The trend toward globalization and economic convergence in the late 19th and late 20th centuries was accompanied by changes in the distribution of income as inequality rose in rich countries and fell in poor ones. Between 1/3 and 1/2 of the rise in inequality since the 1970s in the US and other member countries of the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) has been attributed to global economic forces, about the same as a century earlier. It appears that the inequality produced by global economic forces before World War I was responsible in part for the retreat from globalization after the war. There is some question as to whether the world economy will once again retreat from globalization as the rich OECD countries come under political pressure to cushion the side effects of rising inequality.
