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The U.S. economy takes center stage next week when ������Ƶ presents two documentary films, each accompanied by a question-and-answer session, one with former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich and the other with a panel. Both programs are open to the public.

• — Reich, who served in Bill Clinton’s Cabinet, collaborated on this film by Jacob Kornbluth. The screening, with Reich there for the Q&A, is set for 5:30 p.m. Monday, May 19, in Jackson Hall at the Mondavi Center for the Performing Arts.

• — This documentary, which premiered on HBO last year, follows eight families struggling in the wake of the recent recession. This is a free screening, 6:30 p.m. Thursday, May 22, in 198 Young Hall, accompanied by a resource fair with information on local food assistance and other programs.

Inequality for All

“I decided my goal with this film, first and foremost, was to take a conceptual and abstract topic and find a way to tell an approachable and human story about it,” Kornbluth said. “Every choice — from letting Reich’s humor show through to approaching interview subjects as people rather than victims — was designed to help show the argument and the economy in human terms that people could wrap their heads around.”

Reich is the Chancellor’s Professor of Public Policy at UC Berkeley and senior fellow at that campus’s Blum Center for Developing Economies.

������Ƶ’ Blum Center for Developing Economies is the lead sponsor of this program, joined by co-sponsors the ASUCD and other student organizations, the ������Ƶ Center for Poverty Research and the Center for Regional Change.

Free for students with valid IDs, $5 general public (advance tickets available through the Mondavi Center box office).

American Winter

In this film made over the course of a winter in Portland, Ore., brothers Joe and Harry Glantz say they have illustrated the human impact of budget cuts to social services, how people are slipping out of the middle class and seeing their American Dream fractured.

“Even as the economy slowly recovers from the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression, an alarming number of American families are still finding themselves caught in a daily struggle to meet their basic needs,” according to a news release on the American Winter website.

“At the same time, the social safety net that was intended to help those in crisis has been impacted by budget cuts, creating a perfect storm of greater need and fewer resources available to assist vulnerable families.”

The Q&A discussion panel will include one of the filmmakers, Harry Glantz (co-director and producer); Professor Ann Stevens, director of the Center for Poverty Research; and others from ������Ƶ and the community. Yolo County Supevisor Don Saylor will be the moderator.