The main force pushing toward reduction in inequality has always been the diffusion of knowledge and the diffusion of education.
Interpretation
Knowledge and education are essential in reducing inequality within societies.
Thomas Piketty asserts that the primary driver in decreasing inequality throughout history has been the spread and accessibility of knowledge and education. This implies that empowering individuals through learning fosters equality, enabling them to improve their circumstances and challenge societal disparities.
In practice
During a speech on social justice, one could use this quote to emphasize the importance of educational reform.
Contrary to a tenacious myth, France is not owned by California pension funds or the Bank of China, any more than the United States belongs to Japanese and German investors. The fear of getting into such a predicament is so strong today that fantasy often outstrips reality. The reality is that inequality with respect to capital is a far greater domestic issue than it is an international one.
Over a long period of time, the main force in favor of greater equality has been the diffusion of knowledge and skills.
There is one great advantage to being an academic economist in France: here, economists are not highly respected in the academic and intellectual world or by political and financial elites. Hence they must set aside their contempt for other disciplines and their absurd claim to greater scientific legitimacy, despite the fact that they know almost nothing about anything.
When the rate of return on capital exceeds the rate of growth of output and income, as it did in the nineteenth century and seems quite likely to do again in the twenty-first, capitalism automatically generates arbitrary and unsustainable inequalities that radically undermine the meritocratic values on which democratic societies are based.
Having a decent share of the national wealth for the middle class is not bad for growth. It is actually useful both for equity and efficiency reasons.
The discipline of economics has yet to get over its childish passion for mathematics and for purely theoretical and often highly ideological speculation, at the expense of historical research and collaboration with the other social sciences.
There are five Gospels: Matthew, Mark, Luke, John and the Christian. Most people will never read the first four.
There are perhaps no days of our childhood we lived so fully as those we spent with a favorite book.
Teach by doing whenever you can, and only fall back upon words when doing it is out of the question.
There is something so deeply visceral about libraries for me-rooms and rooms full of people dreaming and remembering.
I'm going to college. I don't care if it ruins my career. I'd rather be smart than a movie star.
We recognize that real educational reform is essential if today's and tomorrow's children are to live in a more peaceful, just, and sustainable world.
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