Review Of The Scourge Of Neoliberalism By Jack Rasmus

• DOI: https://doi.org/10.13169/worlrevipoliecon.13.4.0559
• Published date: 20 October 2022
• Date: 20 October 2022
• Pages: 559-567
• Author: Lawrence Souza,Jacob Dunbar
• Subject Matter: neoliberalism,neoliberal capitalism,deregulation,economics scourge

World revieW of Political economy vol. 13 no. 4 Winter 2022

REVIEW OF THE SCOURGE OF NEOLIBERALISM

BY JACK RASMUS

Lawrence Souza and Jacob Dunbar

Dr. Lawrence Souza (left) has over 26 years of teaching economics, finance,

and real estate at major colleges and universities in the San Francisco Bay

Area, and has been teaching for seven years at Saint Mary’s College of

California in the School of Economics and Business Administration (SEBA);

he also has 33 years of experience in the commercial real estate and financial

services industry. He is now President of Economics Applications, Inc.

(Johnson Souza Group, Inc.). Email: Lsouza@JohnsonSouzaGroup.com

Jacob Dunbar (right) is a graduating senior at Saint Mary’s College, pursuing a BS

in economics. His areas of study and interest include neoliberalism, US economic

history, and the 2008 financial crisis. Email: jacobdunbar757@gmail.com

Abstract: In approximately the last four decades, neoliberalism has reigned as the structure

of Western economies, chiefly the United States. However, neoliberal capitalism and an

environment synonymous with deregulation, “free” markets, and limited government

intervention in economic matters has repeatedly led to crises and crashes in history. The

Scourge of Neoliberalism examines the actions of past presidential administrations since

1980, and explains how neoliberalism’s allure has kept it afloat for so many years.

Key words: neoliberalism; neoliberal capitalism; deregulation; economics scourge

Introduction

While there have been many books written on neoliberalism over the past number

of decades (e.g., Noam Chomsky, David M. Kotz, Alan Greenspan, Adrian

Wooldridge, Wendy Brown, Gerard, and William Davies), Jack Rasmus’s book,

The Scourge of Neoliberalism (2020), addresses neoliberalism from a less-

acknowledged perspective, mainly through the lens of historical practice and the

deep material forces driving modern neoliberal policy. The book further chroni-

cles the development and utilization of neoliberal ideology for social and eco-

nomic engineering, as reflected over the decades through the eyes of various

presidential administrations from Reagan (1981–1989) through Trump until 2020,

when the book was published.

In order to gain a better understanding of the neoliberal economic structure that

we are used to, Rasmus chooses to summarize and expose the neoliberal system he

dubs “a wolf in sheep’s clothing” first. To know the core tenets of the neoliberal

DOI:10.13169/worlrevipoliecon.13.4.0559