International Comparisons of Wealth Inequality

Abstract

This study presents reasonably comparable estimates of the size distribution of household or personal wealth for eight OECD countries—Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Japan, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United States. In the mid‐1980s, the U.S. ranked as the most unequal and Japan the least, while the other six countries had roughly comparable levels of wealth inequality. Moreover, while wealth inequality rose sharply in the U.S. during the 1980s, it increased modestly in Sweden and showed little change or a slight decline in Canada, France, and the U.K. A comparison of time trends for the U.K. and the U.S. suggests that the relatively high wealth inequality in the U.S. in the 1980s represents a marked turnaround from the 1950s, when the U.S. was considerably more equal in terms of wealth ownership than the U.K. Comparative results for the two countries hold for both conventional (marketable) wealth and for augmented wealth, which includes a valuation of public and private pension wealth.

Long-Run Trends in the Distribution of Income and Wealth

“…In the end it is based on our subjective reading of which aspects we think are key for understanding the long run developments of inequality, especially in light of the new evidence produced in the past decade. Furthermore, much of what we write about has been covered in previous over-views and surveys of the top incomes literature (Piketty, 2005;Piketty and Saez, 2006;Piketty, 2007, 2010;Leigh, 2009;Atkinson, Piketty andSaez, 2010, 2011), overviews of the changing earnings distribution (Atkinson 2008a) and in overviews on wealth concentration trends (Wolff, 1996;Davies andShorrocks, 2000, Atkinson, 2008b;Ohlsson, Roine and Waldenström, 2008). In general, our aim is to focus on the most recent work in the field building on previous surveys such as and Morrisson (2000).…”

“…We use the compilation of those sources by Wolff (1996) for the period up to 1958, and for the period thereafter we use the survey data from the Survey of Consumer Finances and its forerunners presented by Kennickell ( , 2011. 102 For the adult population, our preferred estimate for 1774 is from .…”

O Topo da Distribuição de Renda no Brasil: Primeiras Estimativas com Dados Tributários e Comparação com Pesquisas Domiciliares (2006-2012)

“…Há resenhas sobre a relação entre o topo da distribuição e o nível e as tendências da desigualdade em diversos países que tratam o assunto com mais detalhe e profundidade do que somos capazes de fazer aqui (Alvaredo et al, 2013;Atkinson, 2008; Atkinson e Piketty, 2010;Atkinson, Piketty e Saez, 2011;Keister, 2014;Keister e Moller, 2000;Medeiros e Souza, 2014;Ohlsson, Roine e Waldenström, 2006;Piketty, 2007; Piketty e Saez, 2006;Torche e Spilerman, 2008;Wolff, 1996). Há também revisões de análises das lacunas preenchidas pela literatura baseada em informações tributárias, em particular a melhor estimativa de mudanças relacionadas aos rendimentos da população de renda alta, a possibilidade de se estenderem séries para períodos muito anteriores ao surgimento das pesquisas domiciliares e um monitoramento mais acurado de rendimentos que não são recebidos com a mesma regularidade que os rendimentos do trabalho (Atkinson, 2007;DiPrete, 2007;Kenworthy, 2007;Kopczuk, Saez e Song, 2010;Myles, 2003;Piketty, 2014).…”

The Political Economy of Investment in Human Capital

“…For example, the gross capital income of the poorest 60 % of the Venezuelan population is only 2.2 % of total gross capital income. 9 Given that this number is gross of debt, 8 11% of French and 7% of Australian Net Worth is in the hands of the three lower quintiles of these countries' wealth distribution (Wolff, 1996).…”