Following the Great Recession of 2008, income inequality became a focal concern of those who feel that market economy has let them down. In 2011, “We are the 99 per cent” became a unifying slogan of the Occupy Wall Street movement. In 2013, the U.S. President Barack Obama described income inequality as the “defining challenge of our time”.
A year later, Pope Francis called for a “legitimate redistribution of economic benefits by the state,” while leftwing economist Thomas Piketty tried to supply the movement for greater income equality with intellectual ammunition in his book, Capital in the Twenty-First Century. The elevation of Donald Trump to the U.S. presidency impeded the movement's momentum, but concern over income inequality did not disappear. Just this week, for example, The New York Times ran an article entitled Happy Birthday, Karl Marx. You Were Right!.
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