Inequality in History: A Long-Run View

Guido Alfani

No 94dgs, SocArXiv from Center for Open Science

Abstract: This article provides an overview of long-term trends in income and wealth inequality, from ca. 1300 until today. It discusses recent acquisitions in terms of inequality measurement, building upon earlier research and systematically connecting preindustrial, industrial and post-industrial tendencies. It shows that in the last seven centuries or so, inequality of both income and wealth had tended to grow continuously, with two exceptions: the century or so following the Black Death pandemic of 1347-52, and the period from the beginning of World War I until the mid-1970s. It discusses recent encompassing hypotheses about the factors leading to long-run inequality change, highlighting their relative merits and faults and arguing for the need to pay close attention to the historical context. (Stone Center on Socio-Economic Inequality Working Paper)

Date: 2023-10-30
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-his
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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Related works:
Working Paper: Inequality in History: A long-Run View (2024)
Working Paper: Inequality in History: A long-Run View (2024)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:osf:socarx:94dgs

DOI: 10.31219/osf.io/94dgs

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