ISPS-Equitable Growth Conference: “Inequality, Politics, and Prosperity” SCHEDULE

• Heather Boushey, Executive Director, Washington Center for Equitable Growth
• Jacob Hacker, Director, ISPS; Stanley B. Resor Professor of Political Science

This opening session will lay out the stakes of this conversation, examining what shared prosperity means, as well as enumerating key trends in its major elements, including feelings of trust and efficacy regarding politics.

Moderator: Jacob Hacker

Conversation Starters:

• Lane Kenworthy, Professor of Sociology and Yankelovich Chair in Social Thought, University of California-San Diego
• Suresh Naidu, Assistant Professor of Economics and Public Affairs, Columbia University

Key Participants:

• Sarah Burd-Sharps, Co-Director, Measure of America
• Janet Gornick, Professor of Political Science and Sociology, CUNY; Director, Luxemborg Income Study
• Adam Levine, Assistant Professor, Department of Government, Cornell University
• Glenn Loury, Merton P. Stolz Professor of the Social Sciences, Brown University
• Daniel Markovits, Guido Clabresi Professor of Law, Yale University
• Dorian Warren, Associate Professor of Political Science and Public Affairs, Columbia University
• Frederick Wherry, Professor of Sociology; Co-Director, Center for Cultural Sociology; Yale University

The second session will examine how greater disperson of income wealth has affected the political standing of different groups in the polity.  Two questions will be the primary focus: First, how do we measure and assess inequality of influence?  Second, what are some of the reasons for unequal influence?

Moderator: Nick Bunker, Policy Analyst, Washington Center for Equitable Growth

Conversation Starters:

• Nick Carnes, Assistant Professor of Public Policy, Duke University
• Marty Gilens, Professor of Politics, Princeton University

Key Participants:

• Alan Gerber, Charles C. and Dorathea S. Dilley Professor of Political Science; Director, Center for the Study of American Politics; Yale University
• Eitan Hersh, Assistant Professor of Political Science, Yale University
• Nathan Kelly, Associate Professor of Political Science, University of Tennessee
• Jesse Rhodes, Associate Professor of Political Science, University of Massachusetts-Amherst
• Kris-Stella Trump, College Fellow in Political Science, Harvard University

Keynote Speaker: Maya Wiley, Counsel to the Mayor, New York City (1:00-1:30 p.m.)

Americans are deeply supportive of equality and shared prosperity in principle, but in practice we see few effective coalitions to support the achievement of these ideals even as the middle class and the poor face greater economic risks, and even as policy has become less effective at reducing inequality and poverty.  What are the sources and effects of these coalitional failures at the individual and collective levels?  In particular, how has growing income segregation undercut the potential for cross-class alliances and greater support for actions to address inequality?

Moderator: Vesla Weaver, Assistant Professor of Political Science and of African American Studies, Yale University

Conversation Starter:

• Jessica Trounstine, Associate Professor of Political Science, University of California-Merced
• Margaret Weir, Professor of Sociology and Political Science, Avice M. Saint Chair in Public Policy, University of California-Berkeley

Key Participants:

• Elizabeth Oltmans Ananat, Associate Professor of Economics, Duke University
• Kendra Bischoff, Assistant Professor of Sociology, Cornell University
• Ryan Enos, Assistant Professor of Government, Harvard University
• Claudine Gay, Professor of Government, Harvard University
• Ilyana Kuziemko, David W. Zalaznick Associate Professor of Business, Columbia Business School
• John Roemer, Elizabeth S. and A. Varick Professor of Political Science and Economics, Yale University
• Patrick Sharkey, Associate Professor of Sociology, New York University

While the first panel concerns a relationship of citizens to officeholders, this panel moves up one level to ask whether and how the institutions that govern our collective wellbeing are being affected by inequality.  How capable are our institutions at ensuring shared prosperity, and how has growing economic inequality affected the capacity for them to resolve pressing social challenges?

Moderator: Elisabeth Jacobs, Senior Director for Policy and Academic Programs, Washington Center for Equitable Growth

Conversation Starters:

• Suzanne Mettler, Clinton Rossiter Professor of American Institutions, Cornell University
• Paul Pierson, John Gross Professor of Political Science, University of California-Berkeley

Key Participants:

• William Galston, Senior Fellow and Ezra K. Zilkha Chair in Governance Studies, The Brookings Institution
• Larry Jacobs, Walter F. and John Mondale Chair for Political Studies, University of Minnesota
• Mike Konczal, Fellow, Roosevelt Institute
• Nolan McCarty, Susan Dod Brown Professor of Politics and Public Affairs, Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton University
• Theda Skocpol, Victor S. Thomas Professor of Government and Sociology, Harvard University
• Vanessa Williamson, Ph.D. candidate in Government and Social Policy, Harvard University

Jacob Hacker (ISPS) and Elisabeth Jacobs (Equitable Growth) will offer concluding comments, lay out a few key questions moving forward, and give a sense of what the next initiative is.