IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/pfq/journl/v63y2018i1p7-23.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Economic Growth and Changes in Capital and Labour Income in the USA (1988–2016) – Additional Information to the Piketty Thesis

Author

Listed:
  • Magas, István

Abstract

The significant political changes which have occurred both in the USA and Europe over the past one and a half years as well as the stabilisation of processes in the world economy have raised the question again: How reliable is the Piketty thesis (r>g) regarding the forecast of income distribution processes by future growth and production factors? After the publication of his world famous book in English (Piketty, 2015), Piketty asked himself the aforementioned question again. He thought that his statement in his original thesis was shrouded in uncertainty. This study provides empirical data to the modified Piketty thesis. After an overview of the original theoretical starting points, the growth, productivity and factor income dynamics of the American private sector between 1988–2016 is analysed. The most important conclusion is that the variations of growth and return to capital differ, the (r–g) difference varies, and in the almost three decades in review considerable substitution effects can be identified between capital and labour in line with the CES type neoclassical production function. The persistently low interest rate environment is likely to increase non-financial investments, which may lay the foundations for a steadier long-term growth trend. In view of the above, mainstream criticism related to the Piketty thesis is often true.

Suggested Citation

  • Magas, István, 2018. "Economic Growth and Changes in Capital and Labour Income in the USA (1988–2016) – Additional Information to the Piketty Thesis," Public Finance Quarterly, Corvinus University of Budapest, vol. 63(1), pages 7-23.
  • Handle: RePEc:pfq:journl:v:63:y:2018:i:1:p:7-23
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://unipub.lib.uni-corvinus.hu/8746/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. James B. Davies & Rodrigo Lluberas & Anthony F. Shorrocks, 2017. "Estimating the Level and Distribution of Global Wealth, 2000–2014," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 63(4), pages 731-759, December.
    2. Loukas Karabarbounis & Brent Neiman, 2014. "Capital Depreciation and Labor Shares Around the World: Measurement and Implications," NBER Working Papers 20606, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Thomas Piketty, 2015. "Putting Distribution Back at the Center of Economics: Reflections on Capital in the Twenty-First Century," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 29(1), pages 67-88, Winter.
    4. James B. Davies & Rodrigo Lluberas & Anthony F. Shorrocks, 2016. "Estimating the level and distribution of global wealth," WIDER Working Paper Series 003, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Mauricio De Rosa, 2018. "Wealth distribution in Uruguay: capitalizing incomes in the dark," Documentos de Trabajo (working papers) 18-07, Instituto de Economía - IECON.
    2. Mauricio De Rosa, 2022. "Accumulation, inheritance and wealth distribution: first estimates of the untold half," Documentos de Trabajo (working papers) 22-07, Instituto de Economía - IECON.
    3. Daniele Checchi & Andrej Cupak & Teresa Munzi & Janet Gornick, 2018. "Empirical challenges comparing inequality across countries," LIS Working papers 756, LIS Cross-National Data Center in Luxembourg.
    4. Glen Loutzenhiser & Elizabeth Mann, 2021. "Liquidity issues: solutions for the asset rich, cash poor," Fiscal Studies, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 42(3-4), pages 651-675, September.
    5. Caruso Raul & Antonella Biscione, 2022. "Militarization and Income Inequality in European Countries (2000–2017)," Peace Economics, Peace Science, and Public Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 28(3), pages 267-285, September.
    6. Hasan, Iftekhar & Horvath, Roman & Mares, Jan, 2020. "Finance and wealth inequality," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 108(C).
    7. Nestor Gandelman & Rodrigo Lluberas, 2022. "Wealth in Latin America," Documentos de Investigación 133 Classification JEL: D, Universidad ORT Uruguay. Facultad de Administración y Ciencias Sociales.
    8. Matthias Kehrig & Nicolas Vincent, 2017. "Growing Productivity without Growing Wages: The Micro-Level Anatomy of the Aggregate Labor Share Decline," CESifo Working Paper Series 6454, CESifo.
    9. Ranaldi, Marco, 2021. "Global Distributions of Capital and Labor Incomes: Capitalization of the Global Middle Class," SocArXiv 3g59r, Center for Open Science.
    10. F. Canova & F. Ferroni & C. Matthes, 2015. "Approximating time varying structural models with time invariant structures," Working papers 578, Banque de France.
    11. Bridgman, Benjamin, 2018. "Is Labor'S Loss Capital'S Gain? Gross Versus Net Labor Shares," Macroeconomic Dynamics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 22(8), pages 2070-2087, December.
    12. Khieu, Hoang & Wälde, Klaus, 2023. "Capital income risk and the dynamics of the wealth distribution," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 122(C).
    13. Joachim Hubmer & Per Krusell & Anthony A. Smith Jr., 2020. "Sources of US Wealth Inequality: Past, Present, and Future," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 2020, volume 35, pages 391-455, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    14. Paolo Acciari & Facundo Alvaredo & Salvatore Morelli, 2021. "The concentration of personal wealth in Italy 1995-2016," PSE Working Papers halshs-03226113, HAL.
    15. Roberto Iacono & Elisa Palagi, 2023. "A micro perspective on r > g," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 90(358), pages 531-556, April.
    16. Serguei Maliar & John Taylor & Lilia Maliar, 2016. "The Impact of Alternative Transitions to Normalized Monetary Policy," 2016 Meeting Papers 794, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    17. Robert J. Sonora, 2022. "A panel analysis of income inequality and energy use," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 40(1), pages 83-97, January.
    18. Karmali,Nadeem M. & Aline Weng, 2022. "Housing Demand and Affordability in India : Implications for Housing Policy," Policy Research Working Paper Series 10031, The World Bank.
    19. Bengtsson, Erik & Waldenström, Daniel, 2018. "Capital Shares and Income Inequality: Evidence from the Long Run," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 78(3), pages 712-743, September.
    20. Tarrazo, Manuel, 2018. "Piketty’s Capital in the 21st Century and modern finance: The other [r−g] relationship," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 67(C), pages 162-174.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    GES production function; elasticity of capital-labour substitution; factor income;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • A10 - General Economics and Teaching - - General Economics - - - General

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:pfq:journl:v:63:y:2018:i:1:p:7-23. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Adam Hoffmann (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/bkeeehu.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.