
Revised

" Contemporary American society has the look of a split-level structure. Its political and social institutions distribute rights and privileges universally and proclaim the equality of all citizens. Yet economic institutions, with efficiency as their guiding principle, create...

In this revised and expanded version of the Godkin Lectures presented at the John F. Kennedy School at Harvard University in the early seventies, Arthur M. Okun explores the conflicts that arise when society's desire to reduce inequality impairs economic efficiency, confronting...