Advance Praise

"A modern classic of financial reporting on the corrupt alliance between predatory lenders and free-market zealots in government…A well timed and lively guide to the wreckage created by financial deregulation and its destructive effect on both consumers and the broader economy."

--Robert Kuttner, co-editor of the The American Prospect and author of The Squandering of America

"Up to Our Eyeballs lays bare the credit tricks and traps that have wrecked the lives of millions of hard-working middle-class Americans. But instead of serving up despair, this book lays out a battle plan for fighting back. Read it now, before it is too late."

--Elizabeth Warren, Leo Gottlieb Professor of Law, Harvard Law School

About the Book

Before most people had heard of subprime mortgages--before Washington had shown any concern or Wall Street had seen anything but a new source of huge profits--there was a debt crisis brewing in this country.

It was a crisis fueled not by a spoiled generation's "aspirational spending" on cars and homes and baubles, but by an ideology of market-worship that had spun way out of control. With boundless expressions of faith in the private sector and endless denigration of government, the giants of the American lending industry were allowed to write their own rules, aggressively marketing a succession of new loan products that were rigged to put people into near-perpetual debt.

That same mind-set led to cutbacks in health, retirement, and other social programs that in our parents' and grandparents' day (and in the other rich countries of the world) insulated working families from economic shocks. The result was to make trick-and-trap-laden loans seem like a normal way for middle- and low-income Americans to make ends meet—our "de facto safety net," in other words.

Up to Our Eyeballs is a lively and timely exploration of the causes and consequences of the explosive rise in consumer debt, and of the fast-spreading financial and economic crisis. After explaining how we got into our credit fix, the authors sketch out a plausible escape route, based on proven good ideas that our political and economic elites have temporarily forgotten, at the expense of the rest of us.

Contact:
To schedule an interview with the authors, or to request a review copy of the book, please contact Timothy Rusch or Gennady Kolker, Demos, communications@demos.org, or call (212) 633-1405.

For key research and statistics on household debt, please visit www.demos.org