should be limited. Neoliberalism seldom proclaims the desirability of inequality directly, for it retains vestiges of liberal conscience, but instead argues for the ethical legitimacy of free market-determined outcomes, claiming that everyone eventually benefits from growth, indeed that growth itself produces income equality in the long run (the Kuznets curve). In response, MacEwan demonstrates the reverse, that during the rapid growth of the twentieth century, the distribution of income shifted in favour of the already-rich countries.
There was no pattern of association between Third World countries with unequal income distributions and countries with high rates of growth in the period 1960–93. Instead studies show that relative income equality is related to economic expansion, the connection lying through formal education and other kinds of social investment. With this falls the most obvious neoliberal ploy on behalf of the rich – that market-driven inequality is good for everyone.