"Is inequality largely the result of the Industrial Revolution? Or, were pre-industrial incomes and life expectancies … as unequal as they are today? For want of sufficient data, these questions have not yet been answered. This paper infers … extraction ratio. Rather than simply offering measures of actual inequality, we compare the latter with the maximum feasible …

Two hallmarks of U.S. monetary policy since the 1981-1982 recession have been declining interest rates and moderation ….070 between 1983 and 2019. This paper analyzes the connection between these two developments on the basis of the Survey of … changes and debt devaluation accounted for 72.6 percent of the advance of mean wealth over 1983-2019. They also would have led …

Entitlement programs have become an increasing component of total government spending in the US over the last six … decades. To some observers, this growth of the welfare state is excessive and unwarranted. To others, it is a welcome counter … entitlements, we argue that such dynamics can be explained by two factors. The first one is that institutional features of policy …

before individuals marry and after the household is formed. These data allow us to establish a number of novel facts. First … largely explained by the return of the spouse with the highest pre-marriage return. This suggests that family wealth is … largely managed by the spouse with the highest potential to grow it. This is particularly true for households at the top of …

methodology to gauge the extent to which the "supply side" of politics hinders voter welfare. Using rich data on thousands of … and non-ideological attributes, and we evaluate voters' welfare given the set of candidates they face. Our estimates … uncover substantial welfare losses to voters relative to three alternative benchmarks of ideal representation. On average, the …