The problem with NAFTA was with what we wanted. And there, the agenda had been set by our corporations. So what is true is that workers in the United States and workers in the developing countries were often disadvantaged. They were worse off. The big winners were our corporations.

Trickle-down economics is a myth. Enriching corporations - as the TPP would - will not necessarily help those in the middle, let alone those at the bottom.

Now it is unambiguously clear that trickle-down economics does not work. But what does that mean? That means we have to structure our economic policies to make sure that we have shared prosperity. And you don't do that by giving a tax cut to the big winners and raising taxes on those who have not done very well. Your economic policy has to respond to the way our economic system has been working.

My teachers helped guide and motivate me; but the responsibility of learning was left with me, an approach to learning which was later reinforced by my experiences at Amherst.

People at the top spend less money than those at the bottom so when you have redistribution toward the top, aggregate demand goes down. Unless you intervene, you're going to have a weak economy unless something else happens. That something else could be a bubble. The United States tried a tech bubble and a housing bubble, but those were not sustainable answers. So I view inequality as a fundamental part of our macroeconomic weakness.

Development is about transforming the lives of people, not just transforming economies.

The reason that the invisible hand often seems invisible is that it is often not there.