Preface -- new gilded age -- Escalating economic inequality -- Interpreting inequality -- Economic inequality as a political issue -- Inequality and American democracy -- partisan political economy -- Partisan patterns of income growth -- partisan coincidence? -- Partisan differences in macroeconomic policy -- Macroeconomic performance and income growth -- Partisan policies and post-tax income growth -- Democrats, Republicans, and the rise of inequality -- Class politics and partisan change -- In search of the working class -- Has the white working class abandoned the Democratic party? -- Have working-class whites become more conservative? -- Do "moral values" trump economics? -- Are religious voters distracted from economic issues? -- Class politics, alive and well -- Partisan biases in economic accountability -- Myopic voters -- political timing of income growth -- Class biases in economic voting -- wealthy give something back : partisan biases in campaign spending -- Political consequences of biased accountability -- Do Americans care about inequality? -- Egalitarian values -- Rich and poor -- Perceptions of inequality -- Facts and values in the realm of inequality -- Homer gets a tax cut -- Bush tax cuts -- Public support for the tax cuts -- Unenlightened self-interest -- Chump change -- Into the sunset --

strange appeal of estate tax repeal -- Public support for estate tax repeal -- Is public support for repeal a product of misinformation? -- Did interest groups manufacture public antipathy to the estate tax? -- Elite ideology and the politics of estate tax repeal -- eroding minimum wage -- economic effects of the minimum wage -- Public support for the minimum wage -- politics of inaction -- Democrats, unions, and the eroding minimum wage -- earned income tax credit -- Reversing the tide -- Economic inequality and political representation -- Ideological representation -- Unequal responsiveness -- Unequal responsiveness on social issues : the case of abortion -- Partisan differences in representation -- Why are the poor unrepresented? -- Unequal democracy -- Who governs? -- Partisan politics and "the have-nots" -- Political obstacles to economic equality -- city of utmost necessity -- Selected references -- Index.