The Inequality Podcast

In many corners, a large and growing global population is cause for worry. More people may create greater problems for the environment, for humanity’s food supply, for gender equity, and more. Today, however, societies face the possibility of a different problem: With birth rates in decline, the global population is growing at a slower rate. Sometime this century, many demographers say, the population will peak and begin to shrink. Our guest today has raised concerns about the coming depopulation, making the case that humanity is better off with more people in it.

Michael Geruso is an economist at The University of Texas at Austin. He is the author of After the Spike: Population, Progress, and the Case for People. In this conversation with host Damon Jones, he discusses the consequences of lower birth rates, addresses common environmental and gender-based concerns about a larger global population, and what economists can learn from the 1998 film Armageddon.

In the United States, the most well-resourced universities largely admit the highest-scoring students, while the least-resourced serve students with the lowest scores. But if individual achievement is shaped not only by ability, but also by family resources, school quality, parental education, and other circumstances, what are the inequality implications of a higher education system that concentrates resources among students who may already be well-equipped to succeed? What if universities instead broadened their support to include students for whom that support generates the greatest gains? Our guest today is among the foremost scholars examining the inner workings of American higher education, offering new insights into educational access, affirmative action, and the consequences of these choices for the labor market—and challenging us to rethink what we believe higher education is supposed to do.

Zachary Bleemer is an economist at Princeton and the author of several studies on American higher education and its consequences for inequality. In this conversation with hosts Steven Durlauf and Damon Jones, he discusses university policies that limit access to certain majors; the successes of affirmative action, both in creating a more integrated student body and improving the economic well-being of its beneficiaries; and the effects of the Vietnam War on Black veterans.

Meritocracy was meant to dislodge the old aristocratic elite: In its most idealized version, a society’s richest would earn their riches, as opposed to merely inheriting them. But what happens when these new meritocratic elites begin using their wealth to give their children unfair advantages? If meritocracy can be corrupted like that, then what does that say about it as an ideal societies are striving for?

Daniel Markovits is a professor at Yale Law School. He is the author of The Meritocracy Trap, which is among the strongest critiques of meritocracy ever written. On this episode, we present a 2024 book talk hosted by the Stone Center about The Meritocracy Trap. The speakers included Markovits, host Steven Durlauf, and Dean of the Harris School Ethan Bueno de Mesquita, who moderated the discussion.

This episode was recorded in October 2024.

It is easy to regard economic ideas as something akin to laws of nature. In reality, every economic idea has a human history, a process through which it was devised, debated, and refined by economists — a group as subject to human nature as any other. Our guest today has spent a career studying how economic thought has evolved, including whether inequality within the field has affected economic thinking about inequality itself.

Beatrice Cherrier is a historian at École Polytechnique in Paris. She is one of the world’s leading historians of economic thought. In this conversation with host Steven Durlauf, she discusses the history of economic thinking about inequality, how economics has moved away from qualitative thinking, and her research on what shapes monetary policy.

Over the past two decades, addressing income and wealth inequality has become a bigger and bigger priority for policymakers and researchers across the world. But have advocates focused on it too much? Our guest today argues that societies should de-emphasize inequality reduction and instead pursue other policies that would lift living standards.

Lane Kenworthy is a sociologist at the University of California San Diego. He is the author of multiple books, including Is Inequality The Problem? In this conversation with host Steven Durlauf, he discusses why he thinks inequality reduction should become less of a priority, what policymakers should pursue instead, and what American debates over so-called “socialist” politicians miss about actual democratic socialism.

Americans have long been susceptible to certain myths about poverty, including that individuals become poor because of choices, as opposed to larger societal forces. This way of thinking has consequences, particularly at the level of policymaking. Our guest today has done foundational work challenging these persistent myths, as well as diagnosing what it takes for our political institutions to meaningfully address poverty.

David Brady is a professor of public policy at USC. His work is essential for understanding poverty, its causes, and how societies might address both through the political process. In this conversation with host Geoff Wodtke, he discusses interviewing state legislators about their handling of poverty, what it would take for the American political system to make more progress on the issue, and debating which is the more effective means for creating social change: institutions or protest.

Critics of meritocracy often emphasize the ways merit-based thinking can justify grossly unequal outcomes, such as wide gaps in pay between rank-and-file workers and CEOs. Indeed, to some meritocratic thinkers, a sought-after executive receiving an eight-figure salary is simply a skilled worker getting their just deserts. But our guest today advocates for a different conception of meritocracy, one that treats merit as a principle for structuring opportunities and institutions, rather than as a moral defense of unequal outcomes.

Jahel Queralt is a professor of law at Pompeu Fabra University. A leading political theorist, she has written extensively about meritocracy, liberal egalitarianism, and more. In this conversation with host Steven Durlauf, she discusses her vision of a just meritocracy, the importance of political liberties, and the economic rights of the global poor.

It is a simple but persuasive idea: In a world of scarcity, rewards like jobs and pay should be distributed based on ability and effort, not birthright, connections, ways of living, wealth, and so on. Meritocracy, framed this way, may sound utterly uncontroversial. Yet the idea has its fair share of critics, who argue that “merit” tends to accrue to those lucky enough to have well-heeled, well-connected parents. In response to such criticisms, our guest today offers a just conception of meritocracy, having written some of the essential texts on the subject.

Thomas Mulligan is a visiting scholar at Georgetown’s Institute for the Study of Markets and Ethics and a researcher at the RAND Corporation. He is also the author of Justice and the Meritocratic State, a modern classic within the meritocracy literature. In this conversation with host Steven Durlauf, he discusses common critiques of meritocracy, how the idea relates to debates over affirmative action and reparations, and what policy solutions could make societies more meritocratic.

Beginning in the 1980s, a new political order led policymakers to prize economic efficiency, often at the expense of public goods. What has followed, our guest argues, has been a withdrawal of ethics from policy making, as well as an “erosion of kindness.” Our guest proposes a different ethos, one that hearkens back to a time before the pursuit of efficiency blinded us to other essential human values.

Philip Kitcher is the John Dewey Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at Columbia. He is the author of more than a dozen books, including several that are integral to understanding contemporary inequality. In this conversation with host Steven Durlauf, he discusses the philosophical underpinnings of the market-driven worldview that has come to dominate policymaking, what that approach has wrought, and why charting a different path requires rethinking what education is for.

From Adam Smith’s pin factory to Henry Ford’s assembly line, specialization has long connoted a modern, efficient economy. Within this paradigm, workers’ jobs become repetitive but, ultimately, entail a narrow scope of tasks. So why, in today’s ultra-optimized economy, are so many supposedly specialized workers juggling so many wide and varied responsibilities?

Michelle Jackson is a sociologist at Stanford. In her latest book, The Division of Rationalized Labor, she chronicles how today’s workers became saddled with so many tasks. Her previous book, Manifesto for a Dream, made the scientific case for more radical policy interventions to address inequality. In this conversation with host Steven Durlauf, she discusses how scopes of work ballooned across the economy, how police officers became unlikely symbols of that change, and why reducing inequality may require rethinking the role of the family.