Financial author Amity Shlaes wasn't too impressed with the 2008-09 bank bailout and the last seven years of massive easing by the Federal Reserve.

Both the Bush and Obama administration provided assistance to banks. And the Fed has kept short-term interest rates at record lows since December 2008 and expanded its balance sheet to $4.5 trillion through quantitative easing.

So Republican presidential candidates should focus on avoiding another bailout rather than taxes, Shlaes writes on Forbes.com.

"The 2008 crisis is the elephant in the elephants’ room, the event that affects voter trust in the GOP," Shlaes says. "Since voters aren’t sure what happened in 2008–and aren’t sure what will happen in the next crisis, either–they’re in no mood to take the sort of leap of faith tax reform requires."

The solution: "postpone the tax talk, and, instead, push the candidates on bailouts," she suggests.

"Let them say whether, come the next crisis, they’d wing it, à la [former Treasury Secretary] Hank Paulson, or actually put forward a plan. Clear the air on 2008, and there will be trust enough for tax reform. But the best pledge for this election round is a 'No Bailout' pledge."

Meanwhile, former Labor Secretary Robert Reich sees a different economic issue as paramount.

The technology revolution will exacerbate our country's unequal distribution of income over the next decade, he maintains.

"Income and wealth will become even more concentrated than they are today," the University of California, Berkeley public policy professor writes on The Huffington Post.

"Those who create or invest in blockbuster ideas will earn unprecedented sums and returns. The corollary is they will have enormous political power."

But it won't be so hot for the rest of us, Reich says. "Most people will not share in the monetary gains, and their political power will disappear. The middle class's share of the total economic pie will continue to shrink."

But there is hope, Reich says.

"The current trend is not preordained to last. . . . We can--indeed, I believe we must--ignite a political movement to reorganize the economy for the benefit of the many, rather than for the lavish lifestyles of a precious few."

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