This is a collection of essays by Simon Kuznets, winner of the 1971 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, published posthumously. It represents the primary concerns of his research at a late phase of his career, as well as themes from his earlier work. The first four chapters deal with 'modern economic growth'. Chapters five to seven introduce the main theme of the remainder of the volume: interrelations between demographic change and income inequality. Chapters eight to ten draw on a wider set of data to make comparisons of income inequality among societies at widely different levels of development. Chapter eleven returns to data for the United States to develop more fully the importance of differing childbearing patterns for income inequality. In the introduction Professor Richard Easterlin discusses the relationship of the essays to the balance of Kuznets's writings. In the afterword Professor Robert Fogel discusses the methodologies favoured by Kuznets.

Winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics

"Kuznets rarely leaves a question by providing a single or simple answer. In his hands, issues become multifaceted and subtle. Any tentative answer is inevitably tied to a series of challenging new hypotheses. Economics could clearly benefit from more social statisticians following in the footsteps of Kuznets. Robert Fogel's concluding essay in the volume searches for the special quality of mind and method that sets Kuznets apart from his own generation and appears to separate him even further from the generations that follow. Fogel's concluding essay warrants the same careful reading as the rest of this volume." T. Paul Schultz, Journal of the American Statistical Association

"Throughout this book...the elegant simplicity, but extraordinary power of Kuznets' vision is palpable." Journal of Economic Literature