TY  - JOUR
IS  - 6
A1  - Moll, Benjamin
A1  - Rachel, Lukasz
A1  - Restrepo, Pascual
PB  - The Econometric Society
Y1  - 2022/11/01/
ID  - discovery10160452
N1  - This version is the version of record. For information on re-use, please refer to the publisher?s terms and conditions.
SN  - 0012-9682
EP  - 2683
JF  - Econometrica
AV  - public
N2  - The benefits of new technologies accrue not only to high?skilled labor but also to owners of capital in the form of higher capital incomes. This increases inequality. To make this argument, we develop a tractable theory that links technology to the distribution of income and wealth?and not just that of wages?and use it to study the distributional effects of automation. We isolate a new theoretical mechanism: automation increases inequality by raising returns to wealth. The flip side of such return movements is that automation can lead to stagnant wages and, therefore, stagnant incomes at the bottom of the distribution. We use a multiasset model extension to confront differing empirical trends in returns to productive and safe assets and show that the relevant return measures have increased over time. Automation can account for part of the observed trends in income and wealth inequality.
VL  - 90
SP  - 2645
UR  - https://doi.org/10.3982/ecta19417
KW  - Inequality
KW  -  wealth
KW  -  capital
KW  -  returns
KW  -  wages
KW  -  labor share
KW  -  technology
KW  -  automation.
TI  - Uneven Growth: Automation's Impact on Income and Wealth Inequality
ER  -