Book Jeff
Jeff Gates is currently at work on sequels to Guilt By Association, the first release in the Criminal State series. However, he would be happy to respond to proposals for interviews or speaking engagements. Contact: jeff.gates@criminalstate.com.
Below the jacket blurbs on Guilt By Association are a CV and colleagues’ comments on earlier books.
Comments on Guilt By Association
“Breathless just reading it.”
— Noam Chomsky, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
“Explosively revelatory, powerful, compelling.”
— Ambassador Ed Peck, Deputy Director, Cabinet Task Force on Terrorism, Reagan White House; former Chief of Mission, Baghdad
“Magnificent, timely and persuasive.”
— Paul Findley, Member of Congress 1961-1983 (first member openly removed by the Israel lobby)
“Brilliantly provocative.”
— Ambassador Andrew Killgore, publisher, Washington Report on Middle East Affairs
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Jeff Gates – Curriculum Vitae & Book Endorsements
Author, educator, attorney, merchant banker and adviser to policy-makers worldwide
Counsel to the U.S. Senate Committee on Finance (1980-87) working for Democrat Russell Long, son of Louisiana Governor and U.S. Senator Huey P. Long. Specialist in employee benefits law—pensions, 401(k) plans, stock options, employee stock ownership plans (ESOPs), et.al. As of April 2007, tax-qualified employee benefit plans accounted for $17,000 billion in assets (up from $800 billion in 1980) and more than half the funds in the hands of institutional investors. As of 2007, ESOPs were in place in 11,500 firms nationwide, covering 10% of the U.S. workforce and holding $800 billion in assets.
Law practice w/ former Senators Russell Long and Paul Laxalt, Republican of Nevada, chairman of Ronald Reagan’s presidential campaigns.
Counsel to Kelso & Company, Manhattan-based merchant bankers, completing $4 billion in transactions in 24-months, including the $3 billion leveraged buyout of American Standard, Inc., with employees and managers gaining a 33% stake in this multinational firm.
Author, Democracy at Risk – Rescuing Main Street from Wall Street (April 2000). Written as a sequel to The Ownership Solution –Toward a Shared Capitalism for the 21st Century (1998). Both books cited by presidential candidate Ralph Nader when branding the U.S. Green Party “the party of the new populism.” Guilt By Association – How Deception and Self-Deceit Took America to War (2008).
Draftsman, 1986 Presidential Task Force Report on Project Economic Justice: “U.S. Efforts to Encourage Employee Stock Ownership Plans in Central America and the Caribbean.” Author, World Bank Discussion Paper: Employee Stock Ownership Plans: Objectives, Design Options, International Experience; DEMOS Argument Series (U.K.): Revolutionizing Share Ownership—The Stakeowner Economy; Tomorrow’s Capitalism (Pacific Institute), et. al.
Advisory work with foreign governments, including Argentina, Australia, Brazil, China, Guyana, Haiti, Hungary, Ivory Coast, Jamaica, Latvia, Lithuania, Mexico, Morocco, Pakistan, Peru, Poland, Puerto Rico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Thailand, Trinidad, Tunisia, Zambia, Zimbabwe and the U.K. South Korean President Kim Dae-Jung announced August 2000 that the Korean edition of The Ownership Solution was his vacation-reading pick.
Contributor to trade, professional and popular publications worldwide: Financial Times, Japan Times, Financial Executive, M&A Today, Boston Review, Latin Finance, East/West Business Report, Society, Human Resource Management, Los Angeles Times, National Journal, World Times, The Humanist, Peace Review, Business Ethics, America, Tikkun, Whole Earth, Perspectives, Journal of Society of Organizational Learning, Journal of Organizational Change Management, et.al.
University of Virginia (B.A. in Honors Economics); J.D. from University of California, Hastings College of Law; Partner, Washington office of Powell, Goldstein, Frazer & Murphy. Faculty in the MBA program, Emory University. Vietnam veteran (1LT, U.S. Army). Native of Athens, Georgia.
Endorsements re The Ownership Solution (1998)
“This book focuses on the central issues that have to be addressed if the 21st century is to transcend the simplistic dilemma of capitalism versus socialism and create a new, sustainable civilization.”
– Mikhail Gorbachev, Executive President of the Soviet Union, 1989-1991
“In countries like my own, Nicaragua, the rich and political elites should read Jeff Gates’ The Ownership Solution for inspiration on how to stop the impending social conflagration which we have been stirring for generations.”
– Arturo J. Cruz, Senior, former Nicaraguan Ambassador to the U.S.
“With this book, a long-time explorer and discoverer, Jeff Gates, hands over his carefully constructed maps to direct policy-makers, business and workers to a common destination of greater economic vitality and power.”
– U.S. Senator John D. Rockefeller IV
“This book may save capitalism.”
– Stephan Schmidheiny, founder, World Business Council for Sustainable Development
“In the book The Ownership Solution I found an original and promising proposal for the implementation of an appropriate ethic for capitalism in the next millennium.”
– Oscar Arias, 1987 Nobel Peace Laureate; former President of Costa Rica
“Jeff Gates is that most unusual of individuals, the practical visionary.”
– Edward W. Kelley, Jr., Governor, U.S. Federal Reserve
“Ownership is the great neglected issue of contemporary left-wing politics. Jeff Gates has brought us the most serious effort to date to address that gap; his book will be enormously influential.”
– Ian Hargreaves, editor, New Statesman (UK)
“A brilliant and innovative exploration of new ways to spread wealth ownership and foster wealth creation. The Ownership Solution is a blueprint for the new age of capitalism.”
– Dr. Madsen Pirie, President, The Adam Smith Institute (U.K.)
“Development will be truly sustainable only when Jeff Gates’ ideas are put into practice.”
– Dr. Norman A. Bailey, Senior Director of National Security Planning, National Security Council (Reagan Administration)
“Jeff Gates… has written the best book on economics for a generation. The Ownership Solution is full of insight and description, assembled in an accessible and readable manner.”
– Labor MP Denis MacShane (U.K.)
“Ownership is a sine qua non of sustainable development….an interesting intellectual contribution to the evolving debate.”
– James D. Wolfensohn, President, The World Bank
“Fantastic! Jeff Gates has achieved the impossible. The Ownership Solution is eminently readable yet produces in cogent form why broad based ownership is the sine qua non of private enterprise. This is a genuine watershed in policy making, destined to be a classic.”
– Rodger J. Pannone, President of the Law Society, 1995-96 (UK)
“The world has turned its back on the state ownership of the means of production. The free enterprise system is the best we have for generating wealth. But there is a risk that if economic disparities widen – and there is some evidence that is happening – it may also give rise to discontent. Jeffrey Gates has given much thought to how this could be avoided and capitalism given a broader base of stakeholders and beneficiaries. He sets out his ideas in this stimulating and timely book.”
– Sir Shridath Ramphal, Secretary-General of the British Commonwealth (1975-90)
“An important proposal from which all those concerned with helping the poor will want to learn.”
– Michael J. Novak, American Enterprise Institute
“Expansion of ownership and greater access to capital will both strengthen and spread democracy and market economies throughout the world. This is a compelling account of how to help bring it about.”
– Jack Kemp, former Republican vice presidential candidate
“The Ownership Solution succeeds brilliantly in showing how broad based personal ownership can strengthen communities and make global sustainable development possible.”
– Dick Gephardt, Democratic Leader of the U.S. House of Representatives
“Jeff Gates has produced a view of sustainable growth that at last puts more faith in humans than governments. Splendid!”
– Malcolm Wallop (U.S. Senator, 1977-1995); Chairman, Frontiers of Freedom Institute
“Jeff Gates outlines a creative, yet credible strategy for empowering working people with a more vital interest in private enterprise. If capitalism can indeed have a human face, the reforms proposed in this provocative book merit careful consideration.”
– Coretta Scott King, founder, The King Center
“A book full of original and stimulating ideas to which those who want to keep up with the times should expose themselves.”
– Prof. Franco Modigliani, 1985 Recipient of Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Science
”A wonderfully different and original line of thought.”
– John Kenneth Galbraith, Harvard University
“In The Ownership Solution, Jeff Gates does more than point the way to broadening the base of ownership in society. He may have put his finger on the possibility of a historical convergence. If capitalism can be prevented from concentrating ownership and wealth, social democrats will avoid the danger which they are pledged to fight as they pursue the imperative of social equity. Equally, if social equity can be achieved without frustrating entrepreneurship and undermining market forces, the conservatives will be assured of the preservation of those sources of economic energy which they are pledged to guard. Let’s both get on with it!”
– Michael Manley, Prime Minister of Jamaica (1972-80; 1988-92)
“An ingenious and compelling look at the power inherent in widespread personal ownership. Engrossing, insightful and persuasive.”
– Gerald Greenwald, Chairman and CEO, United Airlines
“A compelling account of how widespread capital ownership is the ‘missing piece’ needed to strengthen both democracies and private property economies worldwide.”
– Senator Russell B. Long (U.S. Senator, 1949-87)
“One of the most important books of this decade. The Ownership Solution is really a solution — one of the most significant contributions to restoring a civil society…. A monumental book that should be read by everyone concerned about human betterment.”
– Warren Bennis, University Professor and Distinguished Professor of Business Administration, University of Southern California; author, On Becoming a Leader.
“Long-term, sustainable development requires a balancing of economic, social, fiscal and environmental goals. In The Ownership Solution, Jeff Gates provides a thoughtful and thought-provoking approach to understanding these goals and how broad-based capital ownership can help to achieve them.”
– Bill Bradley (U.S. Senator, 1979-1997)
“A thoughtful and creative approach to the problem of how to involve people most personally, productively, and with a minimum of loss to their individuality, in the rapidly forming world economy. Gates envisions an expansive and dynamic capitalism that is both market-oriented and people-oriented. [The Ownership Solution] can open horizons for both policymakers and entrepreneurs.”
– Jim Wright, Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives (1987-1989)
“In the dynamic age of globalization, Mr. Gates stretches the envelope of conventional thinking on the critical issues of ownership and equity.”
– James Gustave Speth, Administrator, United Nations Development Program
“The Ownership Solution is nothing less than a Capitalist Manifesto, a blueprint for spreading the benefits of capitalism more broadly.”
– Ralph Nader, Public Citizen News
“[The Ownership Solution] might be the only solution for the confusion of formerly centrally planned economies after the collapse of communism.”
– Kiichi Mochizuki, President, The Pacific Institute
“Around the world, the chasm between the haves and have-nots is growing. Can that threaten capitalism, peace and prosperity? Jeff Gates’ solution for broadening ownership is the cutting edge, free market way to avoid that threat and improve lives.”
– Mary K. Bush, Alternative Executive Director, IMF (1982-86)
“The great value of Jeff Gates’s book is that it offers proven and practical ways to restore a sense of pride and ownership in industry, and how to marry capitalism to ethical values. It couldn’t be more timely.”
– Geoff Mulgan, Director, DEMOS (U.K.)
“How do we close a growing gap between successful owners and investors and an increasingly anxious underclass? One way that would help – more participants in ownership! No one knows more about how that should be done than Jeff Gates and he offers his spectacular insight in this cornucopia of philosophical and practical ideas.”
– Mario Cuomo, Governor of New York (1983-1995)
“Elegantly researched. A masterful statement by a creative author — a remarkable book.”
– David McLaughlin, President-Emeritus, The Aspen Institute
“The twenty first will be the ‘Century of the Corporations.’ Jeff Gates gives an exciting and well written preview of this New World and the ‘owners’ whose informed involvement will be essential for the continued welfare of the planet.”
– Robert A.G. Monks, author, Power and Accountability and Corporate Governance
“A timely and provocative stimulus which should be required reading for policymakers.”
– Ian Taylor, MP and Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Trade and Technology (U.K.)
“An important subject, excellent thinker, good writer, thoughtfully done. Read it!”
– Dee Hock, Founder, President and CEO Emeritus, Visa International
“Jeff Gates has devoted years to discussing new patterns of distributed ownership. In this thoughtful and well-researched book, he argues the increasing disparity of wealth within and among nations, the difficulties of abetting development, and recent success of micro-financing all suggest a major role for new ownership patterns to drive local and global economic growth and stabilization of democracy. Gates may not have the whole solution. It is enough that he may well have an essential piece of it.”
– Stuart A. Kauffman, founding general partner, Bios Group, LP; Professor, Santa Fe Institute; author, The Origins of Order and At Home in the Universe.
“An important book about a critical subject at a time when new forms of ownership are a key to sound corporate governance and accountability.”
– Simon Zadek, Development Director, New Economics Foundation (U.K.)
“Is it possible to reverse the widening gap between richer and poorer, while simultaneously engaging the participation of more citizens in wealth generation? This book gives a convincing, positive answer.”
– Richard Best, Director, The Joseph Rowntree Foundation (U.K.)
“The Ownership Solution explains how the expansion of ownership solutions can serve not only local economies, but can also create just, moral and stable societies worldwide. The Ownership Solution will prove to be a very valuable and respected literary work to everyone it reaches.”
– Sam Ayoub, Chief Financial Officer, Coca-Cola Company, Inc. (retired)
“At last, Jeff Gates’s masterful work transforms the oxymoron of “Responsible Capitalism” into a realistic scenario of the saner economic society our beautiful planet urgent needs.”
– Godric Bader, Life President, Scott Bader Commonwealth Limited
“The most incisive and fascinating analysis yet of how broader capital ownership can help drive faster U.S. growth — and in the bargain repair the moral basis of American capitalism.”
– Robert J. Shapiro, Vice President, Progressive Policy Institute
“Jeff Gates has provided a sweeping review of capitalism at its best and at its worst, and has skillfully shown us how a fundamentally different and better future could be shaped by weaving the thread of widespread individual responsibility through ownership into the fabric of society. ”
– Ray C. Anderson, Chairman & CEO, Interface, Inc.; Co-Chair, President’s Council on Sustainable Development
“A truly important and outstanding contribution.”
– Prof. George C. Lodge, Harvard Business School; author, The New American Ideology
“A very innovative, progressive idea. Sure to stimulate much good dialogue.”
– Prof. Amitai Etzioni, George Washington University, author, The Spirit of Community
“Why does capitalism create so few capitalists? Jeff Gates asks and answers the central economic question, the source of our deepest social and political conflicts. He provides a humane and convincing blueprint for reforming capitalism, bringing clarity and humanity to the taboo subject of concentrated wealth.”
– William Greider, author, One World, Ready or Not; Who Will Tell the People; Secrets of the Temple. National Editor, Rolling Stone.
“An unparalleled effort by a unique individual with the mind of a chief financial officer and the heart and soul of a prophet.”
– John Feldmann, Director, Center for Ethics, Capital Markets and Political Economy
“The Ownership Solution offers a persuasive argument for why broadened capital ownership should be a top economic priority.”
– J.R. Beyster, Chairman and CEO, Science Applications International Corporation
“Jeff Gates is one of America’s most insightful analysts of worker ownership and participation; his book, The Ownership Solution, is a brilliant contribution to a broader understanding of the enormous potential of employee ownership.”
– Stan Lundine, President, Worker Ownership Institute; former Congressman and Lieutenant Governor of New York
“A delightfully refreshing strategic overview for utilizing the vehicle of capitalism to bring us, as a people, back into compassionate community.”
– Ram Dass, author and lecturer
“The world is increasingly being divided into those who own capital and technology and those who don’t. The former group’s wealth is growing; the latter’s stagnates and diminishes. Instead of taking this as an inevitable trade-off capitalism imposes, Jeff Gates has made a compelling argument for an approach that can share ownership with all those who create it. Indeed, it is an approach Newt Gingrich can adopt as readily as Ted Kennedy.”
– Corey Rosen, Executive Director, National Center for Employee Ownership
Endorsements re Democracy at Risk (2000)
“We all know that in the transition to the 21st century there are many paradigm shifts. Jeff Gates’ book helps to understand the new direction.”
– Professor Klaus Schwab, Founder & President, World Economic Forum/Davos
“Written with uncommon clarity and candor, Democracy at Risk should be read by everyone who is concerned with liberty and equitable distribution of power and wealth. The more prosperous and powerful you might be, the more important it is to pay attention to what Jeff Gates has to say.”
– Dee Hock, Founder and CEO Emeritus, VISA; author, Birth of the Chaordic Age
“Jeff Gates is a new kind of populist. He makes some folks uncomfortable by wanting to correct a capitalism in which the wealth of the wealthiest 1% exceeds what 95% of Americans have to live on. But he also wants to make capitalism worth conserving—by making it more civilized and more democratic, by making owners of all those who contribute to its success. Democracy at Risk is a tough diagnosis, with a fresh and future-oriented prescription attached.”
– Harlan Cleveland, President, World Academy of Art and Science; former U.S. Ambassador to NATO; author, Birth of a New World, The Global Commons
“Put [Democracy at Risk] in front of every student who’s studying economics, every politician and every financial journalist for their consideration….At the center of this book is the cry to hold on to what is silently slipping through our fingers—democracy.”
– Anita Roddick, OBE; founder, The Body Shop
“In the aftermath of the citizen uprising against the World Trade Organization in Seattle, the need to bring democracy to our economic systems is clearer than ever. Gates reminds us that without democracy in our financial world we can’t really expect to have real democracy anywhere. Democracy at Risk puts forth series of bold and practical proposals to redesign democracy and capitalism to be things the earth and future generations can afford. After Seattle, I think the world is ready to listen.”
– David Brower, Founder and Chairman, Earth Island Institute; author, Let the Mountains Talk, Let the Rivers Run
“With passion and precision, Jeff Gates reminds us that capitalism does not have to be an exclusive system. We make the rules! Here, from the man who helped bring us employee stock ownership is compelling commonsense for how we can make capitalism work for all of us by “ownerizing” it. Mind expanding. Hope inducing. And we need both!”
– Frances Moore Lappe, author, Diet for a Small Planet, Rediscovering America’s Values, co-author, The Quickening of America
“Tom Paine is back and he is not pleased. But he has done his homework. Democracy at Risk is not a book, it is a bible for a powerful populism that will arise after the latest Gilded Age is over. Read it and run, or read it and recover your sense of what it could mean to actually live in a democratic society.”
– Paul Hawken, author, Natural Capitalism; The Ecology of Commerce
“Democracy at Risk argues for widespread ownership of capital resources in an era of massive disparities of wealth that subordinate democracy to plutocracy. Gates is a practical man, which means he offers politically practical and financially feasible ways toward a broad-based prosperity around the world. His facts will enrage you into higher expectation levels for what a modern economy should look like and be for.”
– Ralph Nader, Public Citizen News
“Democracy at Risk is a highly original, gutsy, carefully thought through work that offers practical alternatives for a new economics and politics—and in the process reclaims populism from demagogues who have used it to divert people from the core issues Jeff Gates so thoroughly documents. This is an important and timely book.”
– Riane Eisler, author, The Chalice & The Blade, Tomorrow’s Children, and Sacred Pleasure
“Democracy at Risk invites—no, compels—us to open our eyes to what seems to be an ominous contrast between the capitalism of today and the fundamental ideals of an inclusive democracy. It is, at the very least, a wake-up call—if you can speak of an exploding stick of dynamite as a wake-up call. Yet, the solutions offered leave us gratefully optimistic that a truly democratic capitalism is in fact attainable—but that there is not a moment to waste.”
– Jacob Needleman, author, Money and the Meaning of Life
“In this provocative study, Jeff Gates addresses a rich array of problems of fundamental human significance, and suggests approaches to them that should stimulate serious thought, and committed action, on the part of people who view the present world, and the possibilities for a better future, from many different perspectives.”
– Noam Chomsky, author; professor, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
“At a time when the need is great, Jeff Gates offers us a populist vision for the twenty-first century.”
– Lawrence Goodwyn, author, Democratic Promise: The Populist Moment in America
“Gives hope that capitalism and humanism are not necessarily mutually exclusive.”
– Paul Krassner, Editor, The Realist
“Meticulously documents the need for broadening capital ownership in the United States—not only for overall efficiency and social development—but to fully release the talents and motivations of all our citizens in growing a more prosperous, just and ecologically sustainable society.”
– Hazel Henderson, author, Beyond Globalization, Building a Win-Win World
“Jeff Gates is an insider who knows how wealth and the investment system really works — and it fills him with rage. Beneath his righteous anger, there’s a deep sadness for what has happened to our democracy and also the conviction that it doesn’t have to be that way. This is populist thunder that enthralls and educates and also ought to mobilize us.”
– William Greider, author, One World, Ready or Not: The Manic Logic of Global Capitalism
“Jeff Gates is a phenomenon. He is turning the economics searchlight on ownership and demanding to know why the morally unbearable maldistribution of wealth and income is taboo in classical and contemporary economics. Jeff has achieved this focus, in two books two years apart, to the profound benefit of economics and democracy. He comes straight from top-of-the-mark work on Capitol Hill for Russell Long and the Senate Finance Committee to the crisis for democracy in which we Americans are all now mired, whether we want to be or not. American democracy is in great danger, if it’s not already over the cliff, and Jeff Gates is making his special heroic effort to help save it and free enterprise. Can it be done? I don’t know.”
– Ronnie Dugger, founder, Alliance for Democracy; former editor, The Texas Observer; author, The Politician: The Life and Times of Lyndon Johnson; On Reagan: The Man and His Presidency
“In Democracy at Risk, Jeff Gates has presented us with an urgent and passionate polemic in support of a renewed democracy based on broadly shared ownership and economic power. He calls for an immediate populist insurgency to bring about a democratic sharing of wealth and power, and a broadening of the criteria of success to include the host of environmental, educational, cultural, community, intergenerational and global concerns which have the potential to threaten, or to enhance, the future of our civilization and, indeed, of our planet.”
– Lynn R. Williams, president, United Steelworkers of America (retired)
