WGBH Forum Network; Arianna Huffington: Third World America
Description:
Arianna Huffington, cofounder and editor-in-chief of The Huffington Post, discusses the future of American prosperity and her new book, Third World America: How Our Politicians Are Abandoning the Middle Class and Betraying the American Dream.Our industrial base is vanishing, taking with it the kind of jobs that have formed the backbone of our economy for more than a century; our education system is in shambles, making it harder for tomorrows workforce to acquire the information and training it needs to land good twenty-first century jobs; our infrastructureour roads, our bridges, our sewage and water, our transportation and electrical systemsis crumbling; our economic system has been reduced to recurring episodes of Corporations Gone Wild; our political system is broken, in thrall to a small financial elite using the power of the checkbook to control both parties.And Americas middle class, the driver of so much of our economic success and political stability, is rapidly disappearing, forcing us to confront the fear that we are slipping as a nationthat our children and grandchildren will enjoy fewer opportunities and face a lower standard of living than we did.
