Overview

Over the last three decades, millions of people have slipped through a loophole in the American dream and become downwardly mobile as a result of downsizing, plant closings, mergers, and divorce: the middle-aged computer executive laid off during an industry crisis, blue-collar workers phased out of the post-industrial economy, middle managers whose positions have been phased out, and once-affluent housewives stranded with children and a huge mortgage as the result of divorce. Anthropologist Katherine S. Newman interviewed a wide range of men, women, and children who experienced a precipitous fall from middle-class status, and her book documents their stories. For the 1999 edition, Newman has provided a new preface and updated the extensive data on job loss and downward mobility in the American middle class, documenting its persistence, even in times of prosperity.

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9780520218420

Table of Contents

Reviews

"""Searches beyond the statistics of economic decline, plant closings, layoffs, and unemployment to capture the drama of human suffering at the individual level. . . . Aimed at a general audience, this well-written study would be a good addition to courses in stratification, work, or the family.""--Bart Landry, ""Contemporary Sociology"

Here, anthropologist Newman (Columbia) tackles the growing problem of downward mobility in the middle class. The vaunted figure of the 80's may be the Yuppie, but Newman suggests that, in actuality, over half of the American population is currently experiencing an erosion of living standards due to inflation, corporate layoffs (particularly in the high-tech fields), or divorce. Newman indicts the corporate world for a seeming lack of empathy for displaced workers and executives caught in budget crunches. She suggests that laid-off executives (who fall the farthest) are lumped into the category of inept by other corporations and head-hunters, despite the fact that they usually fall due to the cutting of a whole department for budget reasons. Based on in-depth interviews with actual victims, this work chronicles the loss of self-confidence that ultimately eats away at those who are forced to give up old standards of living and even to sell homes in the effort to keep food on the table. Downward mobility is the crucible of self-doubt. Newman, unfortunately, is long on indictments but short on solutions. She devotes just half a page to the subject of how our society might better face this problem. Falling back on other cultures, Newman suggests the Japanese. or West German approach as a preventative. The industries of those countries seem to be suffused with an ethos of loyalty and reciprocal commitment. Before discharging employees, these nations' industries will look to cut hours. And when times really get rough, Japanese companies might, as Matsuhita actually did, send assembly-line workers out selling door-to-door. Others have suggested that America adopt Japanese methods before, so Newman is offering no new prescription here. But her diagnostic tracking of middle-class belt-tightening is well researched and valuable. (Kirkus Reviews)

Searches beyond the statistics of economic decline, plant closings, layoffs, and unemployment to capture the drama of human suffering at the individual level. . . . Aimed at a general audience, this well-written study would be a good addition to courses in stratification, work, or the family. --Bart Landry, Contemporary Sociology

Author Information

Katherine S. Newman is Ford Foundation Professor of Urban Studies, Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, and the author of No Shame in My Game: The Working Poor in the Inner City (1999), Declining Fortunes: The Withering of the American Dream (1994), and Law and Economic Organization (1983).

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