Inequality Reduction Between Tragedy and Progress: The Great Leveler and Recent Scholarship, 2017-2024

Abstract

In my 2017 book The Great Leveler, I argued that over the course of recorded history, only four kinds of violent disasters-state collapse, severe pandemics, mass mobilization warfare and transformative revolution-had greatly reduced inequality of income and wealth. I survey relevant scholarship that has appeared since then and find that it is generally compatible with my thesis. Recent research offers revisions regarding the scale and other specifics of historical leveling events and draws attention to previously neglected processes such as natural disasters. Studies that emphasize peaceful mechanisms of equalization do not contradict my findings and may not pay enough attention to the long-term distributional consequences of violent crises.

Keywords: Inequality, Income inequality, Wealth inequality, History of inequality

JEL Classification: O15, Z13, D31, H12, H13, N00, N30