September 30, 2025
Leslie McCall, Stone Center Senior Scholar and Presidential Professor of Sociology and Political Science at the Graduate Center, delivers the first keynote at “The III at 10: New Directions in Inequality Research.” The event was chaired by Fran Tonkiss, professor of sociology at LSE.
Economic inequality is rising or at high levels in many countries across the globe. This has prompted a large, interdisciplinary and international body of research on public demands for government redistribution through income taxes and transfers. It is typically assumed — but not explicitly tested — that any opposition to government redistribution reflects acceptance of inequality or an individualistic belief in the undeservingness of the poor. We test this assumption directly and add a largely unexamined third possibility (besides government redistribution and individual responsibility): that major institutions and actors in the market sphere should reduce inequality in labor earnings. We find substantial support for this third market responsibility option, especially in advanced market economies such as the United States and Switzerland, where support for government redistribution is comparatively low. In contrast, we find the least support across all countries for the idea that inequality levels are acceptable or mainly the responsibility of the poor.
