News Media and Economic Inequality

Chapter 10 provides an overview and a summary reflection on the key findings from the authors’ distinctive, cross-country study of news media coverage of economic inequality, viewed through the lens of journalistic responses to Piketty’s high-profile book on this theme. It examines key findings arising from cross-country empirical research, linking them to broader discourses on economic, material, and discursive aspects of power, public policies, and political economy, as well as cultural research on news media. This chapter also briefly considers the contours of requisite reforms if the present dominance of elite discourses are to be ameliorated when it comes to inequality and other economic issues of wider public interest.