Kevin A. Hassett admits in the latest National Review: ?The distribution of income has gradually become more unequal. Within the United States, that fact is incontrovertible.?

What Hassett doesn?t endorse is the notion that increased inequality has been bad:

Inequality is, after all, the foundation of a capitalist society. When individuals work hard, or innovate, they receive outsized rewards. When others see those rewards, they are motivated to work hard and innovate. As the lottery-ticket market has demonstrated, the bigger the prize, the bigger the motivation.

But a society that focused all rewards on the very wealthy would be unacceptable. Individuals born in poverty would be condemned to stay there. The inequality that accompanies a vibrant capitalist society is attractive because it enables growth that benefits all. If capitalism is working well, then as growth advances, the welfare of even the poorest members of society improves. A capitalist can accept the fact that the fellow at the top has a lot more money than the fellow in the middle, because the system that allows that to happen helps the fellow at the bottom.

Hassett then goes on to show links between the spread of capitalism and a 64 percent drop in poverty from 1970 to 2006. ?If the trend continues for just 40 more years, poverty will have been essentially eradicated from the globe. And capitalism will have done it.?