Part of the Series
Moyers and Company
There are 80-plus million Americans today who were born roughly between 1978 and 2000, and they’re getting hit hard by economic circumstances created over the past 30 years. The Millennials are the first generation of Americans who cannot count on doing better than their parents. How have these realities affected their outlook? And how will that impact Barack Obama, whom they supported so enthusiastically in 2008? This week, Bill discusses how economic inequality destroys opportunity for the Millennial generation with Heather McGhee — a Millennial herself — who directs the Washington office of the research and advocacy group Demos.
Also on the show is Bruce Bartlett, a former domestic policy adviser for the Reagan White House and former top treasury official under the first President Bush. Now a heretic in the conservative circles where he once was a star, Bartlett argues that right-wing tax policies — pushed by the ideologue Grover Norquist, Tea Party activists, and the One Percent’s rented politicians — are destroying America’s economic foundation.