Summary

Piketty begins chapter one recalling several historical conflicts that were fundamentally conflicts between the opposed interests of capital and labor. The primary example is a 2012 conflict between the workers of a South African platinum mine owned by the stockholders of Lonmin, Inc. The workers there were striking for higher wages. Police intervened and fired on the crowd, killing 34 striking mine workers (39).

Piketty presents the conflict as another episode in the long-running debate over what share of profits ought to go to capital, and what share ought to go to labor. He notes some of the financial obligations a business may have aside from compensating labor. What is the “right” division of profits between capital and labor, he asks (41). Piketty cites that for a long time economists have accepted that out of the national income two thirds usually go to labor, and one third goes...