The gold standard. The decoupling of currency to gold corresponded with increasing income inequality. Decoupling currency from gold put control of interest rates in the hands of central bankers, who lowered those rates as times passed. The inflation of the prices of financial assets and lowering of yields as a result of lowering of interest rates meant it became harder and harder for the working class to save their way into financial independence. The group of people who originally held the assets reaped the benefit of higher asset prices, allowing them to borrow more against their assets to purchase more capital, and as prices rose, it was like the ladder to financial independence slowly lifted away from the ground, too.