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> We're living through the most anomalously prosperous period in [History] …on average - inequality has never been so high.

jmb99 2y ago
I think there’s a fairly reasonable argument to be made that the (super)majority people today are better off than they would have been 2-500 years ago, at least in most of the world.
- lazide 2y ago
  Near as I can tell, folks have no idea (really) how bad it could be, since most of the really significant shifts have been in removing a lot of major problems. For example, eradicating Smallpox. Controlling Measles, Polio, Tetanus. Synthetic fertilizers eliminating famines in all but the most dysfunctional areas, etc. It used to be dying of disease or famine was a huge problem in much of the world. Now it is only in tiny, very broken areas, for relatively small portions of the population.
- DrNosferatu 2y ago
  Then why average homeownership rate - at a same given age - is much lower for younger generations? Here's some actual data: https://ifs.org.uk/data-items/average-homeownership-age-people-born-different-decades https://ifs.org.uk/data-items/average-homeownership-age-peop... PS: Obviously my comment above was about contemporary generations: sure, we live better today than in the middle ages. But how relevant is that?
ascorbic 2y ago
People at every level of income are better off than their equivalent in the same country at every point in history. Once you get past 100 years or so it's not even close. Even the imperfect (to say the least) social safety nets in rich countries today are far above the level they were 100 years ago, and people are better off by almost every measure. Middle class people live like royalty a few hundreds years ago, when it comes to access to healthcare, food, travel, leisure (and that's before we talk about tech).
AnimalMuppet 2y ago
Never in history? Not in feudal Europe? Not in Egypt under the Pharaohs? Never? I really doubt that...
dredmorbius 2y ago
True. Just as the Industrial Revolution has reduced income inequalities within societies, it has increased them between societies. There lives now both the richest people who ever walked the earth, and the poorest. This divergence in regional and national fortunes since the Industrial Revolution has recently been labeled the Great Divergence. Gregory Clark, A Farewell to Alms, (2006) pp 3--4. <https://faculty.econ.ucdavis.edu/faculty/gclark/papers/FTA2006-1.pdf https://faculty.econ.ucdavis.edu/faculty/gclark/papers/FTA20...> NB: Clark's book is from the Princeton University Press's "Economic History of the Western World" series edited by Joel Mokyr. It's an absolutely phenomenal treasury of books about economic history with a special focus on the immense transformation of the Industrial Revolution(s). Some may have heard of Robert J. Gordon's The Rise and Fall of American Growth, one of the 50+ books in the series. It's not all the books I'd recommend reading on the topic, but it's a dense treasury of quite good ones. <https://press.princeton.edu/series/the-princeton-economic-history-of-the-western-world https://press.princeton.edu/series/the-princeton-economic-hi...>

jmb99 2y ago

I think there’s a fairly reasonable argument to be made that the (super)majority people today are better off than they would have been 2-500 years ago, at least in most of the world.

lazide 2y ago
Near as I can tell, folks have no idea (really) how bad it could be, since most of the really significant shifts have been in removing a lot of major problems. For example, eradicating Smallpox. Controlling Measles, Polio, Tetanus. Synthetic fertilizers eliminating famines in all but the most dysfunctional areas, etc. It used to be dying of disease or famine was a huge problem in much of the world. Now it is only in tiny, very broken areas, for relatively small portions of the population.
DrNosferatu 2y ago
Then why average homeownership rate - at a same given age - is much lower for younger generations? Here's some actual data: https://ifs.org.uk/data-items/average-homeownership-age-people-born-different-decades https://ifs.org.uk/data-items/average-homeownership-age-peop... PS: Obviously my comment above was about contemporary generations: sure, we live better today than in the middle ages. But how relevant is that?

ascorbic 2y ago

People at every level of income are better off than their equivalent in the same country at every point in history. Once you get past 100 years or so it's not even close. Even the imperfect (to say the least) social safety nets in rich countries today are far above the level they were 100 years ago, and people are better off by almost every measure. Middle class people live like royalty a few hundreds years ago, when it comes to access to healthcare, food, travel, leisure (and that's before we talk about tech).

AnimalMuppet 2y ago

Never in history? Not in feudal Europe? Not in Egypt under the Pharaohs? Never? I really doubt that...

dredmorbius 2y ago

True. Just as the Industrial Revolution has reduced income inequalities within societies, it has increased them between societies. There lives now both the richest people who ever walked the earth, and the poorest. This divergence in regional and national fortunes since the Industrial Revolution has recently been labeled the Great Divergence. Gregory Clark, A Farewell to Alms, (2006) pp 3--4. <https://faculty.econ.ucdavis.edu/faculty/gclark/papers/FTA2006-1.pdf https://faculty.econ.ucdavis.edu/faculty/gclark/papers/FTA20...> NB: Clark's book is from the Princeton University Press's "Economic History of the Western World" series edited by Joel Mokyr. It's an absolutely phenomenal treasury of books about economic history with a special focus on the immense transformation of the Industrial Revolution(s). Some may have heard of Robert J. Gordon's The Rise and Fall of American Growth, one of the 50+ books in the series. It's not all the books I'd recommend reading on the topic, but it's a dense treasury of quite good ones. <https://press.princeton.edu/series/the-princeton-economic-history-of-the-western-world https://press.princeton.edu/series/the-princeton-economic-hi...>