Tag Archives: inequality

Eugenics has a bad reputation. Even the word "eugenics" is repugnant to many people, associated as it is with atrocities - forced sterilization programmes in America, for example, and of course the horrors of Nazi Germany. We like to see eugenics as discredited pseudo-science that has been consigned to the dust of history. Never again will we treat people as expendable simply because of their inherited characteristics. But ideas that we discard because of their horrible consequences have...

Branko Milanovic on his new paper with Thomas Hauner and Suresh Naidu exploring inequality prior to World War I and providing empirical support for the classical theory of imperialism. ProMarket — The blog of the Stigler Center at the University of Chicago Booth School of BusinessInequality, Imperialism, and the First World WarBranko Milanovic | Visiting Presidential Professor at City University of New York Graduate Center and senior scholar at the Luxembourg Income Study (LIS), and...

Important.  Marshall Steinbaum catches us up on what's happened since the publication of Piketty's Capital in the 21st Century three years ago. Actually, lots.  But the economics profession has largely ignored it since it involves distribution and the economics profession doesn't consider distribution irrelevant.Boston ReviewWhy Are Economists Giving Piketty the Cold Shoulder?Marshall Steinbaum | Fellow and Research Director at the Roosevelt Institute

I would phrase it somewhat differently: "It's the distribution, stupid."The social and political problems arise from grossly asymmetrical distribution and the ensuing distributional effects economically through highly asymmetrical income and wealth.Occasional Links & CommentaryIt’s the profits, stupid!David F. Ruccio | Professor of Economics, University of Notre Dame

It is customary to contrast Trump and Macron: on one hand the vulgar American businessman with his xenophobic tweets and global warming scepticism; and on the other, the well-educated, enlightened European with his concern for dialogue between different cultures and sustainable development. All this is not entirely false and rather pleasing to French ears. But if we take a closer look at the policies being implemented, one is struck by the similarities. In particular, Trump, like Macron,...

British Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn addressed United Nations officials in Geneva this Friday in a speech outlining his vision for a twenty-first century internationalism. The speech, scheduled to mark International Human Rights Day, examined the roots of global economic inequality, the developing climate crisis and the impact of war across the world. These “threats to our common humanity,” it argues, can only be overcome with “a global rules-based system that applies to all and works...

A new paper challenges Thomas Piketty’s portrayal of an income distribution dominated at the top by passive rentiers who do nothing to earn their money, arguing that income inequality in America today is driven by the working rich. ProMarket — The blog of the Stigler Center at the University of Chicago Booth School of BusinessWho Are the Top 1 Percent in America? The Answer from New Research Might Surprise You Samantha Eyler-Driscoll

As it turns out, Nature (unfortunately behind a paywall) has just published a study in which the authors attempt to estimate the degree of wealth inequality in ancient societies for which we do not have written records.* What they did is collect data from 63 archaeological sites or groups of sites, used the distribution of house sizes as a proxy for wealth, and assigned Gini coefficients to each society. What they are able to show is that wealth disparities generally increased with the...

Economic, social and health decline in the industrial Midwest may have been a major factor in the 2016 US presidential election, Monnat and Brown’s INET research finds, with people living in distressed areas swinging behind Trump in greater numbers. Trump performed well within these landscapes of despair – places that have borne the brunt of declines in manufacturing, mining, and related industries since the 1970s and are now struggling with opioids, disability, poor health, and family...

Skyrocketing land rent in the UK. In just two decades the market value of land has quadrupled, increasing recorded wealth by over £4 trillion. The driving force behind rising house prices — and the UK’s growing wealth — has been rapidly escalating land prices. For those who own property, this has provided enormous benefits.... Open DemocracyIt’s Time to Call the Housing Crisis What It Really Is: The Largest Transfer of Wealth in Living Memory Laurie Macfarlane