Talk:Thomas Piketty

Weblinks

The link to the curriculum vitae does not work anymore. --13Peewit (talk) 18:00, 4 June 2013 (UTC)

Fixed his CV can now be found at http://piketty.pse.ens.fr/en/cv-en @13Peewit: Jonpatterns (talk) 23:19, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Thank you very much. :) --13Peewit (talk) 01:12, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Unsourced or badly sourced claims

• The infobox says that the "influences" of Piketty were "John Maynard Keynes, Anthony Atkinson, Roy Harrod, Nicholas Kaldor, Franco Modigliani, Luigi Pasinetti, Robert Solow, Robert Barro, Simon Kuznets". That is unsourced. I have read a substantial part of Piketty's work but I cannot guess what in it is likely to have been influenced by Franco Mogigliani or Robert Barro, or even Keynes. The only one that is often cited by Piketty is Kuznets (though mostly because Piketty refutes Kuznet's thesis, so adding that without any explanation in an "influences" section is rather misleading. Absent more details, I think we should simply remove this section.

• "According to a study by Emmanuel Saez and Piketty, the top 1 percent of earners have captured more of the income gains under Obama than under George W. Bush". The source given is just a political rant by the Cato Institute. Citing the paper itself would sound more interesting, but in the context of this article, the quoted sentence would make sense only if Piketty and Saez say that the differences between the Bush years and the Obama years can be explained by national policies (and I doubt very much that they do). Does anyone have more info or can I just remove that ? --Superzoulou (talk) 14:27, 24 April 2014 (UTC)

• Also, school : keynesian (or "neo-keynesian") does not appear to make any sense to me. He may believe that keynesian ideas are right, but this is rather orthogonal to his research. I just cannot see what a "keynesian school" can mean in his field of work. --Superzoulou (talk) 19:44, 7 May 2014 (UTC)

Citations and original research

Foremost, the "criticism" section is heavily cited. I am not sure what the issue here is about original research. Please specify more clearly. Second, the second paragraph of the intro is a restatement of the criticism section. Citations here are redundant, and the reader should direct his or her attention to the body of the article. Archivingcontext (talk) 17:45, 6 May 2014 (UTC)

Looking at it, it's "cited" but the sources which are "cited" were being misrepresented. For example [1] or the Tyler Cowen piece. The rest was pure original research cited to works which do not mention Piketty and which were in fact published before his book came out.

Removed the nonsense from the criticism section. Hence, I will now remove it's "summary" from the lede.Volunteer Marek (talk) 20:50, 6 May 2014 (UTC)

This debate seems to have evolved over the past weeks, but for the record, the content was a summary of the sources cited, not quotations and thus not a misrepresentation. These authors had substantive critiques of Piketty that were succinctly summarized to give the reader a sense of the debate surrounding the reception of his ideas. As for the critiques of social democracy that Piketty champions, these have developed over the past twenty years, of which Piketty's work and politics have been a part and are stated as so. Again, it is not OR or misrepresentation but a summary, which is what an encyclopedia article is supposed to be! Archivingcontext (talk) 14:39, 25 May 2014 (UTC)

Neutrality

The so-called "criticism section" is in fact mostly a cherry-picked excerpt from the reception section of the article about the book. I'd propose to either expand this into a broader reception section here as well (perhaps by copying the quotes from Will Hutton and Paul Krugman into this article) or to confine all reception dealing with the book to the existing article about the book. --Sewonathy 17:31, 7 May 2014 (UTC)

Given that most of the "criticism" section is about reception section, I'd think it would be more appropriate there. There is paragraph about an article criticizing Pour une révolution fiscale, but as Pour une révolution fiscale is barely mentionned in the article, I do not think it is worth mentionning its criticisms. And if it is, we should certainly look for something more consequential than the cited criticism.

That said, do we have any way we can choose which criticisms of the book we should cite ? I suppose that it is not our job to choose which criticisms are interesting and which aren't, and so we should primarily take into account the influence of the critic. Does it mean we need to cite [2] just because it was published in a widely read newspaper ? --Superzoulou (talk) 20:08, 7 May 2014 (UTC)

I agree that the section would be more appropriate in the article about the book. And it is hardly useful to cite a criticism of "Pour une révolution fiscale" if its contents are not described in this article. My preference would be to remove the criticism section in this article unless someone shows that the cited reception here offers something more substantial than a (one-sided) selection of book reviews.--Sewonathy 10:14, 8 May 2014 (UTC)

How I like all those people who are so quick to make contentious reverts without ever showing up on the talk page. By the way, I still think Philippe Nemo's criticism has no place here unless the work to which his criticism refers is actually described in the article.--Sewonathy 07:31, 9 May 2014 (UTC)

I removed Philippe Nemo's "criticism" as it does not belong in the subsection about Capital in the 21th century. As to the more general approach, it seems to makes sense to devote more space to negative than to positive criticisms, as they are more likely to add something new, but really I still do not know how we should choose which ones to add. For instance, Galbraith's cited criticism appears to be based on a misundertanding as a later comment by Galbraith himself suggests here. --Superzoulou (talk) 10:15, 9 May 2014 (UTC)

The danger of overemphasizing negative reviews is that it can convey the false impression to the reader that Piketty's work had encountered nothing but criticism or far more criticism than praise, which is not the case. There are certain criterias for selecting certain statements such as the prominence of the cited person (most obvious in the case of Paul Krugman). But any selection of reviews by Wikipedia users has also the danger of being arbitrary and subjective and is hard to defend if other users lobby for their favorite review to be included.

Another approach could be to attempt at some sort of a brief summarizing overview of the reception given that this is Piketty's biography article and the exhaustive description of the reception rightfully belongs into the article about the book. It would, however, be interesting if there is consensus for such an approach given that some users here are quick to revert without using the talk page and such a summary isn't that easy to write.

--Sewonathy 14:28, 9 May 2014 (UTC)

A note about criticism and neutrality.... editors are welcome to reference material that praises Piketty as well as criticizes him; that would balance things nicely. 66.185.200.1 (talk) 12:22, 3 June 2014 (UTC)

As far as I can see the current version does neither praise nor criticizes Piketty, which IMO, is a good thing. Capital in the Twenty-First Century gives sources for both praises and criticisms, and I think it is relatively balanced (except that it seems to put too much weight on the FT accusation even though no ones seems to take them seriously anymore, since Piketty, and others, have refuted them). --Superzoulou (talk) 12:33, 3 June 2014 (UTC)

but these are criticisms in general, not of the CitTFC--in CitTFC page they would be misplaced. you are welcome to post anti-critical references too! 66.185.200.1 (talk) 12:38, 3 June 2014 (UTC)

That's certainly not true. Specifically, in your multiple reverts, you've referenced only people talking about the book, not the man, except for some one-liners. Hipocrite (talk) 12:42, 3 June 2014 (UTC)

Before any criticism or praise is added to the article, it should be discussed on the talkpage and agreed. They need to be relevant to the article and in keeping with our policies. That excludes criticism farming. Formerip (talk) 13:13, 3 June 2014 (UTC)

"Fabrication of data"

Not that it really matters but just a note on the "fabrication of data" charge added by an IP, in case the matter should come up again. The cited article has a rather aggressive tone but what it essentiallly says is that a graph is a book is misleading in that it only includes that working population between 18 and 65 rather than the whole population. This is arguably true -even though the caption of the graph is perfectly explicit- but that sounds rather ridiculous to mention that in this article (and of course that doesn't qualify as "fabrication of data"). --Superzoulou (talk) 16:24, 8 May 2014 (UTC)

According to what I could find out Bernard Zimmern is just a businessman. For such a fundamental charge to be cited, the critic should be at least a widely respected university scholar.--Sewonathy 17:09, 8 May 2014 (UTC)

The cited study has two authors. Why focus your censorship on only one? It wouldn't be because Saint Cast is an academic, would it? 66.185.200.1 (talk) 12:18, 3 June 2014 (UTC)

Reception section

That section needs to be collapsed with the main section on the book and summarizer per WP:SUMMARY. Most of the content is duplicated at Capital in the Twenty-First Century Cwobeel (talk) 22:23, 9 May 2014 (UTC)

Once again, single reactions to and reviews of the book have been added to the biography article. As there are hundreds of different reviews of and reactions to the book this would be more fitting in the article about the book but not here. It would make great sense to replace the mention of single reviews with a real (and brief) summary of the reception of the book.--Sewonathy 13:59, 24 May 2014 (UTC)

The FT article has achieved substantial worldwide coverage in other RS sources - it is far from being one of "hundreds of different reviews" at that point. Cheers. Collect (talk) 14:33, 24 May 2014 (UTC)

Charges of fabricating data and the like are very serious. If there are scholarly sources which make that claim that's fine. Otherwise it doesn't belong here.Volunteer Marek (talk) 17:29, 24 May 2014 (UTC)

The Financial Times' Chris Giles of the FT is an "expert in the field" and the story has made all the major wire services. We make no claims in Wikipedia's voice and we include his statement as well as to why he changed figures. Hard to get any more NPOV than that to be sure. Collect (talk) 20:49, 24 May 2014 (UTC)

NYT [3] Some of the issues identified by Mr. Giles appear to be clear-cut errors, and others are more in the realm of judgment calls in analyzing data that may not be fully explained by Mr. Piketty but are not necessarily wrong.

WaPo [4] How serious are these problems? And how much, if at all, should they change what we think about inequality? Well, the answer seems to be not too serious, except for the recent British numbers. Let's go through them. Giles identifies three basic types of issues. The first are simple transcription errors. He finds, for example, that Piketty accidentally entered Sweden's wealth data from 1908 instead of 1920

The next concern is methodological. Giles thinks Piketty should average European data by population, not by country. He doesn't like that Piketty draws trends between large gaps in the numbers. Or that Piketty labels data from, say, 2004 as "2000" on some of his charts. And Giles isn't sure why Piketty has put together some of his wealth data—which is sparse, and needs to be adjusted, if not constructed—the way that he has.

The last problem is the most significant. Giles points out that Piketty seems to have mixed up different sources on British wealth the last few decades, and overestimated their inequality. You can see Piketty's numbers (blue) versus the raw data (red) below. This does need to be explained.

Guardian [5] For the lay person attempting to referee the row, and having to interpret such abstruse concepts as the Gini coefficient and, as Gaffney neatly summarises, whether "the r > g inequality is amplifying the reconcentration trend", illumination is hard to discern. For its critics, further confirmation of why economics is called the dismal science

CNBC [6] For example, once the FT cleaned up and simplified the data, the European numbers do not show any tendency towards rising wealth inequality after 1970. An independent specialist in measuring inequality shared the FT's concerns.

This suggests the issue is pretty much "big news" and we ought not ignore it - just make absolutely sure it is covered in an NPOV manner. Collect (talk) 21:00, 24 May 2014 (UTC)

You're just dying to stick some allegations into a BLP… Nomoskedasticity (talk) 21:04, 24 May 2014 (UTC)

The wording I suggested is in keeping with all policies, and since no "allegation of a crime" is remotely involved, I find your snideness rather useless here -- this page is for discussing the article and not for making snarky remarks about any editor at all. The issue has made every major wire service, every major economic publication, and has international notoriety at this point. Cheers. Collect (talk) 21:22, 24 May 2014 (UTC)

The consensus of RS on the gravity of Pikkety's errors is not conclusive enough to justify inserting these allegations into the article. Collect's sources seem to be the ones with the most damning appraisal, and also deviate from the consensus, which seems to be that his methodology is questionable but that his errors do not equate to academic fraud or plagiarism. (For the record, I'm not a fan of Piketty's work. I consider myself pro- free market, though I'm sure I'm a "socialist" according to American conservatives and libertarians, as sane people tend to be.) Steeletrap (talk) 21:24, 24 May 2014 (UTC)

Actually -- they are far from the most damning -- and the Guardian likes Piketty but still sees problems. I specifically chose RS sources which had been favourable to Piketty in the first place -- if we went with damning sources, the virtual paper would catch fire <g>.

Try [7]

His most damning claim: Piketty altered U.K. data to show that wealth distribution there is worse off than it appears to be. Piketty says the share of income going to the top 10% never fell lower than 60%, and since the end of the 1970s has returned to 70%, a level not seen in 70 years. But the data Piketty himself cites shows the top 10% share of wealth is no greater than 50%, and may be as low as 42%.

So far, Piketty has only offered a somewhat vague response. It basically boils down to: “This stuff is complicated, but I’m trying to be as transparent as possible.” from Slate [8] It's a bit early to draw conclusions about the FT’s report. But the disagreement over Britain is jarring. And given that Piketty’s book is seeking to make universal claims about the nature of capitalism, he’s going to need to provide a more detailed rebuttal

The Independent [9] The significance of these errors is that it weakens Piketty’s claim that there has been a trend to greater inequality since 1980 in all rich countries. It is true of the US, but not, as is now clear, of those European countries cited in Piketty’s book.

The ultra-right-wing Mother Jones [10] The fundamental problem here is that the difficulties of measuring wealth are profound enough that it's always going to be possible to deploy different statistical treatments to come to slightly different conclusions. There's just too much noise in the data. In any case, I'm not taking any sides on this. The data analysis is too arcane for a layman to assess. But it's worth keeping an eye on.

Spectator [11] What he has found – on the cover of today’s FT and in detail on a blog here – is shocking because the errors are so basic. And yet on this, Piketty has built a manifesto for all kinds of tax rises. It makes you wonder how his publisher, Harvard University Press, allowed such flaws to enter print.

Any sixthformer would know that you can’t average out results between a massive country and a tiny one. You need to produce a “weighted average,” a concept with which a GCSE maths student ought to be familiar, let alone an economics professor. Average figures for any European metric (i.e., health spending as a share of GDP) need to take account for such population variations.

In basing his book on editorialised data, Piketty now looks like an economist who has been behaving like a journalist. He has been rumbled by a journalist, who has been behaving like an economist.

You may note I did not use anything near the "most damning" version of the story at all. Collect (talk) 21:47, 24 May 2014 (UTC)

Of course the issue has covered a lot of coverage: it was a major newspaper making a rather strong attack, and pundits want to keep abreast with the news even when they cannot understand fully what is going on. Now that Piketty has given detailed response and all those rushed blog-comments seem rather ridiculous. I think that should be a reminder that media-time is not knowledge's time, and that we should not try to force every week's latest fad into Wikipedia. What about requiring reviews to be a few weeks old before we cite them here ? --Superzoulou (talk) 14:28, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

The coverage is ongoing, Wikipedia looks rather silly for eliding any mention at all. The political Bowdlerization of this article is not anything to be proud of at all. Collect (talk) 15:12, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

Redact the BLP violations you made before you offer your reflections about taking pride, for pity's sake. Formerip (talk) 15:58, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

Redact the asinine ad homs about other editors, please. The material from Reuters, NYT, Bloomberg, Guardian, WSJ and roughly 800 other reliable sources etc. are not "BLP violations" AFAICT. Collect (talk) 16:18, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

The BLP violations posted by Collect at BLPN have been taken care of (though unfortunately not by Collect). Not sure if there are others that need to be dealt with. Nomoskedasticity (talk) 16:43, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

The ad homs repeated on this page have not been taken care of. I made no edit whatsoever in violation of WP:BLP your "indignation" not to the contrary. Do you really think attacking editors on a talk page is conformative to Wikipedia policies and guidelines? Cheers. Collect (talk) 16:56, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

Just to refresh your memory, Collect, during the discussions about the allegations in the FT, you made repeated false assertions that Piketty had admitted (or partly admitted) fault. Asked to substantiate these, you repeatedly blustered, failed to come up with anything and then carried on repeating the same assertions regardless. This could be interpreted as you being unbelievably thick. But I don't think that is the case. It can only fairly be interpreted as you flagrantly and shamelessly bullshitting in an attempt to deceive other editors into green-lighting contentious material for a BLP. For someone who like to tout himself as a champion of BLP policy, this behaviour is beyond disgraceful.

I had expected that, having been found out, you would just sidle off whistling and not darken the talkpage again. If that is not to be the case, please at least have the decency not to come back for the purpose of sniping at the ethics and conduct of other editors. Formerip (talk) 16:58, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

I stated Piketty said he had smoothed the figures -- which is in absolute accord with what Giles wrote, and what the Guardian wrote, NYT, WSJ etc. -- your insistence that I said what I did not say is tiresome. And I note that your seeming attempt to make this talk page entirely a set of ad homs is improper. Collect (talk) 18:43, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

You stated that Piketty admitted he had made errors [12]. After repeated requests you have failed to substantiate this allegation. It's quite telling that you have left my redaction at BLPN in place; in that context it is shameful that you are attempting to whitewash your actions. Nomoskedasticity (talk) 19:01, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

(od) What is means is I do not give a damn about any of your "redactions" and ad homs any more And I do not try responding in kind, as you are doing a quite excellent job on this article talk page. Collect (talk) 19:09, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

Great so maybe we can go back to what matters for this article - or the article about the book: the FT claims at transcription errors and data fudging have been completely refuted by Piketty, and perhaps we should not echo this sort of attacks just because it gets a few days of press coverage. --Superzoulou (talk) 20:01, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

Proposal

How about we omit the dubious fraud/plagiarism allegations from CNBC/FT, and instead create a criticism section that notes the statistical errors and criticizes his methodology? Steeletrap (talk) 21:29, 24 May 2014 (UTC)

Per BLP and NOTNEWS, the real answer is just to wait. The criticisms may be extremely serious, they may be quite serious or it may all be a storm in a teacup. Looking at all the sourcing, the last one of those looks more likely to me. But we are not really in a position to judge at the present time, and there really isn't a particularly pressing need to get as much criticism as possible into the article before the clock strikes twelve and we all turn into pumpkins. The claims will undoubtedly be thoroughly reviewed in multiple reliable sources in the near future. It won't hurt at all to wait for that. Formerip (talk) 21:46, 24 May 2014 (UTC)

Did you see how many sources cover this? Guardian, Spectator, NYT, WSJ, and a couple hundred others? They appear to meet WP:RS to me on this. Cheers. Collect (talk) 21:47, 24 May 2014 (UTC)

Yes, they meet RS, but that is in no way the issue.

From attempts that have been made to add content on this to the article, it appears that it is difficult to do so in anything like a fair and proportionate manner. Maybe it will be easier once the dust has settled. The weight of the sourcing seems to suggest that the criticisms made could be trivial, and there's no deadline for us. Formerip (talk) 21:58, 24 May 2014 (UTC)

Huh? The version removed was damn neutral, and included Piketty's response. What more can one ask for? It amounted to three lines - and trying to trim it down below three lines with the international coverage already generated would be a futile exercise. Kindly note my edits at Johann Hari where I took exactly the same position - and found folks pushing to make the direct charge of "plagiarism" in Wikipedia's voice which was wrong. Collect (talk) 22:12, 24 May 2014 (UTC)

I think my proposal should be suspended for now. We should wait and see how thins shake out, per WP:BLP and NOTNEWS. I'm surprised that a BLP defender such as Collect doesn't agree. Steeletrap (talk) 22:17, 24 May 2014 (UTC)

We can not make accusations of wrongdoing in Wikipedia's voice. That is what WP:BLP requires. But when we ignore the existence of a major controversy concerning use of statistics which has hit front pages, then we are dis-serving the reader. Which means we report the existence of the issue, and Piketty's response to it, in a short and neutral manner. I would absolutely oppose any use of Wikipedia to make a charge of anything remotely criminal in nature about a person, but in the case at hand, the existence of the charges has been in just about every major news and economics publication since the FT came out. Just like every single BLP out there. Collect (talk) 22:33, 24 May 2014 (UTC)

The "damn neutral" version that was removed in effect appears to indicate that experts have dismissed the premise of the book as a contrivance based on false data, with Pikkety admitting as much. That does not appear to accurately represent the balance of what the sources posted above say as a whole (as per FormerIP), nor can it be construed as a foregone conclusion.--Ubikwit ^連絡 _{見学/迷惑} 22:56, 24 May 2014 (UTC)

Ubikwit, you have never edited this article nor this talk page before. Whatever disagreements there are about this particular issue, you're not part of them. In the very very very recent past you have had disputes with both myself and Collect. So this look very much like you jumping in, in yet another venue to fight your awesome MMPORG WP:BATTLEGROUND. Your participation is NOT appreciated. Go away. You're not helping things. While there's a disagreement here, the chances that it will get worked out in a calm, reasonable manner, are much smaller with you jumping in to get some kicks in against editors you don't like. Whether that be me or Collect. Quick causing drama. Did I mention WP:BATTLEGROUND already? Probably not enough.Volunteer Marek (talk) 23:28, 24 May 2014 (UTC)

This is a content discussion VM, keep it civil.

The crux of the comment I left is that there don't appear to be clear allegations of "plagiarism", but more along the lines of falsification/manipulation of data, which are far from conclusive. Even though the allegation do not rise to plagiarism, were the assertions true, they would constitute academic misconduct.--Ubikwit ^連絡 _{見学/迷惑} 08:05, 25 May 2014 (UTC)

I support Collect on this. The debate has become substantial enough to garner a large amount of attention and an official response from Piketty himself. We can add a few lines on the controversy as suggested above. The trick for this BLP article, however, is to link the controversy to his ideas in general, rather than the most recent book. There are a number of articles out there that are speaking of his larger intellectual project in this context, which we can draw on to provide readers with a credible summary in a NPOV. Archivingcontext (talk) 14:43, 25 May 2014 (UTC)

That sounds like a meta-proposal/response. Do you have any specific suggestions as to text or sources? I'm posting a couple of inks below relating to the recent work and follow up related thereto that has already been deleted out of the article, after have been there by @C.J. Griffin: here. It seems necessary to discuss the statements and sources that are repudiated in the edit summary of that revert, at any rate.--Ubikwit ^連絡 _{見学/迷惑} 15:34, 25 May 2014 (UTC)

Picketty, Saez, Zucman

The sources cited in Picketty's reply to the FT have been claimed to be "unreliable" in a revert. It seems that the sources[13][14] should be considered reliable, but maybe that can be discussed here without going to a notice board first.

Further, in his reply, Picketty states

For instance, my US series have already been extended and improved by an important new research paper by Emmanuel Saez (Berkeley) and Gabriel Zucman (LSE). This work was done after my book was written, so unfortunately I could not use it for my book. Saez and Zucman use much more systematic data than I used in my book, especially for the recent period. Also their series are constructed using a completely different data source and methodology (namely, the capitalisation method using capital income flows and income statements by asset class)...
As you can see by yourself, their results confirm and reinforce my own findings: the rise in top wealth shares in the US in recent decades has been even larger than what I show in my book...
Finally, let me say that my estimates on wealth concentration do not fully take into account offshore wealth, and are likely to err on the low side. I am certainly not trying to make the picture look darker than it it. As I make clear in chapter 12 of my book (see in particular table 12.1-12.2), top wealth holders have apparently been rising a lot faster average wealth in recent decades, at least according to the wealth rankings published in magazines such as Forbes. This is true not only in the US, but also in Britain and at the global level (see attached table). This is not well taken into account by wealth surveys and official statistics, including the recent statistics that were published for Britain.Piketty response to FT data concerns

--Ubikwit ^連絡 _{見学/迷惑} 15:34, 25 May 2014 (UTC)

It appears that saying in one sentence that the material has been "claimed" to be "unreliable" is a misuse of what the reliable sources actually state and then quoting Piketty at great length might violate NPOV as well. Best to state the issue briefly and his demurral - we are not here to either attack anyone, nor to ignore what has achieved major international coverage. FWIW, US pension funds now total about $21 trillion [15]. Total market cap of all US listed companies is under $19 trillion [16]. Total US household net worth is about $65 trillion or so [17] (no gain from 2006) making about 1/3 of all household assets being in pension funds. Collect (talk) 15:53, 25 May 2014 (UTC)

I wasn't suggesting that the above passages should be quoted in full--if that is what you were referring to, just posting them for reference in relation to TP discussion.--Ubikwit ^連絡 _{見学/迷惑} 16:29, 25 May 2014 (UTC)

A whole lotta bullshit

Collect (and perhaps others) has been itching to add "serious allegations of fudging data", with Collect apparently believing it is sensible to do so because "the statements that Piketty used incorrect figures are admitted by Piketty at this point" -- indicating that Piketty admits he used dodgy data and thereby implying that his arguments about inequality are wrong. It's then worth noting that Piketty rejects that implication and considers the FT criticism "dishonest". (The final paragraph of that last link is especially interesting on that larger point.) So, this whole thing is textbook WP:NOTNEWS and forms an apparently much-needed object lesson for some editors re how to edit BLPs. One awaits signs of that lesson having been learned. Nomoskedasticity (talk) 14:10, 26 May 2014 (UTC)

First of all you should change your title as it will only invite more friction. Second, this is not a NOTNEWS issue. His work is receiving some significant questions regarding some of the math in his spreadsheets. Given the these issues question the basic premise of his book there is no reason not to make some mention of them. Also, WP:SUMMARY makes it clear that something should be mentioned because it is a main section in the primary article for the book. Arzel (talk) 14:34, 26 May 2014 (UTC)

The claims made by the FT and verified by the NYT and a host of other reliable sources (Economist, Spectator, Guardian, HuffPo, Reuters etc.) are not "bullshit". That sort of comment about editors is not impressing anyone at all, and seems more designed to be an attack on editors than a remotely serious attempt at improving the article. Cheers. Collect (talk) 14:57, 26 May 2014 (UTC)

• Agree with Nomoskedasticity. Here is a substantial quote from the Guardian piece

  Scott Winship, an economist at the right-leaning Manhattan Institute for Policy Research, and notable critic of Piketty's analysis, said the FT's allegations weren't "significant for the fundamental question of whether Piketty's thesis is right or not". In an email to Bloomberg news agency, he wrote: "It's hard to think Piketty did something unethical when he put it up there for people like me to delve into his figures and find something that looks sketchy … Piketty has been as good or better than anyone at both making all his data available and documenting what he does generally."

  Trumped up allegations do not belong in the article.--Ubikwit ^連絡 _{見学/迷惑} 16:02, 26 May 2014 (UTC)

What trumped up allegations? Either Piketty did or did not make some mathematical errors in his book. From all accounts he did make some. The second part is whether they make a difference in his general thesis, of which there is disagreement. But to say that they don't exist or are made up, is simply not true and does not help the discussion. Arzel (talk) 18:32, 26 May 2014 (UTC)

That doesn't seem to be quite right. Giles does claim some straightforward errors, but there seems to be consensus among everyone else that if these actually are errors, they are inconsequential. The more serious allegations are not about errors but about "cherry picking of sources" and the fact that "some numbers appear simply to be constructed out of thin air", according to the text that was previously added to the article. I don't know about "trumped up", but there does seem to be a consensus in sources that these allegations are, at least, greatly overstated. Formerip (talk) 21:31, 26 May 2014 (UTC)

I am glad that the difference between 44% and 72% is "inconsequential." And your finding of a "consensus" is quite belied by the sources given. Cheers. Collect (talk) 21:36, 26 May 2014 (UTC)

Collect, it's perfectly possible for numerically large errors to be inconsequential if they don't have a substantive effect on a result or a conclusion. But this is not an economics seminar, I'm only going off the sources. I haven't found a single source that says anything other than that the common-or-garden numerical errors alleged are unimportant. I also haven't found a source that has double-checked and is able to confirm that they are errors. Formerip (talk) 21:49, 26 May 2014 (UTC)

• A nuanced assessment of this issue is presented by the Economist: [18]. It reinforces the notion that Collect's edit was a BLP violation. Nomoskedasticity (talk) 22:34, 26 May 2014 (UTC)

The article cited has:

Second, the differences in the wealth-inequality figures are, with the exception of Britain, too minor to alter the picture.

That is - the example of Britain differences is not minor.

For America, the outcome of the analysis is relatively muddy (based in part on the fact that the source data themselves are harder to parse, according to Mr Giles).

That is - the material is "muddy" due to variances in the sourc data.

A broader point concerns whether an average of Britain, France, and Sweden should be represented as "Europe", but that of course is the way Mr Piketty presented the data in the first place.

All of which is in precise and complete accord with the NPOV edit I suggested. Right now we are Wiki-ostriches denying that any controversy exists, where the Economist clearly says one does exist. Cheers. Collect (talk) 00:18, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

But here we are not talking about Giles alleging straightforward errors. Giles alleges that Piketty actively card-sharked the data relating to wealth inequality in these examples. Which is why there is a BLP issue.

And you're being a bit selective in quoting the Economist article. The differences between the British data as presented by Piketty and as presented by Giles are, indeed, not minor. We hardly need the Economist to tell us that. But this is only really a problem for Piketty (other commentators suggest that it would not be much of one in any case) in the event that he is wrong and Giles is right, and the Economist most definitely does not say that. In fact, those qualified to comment across all sources have so far been broadly supportive of Piketty and critical of Giles. Which is why there is a serious NPOV issue with the edit you made. Formerip (talk) 00:48, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

Nomo above was the one who brought up the Economist article. I did not "select" it in any way. Cheers. Collect (talk) 11:33, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

I'm sure you just selected three short quotes from it. But, if not, my mistake. Formerip (talk) 11:38, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

That does not mean that they cannot be stated. Arzel (talk) 02:02, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

Doesn't this come under WP:TheTurth? I found Giles' critique (the FT's brain-dead shill for the British right) to be desperately pathetic, but his criticism sadly nevertheless meets notability criteria, and so can be included if an editor wants to add it. Anyway, to avoid The Truth, the article should surely mention and link to the criticism, mention and link to Piketty's rebuttal (his refutation, in my view), and avoid passing judgement on who is right—that should be left up to the reader to decide. Well, that is what I reckon. --YeOldeGentleman (talk) 19:15, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

Proposal to move it to the article on the book

Ok, in the past week or so the FT criticism has gotten a lot of attention, which means that whether it is correct or not it should probably be mentioned... somewhere. It's a little hard to make out exactly the nature of the purported mistakes (without replicating the analysis myself, which I don't have time for) which is why my preference would be to wait till this is hashed out in academic journals and publications. Recall that the Reinhart and Rogoff controversy, to which this has been compared, got recognition and became "notable" only once the critics published their findings in an actual journal article. AFAIK that hasn't happened here yet. It's a conversation in the "econ blogosphere". If I'm wrong, then please feel free to correct me on this point.

Assuming that I'm not, I do think that for WP:BLP reasons converge of this controversy belongs in the article on the Capital in the Twenty-First Century itself, not here.Volunteer Marek (talk) 00:24, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

Considering the book is neither an academic journal or publication, there is no reason to wait for academic papers to point out that there were errors. There were errors, whether they change Piketty's main thesis is under debate, but there is no reason to not mention that they exist. Arzel (talk) 02:00, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

It's not an academic publication? Huh?Volunteer Marek (talk) 18:23, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

Let's not go round in circles too much. AFAICT, there are only alleged errors at present, since no source has actually confirmed their existence. And there are also separate allegations of misconduct, which it is important not to mis-classify. On the possible or actual errors, the jury seems to have already returned a verdict of "meh", since even those who are critical or cautious of Piketty don't think they matter. So the errors don't seem important enough to mention in the bio article. Whether to mention the allegations of misconduct turns on how real/serious they are, but that's what's not clear.

We don't need to include all praise and all criticism of Piketty in the article, since that would make it unbalanced and a chore to read. We should include criticism that is particularly important to his life story. The difficulty in this case is that we are dealing with something whose noteworthiness in very unclear. Formerip (talk) 09:31, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

Actually, not just "alleged" as Piketty has acknowledged transcription errors, and also acknowledged making alterations to smooth out curves. The issues are not of "existence" but of possible resultant changes to any findings of the book, and on that there seems some debate. And the data issue is now mentioned in a few hundred distinct reliable sources. Collect (talk) 11:31, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

Do you have a source for Piketty acknowledging transcription errors? He has "acknowledged" adjusting data (he does this is the book), but that's just something economists do. It's not an admission of any error or wrongdoing. Formerip (talk) 11:53, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

In hard science, "adjusting data" is not accepted practice.

As I make clear in the book, in the on-line appendix, and in the many technical papers I have published on this topic, one needs to make a number of adjustments to the raw data sources so as to make them more homogenous over time and across countries. (response to FT) and (if there was anything to hide, any “fat finger problem”, why would I put everything on line?). ("fat finger" refers to simple transcription errors)

This is not well taken into account by wealth surveys and official statistics, including the recent statistics that were published for Britain. Of course, as I make clear in my book, wealth rankings published by magazines are far from being a perfectly reliable data source.

[19] shows the general hard science view of "adjusting data". In fact, had "adjusting data" been allowed in Physics, Relativity would not exist as a topic <g>. Collect (talk) 12:57, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

In hard science, "adjusting data" is not accepted practice. - of course it is, like when you "adjust" inches into centimeters. That's what it sounds like Piketty is doing here, converting raw data into common units and such.Volunteer Marek (talk) 18:06, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

OK, so, in answer to my question, no Piketty hasn't acknowledged any errors or wrongdoing, then something about Relativity. Formerip (talk) 13:13, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

You could read what Piketty wrote - he says that "fat fingers" (transcription errors) are not a major problem in the book - he specifically allows that such transcription errors exist. And he asserts that changing figures is not "wrongdoing" but he definitely admits to changing the figures. Economics is not "hard science" perhaps - but such cavalier "smoothing" is what Physics and other hard sciences find a major problem. Collect (talk) 14:13, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

"Transcription errors" are not the same as "fudging data" (viz. your initial edit summary). "smoothing" is also not "fudging data". I'd suggest that you leave this issue to people who take BLP a bit more seriously; Wikipedia really ought to get it right. Nomoskedasticity (talk) 11:43, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

The edit did not use the term "fudging" and your faux umbrage is "tres amusant" here. Collect (talk) 12:57, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

Piketty changed some of the data. How you wish to define that change is up to you. As Collect stated, changing of data in scientific research is a no-no. His smoothing of the data to make it easier to compare data across time and country should not have been done, period. Arzel (talk) 13:48, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

You've got a big job ahead of you -- convincing economists to do something different from what they've been doing for decades. Nomoskedasticity (talk) 13:51, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

Nomoskedasticity is correct. Converting data into common units or even smoothing data to separate out trend from high frequency volatility is standard practice. Not just in economics.Volunteer Marek (talk) 18:08, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

That is not standard practice. Occasionally you do remove outliers, but you don't change the value of outliers to smooth out the trend, that is not acceptable, and is certainly not acceptable in the research are I work in. Arzel (talk) 18:15, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

It is not my task to "convince economists" of anything at all -- it is our task to reflect what the reliable sources state. Neither more nor less. And when we refuse to go by what the reliable sources state, and decline to follow Wikipedia policies and guidelines, we ill-serve the goal of the project. Collect (talk) 14:17, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

We might have to work on terminology. Yes, economists adjust data all the time. If given nominal GDP over time, they reflexively (and properly) adjust by inflation to look at real GDP. Hard scientists would do the same thing, if one data set was in metric and another was in American units. However, smoothing, which is entirely proper for presentation purposes, does not justify the use of smoothed data when doing analysis. Unfortunately, the dividing line between acceptable adjustments and not acceptable adjustments is not as clear as one would like. If a climate scientist has a set of data over time, and realizes that some years were measured at midnight, and others were measured at 9 am, they need to make some adjustments to put the data on a consistent basis. How to do this is not as cut-and-dried as conversion of feet to meters, so the choice of a conversion algorithm might be fine, or it might reflect a bias.--S Philbrick(Talk) 14:45, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

Agree. That would be what we call a "Transformation" You make a uniform change which does not change the underlying meaning of the data. From what has been reported, that is not what happened here. Arzel (talk) 14:59, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

I agree. I just want to be careful, when discussing what is or it not acceptable, that we do not over-reach, and suggest that adjustments to raw data are never warranted. Dividing national income by population to create per capita income is not not a uniform change, but acceptable. Seasonal adjustment can be acceptable, but require a bit of care to ensure how they are done.--S Philbrick(Talk) 15:30, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

Ugh. Look, smoothing data is no different than calculating and reporting a mean or a variance. It's a way of summarizing data or a way of focusing on a particular aspect of the data. There's absolutely nothing wrong with such procedures. Now, of course in some instances it might not be a very useful way of presenting data; volatility might be more important than trend in some settings, just like sometimes variance or standard deviation by itself may not emphasize a key characteristic of a distribution (like skewness or kurtosis). But that's a different question.Volunteer Marek (talk) 18:11, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

It is way different. Changing actual data values to make your trend look "smoother" is not acceptable unless the change is applied to all data in the same manner in the form of a transformation of data. Another acceptable change is the removal of outliers, which can have a similar effect. The FT report is that Piketty made changes to values in a manner related to my first sentence. Another charge is that he averaged %'s without adjusting for sample size, another no-no. Arzel (talk) 18:21, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

VM, I agree that smoothing data is no different than calculating a mean or a variance. A mean is calculated as a way to provide some summary of a large set of data. As is a variance. Our minds are generally not capable of viewing, for example, one hundred data points and knowing what conclusions to draw. A mean is one simplified summary statistic. It notably fails to measure spread, so variance is a single valued statistic which provides some information about the spread. One can think of a smoothed data set as a way to portray the entire data set in a fashion to better illustrate the trends over time. But in the same way that it is OK to use a mean to summarize the data to make a particular point, it is incorrect to use only the mean as input to a model of the process. Unfortunately, I have seen practitioners calculate smoothed values to demonstrate a curve (which is OK) then used the smoothed, rather than the original values to calculates a correlation with some other data set. That is decidedly wrong. I have not yet delved into this particular situation to know exactly what was done; my point is simply to emphasize that one cannot draw a conclusion about whether something is right or wrong simply by knowing that the practitioner used smoothed values. They are quite appropriate in some uses (graphing the data) while quite inappropriate in other uses (correlation to other data sets).--S Philbrick(Talk) 20:51, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

Sphilbrik, that's pretty much my point. There's nothing inherently wrong in transforming or adjusting data. What matters is the context and the reason.Volunteer Marek (talk) 21:02, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

Some of this is interesting, but it's also not particularly useful to be getting too far into blind guesswork about what Piketty may or may not have done wrong. We should be deferring on that to reliable sources.

For the sake of clarity, though, nothing to do with data-smoothing seems to be involved. Giles doesn't claim this and, in terms of the book at least, there's no evidence of any smoothing. None of the figures, AFAICT, represent data as curves (he just plots simple line graphs) or look as if they might possibly have been smoothed. It also wouldn't be an effective way fro Piketty to cheat, AFAICT, because it wouldn't change anything fundamental about the meaning of the data. Formerip (talk) 21:30, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

There appears to be broad agreement that mentioning the criticisms of the book in the biography is not appropriate. Hipocrite (talk) 12:34, 3 June 2014 (UTC)

Strong claims require solid support

(I saw the following in the article about the book Capital in the Twenty-First Century, so I left a comment there, but I find the same sentence in this article, so I'll repeat the comment here. My suggestion is that this should only be discussed in one place. The book talk page section seems like the logical best place, but I note this page gets more page views, and seems more active, so it may happen here.)

The third sentence of the section about the book reads:

The book thus argues that unless capitalism is reformed, the very democratic order will be threatened.

I read the source:

Rather than simply revert and discuss, I thought I might be missing something, so I'm asking if someone else can see how the very strong claim the very democratic order will be threatened is supported by the source. I'll also suggest, that such a strong claim, unless supplemented by links to the original book, requires additional sourcing. --S Philbrick(Talk) 14:11, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

This is the relevant passage

That is why Piketty has made such a huge impact: He has starkly and convincingly outlined the stakes for future generations. Either we'll have a new birth of reformed capitalism, with his preferred progressive wealth tax and other institutions, or we'll have wealth concentration on such a colossal scale that it will threaten the democratic order.

On the basis of solely that source, it seems like a reasonable sentence for the lead, but the body should be more specific as to what Pikkety specifies in terms of reform. There are concurrently serious debates in academia relating to plutocracy and oligarchy in the USA, incidentally, so I personally don't find the text to be overly alarmist. These are fairly widely shared concerns. One scholar has recently used the neologism "civil oligarchy". The article points out possible areas for reform, stating:

1. American conservatives have been eagerly demolishing... moderating structures
2. they sharply reduce taxes on inheritances and other unearned wealth much more than they do those on income
3. The bold new conservative innovation since the 2008 financial crisis has been to add social insurance, especially for the poor, to the list of things that need to be slashed.
4. the ultra-rich are capturing nearly all (or more than all) the gains of economic growth, a rapidly shrinking middle class is treading water, and an increasingly huge minority is being left behind in poverty and desperation. Capitalism as we know it is responsible for those trends.
   --Ubikwit ^連絡 _{見学/迷惑} 18:51, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing that out. I did a search for the phrase "demo" and thought it failed, but I now see it.--S Philbrick(Talk) 20:35, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

I'm not sure it is a very good characterisation of the book, though. I had to search hard for anything like that and, although, I did eventually find a bit where Piketty says, pretty much in passing, that if wealth inequality goes on increasing it would "be likely to provoke a violent political reaction from the middle classes", that seems like pretty much it for the whole book. It's not really a central theme. I would say this view would be best attributed to the reviewer. Formerip (talk) 22:09, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

References

I found one quote referring to PIcketty cautioning about democracy as shown below. Does Piketty he make any reference to oligarchy or plutocracy? The google search nets quite a few hits, and this piece by Thomas Frank also mentions plutocracy in a manner such as to attribute a statement to Piketty on it.

As I wrote on Salon several months ago, the growing plutocracy is a subject for all of us; in Piketty’s words, it “is too important an issue to be left to economists, sociologists, historians, and philosophers.”
The outrage of soaring inequality is ultimately, as Piketty reminds us, a challenge to democracy itself. [20]

--Ubikwit ^連絡 _{見学/迷惑} 22:50, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

Salon seems to be misrepresenting Piketty a bit. He actually says "The question of wealth distribution is too important...". But it's fair to say that Piketty sees the potential rise of oligarchies (he uses the word in the same sense as "plutocracies") as a credible future threat. I was thinking of a "threat to the democratic order" in terms of revolution, but I guess that would also count... Formerip (talk) 23:24, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

Not a bell curve

I removed the qualifier "bell" as a descriptor of a Kuznets curve. The shape in the article about the curve is not a bell curve. I reviewed Kuznets' paper (quickly) and did not find a reference to "bell" or "normal". Nor did I see anything in the paper which would suggest it would be a normal curve.--S Philbrick(Talk) 15:47, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

References

Usually it's called "reverse U shape". I think "bell" is an innocuous way of saying the same thing but I understand that it might be confused with the normal distribution pdf.Volunteer Marek (talk) 18:13, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

I thought about calling it reverse "U", because I have seen that, but I chose not to, because it isn't a reverse "U". At the risk of sounding picky, a reverse U has vertical sides, which a Kuznets curve decidedly does not. I get that the shape of a bell is a better descriptor, but as you suggest, the term is generally reserved as a casual descriptor of a normal curve, and it isn't that. I see that the original language came from a translation of the French article.--S Philbrick(Talk) 20:27, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

Piketty indicates that it is normally described as an "inverse U curve". Formerip (talk) 22:14, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

As I mentioned, I'm aware of what it is sometimes called. But that is a poor choice. It's closer to an inverse V than U, but for the non-differentiable point. I'd prefer not to perpetuate nonsense, unless it is inevitable.--S Philbrick(Talk) 22:52, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

Well, the relationship is sometimes termed "the inverse U hypothesis", so it's definitely in use in the literature [[21].Volunteer Marek (talk) 23:07, 27 May 2014 (UTC)

I see that Piketty actually used the term "bell curve" to describe a Kuznets curve. I haven't restored the term, because he is wrong. If someone really wants it in the article, we cannot use it in the voice of Wikipedia, but in the voice of Piketty. However, given that it is wrong, and unimportant to the thesis, I see no good reason for trying to figure out how to add it back in.--S Philbrick(Talk) 19:35, 14 June 2014 (UTC)

" The book argues that when the rate of return on capital is greater than the rate of economic growth, then inequality increases."

Stated this way, it is really misleading. Piketty writes about 2 types of inequality: wealth and income. Current income inequality is mostly about wages (as Piketty mentions), which are not directly related to returns on capital. As for capital inequality, Piketty does not argue that inequality increases mechanically when r > g. What he says (most clearly in this "Capital is back" technical article, but also in the book) is that under assumptions he finds plausible about growth, return on capital and propensity to consume, capital inequality will tend toward a steady state that is significantly higher than the current situation. --Superzoulou (talk) 16:41, 2 June 2014 (UTC)

I get the first part of what you are saying, but not the second. "...tend toward a steady state that is significantly higher than the current situation" seems to me like it means the same thing as "increase" (?). To quote the book directly: "...the fact that returns on capital clearly and durably exceed the rate of growth is a powerful force for increasing wealth inequality". So I don't see where the header is incorrect. Perhaps it would be clearer to add the word "wealth" (?). I agree that this misses out any consideration of incomes, which are obviously important, but I'm not sure I understand why this makes the statement misleading. That could be me just not seeing something, though. Formerip (talk) 17:23, 2 June 2014 (UTC)

Yes, adding the word "wealth" would be clearer. My emphasis on the steady state thing is that the growth in inequality will not be endless. This is not "inequality increases when r > g" but "in the current state of thing r > g is a potent generator of wealth inequality (and in virtually all situations it is a potent perpetuator of wealth inequality"). That may seem like nitpicking, but really the logic is different. And it is rather important, and Piketty seems to suggest that for much of human history, this steady state was reached (that is r > g, but wealth inequality does not increase). So I would suggest something like:

He is the author of the best-selling book Capital in the Twenty-First Century (2013) that documents capital accumulation and distribution in the past 250 years. The book argues that developed countries seem to be heading toward higher levels of wealth inequality, notably because the rate of return to capital is durably higher the economic growth rate.

My phrasing may not be the most elegant, but I think this is a more accurate description of what Piketty says. --Superzoulou (talk) 18:15, 2 June 2014 (UTC)

I haven't finished the book yet but, unless there's a surprise ending, I'm a bit intrigued to see your idea that Piketty sees some sort of ceiling or point of equilibrium in terms of wealth concentration. I don't think he does at all. AFAICT, he just thinks wealth will continue to concentrate as long as r > g. If you are right and I am wrong, then your wording is probably good, but can you provide a quote from the book or a review or something in support of what you contend?

It is fair to say that the current version doesn't actually say anything about whether Piketty thinks r > g is particularly likely to ever occur, so it does need modifying. Formerip (talk) 20:50, 2 June 2014 (UTC)

I've tweaked the wording. I'm not saying that's an end to the matter or that it is now perfect, though. Formerip (talk) 22:46, 2 June 2014 (UTC)

Yes, I think the current wording is ok as it avoids the suggestion of an absoluted mechanical effect produced by "when".

Actually, I was being imprecise. Yes, you are right, Piketty does not seems to see any limit to the effects of r > g on wealth concentration. However, my understanding is that he does not warn so much against wealth concentration per se, than against the coming back of a Balzaco/Astenian society economically and politcally dominated by rentiers. And this is a function of capital concentration, but also of the proportion of national income going to capital owners. As such it is limited by the capital income/total income ratio. And this ratio, Piketty says, tends toward an equilibrium state determined by what he calls "the second fundamental law of capitalism" (and he suggests here (p33) that a ratio as high that 53% cannot be ruled out). --Superzoulou (talk) 07:36, 3 June 2014 (UTC)

Domestic violence

Addable in a 'personal life' section at the bottom of the article?

There is an uncomfortable topic that I have to raise. Earlier this year, allegations surfaced that Piketty had perpetrated domestic violence against his former partner, who made a legal complaint in 2009. Piketty has spoken out before to confirm he was arrested but that no charges or prosecution followed. His response, however, at this interview, is perturbing. When I ask about the allegations, he clams up and begins to mumble. “I’ve not seen that, you’re the first person to tell me about it.” It has been in several newspapers, I say. “I’ve not seen it.” The claims are just all nonsense, then? “I have not seen it. I am sorry. You probably don’t read the same papers as I do!” A nervous laugh follows. I move on, although the atmosphere has gone rather stale. Does he find his rock-star intellectual reputation demeaning or has he embraced it? “Well, if it gets more people to read my book, then I have no problem with the publicity,” is the curt reply.

--YeOldeGentleman (talk) 19:08, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

No. See WP:BLP.Volunteer Marek (talk) 21:54, 17 January 2015 (UTC)

Marx as influence

Karl Marx is listed as an influence. Why? In Capital in the 21st Century, Piketty repeatedly criticizes Marxism and explicitly states he is of a recent enough generation that he is in no way enamored with Marxism. This should be removed in my opinion, but before I do that I'd like to hear why anyone thinks it belongs. Honestly, the same could be said for the Kunetz as influence reference as well. People you argue against aren't really influences are they? (6 Jan 2015). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.250.80.193 (talk) 18:52, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

Yeah, I took it out.Volunteer Marek (talk) 19:29, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

Inequality growth under Obama

I had removed what I feel was a POV pushing sentence "According to a study by Emmanuel Saez and Piketty, the top 1 percent of earners have captured more of the income gains under Obama than under George W. Bush." I argue this is a POV pushing sentence that can be considered misleading because the overall project of Piketty and Saez has been to show that inequality has been growing for awhile. The source I feel decontextualizes the Saez/Piketty study to make a specific political point about Obama. The source uses the Saez/Piketty study, but however, then makes its own political and economic conclusions about the study, ignoring Piketty's overall argument. It seems to me that the "source" here is a POV pushing article that happens to cherry pick an out of context stat to make a political point. -Xcuref1endx (talk) 21:14, 17 January 2015 (UTC)

I agree. The whole point of the book and research is that the growth in inequality since the 70's has been structural. Putting in stuff about Bush or Obama completely misses the point, is an obvious example of cherry-pickin' and it is POV pushing.Volunteer Marek (talk) 21:53, 17 January 2015 (UTC)

I disagree. The source mirrors the Saez/Piketty study by quoting its findings! A plan fact is being reported. Let the Wikipedia reader makes their own political and economic conclusions. Should Wikipedia cover up facts because some people find these facts inconvenient?!Jimjilin (talk) 04:32, 26 May 2015 (UTC)

No, it's POV pushing and political point scoring. An encyclopedia is not a place for that.Volunteer Marek (talk) 04:45, 26 May 2015 (UTC)

It's not a "cover up" because some people find "these facts inconvenient.". Please see what was written above. The "facts" here are WP:CHERRYPICKed and a violation of WP:NPOV. -Xcuref1endx (talk) 00:06, 27 May 2015 (UTC)

User:Jimjilin is engaged in edit war. -Xcuref1endx (talk) 03:12, 1 June 2015 (UTC)

Why do you feel I am "selecting information without including contradictory or significant qualifying information from the same source and consequently misrepresenting what the source says."Jimjilin (talk) 04:17, 1 June 2015 (UTC)

Read above and your question is answered. Before adding another line to the article. Put the proposed addition here so it could gain consensus. -Xcuref1endx (talk) 05:48, 5 June 2015 (UTC)What "contradictory or significant qualifying information from the same source" was not included? Please be specific instead of vague.Jimjilin (talk) 19:31, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

I'd like to add: A study by Emmanuel Saez and Piketty showed that the top 10 percent of earners took more than half of the country’s total income in 2012, the highest level recorded since the government began collecting the relevant data a century ago.Jimjilin (talk) 19:34, 5 June 2015 (UTC) Does anyone feel this addition is cherry picked? Please explain why.Jimjilin (talk) 13:44, 9 June 2015 (UTC) Since no one seems able to tell me how my proposed addition is "cherry-picked" I'll just add it.Jimjilin (talk) 03:50, 13 June 2015 (UTC)

Study by Saez and Piketty

@Xcuref1endx, Volunteer Marek, and Jimjilin:The follow was removed from the article on grounds of consensus being against it. However, it seems consensus was against referring to who was president (see above). Jonpatterns (talk) 09:00, 15 June 2015 (UTC)

A study by Emmanuel Saez and Piketty showed that the top 10 percent of earners took more than half of the country’s total income in 2012, the highest level recorded since the government began collecting the relevant data a century ago.ref one ref two

Good point. What is the objection now?Jimjilin (talk) 03:41, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

It's still tendentious POV-pushing. Nomoskedasticity (talk) 08:59, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

@Nomoskedasticity: could you expand on what the POV is that the above paragraph is pushing? To me it just seems to be stating a fact. Jonpatterns (talk) 10:13, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

The first source does not say what you say it says. The second source, an opinion piece, is not reliable for this info. Aside from that, this isn't the article to put this kind of info into. Maybe a different one.Volunteer Marek (talk) 20:58, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

The report being referred to in the article is Striking it Richer: The Evolution of Top Incomes in the United States (2012) it is an update on work done jointly with Piketty, probably The Evolution of Top Incomes: A Historical and International Perspective (May 2006), and there is a further update using figures from (2013).

A report co-authored by the article's subject and widely reported should be included. I think it would be informative to add that the report notes a decline in top 10% wealth income share, before returning to higher levels.Jonpatterns (talk) 11:33, 17 June 2015 (UTC)

Volunteer Marek, I quoted the first source exactly!Jimjilin (talk) 05:29, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

Ay, you're right, my apologies. Nonetheless, I see no reason for this to be in *this* article. Piketty is known to the public for his book, and to the professional economists for the dataset. If we are going to mention Piketty and Saez - which I believe we already do - then it's the dataset that should be discussed. The findings for a particular year from one of the many papers he's written belong in the appropriate article, in this instance the one on inequality in United States, and I would not oppose this info being added there.Volunteer Marek (talk) 14:09, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

There is a section on 'Study of long-term economic inequalities', I feel a mention would be appropriate there.Jonpatterns (talk) 16:51, 18 June 2015 (UTC)

I just mirrored the source Volunteer Marek.Jimjilin (talk) 14:51, 26 June 2015 (UTC) I added another source. I hope this is okay.Jimjilin (talk) 14:51, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

RfC should inequality study by Piketty and Saez be included

The following discussion is an archived record of a request for comment. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

There is consensus to include. AlbinoFerret 20:09, 3 August 2015 (UTC)

---

@Xcuref1endx, Oceanflynn, Xcuref1endx, Volunteer Marek, Annihilation00, Nomoskedasticity, and Jimjilin:The following paragraph was removed with the comment 'Following a different editor's suggestion', diff:

A study by Emmanuel Saez and Piketty showed that the top 10 percent of earners took more than half of the country’s total income in 2012, the highest level recorded since the government began collecting the relevant data a century ago.ref 1ref 2

The study referred to by the New Times and New York post is available online here (for different versions {2006, 2013} see section above).

The RfC is about two questions.

1. Should the study be mentioned in the article? (answer: include, or keep removed)
2. If yes to question 1, should the removed paragraph be used or something else? 10:42, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

Please don't respond to editors answers in the Survey section, use 'threaded discussion'.

Survey

• 1. Include A report co-authored by the article's subject and widely reported should be included. 2. The removed paragraph is okay, but perhaps it could be phrased in a more academic way. Include direct reference to report.Jonpatterns (talk) 10:42, 25 June 2015 (UTC)
• Include Agree completely with what Jonpatterns said. Darx9url (talk) 01:42, 26 June 2015 (UTC)
• IncludeJimjilin (talk) 14:46, 26 June 2015 (UTC)
• Keep Removed - that article is about Piketty, so things misattributed to him do not belong. Cite of a Saez-only ppiece, and a blog and a NYC oped criticizing Obama is waaaay off topic of who this person is. Markbassett (talk) 23:43, 30 June 2015 (UTC)
• reinstate removed paragraph - summoned by bot. Per Jonpatterns, include a direct ref to report. Flat Out (talk) 00:08, 1 July 2015 (UTC)
• Include - summoned by bot. Agree with Jonpatterns. —Мандичка^YO 😜 06:57, 14 July 2015 (UTC)
• Include Agree with other above. The article was widely circulated, meriting its inclusion. BurritoSlayer (talk) 20:22, 17 July 2015 (UTC)
• Include - Piketty is well known for this kind of work, and in this case the study is cited by major sources and easily a part of his biography. -Darouet (talk) 00:07, 19 July 2015 (UTC)

Threaded discussion

Further discussion goes here.Jonpatterns (talk) 15:04, 1 July 2015 (UTC)

To reply to the points raised by @Markbassett:. The 2006 study is perhaps the one that should be mentioned, and how it laid the ground work for the Saez authored studies in 2012 and 2013. The study being cited in mainstream media makes it notable. Whether or not the NYC piece criticised Obama is irrelevant, and is not mentioned in the removed paragraph. Perhaps this criticism of Obama is the main controversy over inclusion.Jonpatterns (talk) 15:25, 1 July 2015 (UTC)

Still at exclude - Making it 'A study based on Piketty by Saez concluded that the top 10 percent of earners...' is still Saez material, not something Piketty did or something about Piketty so not appropriate for *this* article. And that material is excerpted from op-ed on Obama, so it's really not good RSS on Saez either, with focus on the material mentioned, it's pushing a point about Obama and making his own conclusion out of Saez work to make a point -- it is the author of that op-ed that is saying this, not Saez. Markbassett (talk) 23:17, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.