ABSTRACT
Latin American income inequality is notorious, and ancient. The European explorer Alexander von Humboldt (1822/1966) was shocked by it two centuries ago especially in New Spain, today’s Mexico. Some African countries, like South Africa, now lead the world into the abyss of inequality, but no region of continental proportions, only sub-continental countries like China and India, can rival Latin American income inequality. The USA and Russia are not quite on par (Therborn, 2013: Table 10, with references). However, income distribution is not the whole story of inequality. The UNDP Human Development Reports have come to widen our horizons.
