The sudden and large increase of interest in questions of distribution
of wealth and economic inequality, arising in recent years, resulted primarily
from the enormous increase in inequality that occurred during the last three
decades. The global economic crisis that emerged in 2008 gave a new impetus
to this research because numerous scientific studies appeared in which inequalities
were given as one of the key causes of the crisis from which the
world is slowly recovering. This is especially true in Europe, whose recovery is
barely discernible. This paper analyzes the trends of economic inequality and
points to the impact of inequality on economic growth. The central question in
this paper, however, is whether the economic inequalities caused the economic
crisis. Although opinions differ as to inequality’s impact on the occurrence of
the crisis, the fact is that enormous economic inequalities, and especially their
permanent growth, could have many negative effects, such as increasing poverty,
increasing social stratification and causing global economic crises. As
many authors have pointed out, escalating inequality is not an inevitable price
of progress. On the contrary, it is a political decision that often has expensive
ramifications.