About Me

I am Associate Professor and Chair of the History Department at the University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth. I am also the Academic Director of the Clemente Course in the Humanities, in New Bedford MA. Author of "Social Security and the Middle Class Squeeze" (Praeger, 2005) and the forthcoming "Saul Alinsky the Dilemma of Race in the Post-War City" (University of Chicago Press), my teaching and scholarship focuses on American urban history, social policy, and politics. I am presently writing a book on home ownership in modern America, entitled "Castles Made of Sand? Home Ownership and the American Dream." I live in Providence RI, where I have served on the School Board since March 2015. All opinions posted here are my own.

Great recent articles from around the web

Jonathan Chait, The Triumph of Taxophobia, Democracy Journal, Spring 2011

Simon Johnson, Did the Poor Cause the Crisis?  Project Syndicate, January 2011

Gar Alperovitz, "The New-Economy Movement," The Nation Magazine, June 13th 2011

George Packer, Empty Wallets, New Yorker, July 25th 2011

Suzanne Mettler, 20,000 Leagues Under the State, Washington Monthly, July/August 2011