It’s time we got real about ‘levelling up’ | Letters
Tim Worstall of the Adam Smith Institute (Letters, 12 February) says: "Reality is telling us that the economy is not a zero-sum game", as if that implies it is actually possible to "level up the needy" without redistribution of wealth. But GDP per capita tells us precisely nothing about wealth inequality within a country, and results in such a distorted picture in tax havens like Ireland that its central bank introduced another measure, modified gross national income, in 2017 to assess the country's economy and indebtedness more accurately.
If 1% of the UK population in 1751 enjoyed most of its wealth, and 99% next to none, and those proportions are the same today, there remains a cogent argument for wealth redistribution as an engine of economic growth and wellbeing - as demonstrated by Piketty et al.
Dariel Francis
Tunbridge Wells, Kent