this critically important topic actively entered public debate in 2011 with Occupy Wall Street. Nobel Prize-winning economists Joseph Stiglitz and Paul Krugman and others added to the debate in the years that followed. Then, Senator Bernie Sanders flogged the issue at every opportunity in his presidential race in 2016, giving the issue further prominence. If there’s anyone alive and alert in America today who isn’t aware that the concentration of wealth is a growing problem for our society, I’d be surprised.
Few contemporary American observers have a clearer-headed understanding of the issue and its causes than Noam Chomsky. Chomsky, born in 1928, is widely regarded as the father of modern linguistics and one of the founders of the field of cognitive science. He’s also well known—some might say notorious—as an activist and social commentator. He has written dozens of books on the technical aspects of his academic work, and even more on politics. But his latest, Requiem for the American Dream: The 10 Principles of Concentration of Wealth & Power, is not a book he wrote.
Instead, the book was distilled from a 2015 film of the same name, a documentary patched together using interviews filmed over four years with Chomsky. Unlike the books he has written, most of which are slow going and many (the texts on linguistics, impenetrable), Requiem consists entirely of transcriptions from the spoken word. The style is conversational and uses only a bare minimum of jargon. It’s a quick read, and an enlightening one.
As Chomsky notes, “Power has become so concentrated that not only are the banks ‘too big to fail,’ but as one economist put it, they are also ‘too big to jail.'” Given our experience over the past decade, it would be difficult to argue with that. And anyone who closely follows events in American society today would say the same about this observation by Chomsky: “the rich and powerful, they don’t want a capitalist system. They want to be able to run to the ‘nanny state’ as soon as they’re in trouble, and get bailed out by the taxpayer.” If the American people fully understood how much tax money is funneled to corporations as subsidies, and how much the tax code has been distorted to favor them and their shareholders, they would storm Washington DC by the millions.
In Requiem, Chomsky presents ten “principles” that together explain how the massive concentration of wealth in America today has come about. (His analysis applies to other wealthy countries as well, but it fits the U.S. best.) His argument is best summed up as what he calls a vicious circle: “Concentration of wealth yields concentration of power, particularly so as the cost of elections skyrockets, which forces the political parties even more deeply into the pockets of major corporations.”
The 10 principles underlying this reality, as Chomsky sees them, are:
Reduce Democracy
Shape Ideology
Redesign the Economy
Shift the Burden
Attack Solidarity
Run the Regulators
Engineer Elections
Keep the Rabble in Line
Manufacture Consent
Marginalize the Population
I’ve never seen a more comprehensive or economical explanation of how wealth has come to be so concentrated in so few hands in the U.S. today. Most of these principles are self-evident at a glance. Only two may require explanation. Chomsky uses the word “solidarity” as a synonym for empathy, caring for others, or “concern for your fellow man,” to cite another archaic expression. His Principle #8, “Keep the Rabble in Line,” refers to the coordinated 45-year effort by Big Business and Right-Wing ideologues to destroy the labor movement.
The editors of Requiem—Peter Hutchison, Kelly Nyks, and Jared P. Scott—have interspersed short passages from other sources among the 10 Principles. The sources range over the centuries: from Aristotle and James Madison to Harry Truman and Martin Luther King Jr. These short excerpts from classic documents, speeches, press reports, and social commentaries add depth to the book’s presentation and enhance understanding of Chomsky’s message.
Chomsky’s views have often been regarded as extreme. Certainly, he is vilified by commentators and scholars on the Right. But if you read Requiem for the American Dream, I think you’ll find his reading of history is accurate, his logic is sound, and his view of America today is—sadly—right on target.
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ChrisD
5.0 out of 5 starsNot Radical - Right OnMarch 29, 2017
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Clear summary of the fundamentals and history of the mechanisms enabling and sustaining concentration of power to the few with wealth.
Included are excerpts of related writings supporting the topics from a variety of sources: Adam Smith, James Madison, Aristotle, Alan Greenspan, Citigroup document, Standard and Poors research, John Dewey, etc. The related material gives you a hint that what Chomsky is writing about is not far fetched but grounded in a rich history of ideas about how the world should work.
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Amazon Customer
5.0 out of 5 starsChomsky's elaboration of how we got to now and the ...March 29, 2017
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Chomsky's elaboration of how we got to now and the techniques and strategies of the wealthy ruling elite is delivered in a succinct and easy-to-understand text. Essential reading for those trying to make real sense of the world today or looking for ways to take control back from the few and give a voice to the masses.
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Sinan
5.0 out of 5 starsAnother outstanding book by ChomskyAugust 22, 2017
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Well researched and full of insights. This is another amazing write up that you should read if you are interested in modern politics, economics and history
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Okienoah
5.0 out of 5 starsExcellentJuly 14, 2017
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Noam Chomsky is my Guru.
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Ms.Fitness
5.0 out of 5 starsGreatJuly 12, 2017
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Great author
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Bob Greaves, audio engineer, professor
5.0 out of 5 starsA good summary of Chomsky’s concerns.November 2, 2017
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What can I say, classic Chomsky.
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geary
5.0 out of 5 starsFive StarsAugust 27, 2017
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Chomsky is an American voice ringing clear as a bell. Unfortunate that too few listen.
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