Glen Weyl and Eric Posner: Piketty’s conjecture that we will reach the same or worse levels of wealth inequality than in the nineteenth century is implausible. Moreover, his focus on inequality misses that something great is also going on—that more and more people can live off society’s accumulated wealth and so don’t have to work. The real danger is not inequality per se but bad policy that suppresses growth and thus the accumulation of wealth, delaying this utopia for the masses longer than necessary. So while progressive taxes may serve as a short-term palliative, we should focus on giving the most capable part of the population better incentives to innovate, while allowing everyone else to benefit from their brilliance as rentiers.
Posted on: Fri, 01 Aug 2014 19:06:32 +0000
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