Rewarding Work

by Phelps, Edmund S.

• ISBN13: 9780674026940
• ISBN10: 0674026942
• Edition: 2nd
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2007-10-30
• Publisher: Harvard Univ Pr

Summary

Since the 1970s a gulf has opened between the pay of low-paid workers and the pay of the middle class. No longer able to earn a decent wage in respectable work, many have left the labor force, and the job attachment of those remaining has weakened. For Edmund Phelps, this is a failure of political economy whose widespread effects are undermining the free-enterprise system. His solution is a graduated schedule of tax subsidies to enterprises for every low-wage worker they employ. As firms hire more of these workers, the labor market would tighten, driving up their pay levels as well as their employment.

Author Biography

Edmund S. Phelps is McVickar Professor of Political Economy at Columbia University

Table of Contents

Preface 2007	p. vi
Preface	p. ix
Prologue	p. 1
The Problem
Why Work?	p. 11
America's Second-Class Workers	p. 16
The Decline of Labor	p. 27
The Damage to Others	p. 38
The Causes
Is It Culture?	p. 51
Economic Sources	p. 64
The Role of the Welfare System	p. 83
The Remedy
The Market-Based Solution	p. 103
The Case for the Market-Based Solution	p. 122
The Flaws in Other Approaches	p. 144
Reply to Objections	p. 156
Epilogue	p. 167
Cost of the Model Wage Subsidy Plan	p. 175
Notes	p. 177
Index	p. 195
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