[simplefish]

"I don't think we are conquering global inequality. I think it's getting worse."

I'm sure you think that, but the numbers are clear, and not really under any dispute. Global inequality has been falling steadily and rapidly since 1980; it's the biggest reduction in absolute poverty the world has ever seen. You can interpret those numbers however you like, but those are the numbers.

"And the environment might not recover eventually; it might go into runaway heating and boil off the atmosphere."

Not according to the IPCC and the "scientific consensus". :)

[chii]

Some believe that equality means that the gap between the rich and poor is lessened, and if that was your frame of mind, then it does seem like global inequality has risen.

However, absolute poverty is decreasing just as you said, and i think that ought to be the real measure. Who cares if the richest of the rich is 100million times better off than the poorest, if the poorest is better off already?

[simplefish]

This stuff is actually not as hard as you seem to be making it. We don't need all these "some believe" or "seem like" qualifirs.

First, what do we mean by "global inequality"? Well, let's break that down. We're talking about a metric measuring income dispersion, which is, yes, a measure of the gap between rich and poor. A common metric is the Gini Coefficient[1]. And instead of looking at the coefficient of a single country, if we look at the entire population, we get a metric of global inequality. Not hard, right?

Second, what have metrics of global inequality been doing since 1980? Why, they've been falling[2]!

So, yes, the "gap between the rich and poor [has] lessened". I have no idea why you or anyone else might think that it seems otherwise. Find an op-ed or column about the global economy from anytime in the past decade, and you've got a good chance of it either talking about how real incomes in the West (ie, the global 1%) are stagnating, or how real wages in China (ie, the global 99%) are booming. There's really no way this could happen and not result in a significant reduction in the gap between the rich and poor. And indeed, that's exactly what's resulted. (And to tie it back to a perennial HN favourite, the mechanism by which this has happened - an unprecedented reduction in global inequality and a massive reduction in absolute poverty - is exemplified by Apple and Foxconn.)

(You're also right that we could have a reduction in absolute poverty even as global inequality increased. But that's now what is happening.)

[1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gini_coefficient

[2]: I'm resisting supplying citations because a quick Google search will turn up, literally, pages of results. Still, if you want one image, this one[3] isn't bad.

[3]: http://media.economist.com/sites/default/files/cf_images/200...