Ingo Stutzle; Stephan Kauffmann Thomas Pikettys Capital in the Twenty First Century

An introduction to Thomas Piketty's monumental work US Nobel Prize winner Paul Krugman described Thomas Piketty's Capital in the Twenty-First Century as "perhaps the most important book of the last decade". It has sparked major international debates, dominated bestseller lists and generated a level of enthusiasm-as well as intense criticism-in a way no other recent economic or sociological work has. Piketty has been described as a new Karl Marx and placed in the same league as the economist John Maynard Keynes. The 'rock star economist's' ( Financial Times ) underlying thesis: inequality under capitalism has reached dramatic proportions in the last few decades and continues to grow-and not by coincidence.

Thus, a small elite becomes simultaneously richer and richer and more and more powerful. Given the sensational reception of the not-so-easily digested 800-page study that spans back to the eighteenth century, the question as to where the hype around Piketty's book comes from deserves to be asked. What is correct in it$646 What are the criticisms of it$647 And what should we make of it-both of the book itself and of the criticism it has received$648 This book lays out the argument of Piketty's monumental work in a compact and understandable format, while also investigating the controversies that this book has caused. In addition, the two authors demonstrate the limits, contradictions and errors of the so-called 'Piketty revolution'.