About Understanding America
If you’re someone who cares deeply about this country, if you want to stay up-to-date about the key economic and political developments that will most influence events, if you have noticed the remarkable emergence of a more responsive and worker-focused conservatism and want to know where that’s going, then Understanding America is for you.
Who am I? And what is American Compass?
My name is Oren Cass. I am “a policy nerd out of central casting, bespectacled and short with salt-and-pepper hair and a slightly nasal voice,” according to this New York Magazine profile, “The Nerd Trying to Turn the GOP Populist,” which does a pretty good job of describing my background.
I served as domestic policy director for the Romney-Ryan presidential campaign in 2012, wrote countless reports and essays during five years as a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, and in 2018 published my first book, The Once and Future Worker: A Vision for the Renewal of Work in America, which was celebrated across the political spectrum. David Brooks called it “absolutely brilliant” while J.D. Vance considered it “one of the most important books I have ever read.” Emmanuel Todd, the eminent French left-winger, described it as “a remarkable intellectual articulation of ‘populism,’ a kind of manifesto of a polite Trumpist, if you will, one relieved of excessive language and so rendered amazingly convincing,” while the Christian World Magazine named it “book of the year for understanding America.”
In 2020, I founded American Compass, the think tank charting the course for conservative economics. As Matthew Continetti, director of domestic policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute explained in Commentary:
Of the New Right groups, American Compass probably has the most pull inside the Beltway. It is not hard to see why. Cass offers a ready-made diagnosis of troubled communities, as well as a helpful menu of policy options…
Much of our success in reshaping conservative economic policy debates is the result simply of our willingness to believe what the American people are saying, make their problems our starting point, and take their priorities as our own. It helps, also, that I couldn’t care less what our established political institutions think. I live 300 miles from Washington with my wife and three young children in a town of 5,000 people who definitely do not read Politico Playbook. I have no political aspirations, or even any interest in working inside the Beltway in the foreseeable future.
You’d be amazed how easy it is to spot transparently silly orthodoxy when you have no stake in upholding it.
What will you get if (when!) you subscribe?
I’ll be writing every week, both sharing my own extended thoughts on some particular item and then commenting on the most important developments and debates of the moment. Why are politicians and pundits adopting their stances and how does that align with the preferences of the American people? What are the actual data, assumptions, and models behind some set of claims and are they worthwhile? Who is making a fool of himself reciting outdated dogma this time?
Also each week, you’ll get a rundown of the things I am reading that I think are most important, stimulating, or just fun. And this will be a great way to keep up with everything happening at American Compass—from new podcast episodes and commentary to essays, reports, and policy proposals.
All posts and the full archive are available for free to subscribers, but we also offer the option of paid subscriptions for anyone who would like to take this opportunity to support our work. 100% of the subscription revenue that we receive goes directly to American Compass.
Still want to learn more?
A great place to start is my introductory post for the Substack [insert link].
You might also take a look at:
“The Working Hypothesis,” an adaptation from my book, The Once and Future Worker.
“Neoliberalism Falls Apart,” my Founder’s Letter in American Compass’s first annual report.
“Searching for Capitalism in the Wreckage of Globalization,” the story of how I came to question most of what I had learned about economic policy.
“What Happened to Capitalism,” my foreword to American Compass’s Rebuilding American Capitalism handbook for conservative policymakers.
