Wage suppression from interwar austerity persists as today’s main inequality driver
Evidence
A century later, exploitation due to wage stagnation— what I show to be the most intractable legacy of austerity— persists as the main driver of a global inequality trend in which a country like Italy (which suff ers far less inequality than the United States) has seen the wealth of its richest 6 million increased by 72 percent in the last ten years. Th e country’s poorest 6 million have had their wealth diminished by 63 percent over the same period. Th e offi cial data tells that in 2018, 5 million people (8.3 percent of the Italian population) lived in absolute poverty, i.e., were deprived of the necessary means to live with dignity. Th e numbers in 2020 worsened: 5.6 million people, 9.4 percent of the population, live in absolute poverty. In Britain the situation is no less gloomy: 30 percent of the country’s children (4.1 million) lived in relative poverty in 2017– 2018, and 70 percent of these children lived in working families. As of 2020, the number of poor children has increased to 4.3 million. — Clara E. Mattei, The Capital Order, 81
Categorization
- XREF: connects to: Austerity enforces the wage-labor relation that capitalism requires for growth — Clara E. Mattei, The Capital Order: How Economists…, 29; Export-led growth structurally demands wage suppression and anti-inflationary monetary dominance — Mark Blyth, Austerity: The History of a Dangerous…, 368; Financialization theory links wage-compromise collapse and shareholder value to inequality — Natascha van der Zwan, Making Sense of Financialization, 109 (+1 more)
Broader Connections
- Austerity originated after World War I as a counteroffensive against working-class unrest
#expands(0.85) — Clara E. Mattei, The Capital Order, 28 - Austerity enforces the wage-labor relation that capitalism requires for growth
#expands(0.80) — Clara E. Mattei, The Capital Order, 29 - Export-led growth structurally demands wage suppression and anti-inflationary monetary dominance
#corroborates(0.78) — Mark Blyth, Austerity, 368 - Financialization theory links wage-compromise collapse and shareholder value to inequality
#expands(0.72) — Natascha van der Zwan, Making Sense of Financialization, 109