Christmas is in a week. I wouldn’t do justice to the title of this column if I were writing about a real Christmas. So I am writing about New Year’s goods: about expensive money.
Defeat Kappeler explains in his book Wealth for All how to best distribute wealth. The former trade unionist is not calling for an inheritance tax, as one might think, given his professional background. Against. According to the economist and author Kappeler should apply to income, since people with low incomes also receive capital income such as interest, dividends, and profits. Ownership should be encouraged. I wrote about it here last Sunday.
When Beat Kappeler presented his work at the book launch in the fall, Melanie Haner was also on the podium. She heads the social policy department of the Research Institute for Swiss Economic Policy at the University of Lucerne (IWP). In her doctoral dissertation, she explored the question of how saying yes affects the distribution of income and wealth.
Opposites attract. The case is the other way around. “These kind of merge into a heap,” says Melanie Hener. “He who makes a lot of money in the labor market also uses his best chances to find a good match in the marriage market,” the scientist writes in his dissertation. Saying “yes” to the registry office not only changes the life and financial situation of the couple: it also leads to increased income inequality and, therefore, to redistribution in society.
Connoisseurs of European history will remember the Habsburgs when they hear this: “Let others wage wars, you, happy Austria, get married.” Not everyone has to be married. Only people with blue blood and the highest possible territorial claims are eligible.
Yet much has changed since the days of the Habsburgs. Melanie Haner cites social mobility as the reason. It refers to movements among different social classes. In other words, that people from the same social class do not belong to the same social class for generations – as was the case with the Habsburgs.
Hener determined this social mobility based on the assets of the parents of the future spouses. Here she learned that parental assets, that is, potential inheritance, often differ greatly. So in a married couple, the man’s parents are richer than the woman’s parents – or vice versa. Melanie Hehner concludes: “The social status of a spouse today is much more important than his marital status.”
Have a good Advent season and of course a good party.