Kevin Phillips and Alan Reynolds take quite a different stand on the decade of the 1980s, and whether it was an era of greed or one of sound economic policies. Phillips makes the contention that the switch from Keynesian to supply-side economics, namely Reaganomics, did nothing to help those outside of the top five percent of income earners in the U.S. In fact, he argues that the economic policies enacted by the Reagan administration had two main effects: a polarization of income; an enormous buildup of debt. His argument is convincing, with data and evidence culled from reliable sources as well as a broad understanding of the economic history of the 2oth century via which he frames his 1980s comparisons. Reynolds, on the other hand, puts together a spurious argument that contends that the economic policies of the 1980s lifted the “boats” of 90 percent of the American public. He basically provides no evidence for his argument except for his deconstruction of one source, by Krugman and Nasar, which shows he is attacking one document as erroneous but he forgets there are many other documents which, like Krugman’s and Nasar’s, contend the 1980s were a decade of greed. Further, his argument smacks of a level of racism, bigotry, elitism and obtusity as to make one wonder why he isn’t a Republican leader. For example, his argument for why the poorest percentage of Americans is poor, a number he says is much lower than actually reported (as he says of most statistics disproving his point) is based on his logic that this percentage is lazy, is unwilling to save, and counts many deadbeat fathers among its members, “About 9 to 12 per cent continued to be poor, but this group increasingly consisted of female-headed households with young children. More and better jobs cannot help those who do not work, improved investment opportunities cannot help those who do not save, and increased incomes cannot help families whose fathers ...