It is not hard to see the effects of inequality; just go to any inner city neighborhood and the consequences of low income and few prospects are obvious. But the effects are much broader and deeper than a few run-down housing tracts. As British epidemiologists Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett point out in their new book The Spirit Level: Why Greater Equality Makes Societies Stronger, in societies with less inequality, people do better on every measure of human well-being.
In commenting on the book, Sam Pizzigati, of the Institute for Policy Studies writes:
“If you want to know why one country does better or worse than another,” as Wilkinson and Pickett note simply, “the first thing to look at is the extent of inequality.”
The United States, the developed world’s most unequal major nation, ranks at or near the bottom on every quality-of-life indicator that Wilkinson and Pickett examine. Portugal and the UK, nations with levels of inequality that rival the United States, rank near that same bottom.
Japan and the Scandinavian nations, the world’s most equal major developed nations, show the exact opposite trend line. They all rank, on yardstick after yardstick, at or near the top.
And we see the same pattern within the United States. America’s most equal states — New Hampshire, Minnesota, North Dakota, and Vermont — all consistently outperform the least equal, states like Mississippi and Alabama.
People in more equal societies simply live longer, healthier, and happier lives than people in more unequal societies. And not just poor people in these societies, Wilkinson and Pickett emphasize continually, but all people.
If you have a middle class income in an unequal society, you’re going to be more stressed and less healthy — mentally and physically — than someone with the same income in a more equal society. […]
Over the past 30 years, the income of the top 1%, adjusted for inflation, doubled: the top one-tenth of 1% tripled, and the one-one-hundredth quadrupled,” says Pizzigati. “Meanwhile, the average income of the bottom 90% has gone down slightly. This is a stunning transformation.”
The United States has not always been a country of massive inequalities. These statistics are the product of deliberate policies on the part of conservative politicians supported by their propagandists and apologists in the media who have steadily gained influence over the past 30 years.
And it can be reversed if liberals are willing to fight—or they can stay home and sit on their hands as they did in Massachusetts two weeks ago.
