As he frames it, America went from an open, dispersed system of prosperity where the wealth was shared by lots of folks, who then fully participated in decision-making process about how that wealth would be spent and saved, (these were the years of prosperity); to a closed system where the wealth gravitated to Wall Street and where decision-making was concentrated in many fewer hearts and heads. The Wall Streeters then skimmed off the top and gambled away the cash! These are the years of the great regression.
Here's the picture:
How do we fix it? That's the million dollar question. Robb thinks it's so broken, it can't be fixed, that we have to turn to resilient communities and start over. It is a compelling vision!