It’s time that we meet in the real world and talk about the first important economics book of this century, Thomas Piketty’s Capital in the Twenty-First Century. The work concerns the history and future of inequality in our capitalist world. I’ve read the whole damn thing, and I’m happy to discuss its ideas with those who have read it, are reading it, or are thinking about reading it. Piketty is regularly called a “rock star,” and he will probably send many men and women who call themselves economists to the graveyard of bad ideas that only die when their tenured believers die. (Vermillion, 1508 11th Ave, vermillionseattle.com, 6 pm, free, 21+)