13 May 2014

Thomas Piketty doesn’t hate capitalism

Matthew Yglesias


Piketty:

"My point is not to increase taxation of wealth. It's actually to reduce taxation of wealth for most people"


Also:

“[A trip he took with a close friend to Romania in early 1990, after the collapse of the Soviet empire] sort of vaccinated me for life against lazy, anticapitalist rhetoric, because when you see these empty shops, you see these people queuing for nothing in the street,” he said, “it became clear to me that we need private property and market institutions, not just for economic efficiency but for personal freedom.”