Does the functioning of the world economy tend to concentrate wealth and power, or does it tend to diffuse it? - Robert Gilpin

A prolonged and massive increase in aggregate wealth per capita has taken place over several centuries.

In the abstract world of American economists, equations run both ways; they believe that by changing the sign of a variable from plus to minus or from minus to plus or the price and quantity of x or y, the direction of historical movement can be reversed.

In many societies the domestic social costs of adjustment to changing patterns of comparative advantage are believed to outweigh the advantages of further trade liberalization.