Source: CounterPunch
by David S D’Amato
“A strong claim can be made that the patterns of inequality in feudal societies and today’s state-corporate capitalist systems are more alike than not, even admitting important differences in way of life, economic forms, historical contexts, etc. Through both systems, across centuries, a pattern reveals itself, a startling one showing that a very small group at the top of the pyramid, perhaps one to five percent, have controlled half of all wealth or even more. A concentration of this kind becomes a durable power capable of maintaining hierarchies that run the political, economic, and social worlds. For all of their differences, and they are acknowledged, both systems siphon away the vast majority of the economic surplus to the hands of a privileged few in command of ‘our’ political and economic institutions.” (08/22/25)
https://www.counterpunch.org/2025/08/22/understanding-inequality-across-history/