Economic inequality is now firmly on the public agenda as candidates and voters alike look for someone to blame for stagnant wages, entrenched poverty and a widening gap between rich and poor.
Bernie Sanders blames Wall Street. Donald Trump points his finger at companies moving overseas. Hillary Clinton identifies middle-class families who are working harder but staying in place as the root cause.
While all these factors and others helped increase inequality, they overlook the role of a key American institution that has also helped widen the gap between rich and poor: the Supreme Court.
As my research on economic inequality explains, since the late 1970s and more frequently over the past decade, the court has issued a series of rulings that have benefited businesses and the wealthy at the expense of the working class and the groups that support them. This has, arguably, made it a court for the one percent.
The new court vacancy created by the death of Justice Antonin Scalia, however, provides an opportunity to balance—or further tilt—the economic scales. While Republicans have refused to even consider an Obama appointment to fill his seat, we’re already seeing an example of why balancing those scales is so important.
At the Supreme Court on Tuesday, the eight remaining justices deadlocked 4-4 over whether public employee unions could require nonmembers to pay dues for the work they do negotiating on their behalf. A tie means the last lower court ruling stands, and unions—which have helped reduce inequality—can breath a sigh of relief, for now.
Is this the beginning of a return to a “court for all”? Or will it revert to one that coincided with three decades of worsening economic inequality?
Eroding the American Dream
Occupy Wall Street brought the issue of economic inequality to the fore in 2011, but since then everyone from President Obama and Fed Chair Janet Yellen to the pope has highlighted it as a serious problem. Even corporate America has sounded the alarm, concerned that falling incomes will hurt profits.
Currently, the top one percent earns 20 percent of the nation’s income while holding almost 40 percent of its wealth—that’s worse than during the “roaring twenties,” when income was concentrated in the hands of wealthy industrialists. Meanwhile, worker productivity has risen 64 percent since 1979, yet middle-income workers earn no more today than they did during the last days of disco.
Simply put, the widening divide between the haves and have-nots is undermining the American dream.
