In this context he was assigned by the Roosevelt administration to lead a successful project to determine whether it was feasible to develop an alternative mutual self-help economy, in part based on barter, to the conventional economy in which many people were homeless and starving in spite of having skills and being ready to work.
As in many historical novels, some of the motives attributed by the author to the protagonist were not those of the real person, a source of frustration for Carlton.
He was the founder and chairman in New York of Mobilization for Youth, which became a national model for anti-poverty programs for the inner city.
This proved to be a particularly successful model because co-op members were highly motivated to succeed in their lives once they had a homestead to protect and build upon, and because the approach cost the government nothing once the revolving fund had been established.
In the final decade of his life, Carlton co-founded and was president of Selcore Labs, where a new a-cellular pertussis vaccine was developed and approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.