Rating: 
Summary: Why should I care?
Review: I'm sorry, but as noted by the reviewer, part of the problem is people buying homes they can't afford. Why is spending too much a "crisis"? USA Today in an article referencing the book cited a family with a combined income of $70,000 that had 5 kids and a tough time making ends meet. Here's a thought - don't have 5 kids! Geez, this isn't brain surgery, folks.
Rating: 
Summary: Good argument!
Review: Good argument from a Harvard Law professor on the reasons why two income family are losing the American Dreams. It is well written with compelling cases. It is selling well now, #157. But it does not give clues as to what needs to be done.
Rating: 
Summary: Current affairs buffs -- add this to your collection
Review: Yes, Virginia, what was previously known as the American middle class HAS been losing ground, BADLY. Read this book to confirm what your instincts and life experiences have been telling you for years now. More and more money loaned by an increasingly unregulated financial industry, leads to more and more money chasing homes in areas where kids can play safely in their neighborhoods, leads to people living on the edge so that they can afford those homes, leads to people going over the edge when any contingency arises. The big winner: the financial industry. The losers: all the rest of us, and any chance of a sense of community for our kids to grow up in.Read this book to get well-researched and well-documented facts behind the story. Read it also to dispel any false notion that anyone in Washington is advocating the people's interest. The proposed solutions are not sufficiently developed nor supported, but the exposition on the issues and their causes and implications is worth the price of admission.
Rating: 
Summary: Giving them more excuses...
Review: Sure two income couples have it rough. What about one income families? Retirees on fixed incomes? Single parent homes? I know housing is horrible. Try living in Atlanta and making a mortgage payment. Sure, insurance is going up. What about taxes??? To hand people excuses doesn't help them. They need answers. Saying get a cheaper home won't fix the problem in many instances. It's like my Dad says, "Watch the pennies and the dollars will take care of themselves." It's the people out there with $100 cable bills and $200 cell phone bill who often (not always) have trouble paying the monthly note.
Rating:
Summary: May be choose who you marry differently
Review: I think the authors omit another significant (though somewhat not politically correct) issue. In the past age of lauded
"single-income family", it had been normal for ladies to seek out for marriage older men who have already acquired substantial financial wealth, and established a proven record of long-term economic stability and ability to support the family through thick and thin. In the most of the rest of the world, it still remains the case - the main qualification of good husband material is solid financial security, not looks, dancing ability, youth, "coolness", athletic prowess, or even the level of intellectual or emotional development. In the modern era in the US, with ladies conditioned to be so independent, many choose husbands for all reasons but, and the rest deemed "golddiggers". Well, regretably but inevitably, those who choose whom to marry the same way as whom to hang out with in high school, often experience the consequences.
Rating:
Summary: Interesting read but doesn;t emphasis the main issue
Review: Compare the pre WWII family which had one employed member to today's two income family, look at where the money went then and where it goes today and one thing stands out in stark contrast: Taxes!. Yes, almost all of the second income is going to the increased tax burden imposed on people in this country since WWII. Income tax, sales tax, property tax, use tax, and so on. Let's put the blame squarely where it lies and then people can make an informed and deliberate decision about whether the large government at all levels is worth spending half of the productive capacity of our nation on.
Rating: 
Summary: Surprising and Readable New Data on Middle Class Finances
Review: This book manages to do three things at once: It tells real stories about
families like mine, it conveys an enormous amount of interesting and
original research in an easy-to-grasp format, and it makes some powerful
suggestions for how to increase a family's financial safety. I especially
liked "The Financial Fire-Drill," which recommends not cutting back on
frills. This book is one new idea after another. I recommend this book very highly for those who want to learn about what is happening to the middle class or who want to put their own financial circumstances in a larger social and economic context--and do something about it.
Rating:
Summary: Interesting ideas, limited depth.
Review: The book provides interesting insight into the causes of bankruptcy and the dynamics underlying it. The serious limitations are the authors fail to address certain dimensions of the issues. The authors rightly identify several myths about bankruptcy and rightly criticize soem of the conventional financial advice that does not address stress testing. More detail evaluation of how a families spending and saving habits may offer some protection are left out of this book. For example, examining what happens to the family that saves 10% of its income would have been valuable. The solution of school choice (or public school choice) has a degree of merit; however the implications for education and budget go far beyond the scope of this book. Their critique of our university system is thoughtful, but almost irrelevant. Families do not go bankrupt saving for college--they merely build additional funds which they could deplete in a crisis. In fact the desire to save for college may limit the degree to which people stretch to buy a home. While the practices of many banks and lenders deserve serious criticism, the authors neglect to consider that the loans may ultimately prevent some bankruptcies by providing needed funds that could tide some families over. Are the people with subprime loans going bankrupt because of or inspite of them? The authors also neglect the role of the current price structure in our medical care and insurance system. Families without insurance are often billed 2-3 times the rates paid by insurance companies and their subscribers due to the "favored" rates charged to insurance companies and the inflated "list" prices developed to fool the medicare system.
Rating:
Summary: Misguided Research
Review: I have only made it through the first two chapters and am finding myself so annoyed I am not sure I will continue reading. Their theories on why people get into debt and declare bankruptcy are supposedly researched but I have never heard such crap in all of the research I have done on debt, bankruptcy, and consumerism. They claim that the debt does not come from buying more clothes, toys, cars, and eating out more often, (because, according to them, when you eat out more you buy fewer groceries??? I know personally that that is untrue.) but from buying a home in a good school district. Give me a break! I am really wondering about these authors. They act like they have come up with startling new evidence of why we are in debt, but I think they are making the whole thing up.
Rating:
Summary: Family Values or profit
Review: This study provides an insightful and well-reasoned analysis of the problems facing middle class families. I intend to use it in my next Sociology course because the younger students need a perspective on how to survive in the contemporary economy. Also it is an excellent example of how to link problems at the level of individual families to public policy. As far as analysis, she is too quick to dismiss Juliet Shor who does a better job of economic analysis. Moreover, she clearly ignores central findings in the sociology of education which link school performance to the family background of students rather than the quality of the school. Indeed most of the families seeking out the "best" districts equate that with the class level of the families in that district. Their children might do far better in a "blue collar" district with supportive community institutions. Are they looking to raise their status and rationalizing it as meeting the needs of the children? More on target is her critique of credit practices. I was totally unaware of the legal changes that have occurred and that insight made the entire book worthwhile. Those criticizing families and individuals who accumulate large debts clearly favor the legalization of drugs. After all, if responding to such "temptations" is entirely one's own fault, does that not also apply to drug addiction. And if the kids suffer then it is the fault of the parents. And then let us pass a law that ensures the family will never be able to recover. What we really need is a new "bankruptcy" law that allows the debtor to walk in and terminate all obligations in which their payments equal the original amount borrowed. This will quickly end all usurious practices. If we really support family values, we should support family institutions just as was done during the era of the "Greatest Generation."
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