In an excellent post on the Lepore-Christensen fracas, John Hagel draws on Deloitte’s Shift Index to provide some data on disruption. Disruption has increased by a variety of metrics.

One of the metrics in our Shift Index looks at what economists call topple rate – the rate at which leaders fall out of their leadership position. In this case, we focused on the rate at which public US companies in the top quartile of return on assets performance fall out of this leadership position.Between 1965 and 2012, the topple rate increased by 40%. OK, but the skeptic might reply that this is only about financial performance. Another more significant measure of fall from leadership position is provided by my old colleague and mentor, Dick Foster, who looked at the average lifespan of companies on the S&P 500. In 1937, at the height of the Great Depression and certainly a time of great turmoil, a company on the S&P 500 had an average lifespan of 75 years. By 2011, that lifespan had dropped to 18 years – a decline in lifespan of almost 75%. At the same time that humans are significantly increasing their lifespan, large companies have been heading rapidly in the opposite direction.

Another measure of disruption is executive turnover which has increased.

Some of Deloitte’s work also speaks to the implicit idea in Piketty that capital accumulation is easy. Once someone has capital, Piketty argues, that capital just grows and grows at r>g. Not so, and less so today than ever before. According to Deloitte the return on capital is decreasing and the volatility is increasing. Here’s the return on assets by top and bottom quartile. Even in the top quartile, r is decreasing but it’s easier than ever before to pick wrong and lose your shirt in the bottom quartile.

Lots more of interest in Hagel’s post and in Deloitte’s work.