Moreover, MarxвЂ™s Capital is the climax in a tradition, beginning with Adam Smith, and dubbed вЂњpolitical economy,вЂќ that factored in the historic role of the state in explaining the evolution and workings of capitalism. He acknowledges to Chotiner that he read The Communist Manifesto, but in his books he cites passages and arguments from the first book of Capital and from book three, which Frederich Engels put together posthumously from MarxвЂ™s notes, and which is only read and discussed these days by aficionados. He discusses MarxвЂ™s ideas more than those of John Maynard Keynes or any contemporary economist. In Capital in the Twenty-First Century, whose title is an allusion to MarxвЂ™s work, Piketty discusses MarxвЂ™s ideas more than those of any economist except, perhaps, Simon Kuznets, who in the 1950s pioneered the econometric techniques that Piketty has refined. He says he вЂњnever managed to readвЂќ Marx and that MarxвЂ™s ideas were вЂњnot very influentialвЂќ on his work and that his book, unlike MarxвЂ™s Capital, is вЂњabout the history of capitalвЂќ and that MarxвЂ™s Capital contains вЂњno data.вЂќ These statements are uniformly false, and Piketty must know it. But I fear that, in his interview with Isaac Chotiner, Piketty was putting on his American readers when he disclaims any interest in MarxвЂ™s ideas.

I admire Thomas PikettyвЂ™s new book, Capital in the Twenty-First Century.

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