As popular as Piketty is here all of a sudden, he’s pretty passé in his home country:
Although Amazon.fr now puts [Capital in the 21st Century] at the top of its current best-selling books, it did not feature at all in the top 100 in 2013 and did not grab headlines when the 970-page French version came out in August last year. Across all outlets, the French version of Capital is currently in 192nd place, according to Edistat, the French book-publishers’ ranking.
The French seem almost bemused by the sudden international fame of their home-grown economist. “Thomas Piketty, une star américaine,” ran the headline of an article in La Tribune, a business newspaper.
Tyler Cowen and Veronique de Rugy explain why Capital has been such a bigger deal in America:
First, Mr. Piketty has been on the intellectual scene, and the darling of the French Socialist party and intellectuals, for some time already. An early appointment as an economic adviser to Ségolène Royale, the Socialist presidential candidate in 2007, gave him a platform to present his ideas to the news media. He also has had access to President François Hollande and many other leaders for a while, so Mr. Piketty is older news to the French political elite and journalists alike. Besides, in France, unlike in the United States, most people take for granted the notion that income inequality is growing and destructive. A book that tells people what they already believe may receive approval without generating adulation.
But as Piketty’s American editor observed recently, Capital’s huge stateside success and the ensuing publicity have “re-energized interest in France.” That’s capitalism for you.
The Dish 