Chuck Collins

Author
Examiner Club Head of Nominating Committee

Chuck Collins is the Director of the Program on Inequality and the Common Good at the Institute for Policy Studies, where he co-edits Inequality.org. He is author of the popular book, Born on Third Base: A One Percenter Makes the Case for Tackling Inequality, Bringing Wealth Home, and Committing to the Common Good (Chelsea Green). His most recent book is The Wealth Hoarders: How Billionaires Spend Millions to Hide Trillions (Polity Books).

He is an expert on U.S. inequality and the racial wealth divide and author of several other books, including with Bill Gates Sr. of Wealth and Our Commonwealth, (Beacon Press, 2003), a case for taxing inherited fortunes. He is co-author with Mary Wright of The Moral Measure of the Economy, a book about Christian ethics and economic life. He was featured in this interview in Sun Magazine and with Terry Gross on NPR’s Fresh Air.

He is co-author of several IPS reports including “White Supremacy Is the Pre-Existing Condition: Eight Solutions to Ensure the Economic Recovery Reduces the Racial Wealth Divide,” “Billionaire Bonanza 2020: Wealth Windfalls, Tumbling Taxes, and Pandemic Profiteers,” and Gilded Giving 2020: How Wealth Inequality Disrupts Philanthropy and Imperils Democracy (July 2020). 

He is a founding member of the Patriotic Millionaires. In 1995, he co-founded United for a Fair Economy (UFE) to raise the profile of the inequality issue and support popular education and organizing efforts to address inequality. He was Executive Director of UFE from 1995-2001 and Program Director until 2005.