Wealth in America: Trends in Wealth Inequality

About this title:

Wealth ownership in the United States has long been concentrated in the hands of a small minority of the population. Because of scarce data on wealth ownership, the nature of wealth ownership distribution and knowledge about wealth inequality has received relatively little attention from social scientists. Keister synthesizes theory and data from various sources to present a detailed picture of household wealth distribution from 1962-1995. Utilizing existing survey data and a unique simulation model, the author isolates and examines processes that create this distribution, paying particular attention to the wealth ownership and accumulation of top wealth holders, those who control the bulk of household wealth. The results underscore the importance of wealth as an indicator of well-being, identify important causes of wealth inequality, and propose methods of lessening the recent increase in the concentration of wealth.

'Wealth in America will fill an important gap in the recent literature on inequality in America. Given the growing interest of academic economists, as well as journalists in the issue of rising inequality in America, this book is very timely and will command a wide interest in the subject. Wealth in America is extremely well written and accessible to a wide audience - over and above academic economists and sociologists.'
--Edward Wolff, New York University

'Keister presents a longitudinal study of inequality of wealth in the US, which is remarkable because there are no published data on changes in wealth inequality. She does so by creating a simulated model of changes in the distribution of wealth derived from cross-sectional and short-range panel studies. Everyone knows or suspects that there is a great deal of inequality in this country, but Keister's data surprisingly proves that it is greater than we have suspected.'
--Peter M. Blau, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

'Lisa Keister has produced a profoundly interesting, soundly researched, and significant book on household wealth accumulation and distribution in America. Her findings will interest the general, educated public as well as instructors and students of the American economy and society.'
--Thomas Shapiro, Northeastern University

 

Chinese Business Groups: The Structure and Impact of Interfirm Relations During Economic Development



About this title:
This book provides an account of the emergence of business groups in China and details their organizational structure. It contributes to our understanding of the function of these groups by isolating and examining the relationships between various aspects of group structure and the financial performance of member firms.
 

Getting Rich: America's New Rich and How They Got That Way

Explores wealth in America, examining the sources of wealth and the impediments to wealth mobility. Although the basic facts about wealth inequality are no longer a mystery, we still know very little about who the wealthy are, how they got there, and what prevents other people from becoming rich. That is, we know very little about the process of wealth mobility. This book investigates some of the most basic questions about wealth mobility. The advantages of owning wealth and the elusive nature of true wealth have long made questions about the wealthy broadly appealing. In recent years, that interest has been amplified by dramatic economic changes and rising wealth inequality.

About the Author
Lisa A. Keister is associate professor of sociology at the Ohio State University and is the recipient of the National Science Foundation's Faculty Early Development Career Award. She is the author of Wealth in America (Cambridge, 2000).

Entrepreneurship

Entrepreneurship, the creation of new economic entities, is central to the structure and functioning of organizations and economies. New business formation also shapes the nature of social and economic stratification in an economy and may be an important vehicle for social mobility. The papers in this volume explore many of the issues that are central to the study of entrepreneurship today and also break new ground in the field. The papers explore the importance of entrepreneurship, the process by which entrepreneurship occurs, and the way both meaning and process vary with context and opportunity structures. These papers address long-standing controversies in the study of entrepreneurship, and they also identify new, innovative questions and approaches. As a result, both seasoned entrepreneurship researchers and those who are new to the field will find the papers interesting and useful.