Evil Geniuses: The Unmaking of America
by Kurt Andersen
View on GoodreadsAndersen's companion-volume argument that the explosion of inequality since the 1970s wasn't drift or accident but a deliberate, organized, decades-long project executed by corporate and conservative elites.
Core ideas
- The 1971 Powell Memo is treated as the founding document — a literal blueprint for capturing courts, think tanks, media, and economics departments.
- The shift from managerial capitalism (stakeholders, long horizons) to shareholder capitalism (Friedman doctrine, financialization, executive comp in stock) was an engineered ideological win.
- Cultural nostalgia and political progressivism on identity issues mask economic regression — both parties accommodated the new order.
Published2020
Pages430
ISBN9781984801364
ReadSep 2022
