Capital & Ideology is a graphic novel adaption of the famous non-fiction book of the same name. This version uses a fictional family across centuries to teach basic economics history and theories. It works well for high schoolers and up. However, younger children will be quickly bored by all the terms and confused by all the family members and dates.

We start in Paris in 1901. Inequity has allowed the top 10% to control 80-90% of the wealth. The bottom 50% holds almost nothing a bare 1-2%. There is talk of implementing a new idea, progressive income tax, as a means of spreading the wealth around more equally. Predictably, the rich are not in favor of it.

Then we move backwards to the time of feudal landowners, 1789. The rich were still rich and the poor were still kept literally dirt poor. Eventually, the tides turned against the rich. Property transfer taxes were paid to the government rather than the landowners. The rich didn’t like it but learned to live with it. However, giving the landowners’ land permanently to their sharecroppers was a bridge too far. Following the French Revolution, the land was eventually deeded back to the original landowners. The rich always get their way somehow is the central message.

The stories get increasingly short for each generation. They jump around Europe and the decades. During the last few pages of Capital & Ideology, six ideas are proposed to fix the inequalities. They are very French specific but some may work in other countries too. This section seems more like an afterthought than part of the rest of the family lives discussed in the rest of the book.

Overall, if high school or college economics or to some extent history are confusing, this book would be an easy way to learn some simple concepts in a fun way. However, I can’t picture many people reading it just for fun. 3 stars.

Thanks to NetGalley and Abrams ComicArts for providing me with an advanced review copy.

Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC.
This one is a tough one to review. The ideas here are so important, especially for young people, that I really want this book to work! I will also confess freely that I struggled to make it through the actual book (too many years since I dropped out of grad school I guess). So I was excited to think of a graphic that could do for Capital what graphic novels did for Yuval Noah Harari's Sapiens--taking a long book and making it accessible in the way well done graphic novels can. I just don't think this quite hit the mark. Perhaps we needed more? More info or explanation or something? I struggled here not only to process the info on economics but the lives of the people, who was who, and why I was having such a hard time getting through this. I imagine the younger people I want to give this to will also struggle with this. I hope this finds a place and an audience, but it wasn't quite what I was hoping for.

I quite enjoyed this book. I have no expertise to comment on the validity of the economic theories presented but they were presented in an easily understandable format and the use of the family saga to present the different theories/arguments worked really well.

My thanks to both NetGalley and the publisher Abrams ComicArts for an advance copy of this graphic novel that about world economics that tries to explain the state of the world, taxation, generational wealth, inequality, and how politicians use all this to further their agendas.

Math was never one of my stronger classes in school. I started school when new, new math was being taught, and number lines and I could never agree. So math was never much of an interest, nor a class I did well in. This carried over to economics. I loved history but the effect of economics on history eluded me, and never left much of an impression. Until I had to pay for things in the real world. Suddenly I found that both an understanding of math, and economics was important to survive in this world that we had made, or had been made by our inattention. I found if I added a dollar sign to any series of numbers, I could figure out sums, percentages, and what I would have to do without this month. A graphic novel like this might have saved me quite a surprises, and angry enough to see what we have let this world become. Based on the work of famed French economist and right wing Bogeyman Thomas Piketty, Capital & Ideology: A Graphic Novel Adaptation is written and adapted by Claire Alet with illustrations by Benjamin Adam.

The book from which this graphic novel is adapted is nonfiction book about markets, taxation, history and how this all comes together. Alet in adapting the book, has added a French family, and it is through their eyes starting in the 18th century continuing to about the era of Covid. We first met Jules in the year 1901 alarmed at the fact that the government is thinking of not only an income tax, but a a tax based on wealth, not just a proportional tax where everyone pays just a percentage. Jules spends the day being very moody until he meets an American woman, who within a short time becomes his wife, and holds differen belifs in many ways than Jules. The story jumps in time to the past, where we learn how the wealth of Jules, his children and grandchildren was created, following the different ideas of markets, inequality and efforts to change. There are sections on colonization, slavery, and how for a time when the wealthy were taxed high, how great things were. America had the largest minimum wage, schools actually taught things, and life was a positive. However as the book points out, wealthy people, don't want that, and shows how the wealthy have fought these efforts, to all our detriment.

I wasn't sure if I was going to enjoy this graphic novel. I understand the importance of economics, but unlike most radio hosts and podcasters I don't even pretend to understand it. That's what made reading this book so fascinating. The fictional use of the family really helps put a human face on these ideas, taxation, the reasons why people fight policy change the way they do, even when it harms their own interests. The polices put in place by governments, and the failures of many sacred cows, trickle down economics, being a big one. I am not sure if this will change minds, however the arguments are laid out, mistakes are pointed out, and Picketty does not seem afraid to debate those who claim to know better. There is a lot to understand, and untangle. Generational wealth, nepotism, why families were paid for owning slaves, yet the slaves were given nothing. There are many unfair examples in this book.

The graphic novel isn't longer than a typical Batman story, and yet was packed with information, ideas and more, that I started to take notes. As I said this, probably won't push a person who dreams of America the way it once was, but maybe remind them that the tax rates were over 50% for certain people and that could cause a different kind of discussion, rather than the usual rant. A very good use of the graphic medium, and I look forward to more books like this.