The middle class has just fallen further and further behind the rich.

Crime, family dissolution, welfare, and low levels of social organization are fundamentally a consequence of the disappearance of work.

There is a tendency to want to treat blacks as a monolithic socioeconomic group.

My research clearly reveals that if we want to put inner-city workers to work immediately, we just can't rely on the private sector. They don't want to touch them; they don't want to hire them.

There are many positive things to say about the black community. No question about it.

Black employers are just as negative as the white employers concerning inner-city workers.

Prior to 1940, the affluent and the middle class began to converge, but after 1979, the economic gap between the middle class and affluent widened significantly.

Liberals were intimidated by the Reagan administration and did not want to appear naive by talking about programs that called for government support. I just said, 'The hell with that. I'm out there.'

No matter how much suffering you went through, you never wanted to let go of those memories.

We define love the way we experienced it.

I think you manifest what you believe, and when you believe that you have no choice you lose choice.

No substantial famine has ever occurred in a democratic country - no matter how poor.

The highest art is no art. The best form is no form.

When you lose the title, that doesn't mean you lose the contract to what you had. Just like when you win the title, it doesn't mean you win brains, PhDs and MAs.

I love movies like '500 Days of Summer' and 'Juno.' Something offbeat without the glamour and the makeup and the clothing.

Independent filmmaking has always been there and it's not to be forgotten.

If you are truly present and know how to take care of the present moment as best you can, you are doing your best for the future already.

Writing or making anything-a poem, a bird feeder, a chocolate cake-has self-respect in it. You're working. You're trying. You're not lying down on the ground, having given up.