The Spirit Level
by Richard Wilkinson, Kate Pickett · Wilkinson
Wilkinson and Pickett correlate income inequality across rich countries with health and social outcomes: life expectancy, obesity, imprisonment, teenage births, trust. Readers gain a data-driven argument that relative inequality, not average income, drives these differences, plus grounds to weigh its criticisms.
This link may earn us a small commission at no extra cost to you. Affiliate disclosure
More resources on Inequality & Poverty
inequality.org
Inequality.org is a data-driven policy site from the Institute for Policy Studies that analyzes economic inequality, offering articles, dashboards, and briefs on wages, wealth concentration, taxes, and corporate power to inform policy solutions.
World Bank Poverty Overview
The World Bank's landing page for its poverty work: current global and regional poverty estimates against the international poverty lines, links to the Poverty and Shared Prosperity report, and country-level data. A starting point for sourcing figures.
Economics of Money and Banking
Columbia University course that analyses the monetary system through balance sheets: the hierarchy of money, payment clearing, repo and Eurodollar markets, dealer market making, central bank crisis operations, foreign exchange and swaps. Learners can read financial crises and central bank interventions as balance-sheet events.
Indebted: Debt and Race in America
Ten-part podcast series from Convergence magazine in which organizer Maurice BP-Weeks examines medical, student, payday, carceral and municipal debt. Listeners understand how these debt mechanisms work and why they fall hardest on Black households and widen the racial wealth gap.
Inequality
Utrecht University's six-module course on the tension between economic inequality and political equality, covering property, corporations, lobbying, campaign finance, tax avoidance, and alternative institutions. Finishing it, you can explain how concentrated wealth shapes democratic decision-making.
Capital in the Twenty-First Century
Piketty's analysis of wealth and income data spanning three centuries and twenty countries, arguing that returns on capital outpace growth. Readers come away understanding how concentrated wealth accumulates across generations and the historical evidence behind his central claim.