Inequality in Capitalist Systems

New column:

Inequality in Capitalist Systems Is Not Inevitable, by Mark Thoma: Capitalism is the best economic system yet discovered for giving people the goods and services they desire at the lowest possible price, and for producing innovative economic growth. But there is a cost associated with these benefits, the boom and bust cycles inherent in capitalist systems, and those costs hit working class households – who have done nothing to deserve such a fate – very hard. Protecting innocent households from the costs of recessions is an important basis for our social insurance programs.

It is becoming more and more evident that there is another cost of capitalist systems, the inevitable rising inequality documented by Thomas Piketty in “Capital in the Twenty-First Century, that our social insurance system will need to confront. ...