plutonomy

From pluto- +‎ -nomy. Google’s n-gram search suggests the Plutonomy was coined in late 1800s.^[1] References to the term using n-gram can be found in books as early as 1851, in a book written by John Malcolm Forbes Ludlow titled “Christian Socialism and Its opponents”, where it was used in the context of wealth.

In modern use popularized by Ajay Kapur in a series of papers published during his tenure as Citigroup’s global strategist.^[2]

plutonomy (countable and uncountable, plural plutonomies)

1. (sometimes derogatory) The study of the production and distribution of wealth, or a society seen as dominated by such concerns.
   • 1866, Frederic Harrison, “Industrial Co-operation”, in The Fortnightly Review, volume III, page 499:

     On this side it [Socialism] is a crude compromise between the claims of labour and of capital — the hybrid child of Plutonomy and Communism.

   • 2015, Martin Ford, The Rise of the Robots, Oneworld, →ISBN, page 198:

     The [Citigroup] analysts argued that the United States was evolving into a “plutonomy”—a top-heavy economic system where growth is driven primarily by a tiny, prosperous elite who consume an ever larger fraction of everything the economy produces.

   • 2018, Oliver Bullough, chapter 17, in Moneyland, Profile Books, →ISBN, page 240:

     Since his [Ajay Kapur's] very first paper in 2005—and he has kept publishing them, through a series of different employers—he has highlighted the fact that, in its essence, plutonomy is about inequality.

• plutonomist

• plutocracy
• plutocrat
• plutonomic

• “plutonomy”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, launched 2000. (2006)