Sans jamais faire de recherche empirique approfondie, j'étais de l'avis qu'une grande partie de l'inégalité de revenu aux États-Unis n'était pas dû à des facteurs institutionnels, mais bien à une augmentation de la prime pour une éducation après que l'éducation soit terminé. Bon généralement, je vous admet que je me fous pas mal de l'égalité de la distribution du revenu, mais c'est bien de savoir que mon instinct soit correct (même si c'était facile pour moi de vérifier, c'est juste que je suis paresseux des fois). Dans un article de American.com les économistes Gary Becker et Kevin Murphy nous montrent que :
In the United States, the rise in inequality accompanied a rise in the payoff to education and other skills. We believe that the rise in returns on investments in human capital is beneficial and desirable, and policies designed to deal with inequality must take account of its cause.Donc quelqu'un qui a fini son diplôme en 1980 par exemple et s'attendait à un rendement privé de 10 pourcent, en 1990, ce rendement privé avait augmenté à 20 pourcent :
This brings us to our punch line. Should an increase in earnings inequality due primarily to higher rates of return on education and other skills be considered a favorable rather than an unfavorable development? We think so. Higher rates of return on capital are a sign of greater productivity in the economy, and that inference is fully applicable to human capital as well as to physical capital. The initial impact of higher returns to human capital is wider inequality in earnings (the same as the initial effect of higher returns on physical capital), but that impact becomes more muted and may be reversed over time as young men and women invest more in their human capital.Quant aux bonnes politiques à adopter, Becker et Murphy nous laissent sur une note de sagesse et d'expérience:
But it will be a disaster if the focus remains so much on the earnings inequality itself that Congress tries to interfere directly with this inequality rather than trying to raise the education levels of those who are now being left behind (...) A more sensible policy is to try to take greater advantage of the opportunities afforded by the higher returns to human capital and encourage more human capital investment. Attempts to raise taxes and impose other penalties on the higher earnings that come from greater skills could greatly reduce the productivity of the world’s leading economy by discouraging investments in its most productive and precious form of capital—human capital.
