The super-rich have never had it so good. But millions of us can't afford a home, an education or a pension. And unless we change course soon, the future will be even worse. Much worse. But things don't have to be like this.
In this bold new book, former Treasury Minister Liam Byrne explains why wealth inequality has grown so fast in recent years; warns how it threatens our society, economy and politics; shows where economics has got it wrong - and lays out a path back to common sense, with five practical ways to rebuild an old ideal: the wealth-owning democracy.
Liam Byrne draws on conversations and debates with former prime ministers, presidents and policymakers around the world, together with experts at the OECD, World Bank and IMF, to argue that after twenty years of statistics and slogans it's time for solutions that aren't just radical but plausible and achievable as well.
The future won't be a land of milk and honey but it could be a place where we live longer, happier, healthier and wealthier lives.
Liam Byrne is now thinking about doing what was so very recently unthinkable. He is open to policies he once dismissed as unrealistic, and can be persuaded on others that in the past were painted as pipe dreams. British politics is changing, it is abruptly shifting, in a way it has not done fifty years, and in a good way. The Inequality of Wealth is a key part of that turn. It is a hand-break turn.