Piketty's Capital in the Twenty-First Century

I feel like I don't have to read this one with all the press it's getting. Maybe next summer.  This is the gist I've gotten so far:

 Michael Rozworski wrote a piece about it recently. In brief: the basic thesis of the book is that capitalism has a tendency towards the concentration of wealth in few hands.  And there's a discrimination inherent in the system that ensures whites are better able to make it at least into the middle.

In Canada right now, our distribution looks like this:
* the top 10% owns 58.2% of the wealth, up from 51.7% in 1984, and it's largely in businesses and enterprises
* the middle 40% owns 38.6%, down from 43% in 1984, and it's mainly in their own homes
* the bottom 50% owns 3.2% of the wealth, down from 5.3% in 1984

Ethos

“Our ethos is all that we currently hold to be true. It is what we act upon. It governs our manners, our business and our politics.” -  Howard Zinn

Directed by Pete McGrain, and hosted by Woody Harrelson, this 68 minute film explores how we got here and what to do about it as we "fight for a new democracy."  My notes are below, after the film here in its entirety.

Collapse

Collapse by Jared Diamond is a fascinating read particularly for anyone interested in ancient civilizations. Diamond explores what caused the destruction of various civilizations over the past couple millennia. What interested me, of course, is his final few chapters that clarify what this understand of the world can do for our own understanding of our current position.  These are my notes and thoughts as I read: