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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... |
