The socioeconomic gap between the top earners and the remainder of the population has expanded dramatically in the past few decades. Social scientists have been examining this issue from several theoretical and empirical perspectives. Recently, the observation that the extent and type of current global inequality is paralleling that of medieval feudalism is gaining a foothold. This essay examines this theme through two major and recent publications that, I argue, sacrifice the scientific value of the parallel with the feudalist economy in favor of political mobilization.
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