Unequal Democracy

America’s founders were famously fearful that unchecked democracy would lead to the expropriation of property from the wealthy few by the more numerous poor. Yet, as income inequality has inched steadily upwards over the last 30 years, the public policy response has not been greater distribution, but oftentimes less. Taxes on investment income and inheritance have fallen, while the payroll tax has been raised. Are procedural checks against drastic wealth reapportionment simply working as planned, or has American democracy given more political influence to the wealthy and muted the voice of the poor?

Larry Bartels will bring together work on the relationship between politics and inequality in an integrative book to be published by the Foundation. Bartels will begin by reviewing evidence which shows that the poor and less educated participate less in the American political process than the well off. The book will then address questions about how much people participate in different realms of political life, how responsive policy-makers are to the opinions of different social classes, and how well individuals calculate their own self-interest in making political decisions. Using historical, economic, election, and public opinion data, Bartels will argue that increasing inequality in the United States has spawned a highly active and self-interested political class at the top of the income distribution, whose political influence goes unchecked by the much less engaged and economically attuned group of lower income citizens.