Full Employment and the Job Guarantee: An All-American Idea

Abstract

This chapter explores the development of the principle of a universal right to employment in the United States from Roosevelt’s Economic Bill of Rights to the contemporary efforts of economists based at the University of Missouri, Kansas City. Contribution to the development of the job guarantee scheme by black economists and advocates is given special attention. The breadth of support for the job guarantee across the ideological spectrum indicates that it is an idea whose time has come.