Feb
5
Piketty’s Capital in the Twenty First Century- Blog Post #3- Teresa Lo
February 5, 2015 | Leave a Comment
Exactly how serious is global inequality? Does it come before the present war tensions in the Middle East? The Eric Garner trials? Or the recent Metro North crash that killed a few commuters? The answer is, there is no answer. Global inequality is a type of issue that can not be compared with any of these issues mentioned. It’s one of those issues where no matter how many people write articles about it, it can not be completely solved. There is always going to be tension about inequality in general and the issue can only be minimized not eliminated.
I was interested in Mr. Piketty’s theory of capitalism mentioned in The Economist‘s article. Mr. Piketty offers a “prediction of where wealth distribution is heading.” He uses the history of two world wars, the Depression and high taxes to explain the return on wealth seen in the 20th century. He also suggests that since medicine is becoming such an innovation, people are living longer, and with an older population, the growth of wealth should slow. Based on this article, I would agree with Mr. Piketty’s prediction. I like how he used hard evidence and actually implemented his opinions and thoughts to make an educated prediction about the economy.
I agree with the latter half of the article as well. The Economist criticizes Mr. Piketty failure to mention any trade-offs or costs to his redistributionist agenda. It is true that if Mr. Piketty added this to his argument, it would be stronger. What would be the risks and costs to following his agenda? If he did answer this question, a follow-up question would be “How would we combat/minimize these costs?
I think the fact that Mr. Piketty opened “Capital in the Twenty-First Century” with the history of the Industrial Revolution is perfect. The Industrial Revolution is the start of America’s economic growth, in my opinion. Reformation quickly boomed and a lot of changes were taking place in the workplace. The start of the economic American timeline started here. And, despite how far long ago it was, I admire Mr. Piketty’s choice to implement the Industrial Revolution as a starting point despite the title “Capital in the Twenty-First Century.”
In The New Yorker, the statement that surprised me most was when Cassidy notes “the level of inequality in the United States is ‘probably higher than in any other society at any time in the past, anywhere in the world.’ ” That is extremely surprising. The United States considers itself as one of the superpowers in the world and the fact that we are not stable at home is surprising but not unexpected. The income gap is very wide and I think the U.S. should focus on internal affairs occurring in the country before concerning ourselves with external affairs.
