Books
The State of White America
– Video, Bradley Lecture, American Enterprise Institute, April 4, 2011.Summary: Over the last half century, America has developed a new lower class and a new upper class that are different in kind from anything it has ever known. These developments are not… More
Charles Murray on the State of White America
– Video, C-SPAN, April 4, 2011.Summary: Author and political scientist Charles Murray spoke about American cultural values and economic disparity. He said that over the last half century, America had developed not only… More
Belmont and Fishtown
– The New Criterion, January 2012.Excerpt: American exceptionalism is not just something that Americans claim for themselves. Historically, Americans have been seen as different, even peculiar, to people around the… More
White Blight
– Kay Hymowitz, City Journal, January 25, 2012.Excerpt: Charles Murray is back, and the debate about wealth and inequality will never be the same. Readers of the political scientist’s earlier work, especially The Bell Curve and Losing… More
The Great Divorce by David Brooks
– David Brooks, New York Times, January 30, 2012.Excerpt: I’ll be shocked if there’s another book this year as important as Charles Murray’s Coming Apart. I’ll be shocked if there’s another book that so compellingly describes… More
Values Inequality
– W. Bradford Wilcox, Wall Street Journal, January 31, 2012.Excerpt: Mr. Murray’s sobering portrait is of a nation where millions of people are losing touch with the founding virtues that have long lent American lives purpose, direction and… More
The Virtue Deficit
– Ron Haskins, National Review, February 6, 2012.Excerpt: Charles Murray writes important and provocative books. His latest book, Coming Apart, joins Losing Ground (1984) and The Bell Curve (1994) as, in my view, among his most important… More
Five Myths About White People
– Washington Post, February 10, 2012.Excerpt: 1. Working-class whites are more religious than upper-class whites. This is a pervasive misconception encouraged by liberals who conflate the religious right with the working… More
Can the Working Class Be Saved?
– Ross Douthat, New York Times, February 11, 2012.Excerpt: Coming Apart, the book that’s launched a thousand arguments this winter, is a brilliant work with an exasperating conclusion. What’s brilliant is Murray’s portrait, rich in… More
What Charles Murray Gets Right
– Ross Douthat, New York Times, February 14, 2012.Excerpt: “Coming Apart” offers a convincing account of how meritocracy has exacerbated the problems that Murray describes — encouraging the best and brightest to work and live and… More
Narrowing the Class Divide
– New York Times, March 7, 2012.Excerpt: THERE’S been a lot of commentary from all sides about my recently published book, “Coming Apart,” which deals with the divergence between the professional and working classes… More
Discussing Charles Murray’s Coming Apart
– Video conversation, EconLog, March 9, 2012.Summary: Arnold Kling organized a video conference to discuss Coming Apart. Participants were Brink Lindsey, Bryan Caplan, Megan McArdle, Reihan Salam, and Ross Douthat. There was not much… More
Why Economics Can’t Explain Our Cultural Divide
– Wall Street Journal, March 18, 2012.Excerpt: Some reviewers of “Coming Apart,” my new book about the growing cultural divide between America’s upper and lower classes, have faulted me for ignoring the role… More
Mind the Gap by Yuval Levin
– Yuval Levin, Weekly Standard, March 19, 2012.Excerpt: Charles Murray’s profound and important new book has, for the most part, been received as merely the latest volley in the inequality debates. Its champions have tended to praise… More
Charles Murray on Colbert Report
– Video, The Colbert Report, Comedy Central, March 27, 2012.Summary: Charles Murray talks about his book, Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010, and suggests a way to address the growing division between the classes. (7:24)
Charles Murray on Coming Apart
– Video, Hoover Institution, April 10, 2012.Summary: This week on Uncommon Knowledge, longtime American Enterprise Institute fellow Charles Murray discusses his controversial new book, Coming Apart, about what American was, is, and… More
“Coming Apart” and Fishtown
– Philadelphia Inquirer, April 23, 2012.Excerpt: Coming Apart, the book I published a few months ago, tracks the cultural divergences in America’s classes from 1960 to 2010, focusing on whites as a way of getting people to… More
Charles Murray: Why America is coming apart on class lines
– Video, Reason TV, April 25, 2012.Summary: Charles Murray, one of America’s most influential social policy thinkers, has come out with a widely discussed new book called Coming Apart: The State of White America,… More
American Caste
– Kay S. Hymowitz, City Journal, Spring 2012.Excerpt: When Charles Murray’s best-selling Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960–2010 appeared a few months ago, the book’s fictional working-class neighborhood, Fishtown,… More
Two Americas, Growing Apart
– Jonathan Rauch, Reason, June 2012.Excerpt: Unless you live in a cave, you know the controversial work and reputation of Charles Murray. Losing Ground, published in 1984, proposed eliminating welfare as we knew it and became… More
Why America is Coming Apart
– Video, American Enterprise Institute, June 24, 2012.Summary: It used to be that America meant something to all Americans. But that common understanding is dissolving, explains AEI scholar Charles Murray in his new book, Coming Apart: The… More
A Tale of Two Cities
– R. Shep Melnick, Claremont Review of Books, Summer 2012.Excerpt: Charles Murray knows how to draw attention. Soon after Coming Apart appeared, nearly everyone who follows public affairs knew of the yawning gap separating the declining,… More
Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960–2010
– (New York: Crown Forum, 2012.)Summary from Publisher: In Coming Apart, Charles Murray explores the formation of American classes that are different in kind from anything we have ever known, focusing on whites as a way… More
Poker is America
– New York Times, February 24, 2013.Excerpt: Let’s start by getting this straight: poker is about money. If you took the money out of it, I wouldn’t play. But even when I lose, I’ve had a good time. I love playing poker… More
Charles Murray: Are You a Snob? Take the Test.
– Video, Big Think, March 8, 2013.Summary: American Enterprise Institute scholar Charles Murray has designed a quiz he hopes will have “a salutary effect on bringing to people’s attention the degree to which… More
Are We Really Coming Apart?
– Video, panel at the Aspen Institute, March 18, 2014.Summary: Two very different scholars of American society look at the United States and the growing gap in values and behaviors among communities and classes within them. What is happening… More
The American Dream in Crisis? A discussion with Robert Putnam and Charles Murray
– Video, panel at the American Enterprise Institute, June 22, 2015.Summary: In Our Kids: The American Dream in Crisis (Simon & Schuster, 2015), political scientist Robert Putnam illustrates the increasing inequality between rich and poor Americans… More
Kids Today
– Claremont Review of Books, Summer 2015.Excerpt: My takeaway from all this was expressed in the closing chapter of my own work on Putnam’s topic, Coming Apart (2012). Very briefly, I don’t think America’s civic culture will… More
Trump’s America
– Wall Street Journal, February 12, 2016.Excerpt: If you are dismayed by Trumpism, don’t kid yourself that it will fade away if Donald Trump fails to win the Republican nomination. Trumpism is an expression of the legitimate… More
An Open Letter to the Virginia Tech Community
– American Enterprise Institute, March 17, 2016.Excerpt: Last week, the president of Virginia Tech, Tim Sands, published an “open letter to the Virginia Tech community” defending lectures delivered by deplorable people like me (I’m… More
America Against Itself
– Interview by Sean Collins, Spiked Review, August 2016.Excerpt: With the publication in 2012 of Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010, political scientist Charles Murray – celebrated and denigrated in equal measure for his… More
Essays
The State of White America
– Video, Bradley Lecture, American Enterprise Institute, April 4, 2011.Summary: Over the last half century, America has developed a new lower class and a new upper class that are different in kind from anything it has ever known. These developments are not… More
Charles Murray on the State of White America
– Video, C-SPAN, April 4, 2011.Summary: Author and political scientist Charles Murray spoke about American cultural values and economic disparity. He said that over the last half century, America had developed not only… More
Belmont and Fishtown
– The New Criterion, January 2012.Excerpt: American exceptionalism is not just something that Americans claim for themselves. Historically, Americans have been seen as different, even peculiar, to people around the… More
White Blight
– Kay Hymowitz, City Journal, January 25, 2012.Excerpt: Charles Murray is back, and the debate about wealth and inequality will never be the same. Readers of the political scientist’s earlier work, especially The Bell Curve and Losing… More
The Great Divorce by David Brooks
– David Brooks, New York Times, January 30, 2012.Excerpt: I’ll be shocked if there’s another book this year as important as Charles Murray’s Coming Apart. I’ll be shocked if there’s another book that so compellingly describes… More
Values Inequality
– W. Bradford Wilcox, Wall Street Journal, January 31, 2012.Excerpt: Mr. Murray’s sobering portrait is of a nation where millions of people are losing touch with the founding virtues that have long lent American lives purpose, direction and… More
The Virtue Deficit
– Ron Haskins, National Review, February 6, 2012.Excerpt: Charles Murray writes important and provocative books. His latest book, Coming Apart, joins Losing Ground (1984) and The Bell Curve (1994) as, in my view, among his most important… More
Five Myths About White People
– Washington Post, February 10, 2012.Excerpt: 1. Working-class whites are more religious than upper-class whites. This is a pervasive misconception encouraged by liberals who conflate the religious right with the working… More
Can the Working Class Be Saved?
– Ross Douthat, New York Times, February 11, 2012.Excerpt: Coming Apart, the book that’s launched a thousand arguments this winter, is a brilliant work with an exasperating conclusion. What’s brilliant is Murray’s portrait, rich in… More
What Charles Murray Gets Right
– Ross Douthat, New York Times, February 14, 2012.Excerpt: “Coming Apart” offers a convincing account of how meritocracy has exacerbated the problems that Murray describes — encouraging the best and brightest to work and live and… More
Narrowing the Class Divide
– New York Times, March 7, 2012.Excerpt: THERE’S been a lot of commentary from all sides about my recently published book, “Coming Apart,” which deals with the divergence between the professional and working classes… More
Discussing Charles Murray’s Coming Apart
– Video conversation, EconLog, March 9, 2012.Summary: Arnold Kling organized a video conference to discuss Coming Apart. Participants were Brink Lindsey, Bryan Caplan, Megan McArdle, Reihan Salam, and Ross Douthat. There was not much… More
Why Economics Can’t Explain Our Cultural Divide
– Wall Street Journal, March 18, 2012.Excerpt: Some reviewers of “Coming Apart,” my new book about the growing cultural divide between America’s upper and lower classes, have faulted me for ignoring the role… More
Mind the Gap by Yuval Levin
– Yuval Levin, Weekly Standard, March 19, 2012.Excerpt: Charles Murray’s profound and important new book has, for the most part, been received as merely the latest volley in the inequality debates. Its champions have tended to praise… More
Charles Murray on Colbert Report
– Video, The Colbert Report, Comedy Central, March 27, 2012.Summary: Charles Murray talks about his book, Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010, and suggests a way to address the growing division between the classes. (7:24)
Charles Murray on Coming Apart
– Video, Hoover Institution, April 10, 2012.Summary: This week on Uncommon Knowledge, longtime American Enterprise Institute fellow Charles Murray discusses his controversial new book, Coming Apart, about what American was, is, and… More
“Coming Apart” and Fishtown
– Philadelphia Inquirer, April 23, 2012.Excerpt: Coming Apart, the book I published a few months ago, tracks the cultural divergences in America’s classes from 1960 to 2010, focusing on whites as a way of getting people to… More
Charles Murray: Why America is coming apart on class lines
– Video, Reason TV, April 25, 2012.Summary: Charles Murray, one of America’s most influential social policy thinkers, has come out with a widely discussed new book called Coming Apart: The State of White America,… More
American Caste
– Kay S. Hymowitz, City Journal, Spring 2012.Excerpt: When Charles Murray’s best-selling Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960–2010 appeared a few months ago, the book’s fictional working-class neighborhood, Fishtown,… More
Two Americas, Growing Apart
– Jonathan Rauch, Reason, June 2012.Excerpt: Unless you live in a cave, you know the controversial work and reputation of Charles Murray. Losing Ground, published in 1984, proposed eliminating welfare as we knew it and became… More
Why America is Coming Apart
– Video, American Enterprise Institute, June 24, 2012.Summary: It used to be that America meant something to all Americans. But that common understanding is dissolving, explains AEI scholar Charles Murray in his new book, Coming Apart: The… More
A Tale of Two Cities
– R. Shep Melnick, Claremont Review of Books, Summer 2012.Excerpt: Charles Murray knows how to draw attention. Soon after Coming Apart appeared, nearly everyone who follows public affairs knew of the yawning gap separating the declining,… More
Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960–2010
– (New York: Crown Forum, 2012.)Summary from Publisher: In Coming Apart, Charles Murray explores the formation of American classes that are different in kind from anything we have ever known, focusing on whites as a way… More
Poker is America
– New York Times, February 24, 2013.Excerpt: Let’s start by getting this straight: poker is about money. If you took the money out of it, I wouldn’t play. But even when I lose, I’ve had a good time. I love playing poker… More
Charles Murray: Are You a Snob? Take the Test.
– Video, Big Think, March 8, 2013.Summary: American Enterprise Institute scholar Charles Murray has designed a quiz he hopes will have “a salutary effect on bringing to people’s attention the degree to which… More
Are We Really Coming Apart?
– Video, panel at the Aspen Institute, March 18, 2014.Summary: Two very different scholars of American society look at the United States and the growing gap in values and behaviors among communities and classes within them. What is happening… More
The American Dream in Crisis? A discussion with Robert Putnam and Charles Murray
– Video, panel at the American Enterprise Institute, June 22, 2015.Summary: In Our Kids: The American Dream in Crisis (Simon & Schuster, 2015), political scientist Robert Putnam illustrates the increasing inequality between rich and poor Americans… More
Kids Today
– Claremont Review of Books, Summer 2015.Excerpt: My takeaway from all this was expressed in the closing chapter of my own work on Putnam’s topic, Coming Apart (2012). Very briefly, I don’t think America’s civic culture will… More
Trump’s America
– Wall Street Journal, February 12, 2016.Excerpt: If you are dismayed by Trumpism, don’t kid yourself that it will fade away if Donald Trump fails to win the Republican nomination. Trumpism is an expression of the legitimate… More
An Open Letter to the Virginia Tech Community
– American Enterprise Institute, March 17, 2016.Excerpt: Last week, the president of Virginia Tech, Tim Sands, published an “open letter to the Virginia Tech community” defending lectures delivered by deplorable people like me (I’m… More
America Against Itself
– Interview by Sean Collins, Spiked Review, August 2016.Excerpt: With the publication in 2012 of Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010, political scientist Charles Murray – celebrated and denigrated in equal measure for his… More
Commentary
The State of White America
– Video, Bradley Lecture, American Enterprise Institute, April 4, 2011.Summary: Over the last half century, America has developed a new lower class and a new upper class that are different in kind from anything it has ever known. These developments are not… More
Charles Murray on the State of White America
– Video, C-SPAN, April 4, 2011.Summary: Author and political scientist Charles Murray spoke about American cultural values and economic disparity. He said that over the last half century, America had developed not only… More
Belmont and Fishtown
– The New Criterion, January 2012.Excerpt: American exceptionalism is not just something that Americans claim for themselves. Historically, Americans have been seen as different, even peculiar, to people around the… More
White Blight
– Kay Hymowitz, City Journal, January 25, 2012.Excerpt: Charles Murray is back, and the debate about wealth and inequality will never be the same. Readers of the political scientist’s earlier work, especially The Bell Curve and Losing… More
The Great Divorce by David Brooks
– David Brooks, New York Times, January 30, 2012.Excerpt: I’ll be shocked if there’s another book this year as important as Charles Murray’s Coming Apart. I’ll be shocked if there’s another book that so compellingly describes… More
Values Inequality
– W. Bradford Wilcox, Wall Street Journal, January 31, 2012.Excerpt: Mr. Murray’s sobering portrait is of a nation where millions of people are losing touch with the founding virtues that have long lent American lives purpose, direction and… More
The Virtue Deficit
– Ron Haskins, National Review, February 6, 2012.Excerpt: Charles Murray writes important and provocative books. His latest book, Coming Apart, joins Losing Ground (1984) and The Bell Curve (1994) as, in my view, among his most important… More
Five Myths About White People
– Washington Post, February 10, 2012.Excerpt: 1. Working-class whites are more religious than upper-class whites. This is a pervasive misconception encouraged by liberals who conflate the religious right with the working… More
Can the Working Class Be Saved?
– Ross Douthat, New York Times, February 11, 2012.Excerpt: Coming Apart, the book that’s launched a thousand arguments this winter, is a brilliant work with an exasperating conclusion. What’s brilliant is Murray’s portrait, rich in… More
What Charles Murray Gets Right
– Ross Douthat, New York Times, February 14, 2012.Excerpt: “Coming Apart” offers a convincing account of how meritocracy has exacerbated the problems that Murray describes — encouraging the best and brightest to work and live and… More
Narrowing the Class Divide
– New York Times, March 7, 2012.Excerpt: THERE’S been a lot of commentary from all sides about my recently published book, “Coming Apart,” which deals with the divergence between the professional and working classes… More
Discussing Charles Murray’s Coming Apart
– Video conversation, EconLog, March 9, 2012.Summary: Arnold Kling organized a video conference to discuss Coming Apart. Participants were Brink Lindsey, Bryan Caplan, Megan McArdle, Reihan Salam, and Ross Douthat. There was not much… More
Why Economics Can’t Explain Our Cultural Divide
– Wall Street Journal, March 18, 2012.Excerpt: Some reviewers of “Coming Apart,” my new book about the growing cultural divide between America’s upper and lower classes, have faulted me for ignoring the role… More
Mind the Gap by Yuval Levin
– Yuval Levin, Weekly Standard, March 19, 2012.Excerpt: Charles Murray’s profound and important new book has, for the most part, been received as merely the latest volley in the inequality debates. Its champions have tended to praise… More
Charles Murray on Colbert Report
– Video, The Colbert Report, Comedy Central, March 27, 2012.Summary: Charles Murray talks about his book, Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010, and suggests a way to address the growing division between the classes. (7:24)
Charles Murray on Coming Apart
– Video, Hoover Institution, April 10, 2012.Summary: This week on Uncommon Knowledge, longtime American Enterprise Institute fellow Charles Murray discusses his controversial new book, Coming Apart, about what American was, is, and… More
“Coming Apart” and Fishtown
– Philadelphia Inquirer, April 23, 2012.Excerpt: Coming Apart, the book I published a few months ago, tracks the cultural divergences in America’s classes from 1960 to 2010, focusing on whites as a way of getting people to… More
Charles Murray: Why America is coming apart on class lines
– Video, Reason TV, April 25, 2012.Summary: Charles Murray, one of America’s most influential social policy thinkers, has come out with a widely discussed new book called Coming Apart: The State of White America,… More
American Caste
– Kay S. Hymowitz, City Journal, Spring 2012.Excerpt: When Charles Murray’s best-selling Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960–2010 appeared a few months ago, the book’s fictional working-class neighborhood, Fishtown,… More
Two Americas, Growing Apart
– Jonathan Rauch, Reason, June 2012.Excerpt: Unless you live in a cave, you know the controversial work and reputation of Charles Murray. Losing Ground, published in 1984, proposed eliminating welfare as we knew it and became… More
Why America is Coming Apart
– Video, American Enterprise Institute, June 24, 2012.Summary: It used to be that America meant something to all Americans. But that common understanding is dissolving, explains AEI scholar Charles Murray in his new book, Coming Apart: The… More
A Tale of Two Cities
– R. Shep Melnick, Claremont Review of Books, Summer 2012.Excerpt: Charles Murray knows how to draw attention. Soon after Coming Apart appeared, nearly everyone who follows public affairs knew of the yawning gap separating the declining,… More
Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960–2010
– (New York: Crown Forum, 2012.)Summary from Publisher: In Coming Apart, Charles Murray explores the formation of American classes that are different in kind from anything we have ever known, focusing on whites as a way… More
Poker is America
– New York Times, February 24, 2013.Excerpt: Let’s start by getting this straight: poker is about money. If you took the money out of it, I wouldn’t play. But even when I lose, I’ve had a good time. I love playing poker… More
Charles Murray: Are You a Snob? Take the Test.
– Video, Big Think, March 8, 2013.Summary: American Enterprise Institute scholar Charles Murray has designed a quiz he hopes will have “a salutary effect on bringing to people’s attention the degree to which… More
Are We Really Coming Apart?
– Video, panel at the Aspen Institute, March 18, 2014.Summary: Two very different scholars of American society look at the United States and the growing gap in values and behaviors among communities and classes within them. What is happening… More
The American Dream in Crisis? A discussion with Robert Putnam and Charles Murray
– Video, panel at the American Enterprise Institute, June 22, 2015.Summary: In Our Kids: The American Dream in Crisis (Simon & Schuster, 2015), political scientist Robert Putnam illustrates the increasing inequality between rich and poor Americans… More
Kids Today
– Claremont Review of Books, Summer 2015.Excerpt: My takeaway from all this was expressed in the closing chapter of my own work on Putnam’s topic, Coming Apart (2012). Very briefly, I don’t think America’s civic culture will… More
Trump’s America
– Wall Street Journal, February 12, 2016.Excerpt: If you are dismayed by Trumpism, don’t kid yourself that it will fade away if Donald Trump fails to win the Republican nomination. Trumpism is an expression of the legitimate… More
An Open Letter to the Virginia Tech Community
– American Enterprise Institute, March 17, 2016.Excerpt: Last week, the president of Virginia Tech, Tim Sands, published an “open letter to the Virginia Tech community” defending lectures delivered by deplorable people like me (I’m… More
America Against Itself
– Interview by Sean Collins, Spiked Review, August 2016.Excerpt: With the publication in 2012 of Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010, political scientist Charles Murray – celebrated and denigrated in equal measure for his… More
Multimedia
The State of White America
– Video, Bradley Lecture, American Enterprise Institute, April 4, 2011.Summary: Over the last half century, America has developed a new lower class and a new upper class that are different in kind from anything it has ever known. These developments are not… More
Charles Murray on the State of White America
– Video, C-SPAN, April 4, 2011.Summary: Author and political scientist Charles Murray spoke about American cultural values and economic disparity. He said that over the last half century, America had developed not only… More
Belmont and Fishtown
– The New Criterion, January 2012.Excerpt: American exceptionalism is not just something that Americans claim for themselves. Historically, Americans have been seen as different, even peculiar, to people around the… More
White Blight
– Kay Hymowitz, City Journal, January 25, 2012.Excerpt: Charles Murray is back, and the debate about wealth and inequality will never be the same. Readers of the political scientist’s earlier work, especially The Bell Curve and Losing… More
The Great Divorce by David Brooks
– David Brooks, New York Times, January 30, 2012.Excerpt: I’ll be shocked if there’s another book this year as important as Charles Murray’s Coming Apart. I’ll be shocked if there’s another book that so compellingly describes… More
Values Inequality
– W. Bradford Wilcox, Wall Street Journal, January 31, 2012.Excerpt: Mr. Murray’s sobering portrait is of a nation where millions of people are losing touch with the founding virtues that have long lent American lives purpose, direction and… More
The Virtue Deficit
– Ron Haskins, National Review, February 6, 2012.Excerpt: Charles Murray writes important and provocative books. His latest book, Coming Apart, joins Losing Ground (1984) and The Bell Curve (1994) as, in my view, among his most important… More
Five Myths About White People
– Washington Post, February 10, 2012.Excerpt: 1. Working-class whites are more religious than upper-class whites. This is a pervasive misconception encouraged by liberals who conflate the religious right with the working… More
Can the Working Class Be Saved?
– Ross Douthat, New York Times, February 11, 2012.Excerpt: Coming Apart, the book that’s launched a thousand arguments this winter, is a brilliant work with an exasperating conclusion. What’s brilliant is Murray’s portrait, rich in… More
What Charles Murray Gets Right
– Ross Douthat, New York Times, February 14, 2012.Excerpt: “Coming Apart” offers a convincing account of how meritocracy has exacerbated the problems that Murray describes — encouraging the best and brightest to work and live and… More
Narrowing the Class Divide
– New York Times, March 7, 2012.Excerpt: THERE’S been a lot of commentary from all sides about my recently published book, “Coming Apart,” which deals with the divergence between the professional and working classes… More
Discussing Charles Murray’s Coming Apart
– Video conversation, EconLog, March 9, 2012.Summary: Arnold Kling organized a video conference to discuss Coming Apart. Participants were Brink Lindsey, Bryan Caplan, Megan McArdle, Reihan Salam, and Ross Douthat. There was not much… More
Why Economics Can’t Explain Our Cultural Divide
– Wall Street Journal, March 18, 2012.Excerpt: Some reviewers of “Coming Apart,” my new book about the growing cultural divide between America’s upper and lower classes, have faulted me for ignoring the role… More
Mind the Gap by Yuval Levin
– Yuval Levin, Weekly Standard, March 19, 2012.Excerpt: Charles Murray’s profound and important new book has, for the most part, been received as merely the latest volley in the inequality debates. Its champions have tended to praise… More
Charles Murray on Colbert Report
– Video, The Colbert Report, Comedy Central, March 27, 2012.Summary: Charles Murray talks about his book, Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010, and suggests a way to address the growing division between the classes. (7:24)
Charles Murray on Coming Apart
– Video, Hoover Institution, April 10, 2012.Summary: This week on Uncommon Knowledge, longtime American Enterprise Institute fellow Charles Murray discusses his controversial new book, Coming Apart, about what American was, is, and… More
“Coming Apart” and Fishtown
– Philadelphia Inquirer, April 23, 2012.Excerpt: Coming Apart, the book I published a few months ago, tracks the cultural divergences in America’s classes from 1960 to 2010, focusing on whites as a way of getting people to… More
Charles Murray: Why America is coming apart on class lines
– Video, Reason TV, April 25, 2012.Summary: Charles Murray, one of America’s most influential social policy thinkers, has come out with a widely discussed new book called Coming Apart: The State of White America,… More
American Caste
– Kay S. Hymowitz, City Journal, Spring 2012.Excerpt: When Charles Murray’s best-selling Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960–2010 appeared a few months ago, the book’s fictional working-class neighborhood, Fishtown,… More
Two Americas, Growing Apart
– Jonathan Rauch, Reason, June 2012.Excerpt: Unless you live in a cave, you know the controversial work and reputation of Charles Murray. Losing Ground, published in 1984, proposed eliminating welfare as we knew it and became… More
Why America is Coming Apart
– Video, American Enterprise Institute, June 24, 2012.Summary: It used to be that America meant something to all Americans. But that common understanding is dissolving, explains AEI scholar Charles Murray in his new book, Coming Apart: The… More
A Tale of Two Cities
– R. Shep Melnick, Claremont Review of Books, Summer 2012.Excerpt: Charles Murray knows how to draw attention. Soon after Coming Apart appeared, nearly everyone who follows public affairs knew of the yawning gap separating the declining,… More
Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960–2010
– (New York: Crown Forum, 2012.)Summary from Publisher: In Coming Apart, Charles Murray explores the formation of American classes that are different in kind from anything we have ever known, focusing on whites as a way… More
Poker is America
– New York Times, February 24, 2013.Excerpt: Let’s start by getting this straight: poker is about money. If you took the money out of it, I wouldn’t play. But even when I lose, I’ve had a good time. I love playing poker… More
Charles Murray: Are You a Snob? Take the Test.
– Video, Big Think, March 8, 2013.Summary: American Enterprise Institute scholar Charles Murray has designed a quiz he hopes will have “a salutary effect on bringing to people’s attention the degree to which… More
Are We Really Coming Apart?
– Video, panel at the Aspen Institute, March 18, 2014.Summary: Two very different scholars of American society look at the United States and the growing gap in values and behaviors among communities and classes within them. What is happening… More
The American Dream in Crisis? A discussion with Robert Putnam and Charles Murray
– Video, panel at the American Enterprise Institute, June 22, 2015.Summary: In Our Kids: The American Dream in Crisis (Simon & Schuster, 2015), political scientist Robert Putnam illustrates the increasing inequality between rich and poor Americans… More
Kids Today
– Claremont Review of Books, Summer 2015.Excerpt: My takeaway from all this was expressed in the closing chapter of my own work on Putnam’s topic, Coming Apart (2012). Very briefly, I don’t think America’s civic culture will… More
Trump’s America
– Wall Street Journal, February 12, 2016.Excerpt: If you are dismayed by Trumpism, don’t kid yourself that it will fade away if Donald Trump fails to win the Republican nomination. Trumpism is an expression of the legitimate… More
An Open Letter to the Virginia Tech Community
– American Enterprise Institute, March 17, 2016.Excerpt: Last week, the president of Virginia Tech, Tim Sands, published an “open letter to the Virginia Tech community” defending lectures delivered by deplorable people like me (I’m… More
America Against Itself
– Interview by Sean Collins, Spiked Review, August 2016.Excerpt: With the publication in 2012 of Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010, political scientist Charles Murray – celebrated and denigrated in equal measure for his… More
Teaching
The State of White America
– Video, Bradley Lecture, American Enterprise Institute, April 4, 2011.Summary: Over the last half century, America has developed a new lower class and a new upper class that are different in kind from anything it has ever known. These developments are not… More
Charles Murray on the State of White America
– Video, C-SPAN, April 4, 2011.Summary: Author and political scientist Charles Murray spoke about American cultural values and economic disparity. He said that over the last half century, America had developed not only… More
Belmont and Fishtown
– The New Criterion, January 2012.Excerpt: American exceptionalism is not just something that Americans claim for themselves. Historically, Americans have been seen as different, even peculiar, to people around the… More
White Blight
– Kay Hymowitz, City Journal, January 25, 2012.Excerpt: Charles Murray is back, and the debate about wealth and inequality will never be the same. Readers of the political scientist’s earlier work, especially The Bell Curve and Losing… More
The Great Divorce by David Brooks
– David Brooks, New York Times, January 30, 2012.Excerpt: I’ll be shocked if there’s another book this year as important as Charles Murray’s Coming Apart. I’ll be shocked if there’s another book that so compellingly describes… More
Values Inequality
– W. Bradford Wilcox, Wall Street Journal, January 31, 2012.Excerpt: Mr. Murray’s sobering portrait is of a nation where millions of people are losing touch with the founding virtues that have long lent American lives purpose, direction and… More
The Virtue Deficit
– Ron Haskins, National Review, February 6, 2012.Excerpt: Charles Murray writes important and provocative books. His latest book, Coming Apart, joins Losing Ground (1984) and The Bell Curve (1994) as, in my view, among his most important… More
Five Myths About White People
– Washington Post, February 10, 2012.Excerpt: 1. Working-class whites are more religious than upper-class whites. This is a pervasive misconception encouraged by liberals who conflate the religious right with the working… More
Can the Working Class Be Saved?
– Ross Douthat, New York Times, February 11, 2012.Excerpt: Coming Apart, the book that’s launched a thousand arguments this winter, is a brilliant work with an exasperating conclusion. What’s brilliant is Murray’s portrait, rich in… More
What Charles Murray Gets Right
– Ross Douthat, New York Times, February 14, 2012.Excerpt: “Coming Apart” offers a convincing account of how meritocracy has exacerbated the problems that Murray describes — encouraging the best and brightest to work and live and… More
Narrowing the Class Divide
– New York Times, March 7, 2012.Excerpt: THERE’S been a lot of commentary from all sides about my recently published book, “Coming Apart,” which deals with the divergence between the professional and working classes… More
Discussing Charles Murray’s Coming Apart
– Video conversation, EconLog, March 9, 2012.Summary: Arnold Kling organized a video conference to discuss Coming Apart. Participants were Brink Lindsey, Bryan Caplan, Megan McArdle, Reihan Salam, and Ross Douthat. There was not much… More
Why Economics Can’t Explain Our Cultural Divide
– Wall Street Journal, March 18, 2012.Excerpt: Some reviewers of “Coming Apart,” my new book about the growing cultural divide between America’s upper and lower classes, have faulted me for ignoring the role… More
Mind the Gap by Yuval Levin
– Yuval Levin, Weekly Standard, March 19, 2012.Excerpt: Charles Murray’s profound and important new book has, for the most part, been received as merely the latest volley in the inequality debates. Its champions have tended to praise… More
Charles Murray on Colbert Report
– Video, The Colbert Report, Comedy Central, March 27, 2012.Summary: Charles Murray talks about his book, Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010, and suggests a way to address the growing division between the classes. (7:24)
Charles Murray on Coming Apart
– Video, Hoover Institution, April 10, 2012.Summary: This week on Uncommon Knowledge, longtime American Enterprise Institute fellow Charles Murray discusses his controversial new book, Coming Apart, about what American was, is, and… More
“Coming Apart” and Fishtown
– Philadelphia Inquirer, April 23, 2012.Excerpt: Coming Apart, the book I published a few months ago, tracks the cultural divergences in America’s classes from 1960 to 2010, focusing on whites as a way of getting people to… More
Charles Murray: Why America is coming apart on class lines
– Video, Reason TV, April 25, 2012.Summary: Charles Murray, one of America’s most influential social policy thinkers, has come out with a widely discussed new book called Coming Apart: The State of White America,… More
American Caste
– Kay S. Hymowitz, City Journal, Spring 2012.Excerpt: When Charles Murray’s best-selling Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960–2010 appeared a few months ago, the book’s fictional working-class neighborhood, Fishtown,… More
Two Americas, Growing Apart
– Jonathan Rauch, Reason, June 2012.Excerpt: Unless you live in a cave, you know the controversial work and reputation of Charles Murray. Losing Ground, published in 1984, proposed eliminating welfare as we knew it and became… More
Why America is Coming Apart
– Video, American Enterprise Institute, June 24, 2012.Summary: It used to be that America meant something to all Americans. But that common understanding is dissolving, explains AEI scholar Charles Murray in his new book, Coming Apart: The… More
A Tale of Two Cities
– R. Shep Melnick, Claremont Review of Books, Summer 2012.Excerpt: Charles Murray knows how to draw attention. Soon after Coming Apart appeared, nearly everyone who follows public affairs knew of the yawning gap separating the declining,… More
Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960–2010
– (New York: Crown Forum, 2012.)Summary from Publisher: In Coming Apart, Charles Murray explores the formation of American classes that are different in kind from anything we have ever known, focusing on whites as a way… More
Poker is America
– New York Times, February 24, 2013.Excerpt: Let’s start by getting this straight: poker is about money. If you took the money out of it, I wouldn’t play. But even when I lose, I’ve had a good time. I love playing poker… More
Charles Murray: Are You a Snob? Take the Test.
– Video, Big Think, March 8, 2013.Summary: American Enterprise Institute scholar Charles Murray has designed a quiz he hopes will have “a salutary effect on bringing to people’s attention the degree to which… More
Are We Really Coming Apart?
– Video, panel at the Aspen Institute, March 18, 2014.Summary: Two very different scholars of American society look at the United States and the growing gap in values and behaviors among communities and classes within them. What is happening… More
The American Dream in Crisis? A discussion with Robert Putnam and Charles Murray
– Video, panel at the American Enterprise Institute, June 22, 2015.Summary: In Our Kids: The American Dream in Crisis (Simon & Schuster, 2015), political scientist Robert Putnam illustrates the increasing inequality between rich and poor Americans… More
Kids Today
– Claremont Review of Books, Summer 2015.Excerpt: My takeaway from all this was expressed in the closing chapter of my own work on Putnam’s topic, Coming Apart (2012). Very briefly, I don’t think America’s civic culture will… More
Trump’s America
– Wall Street Journal, February 12, 2016.Excerpt: If you are dismayed by Trumpism, don’t kid yourself that it will fade away if Donald Trump fails to win the Republican nomination. Trumpism is an expression of the legitimate… More
An Open Letter to the Virginia Tech Community
– American Enterprise Institute, March 17, 2016.Excerpt: Last week, the president of Virginia Tech, Tim Sands, published an “open letter to the Virginia Tech community” defending lectures delivered by deplorable people like me (I’m… More
America Against Itself
– Interview by Sean Collins, Spiked Review, August 2016.Excerpt: With the publication in 2012 of Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010, political scientist Charles Murray – celebrated and denigrated in equal measure for his… More