The Rich and the Super-Rich

Book excerpt: In the late 1930s bombshell of a book appeared which told the story of the lords of wealth and their glittering clans. It was called AMERICA'S SIXTY FAMILIES. It rocked the nation and became a classic. Lundberg showed how America was ruled by a plutocracy of inherited wealth, even under the New Deal. At the time he could only provide a sampling of the economic and political patterns of those families, which, for one reason or another, had come under public scrutiny. In addition to the Sixty Families he dealt with in depth, he was able to outline the probable holdings of a few hundred other families. The author, in writing THE RICH AND THE SUPER-RICH, had at his disposal infinitely richer data, monographs, Congressional investigations than were available three decades ago. They have made it possible for him to give us a book which is much more than a mere updating of AMERICA'S SIXTY FAMILIES. It is, rather, a systematic study of the entire wealthy class and its familial structure. (In one important aspect it resembles AMERICA'S SIXTY FAMILIES: It is written for the layman to awaken the reader to the real and little-known situation.) These families have all the old levers of power and wealth plus a whole host of new ones created for them during the intervening decades by the politicians, lawyers and judges who serve them. Although published in 1968 and rocketed to the top of the bestseller list, the wealth managed by these families remains a significant force in today's economy and should not be underestimated.