HIS 384 POVERTY AND INEQUALITY IN US

An introduction to how Americans have historically understood, confronted, and sought solutions to poverty from colonial times to the present. The course investigates changes in political economy and culture that have transformed the nature of poverty and who is — and is not — exposed to it, from the rise of “free” wage labor in the 19th century to globalization and the rise and fall of the welfare state in the 20th century. Students will also study anti-poverty political movements — from the 19th century labor movement through the welfare rights movement of the 1960s to the “Fight for $15” movement of today — alongside the ever-growing field of “experts” who have attempted to understand the nature of poverty and the political economies that produce it, from evangelists to Progressive reformers, sociologists, and government bureaucrats.