A term coined by Lester Thurow, describing the problem presented by forces of privilege and power in the pursuit of economic advancement. According to Thurow, current trends of corporate downsizing, industrial outsourcing, and growth of low-level service occupations make it nearly impossible for individuals to move upward, as they become primarily concerned with "hanging on to what they have" (Johnson 45). In such a society, upward movement by some inevitably "comes at the expense of others who must move down to make room for them" (Johnson 45).

The term "zero-sum" is an adaptation of a "term used to describe games that are designed so that one person's gain is always someone else's loss," such as Monopoly and Risk (Johnson 45). This zero-sum situation, according to Thurow, results in the inevitability "that at any given moment a substantial proportion of the population will have to live in poverty or close to it and that different groups within the 'bottom' 60 percent will see one another as competitors and threats to their livelihood" (Johnson 45).

In an essay on the theory of games and their relation to economic structures, one theorist commends Thurow and his zero-sum society concept for attempting to solve the problem of imperfect competition, oligopoly, and monopoly "by means of theories that have attracted world-wide attention" (Morgenstern 10). He goes on to emphasize that while the zero-sum society theory does not perfectly communicate the complexity of the problems facing our society, as it is virtually impossible for such an issue "to be translated accurately into words," the theory and the supporting concepts behind it "are not just a dressing up of fundamentally simple ideas," but an accessible way to reflect on the complex issues we face today (Morgenstern 11).

The Zero-sum Society Distribution And The