Almost every time MFA hears a mainstream economist speak—on topics ranging from the danger of raising the minimum wage to how we all benefit from free trade and globalization—she responds, “Where did they get their degree, from a Cracker Jack box?”
No doubt, she’d react in the same manner if she listened to the members of the closing panel at the 2017 Lindau Meeting on Economic Sciences, who were asked to answer the following question: what could and should we do about inequality?
It’s a terrific question, given the obscene—and still rising—levels of inequality that characterize contemporary capitalism, in the United States and around the world. But those who take the time to watch the video (available here) just aren’t going to learn much about either the causes of inequality or what we can do about it.
The panel consisted of three winners of the so-called Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences— Daniel L. McFadden (2000), James J. Heckman (2000), and Christopher A. Pissarides (2000)—and one “young economist,” Rong Hai.
Individually and together, the panelists simply don’t have anything interesting or insightful to say about inequality.
It’s true, none of the men received their Nobel Prizes for research on inequality, although Hai is currently doing research on inequality (e.g., in relation to credit constraints and tax policy). That itself is a comment on how little inequality has figured as an important concern within mainstream economics. And, given the venue, they’re all mainstream economists. Because of that, there’s little they can say—and a great deal they simply can’t say—about inequality.
Their comments (only some of which were actually prepared) range from the obvious—the issue of poverty is different from that of inequality—to the all-too-frequent sidestep—inequality is caused by globalization and technology.
But they don’t have anything to say about contemporary economic and social institutions, especially those of capitalism, or about history. They don’t discuss in any detail the changes in recent decades that have led to the current obscene levels of inequality or, for that matter, the relationship between the factor distribution of income (e.g, between labor and capital) and the size distribution of income (e.g., the growing gap between the 1 percent and everyone else).
Their concern about and knowledge of the causes and consequences of inequality are, at least to judge from their presentations in this panel, stupefyingly limited.
Maybe MFA is right: they did get their degrees from Cracker Jack boxes.
occasional links & commentary 
The first thing to do is separate discretionary wealth (money that you can use as you see fit, for example for consumption) from investment wealth (the right to allocate capital).
It may seem pedantic, but there’s a world of difference morally and practically. For example you can tax discretionary wealth (yachts) very steeply without the argument that it would kill entrepreneurial innovation. We can tolerate Zuckerberg, Gates, or Buffett making capital allocation decisions in the billions, if we put limits on personal and political motivations on what they do.
This separation will reveal to how much of the problem is inequality of consumption or of investment. If Alice can’t eat, is it because Bob eats too much or because Chuck has too much funds tied up in a business venture, choking incomes and consumption? And we can solve each of these problems by different means.