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INEQUALITY AND INSTABILITY

James K. Galbraith

A Study of the World Economy Just Before the Great Crisis

A landmark work of research and original insight, Inequality and Instability will change forever the way we understand this pivotal topic.
As Wall Street rose to dominate the U.S. economy, income and pay inequalities in America came to dance to the tune of the credit cycle. As the reach of financial markets extended across the globe, interest rates, debt, and debt crises became the dominant forces driving the rise of economic inequality almost everywhere. Thus the "super-bubble" that investor George Soros identified in rich countries for the two decades after 1980 was a super-crisis for the 99 percent-not just in the U.S. but the entire world.

Inequality and Instability demonstrates that finance is the driveshaft that links inequality to economic instability. The book challenges those, mainly on the right, who see mysterious forces of technology behind rising inequality. And it also challenges those, mainly on the left, who have placed the blame narrowly on trade and outsourcing. Inequality and Instability presents straightforward evidence that the rise of inequality mirrors the stock market in the U.S. and the rise of finance and of free-market policies elsewhere. Starting from the premise that fresh argument requires fresh evidence, James K. Galbraith brings new data to bear as never before, presenting information built up over fifteen years in easily understood charts and tables. By measuring inequality at the right geographic scale, Galbraith shows that more equal societies systematically enjoy lower unemployment. He shows how this plays out inside Europe, between Europe and the United States, and in modern China. He explains that the dramatic rise of inequality in the U.S. in the 1990s reflected a finance-driven technology boom that concentrated incomes in just five counties, very remote from the experience of most Americans-which helps explain why the political reaction was so slow to come. That the reaction is occurring now, however, is beyond doubt. In the aftermath of the Great Financial Crisis, inequality has become, in America and the world over, the central issue.

James K. Galbraith is professor at the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs, the University of Texas at Austin, where he holds the Lloyd M. Bentsen Jr. Chair in Government/Business Relations. He is a leading economist whose books include The Predator State, Inequality and Industrial Change, and Created Unequal.
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Book

Published 2023-10-11 by Oxford University Press

Book

Published 2023-04-17 by Oxford University Press

Comments

In Inequality and Instability, James K. Galbraith brings to bear his considerable experience in government and academia to examine one of the most pressing issues of our time. In this accessible and far-reaching volume, he investigates not only the depth and breadth of inequality in Europe, America, and elsewhere, but also its implications for politics and society. It's no surprise that Galbraith, who is well known for having pioneered new understandings of economic inequality, leaves no stone unturned in his discussion of metrics and methodologies...It is a must-read for anyone who wishes to understand our political and economic era.

While most economists 'slept' and some were busying themselves making sure there is no level playing field, Jamie Galbraith was one of the few who kept on insisting on the dangers of runaway inequality, financial-sector driven growth and crony capitalism. In this book, he takes the reader on a journey through the years that preceded the financial meltdown, skillfully links inequality and macroeconomics, and, after showing the why and the how of the crisis, points the way out of it

Based on a mountain of new data, this book undermines much of what scholars thought they knew about economic inequality. James Galbraith's readable and compelling dissections of how financial bubbles and macroeconomic forces shape inequality and its effects on society and the state are seminal. Inequality and Instability is a work not just for scholars, but for citizens.

[P]otentially groundbreaking new methodology . . . Galbraith discredits a number of shibboleths of the economics profession. . . . In this rich study, the author brings both transparency and a fresh approach to a profession where a shake-up seems more than overdue. Economics specialists will enjoy this book, but so too will general readers disenchanted with current economic orthodoxies.

Inequality is at the heart of our modern economic predicament,but its kaleidoscopic nature makes it as hard to summarize as it is to understand. In this important book, Jamie Galbraith and colleagues develop a powerful new measure of global inequality trends and show how it can be used to shed new light on everything from economic growth to voter turnout. The result is a truly pathbreaking work of scholarship.