Wealth Inequality: Historical Trends and Cross‐National Differences. Issue 6 (June 2016) - Kus, Basak
Abstract: This article provides an overview of the recent literature on wealth inequality from a comparative and historical perspective. I first discuss how the stock, composition, and distribution of wealth changed from the 18 th century onwards. In the second part of the paper, I move on to the causal questions: What factors drive wealth inequality? Why does the distribution of wealth vary across nations? In the third and concluding section I briefly discuss the socio‐political challenges posed by increasing wealth inequality, and identify several key questions for research going forward.