Some lives are made small so that others may grow. And we stockpile opportunity in exclusive communities, creating zones of concentrated riches alongside zones of concentrated despair. Those of us who are financially secure prioritize the subsidization of affluence over the alleviation of poverty, designing a welfare state that gives the most to those who need the least. The well-off exploit the poor, driving down their wages while forcing them to overpay for housing and access to cash and credit. Drawing on history, research, and original reporting, he argues that affluent Americans knowingly and unknowingly work to keep poor people poor. In this landmark book, acclaimed sociologist Matthew Desmond sets forth a new and hard-won answer to this question, revealing that there is so much poverty in America not in spite of our wealth but because of it. Why? Why does this land of plenty allow one in five of its children to go without basic necessities, permit scores of its citizens to live and die on the streets, and authorize its corporations to pay workers poverty wages? The United States is the richest country on earth, yet it has more poverty than any other advanced democracy.
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