Tag Archives: inequality

Workers’ wages have been stagnant for the past decade across the 36 countries that make up the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development. But the problem has been particularly acute in the United States, where the “low-income rate” is high (only surpassed by two countries, Greece and Spain) and “income inequality” even worse (following only Israel). The causes are clear: workers suffer when many of the new jobs they’re forced to have the freedom to take are on the low end of...

What we need is to disaggregate growth and report on the progress of all Americans. Instead of the one-number-fits-all approach of GDP growth, this new system would report growth for Americans along the income curve, much as the graphs above do. It might indicate, for example, that the bottom 50 percent of Americans experienced growth of 1.3 percent while Americans in the top 1 percent of earners experienced 4.5 percent income growth. Unfortunately, such a system is not currently possible....

The increasing income and wealth inequalities within countries is one of today’s great social concerns. This column describes how the tendency towards increasing indebtedness in much earlier societies was held in check by debt-cancellation Jubilees, and discusses ways to deal with today’s debt overhang and accompanying wealth inequalities. The funding of a modern Jubilee could come mostly, perhaps entirely, from a land/or property tax. Vox.euSome ways to introduce a modern debt Jubilee...

When the poorest gain, the lower bound, or ‘floor’, of the distribution of living standards rises. Using microdata spanning the last 30 years, this column argues that the floor in the US has been sinking, alongside rising top incomes. The floor would have fallen further without public spending on food stamps, which helped protect the poorest in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis. vox.euAlongside rising top incomes, the level of living of America’s poorest has fallen Martin...

I’ve just reviewed Professor Carey Doberstein’s book on homelessness governance (UBC Press). The book looks at the way decisions are made pertaining to funding for homelessness programs in Vancouver, Calgary and Toronto during the 1995-2015 period. Points raised in my review include the following: -Homelessness trends look quite different across the three cities. For example, it can be growing in one city, but declining in another. -One of the book’s main arguments is that better decisions...

Review of Kate Raworth’s Doughnut economics: Seven ways to think like the 21st-century economist.  Good read. Is Kate Raworth being utopian? I would say that Kate Raworth's work is similar to Mariana Mazzucato's in that they both propose out of the box solutions to addressing contemporary challenges. They are significant in that they are starting points for reflection, inquiry, conversation and debate.  Raworth challenges the growth model of conventional economics and Mazzucato...

The rising scholar of taxation and inequality talks to ProMarket about the problems excessive economic power poses for open political systems, how states can tackle profit-shifting, and critics who have dismissed his work on distributional issues as “a French economics.” ProMarket — The blog of the Stigler Center at the University of Chicago Booth School of BusinessGabriel Zucman: “Some People in Economics Feel That Talking About Inequality Is Not What Economists Should Be Doing”Samantha...

First there was the Great Gatsby curve. Then there was the Proust index. Now, thanks to Neil Irwin, we have the Marx ratio. Each, in their different way, attempts to capture the ravages of contemporary capitalism. But the Marx ratio is a bit different. It was published in the New York Times. Its aim is to capture one of the underlying determinants of the obscene levels of inequality in the United States today—not class mobility or the number of years of national income growth lost to the...

What "they" don't want you to see unless you are one of the "them." Short. It estimates that already in 2006 in the US the richest 5% possessed greater net worth than the bottom 95% combined. Real-World Economics Review BlogCitigroup Plutonomy Reports update Edward Fullbrook

I recently wrote a ‘top 10’ overview blog post about the 2018 Saskatchewan budget. Following on the heels of that, I’ve now written an opinion piece about the budget’s announcement of a phase out a rental assistance program for low-income households. Points raised in the opinion piece include the following: -Across Saskatchewan, rental vacancy rates are unusually high right now, making this a good time to provide rental assistance to tenants for use in private units (indeed, right now it’s a...