By Stan Paul

Income and wealth inequality is the focus of the newly released issue of Blueprint, a UCLA partnership with the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs.

The second edition is once again led by editor-in-chief, Jim Newton, a 25-year veteran reporter and editor for the Los Angeles Times.

“American inequality decreased in the 1950s, only to explode in the 1970s and ’80s and to expand yet again during the recent recession,” writes Newton in the introduction.

Included in the Fall 2015 “Table Talk” section is an interview with economics Nobel Laureate and former presidential adviser, Joseph Stiglitz, author of the influential 2012 book, The Price of Inequality. Los Angeles Times editorial writer and deputy editorial page editor, Jon Healey, interviewed Stiglitz on subjects ranging from taxes and growth since the great recession to minimum wage and basic fairness.

“…we have become one of the nations among the advanced countries with the least opportunity. In the United States, the life chances of young people are more dependent on the income and education of their parents than in almost any other advanced country,” Stiglitz comments.

Research and profiles by noted journalists and scholars in this second edition include a look at leadership in Los Angeles, the physical suffering of the poor, unequal schools, wages and the middle class, and economic growth. Blueprint’s “Landscape” section includes writing on voter turnout (by Newton) as well as pieces on the working poor and same-sex marriage.

“We are more about conversations, writes Newton, adding, “I hope the pieces contained here will start some of those conversations, as policy makers and others who care about society consider inequality and how it shapes neighborhoods and destinies. Few questions more define our history; few are more important to consider and address.”

A public discussion led by Jim Newton is set for Oct. 21 at the California Endowment in Los Angeles. Scheduled discussants are: former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio R. Villaraigosa, Homeboy Industries’ Father Greg Boyle and the California Endowment’s Robert Ross.

For more information and registration, please go to: http://blueprint.ucla.edu/event/public-discussion-thoughtful-l-a-leaders-on-poverty-and-politics/

Read the newly released second edition online at: Blueprint.ucla.edu