Carnegie Forum on Social Inequality

August 12, 2004


In 2000, Carnegie Corporation of New York partnered with the Russell Sage Foundation to explore a topic high on America's agenda: income inequality and the social impact of this growing inequity. The foundations commissioned forty-eight social scientists organized into six working groups to examine whether the recent rise in economic inequality has in fact exacerbated social inequities of the kind that might make the widening gap between rich and poor Americans difficult to reverse.

The first phase of that research is complete, and was published recently in the report Social Inequality (Russell Sage Foundation, 2004).

On August 12, 2004, Carnegie Corporation of New York and its president, Vartan Gregorian hosted a Forum on Social Inequality. As Gregorian said, “We think the time is ripe—now, when the country is focused on the kinds of national concerns that challenge us every four years—to bring the insights and policy implications detailed in the report to the forefront of our national discussions.”

Eric Wanner, president of the Russell Sage Foundation led a panel discussion by three of the scholars who worked on the project: Larry Bartels (who is also a 2004 Carnegie Scholar), Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, Princeton University; Barbara Wolfe, Institute of Poverty Research, University of Wisconsin; and Jane Waldfogel, School of Social Work, Columbia University.

In opening remarks, Wanner said, “The United States has been through an inequality shock over the past few years and this economic trend will have important social consequences.” Many of these implications are examined in Social Inequality, Wanner said, noting some of the issues covered in the book. “In each social domain,” he said, “we asked how the lives of the rich and poor changed over the last three decades, as economic inequality rose? Did inequality in family structure and investments in children, in educational quality and opportunity, in health care and outcomes, in job quality and satisfaction with work, in political participation and influence, and in many other aspects of social life become more or less pronounced?”

The Carnegie Forums comprise an occasional series of working luncheons and roundtable discussions that focus on national and international issues. An essential component of these events are the comments and questions from the audience of academic and policy leaders, foundation colleagues and journalists.

Photos from the Forum:

Vartan Gregorian, President, Carnegie Corporation of NY and Eric Wanner, President, Russell Sage Foundation

Panel of Speakers: Jane Waldfogel, Professor of Social Work, Columbia University; Larry M. Bartels, Donald E. Stokes Professor of Public and International Affairs, Department of Politics and Woodrow Wilson School, Princeton University; Barbara L. Wolfe, Professor of Economics, Population, Health Sciences and Public Affairs, University of Wisconsin-Madison; and Eric Wanner, President, Russell Sage Foundation.

John Brademus, President Emeritus, New York University; Geri Mannion, Chair, Strengthening U.S. Democracy Program, Carnegie Corporation of NY; and Charles Kolb, President, Committee for Economic Development

Melanie Campbell, Executive Director, National Coalition on Black Civic Participation