Flaherty, Eoin
(2015)
Top incomes under finance-driven
capitalism, 1990–2010: power resources
and regulatory orders.
Socio-Economic Review, 13 (3).
pp. 417-447.
ISSN 1475-1461
Abstract
This article examines the impact of financialization on the income shares of the top 1%
from 1990 to 2010, through a panel analysis of 14 OECD countries. Drawing together
literatures stressing the dependence of income inequality on the structural bargaining
power of capital relative to labour, and of the dependence of accumulation on underlying institutionalized modes of state regulation, it shows that financialization has significantly enhanced top income shares net of underlying controls. Whilst the income
shares of the top 1% appear responsive to variables typical of wider studies of personal income inequality, we emphasize distinctive mechanisms of top income
growth linked to the rising dominance of financial instruments and actors, facilitated
by a historically specific regulatory order. These conditions were key to the emergence of a state of ‘asymmetric bargaining’ which disproportionately enhanced the
fortunes of the wealthy. Results thus emphasize the importance of class-biased
power resources and underlying regulatory structures, as determinants both of
income concentration and of the distribution of economic rewards beyond growth
capacity alone.
| Item Type: |
Article
|
| Keywords: |
inequality; financialization; bargaining; social structures; regulation; |
| Academic Unit: |
Faculty of Social Sciences > Sociology |
| Item ID: |
12882 |
| Identification Number: |
https://doi.org/10.1093/ser/mwv011 |
| Depositing User: |
Eoin Flaherty
|
| Date Deposited: |
14 May 2020 10:08 |
| Journal or Publication Title: |
Socio-Economic Review |
| Publisher: |
Oxford University Press |
| Refereed: |
Yes |
| URI: |
|
| Use Licence: |
This item is available under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial Share Alike Licence (CC BY-NC-SA). Details of this licence are available
here |
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