Kuznets curve

Hypothetical Kuznets curve.
A measure of income inequality: the top decile share in the US national income, 1910–2010.[1] Piketty argues that Kuznets mistook the 1930-1950 decrease in inequality for the endpoint of its development. Since 1950, inequality has again reached pre-WW II levels. Similar trends are visible in European countries.[2]

The Kuznets curve (/ˈkʌznɛts/) expresses a hypothesis advanced by economist Simon Kuznets in the 1950s and 1960s.[3] According to this hypothesis, as an economy develops, market forces first increase and then decrease economic inequality. As more data have become available with the passage of time since the hypothesis was expressed, the data show waves rather than a curve.

  1. ^ Based on Table TI.1 of the supplement Archived 8 May 2014 at the Wayback Machine to Thomas Piketty's Capital in the Twenty-First Century.
  2. ^ Piketty, Thomas (2013). Capital in the Twenty-First Century. Belknap. p. 24.
  3. ^ Kuznets profileArchived 18 September 2009 at the Wayback Machine at New School for Social Research: "...his discovery of the inverted U-shaped relation between income inequality and economic growth..."