Where researchers genuinely disagree, we present each side with its strongest evidence and say plainly that the question is open. These pages take no policy position.
Labor economists and political scientists have built two well-evidenced but different accounts of why inequality rose in rich countries after the 1970s. This is the field's central unresolved argument.
A 1990s literature found that more unequal countries grew more slowly. Later work with better data found the opposite sign in some specifications. The relationship's direction is contested, not settled.
One of the most publicly cited political-science findings of the past two decades — that average citizens' preferences have near-zero independent effect on U.S. policy — is also one of the most methodologically contested.