Inequality for All (2013)

A documentary that follows former U.S. Labor Secretary Robert Reich as he looks to raise awareness of the country's widening economic gap.

Director:

Jacob Kornbluth

Stars:

Robert Reich, Candice Bergen, Lily Tomlin

2 wins & 5 nominations.

Cast

Credited cast:
Candice Bergen	...	Murphy Brown (archive footage)
Lily Tomlin	...	Violet Newstead (archive footage)
Dolly Parton	...	Doralee Rhodes (archive footage)
Mary Tyler Moore	...	Mary Richards (archive footage)
Tyne Daly	...	Mary Beth Lacey (archive footage)
Sharon Gless	...	Christine Cagney (archive footage)
Conan O'Brien	...	Himself (archive footage)
Jon Stewart	...	Himself (archive footage)
Barack Obama	...	Himself (archive footage)
Bill Clinton	...	Himself (archive footage)
George Bush	...	Himself
Michelle Obama	...	Herself (archive footage)
Hillary Clinton	...	Herself (archive footage) (as Hillary Rodham Clinton)
George W. Bush	...	Himself (archive footage)
Barbara Bush	...	Herself (archive footage)

Storyline

A documentary that follows former U.S. Labor Secretary Robert Reich as he looks to raise awareness of the country's widening economic gap.

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Taglines:

He's taking this fight to the street.

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Genres:

Documentary

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated PG for thematic elements, some violence, language and smoking images.

Details

Official Sites:

Official Facebook Official site

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

24 April 2015 (Norway)

Also Known As:

Desigualdad para todos

Filming Locations:

University of California, Berkeley, California, USA

Box Office

Opening Weekend USA:

$140,888, 29 September 2013, Limited Release

Gross USA:

$1,205,079, 23 February 2014

Company Credits

Production Co:

72 Productions

Technical Specs

Runtime:

89 min

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.78 : 1

Did You Know?

Goofs

(at around 48 mins) The word "mortgage" is misspelled as "mortgae".

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Connections

Featured in Moyers & Company: The Collision of Sports and Politics (2013)

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Soundtracks

9 to 5
(uncredited)
Written by Dolly Parton
Performed by Dolly Parton

User Reviews

A film that should be mandatory viewing for all citizens

Robert Reich's Inequality for All is an accessible primer on the motion of our nation's socioeconomic barometer over the past century. Together with a range of anecdotal human interest stories, he effectively uses statistical data to show how the country's economic health has waxed and waned over the years, who has benefited and who has not, and just how extreme the concentration of wealth has become over the past 30 years.

At the top of the economic mountain, the 400 richest people in the country have recently accrued the same measure of wealth as the poorest 150 million (i.e., nearly half the country). This extreme concentration of wealth endangers our society by making too much money available for risky speculation (e.g., the stock market crash of 1929 and the mortgage-backed derivatives crash of 2008), producing less tax revenue for government operations (because most of the rich's income is taxed at the much lower "capital gains" rate) as well as making government vulnerable to the exclusive interests of the richest people. For an example of the latter, half a century ago there were 26 income tax brackets, reaching up at least into the middle ranks of the upper class, but now there are only 7. Ronald Reagan presided over the elimination of the higher brackets, thereby generating a huge windfall for the richest that has failed to "trickle down" to the rest of us.

Through a series of graphs, Reich shows the correlation between the current, growing concentration of wealth and the rise of global capitalism, the decline of labor unions, tax law manipulation, the off-shoring of capital and jobs, political polarization, and plain old greed. The average CEO in Reagan's day made about 40X the average worker's salary; that factor has now grown to about 400X. Unlike corporate executives, most of us don't get to determine our own level of compensation.

Reich briefly mentions the favorite red herring of conservative media, which is to incessantly attack government as the root of all evil, while never talking about how the actions of members of the private sector upper class are impoverishing the country, nor how impotent government has become in the face of multinational corporatism. I wish he had said more about this, because it is a major point of misunderstanding for many people.

He also never specifically mentions the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act during the late '90's - an event that paved the way for the crash of 2008. The repeal was driven by the Republican-controlled Congress during Bill Clinton's second term (Clinton had no choice but to sign the bill or else face a Congressional veto override).

But aside from those minor criticisms, overall, this film is a well-organized, fact-based survey of the topic, one that will make many people's jaws drop when they realize how extreme the economic continuum has become, from hyper-rich citizens like hedge fund managers making $4 Billion a year, to working-class parents with children, fighting like hell to keep their heads above water without health insurance nor any prospect for owning a home or saving for retirement.

Another manifestation of inequity is the slow erosion of our public infrastructure - utilities, roads, bridges, schools, transit systems, etc., while U.S. corporations and entrepreneurs hold trillions of dollars of revenue offshore in untaxed accounts. In prior generations, a significant portion of that sequestered capital would have been invested to sustain the "commonwealth." The present extreme inequity is breathtaking, and as Robert Reich infers in his curiously upbeat manner, if we don't change the vector we're on, the prognosis for our society is disturbing.