Hosts Celeste Carey and Cecil Prescod speak with Peter Edelman, author of the new book So Rich, So Poor: Why It's So Hard to End Poverty in America. The income-level disparity in this country is now wider than at any point since the Great Depression. How can some be so rich, while others are so poor? According to Edelman, we have taken important positive steps without which 25 to 30 million more people would be poor, but poverty fluctuates with the business cycle. The structure of today’s economy has stultified wage growth for half of America’s workers—with even worse results at the bottom and for people of color—while bestowing billions on those at the top.
Peter Edelman is professor at Georgetown University Law Center. A top adviser to Senator Robert F. Kennedy from 1964 to 1968, he went on to fill various roles in President Bill Clinton’s administration, from which he famously resigned in protest after Clinton signed the 1996 welfare reform legislation.
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