https://grusky.people.stanford.edu/research
Is the takeoff in income inequality bringing about a reduction in mobility? Although there’s a long history of worrying about a decline in mobility, such concerns have become unusually prominent of late. These concerns can be addressed by exploiting new opportunities with administrative data as well as mining existing survey data. A selection of relevant readings (go here for a full list of relevant work):
Why has income inequality increased so spectacularly in the last 40 years? The conventional wisdom is that it’s the by-product of the invisible hand, that we must simply tolerate such market-generated inequality, and that the only realistic response is to ramp up redistribution. Can the takeoff instead be attributed to an asymmetric process in which opportunities to collect rent disappear at the bottom of the distribution just as they become more prominent and widespread at the top? A selection of relevant readings (go here for a full list of relevant work):
The takeoff in income inequality is of course one of the best-known and most spectacular trends of our time. As important as this takeoff is, what gives it real teeth is that another equally important force – rising commodification – is playing out in conjunction with it. It follows that the poor are now doubly disadvantaged: It’s not just that they have less money, but it’s also that money matters more for securing goods, services, and even opportunities. This trend toward the “commodification of everything” is revealed in the decline of public goods, the decline of public lotteries, and the gradual disappearance of lifecourse zones (i.e., childhood, old age) that were once protected havens from the market (and go here for a full list of relevant work).