Is equality possible in the 21st century? In The Inequality of Wealth, Liam Byrne, a former Treasury minister in Gordon Brown’s government, argues that the economics of the next ten years will be critical in determining the answer to this question – and the nature of all our futures. Surveying five centuries of British capitalism and the damage wrought by the socially divisive policies of the last ten years, Byrne warns that we’re fast approaching a point of no return beyond which we bequeath to Generation Z a dystopian future of irreversible rifts between the super-rich and the rest that erodes the internal bonds of once united countries and triggers the failure or the fracturing of nations. Yet it doesn't need to be like this. Change is now happening so fast that we’re seeing the stuff of science fiction become a reality in our own lives. The future won't be land of milk and honey but it could be a place where we live longer, happier healthier and wealthier lives. But only if we master new ways of sharing wealth without war or revolution. Liam Byrne draws on conversations and debates with former prime ministers, presidents and policymakers around the world together with experts at the OECD, World Bank, and IMF to argue that, after twenty years of statistics and slogans, it's time for solutions that aren’t just radical but plausible and achievable as well.

Before becoming the prime ministers who led Australia in moments of extraordinary crisis and transformation, John Curtin and James Scullin were two young working-class men who dreamt of changing their country for the better. Becoming John Curtin and James Scullin tells the tale of their intertwined early lives as both men became labour intellectuals and powerbrokers at the beginning of the twentieth century. It reveals the underappreciated role each man played in the events that defined the modern Australian Labor Party: its first experience of national government, the turmoil of war, the great conscription clash and party split of 1916, and the heated debates over the party's socialist objective. Becoming John Curtin and James Scullin shows how they became the leaders that history knows best by painting a portrait of two young men struggling to establish their identities and find their place in the world. It tells of their great friendships, loves and passions, and reminds us that these were real men, with real weaknesses, desires and dreams. It explains how their early political careers set the scene for their later prime ministerships as they honed the techniques of power that led them to the summit of Australian politics. This is the story of two young men striving to better the world they had inherited, a story of optimism and hope with enduring relevance for today's troubled politics.

Before becoming the prime ministers who led Australia in moments of extraordinary crisis and transformation, John Curtin and James Scullin were two young working-class men who dreamt of changing their country for the better. Becoming John Curtin and James Scullin tells the tale of their intertwined early lives as both men became labour intellectuals and powerbrokers at the beginning of the twentieth century. It reveals the underappreciated role each man played in the events that defined the modern Australian Labor Party: its first experience of national government, the turmoil of war, the great conscription clash and party split of 1916, and the heated debates over the party's socialist objective. Becoming John Curtin and James Scullin shows how they became the leaders that history knows best by painting a portrait of two young men struggling to establish their identities and find their place in the world. It tells of their great friendships, loves and passions, and reminds us that these were real men, with real weaknesses, desires and dreams. It explains how their early political careers set the scene for their later prime ministerships as they honed the techniques of power that led them to the summit of Australian politics. This is the story of two young men striving to better the world they had inherited, a story of optimism and hope with enduring relevance for today's troubled politics.