The issue of income inequality has been driving the intellectual, political, and policy debate on the Left and within the Democratic party.
It’s been a strain through President Obama’s rhetoric; part of the rise of populist Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass.; the explanation for the surprising success of Capital in the Twenty-First Century, the treatise of French economist Thomas Piketty; and the underlying justification for the push for higher taxes on the wealthy and increased minimum wage.
One constant theme, as Obama put it, was that income inequality was incompatible with economic prosperity. But a new study from Scott Winship of the Manhattan Institute challenges this view.
Looking at global economic data, Winship found that, “Across the developed world, countries with more inequality tend to have, if anything, higher living standards.”
For the latest edition of “Dialogue,” I sat down with Winship for a chat about his study and the broader issue of income inequality.
