Thomas Piketty’s best-selling “Capital in the Twenty-First Century” has given policy makers and pundits a renewed excuse to call for the redistribution of wealth and higher taxes.
But it is time for the French economist to move out of the limelight. Two eminent economics professors, Carnegie Mellon’s Allan Meltzer and the Wharton School’s Scott Richard, are challenging his conclusions with a new model and different data. Contrary to popular wisdom, they find that government redistribution increases inequality rather than reducing it.
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