The United States since 1980

Dean Baker is the cofounder of the Center for Economic Policy and Policy Research in Washington, DC. Before founding the center, he was a senior economist in Washington's Economic Policy Institute. He has authored or edited several books, including The Conservative Nanny State: How the Wealthy Use the Government to Stay Rich and Get Richer (2006), Social Security: The Phony Crisis (1999, with Mark Weisbrot), Getting Prices Right: The Debate Over the Consumer Price Index, which won a Choice book award as one of the outstanding academic books of 1998, and Globalization and Progressive Economic Policy (Cambridge University Press, 1998, coedited with Jerry Epstein and Bob Pollin). Dr Baker has also written for a variety of professional and general-audience publications. His work on economic policy issues is often cited in the media, and he is frequently interviewed on television and radio. Dr Baker has also testified a number of times before Congressional committees. He received his PhD in Economics from the University of Michigan.

• 1. Turning away: the United States breaks ranks; 2. Setting the scene: the United States in 1980; 3. The Reagan revolution I - running to the right; 4. The Reagan revolution becomes institutionalized; 5. The Republican tidal wave and the Clinton Boom; 6. The Bush Administration and the war on terrorism; 7. The United States in 2005: the impact of the last quarter century.

'Dean Baker is one of our most cogent economic thinkers. This is must reading.' Robert Kuttner, co-editor of The American Prospect