Andrew Hacker

Andrew Hacker is a professor of political science at Queens College in New York. He has written ten books, including the bestselling Two Nations and Money. He lives in New York City.

"Few people writing today for a general audience can make more sense of numbers." —The Wall Street Journal

The Math Myth

Andrew Hacker's new book The Math Myth, out February 2016 from The New Press, is the bestselling author’s timely and provocative argument that requiring all students to master a full menu of mathematics is causing more harm than good.

The Math Myth expands Hacker’s scrutiny of many widely held assumptions, such as the notion that mathematics broadens our minds, that mastery of azimuths and asymptotes will be needed for most jobs, that the entire Common Core syllabus should be required of every student. He worries that a frenzied emphasis on STEM is diverting attention from other pursuits and subverting the spirit of the country.

(The New Press, March 2016)

Two Nations: Black and White, Separate, Hostile, Unequal

Why, despite continued efforts to increase understanding and expand opportunities, do black and white Americans still lead separate lives, continually marked by tension and hostility? In his much-lauded classic, newly updated to reflect the changing realities of race in our nation, Andrew Hacker explains the origins and meaning of racism and clarifies the conflicting theories of equality and inferiority. He paints a stark picture of racial inequality in America -- focusing on family life, education, income, and employment -- and explores the current controversies over politics, crime, and the causes of the gap between the races. Illuminating and oftentimes startling, Two Nations demonstrates how race has defined America's history and will continue to shape its future.

(Scribner, May 2003)

Higher Education? How Colleges Are Wasting Our Money and Failing Our Kids---and What We Can Do About It

What's gone wrong at our colleges and universities—and how to get American higher education back on track?

A quarter of a million dollars. It's the going tab for four years at most top-tier universities. Why does it cost so much and is it worth it?

Renowned sociologist Andrew Hacker and New York Times writer Claudia Dreifus make an incisive case that the American way of higher education, now a $420 billion-per-year business, has lost sight of its primary mission: the education of young adults. Going behind the myths and mantras, they probe the true performance of the Ivy League, the baleful influence of tenure, an unhealthy reliance on part-time teachers, and the supersized bureaucracies which now have a life of their own.

As Hacker and Dreifus call for a thorough overhaul of a self-indulgent system, they take readers on a road trip from Princeton to Evergreen State to Florida Gulf Coast University, revealing those faculties and institutions that are getting it right and proving that teaching and learning can be achieved—and at a much more reasonable price.

(Times Books, August 2010)