ABSTRACT
The idea of capitalist meritocracy is the heart of the Republican Party ideology; it is also largely embraced by the Democratic Party leadership; and it resonates very strongly with the views of the capitalist class. At least four themes, central to Piketty's work, raise uncomfortable challenges to the idea of capitalist meritocracy. One is the idea of patrimonial capitalism and the importance of inherited wealth and caste in our economy. The second is Piketty's challenge to productivity theory that equates wages with the merit of workers' contribution. The third is Piketty's challenge to mechanistic economics that denies the importance of social and political power shaping the rules and success of the upper classes. And the fourth returns to the question of the size and future of inequality, and whether any degree of merit can justify such huge, destructive divisions in the population.
