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from the free market, which he obviously distrusts as the ultimate
social arbiter.
It
all underscores the fragmented quality of Thurow 's
analysis and his failure to link his microeconomic insights with some
broader macropolicy standards. This discontinuity is what leaves the
reader unprepared for the remarkable policy recommendations in the
final chapter: "massive public investments, budget surpluses to gener–
ate more savings [for capital formation] ... increases in income trans–
fer payments, and tax cuts for the lower middle class." Corporate
profits taxes and the progressive feature of the personal income tax
should be eliminated, adds Thurow, in favor of taxes on wealth. The
present tax system is maddeningly arbitrary at all income levels: any
residual progressive effects of the federal income tax are being
swamped by "horizontal inequity" - "the unequal treatment of
equals" in the same revenue category. Furthermore, since "lack of
jobs has been endemic in peacetime during the past fifty years of
American history," the one equitable way to shift the output balance
away from consumption, toward needed investment, is by stressing
employment. Thurow calls for nothing less than government-guar–
anteed jobs for everybody, rather than mere income supplements for
poorer households.
These would amount to truly radical policy changes-especially
the last, which would hit capitalist priorities at their most vulnerable
spot, namely, domination of labor markets with a safety valve of
unemployment to keep the lid on wages during economic upswings.
They are proof of Thurow's commitment to genuine social reform; but
it cannot be said that they follow from his preceding zero-sum diagno–
sis. That framework provides no more conceptual support for Thu–
row 's chosen reforms than, say, for neoconservative "supply-side"
economics with its advocacy of large, across-the-board tax cuts and a
trickle-down reliance on high profits and corporate investment to fuel
faster economic growth. Significantly,
The Zero-Sum Society
is appeal–
ing to a variety of economic observers across the political spectrum .
Each has digested, for his own purposes, the message that sacrifices are
necessary to restore economic vitality-that larger investments must be
paid for out of forgone consumption and that society cannot achieve
economic advance unless some group pays the price.
Business Week,
for example, greeted
The Zero-Sum Society
as "a ruthlessly honest,
tough-minded book." "Important as a clue to Thurow's priorities," a
Business Week
senior editor noted, "is that he appears to be ready to
support any program-conservative as well as liberal-to spur growth,
because action is superior
to
a status quo that will cause the U.S.
economy to fail. "
