Oh dear; it am dat Pilketty again, pushing his politics whilst masquerading as a scientist. See their letter, if you really want to see a denialist-style list of "experts"1. It seems that "inequality expert" is now a thing, like "genocide expert" was briefly a thing before they were exposed as frauds. As for their "Inequality is not inevitable" - it is bullshit. Or in somewhat more elegant language: Render possessions ever so equal, men's different degrees of art, care, and industry will immediately break that equality. Or if you check these virtues, you reduce society to the most extreme indigence; and instead of preventing want and beggary in a few, render it unavoidable to the whole community. The most rigorous inquisition too is requisite to watch every inequality on its first appearance; and the most severe jurisdiction, to punish and redress it. But besides, that so much authority must soon degenerate into tyranny, and be exerted with great partialities; who can possibly be possessed of it, in such a situation as is here supposed.An "IPCC" for inequality is a terrible idea. The IPCC worked because there was broad substantial agreement on the physical basis of GW. There is no such basis in economics for TP's opinions on inequality; or rather, I suspect that there is broad consensus amongst economists that his views are wrong.
We should inquire into the origins of this nonsense. The letter is based on a report which styles itself "the G20 Extraordinary Committee of Independent Experts’ Report on Global Inequality". But is somewhat shy on telling us who actually commissioned the thing. Was it indeed the G20, as you might expect from the title? That would be disappointing if so, but it isn't so: instead we read that The Extraordinary Committee expresses its gratitude to the President of South Africa, His Excellency Cyril Ramaphosa, for constituting the G20 Extraordinary Committee for the South African G20 Presidency in 2025, and for commissioning it to publish this report. Unlike the G20, the South African govt cannot disappoint me - my opinion of it is too low. These experts have all the independence of those who wrote A Critical Review of Impacts of Greenhouse Gas Emissions on the U.S. Climate, but happily we can all see that for what it is (or so I assume - I still haven't read it).
I could go on I suppose but I'm sure you've got the point by now.
Notes
Refs
* Illegal Immigrants Didn’t Break the Housing Market; Bad Policy Did.
