Document Type

Article

Publication Date

7-2024

Abstract

Rapidly rising income and wealth inequality in the United States and other Western countries has been commonly identified as an inherent and nefarious feature of the capitalist system. In fact, however, rising inequality within the economically advanced countries has been accompanied by both a significant relative improvement of the economic and social position of the previously disadvantaged groups, such as women and ethnic minorities, and an unprecedented reduction of the inequalities between the people living in the advanced countries and the rest of the world. This change is largely due to the phenomenon of globalization that brought the advantages of the capitalist economic system to the developing world. Rising inequality is also an effect of the deep technological transformation of Western economies in which an increasing share of national wealth is produced by a much smaller number of highly skilled and educated people than had ever been the case in the past. To be sure, the growing inequality does raise the specter of political instability and may call for some counteracting redistributive measures. But the most important condition of all such measures is not to base them on a theory that might undermine the legitimacy and the effectiveness of the capitalist market economy. A program of restituting to the descendants of American slaves the value of the labor unjustly taken from their ancestors might both alleviate some of the existing inequalities and reduce racial animosities, while at the same affirm the liberal commitment to the institutions of private property and inheritance. A provision of a certain amount of capital to each high-school-graduating student might widen and equalize their opportunities, while giving them a stake in the free market economy and redefining the concept of American citizenship.

Disciplines

Inequality and Stratification | Law | Law and Society

Download

Share

COinS