Kim Phillips-Fein did an exceptional job describing and analyzing the process through which a slow-moving neoliberal revolution overtook New York City in the 1970s and early 1980s. The book helps us understand one of the three key developments in the 1970s that laid the foundation for neoliberal capitalism to become a hegemonic system of accumulation to this day. The other two developments were (1) the 1973 Chilean coup, after which the economics team of Milton Friedman went to work remaking the Chilean system, and (2) the emergence of Margaret Thatcher in Britain.
There are six points that struck me about the book along with three areas of concern. I will enumerate them.
First, the crisis developed slowly. In fact, one can argue that the crisis started in the 1930s with the increasing dependency of the city on outside sources for funding, including the state and federal governments. The growing...
