Etymology

plutonomy

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Today it means: The study of the production and distribution of wealth, or a society seen as dominated by such concerns. Full definition →

First used 19th c.
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The story

From pluto- + -nomy. Google’s n-gram search suggests the Plutonomy was coined in late 1800s. References to the term using n-gram can be found in books as early as 1851, in a book written by John Malcolm Forbes Ludlow titled “Christian Socialism and Its opponents”, where it was used in the context of wealth. In modern use popularized by Ajay Kapur in a series of papers published during his tenure as Citigroup’s global strategist.

First known use, by meaning

  • from 19th c. The study of the production and distribution of wealth, or a society seen as dominated by such concerns.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.