October 29, 2009
Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better
David Runciman reviews The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett, in the London Review of Books:
The argument of this fascinating and deeply provoking book is easy to summarise: among rich countries, the more unequal ones do worse according to almost every quality of life indicator you can imagine. They do worse even if they are richer overall, so that per capita GDP turns out to be much less significant for general wellbeing than the size of the gap between the richest and poorest 20 per cent of the population (the basic measure of inequality the authors use). The evidence that Wilkinson and Pickett supply to make their case is overwhelming. Whether the test is life expectancy, infant mortality, obesity levels, crime rates, literacy scores, even the amount of rubbish that gets recycled, the more equal the society the better the performance invariably is. In graph after graph measuring various welfare functions, the authors show that the best predictor of how countries will rank is not the differences in wealth between them (which would result in the US coming top, with the Scandinavian countries and the UK not too far behind, and poorer European nations like Greece and Portugal bringing up the rear) but the differences in wealth within them (so the US, as the most unequal society, comes last on many measures, followed by Portugal and the UK, both places where the gap between rich and poor is relatively large, with Spain and Greece somewhere in the middle, and the Scandinavian countries invariably out in front, along with Japan). Just as significantly, this pattern holds inside the US as well, where states with high levels of income inequality also tend to have the greatest social problems.
More here.
Posted by S. Abbas Raza at 08:06 AM | Permalink
Comments
This book enhances a portion of Tenet Four of Ecocosmology, which advocates such an ideology too.
The notion that people want to be treated unequal and therefore will perform better that way simply does not pass the smell test.
Good book review. Thanks!
Posted by: Dredd | Oct 29, 2009 10:15:46 AM
I was excited to read the title of the review, eureka! I thought. But the review just fizzled in my opinion.
Posted by: Tehseen | Oct 29, 2009 10:32:21 AM
‘Almost everyone, regardless of their politics, would prefer to live in a safer and more friendly society.’
You would think so, but the evidence indicates that the American elite class prefers to maximize their wealth by minimizing their taxes and workerlabor costs and passing more and more taxes on to the workers. As for a safer society, they already live behind the walls of gated communities. The U.S. began as a master/slave society, first using native Americans as cheap labor and then Africans. It is not about to become an egalitarian society like Sweden. It is far more likely to become even more unequal, like Latin America.
Posted by: J.H. | Oct 29, 2009 12:11:04 PM
I wonder if this is a recent phenomenon, though, and perhaps only true of those rich countries that have reached a certain point in their development? Fernand Braudel, in his 3 volume history of capitalism 15th-18th centuries, interpreted data as showing that in the core economic centers of the European world-economy, large-scale capitalists and the state dominated the system for their own benefit and to varying extent to the cost of other social strata. Price increases always outstripped wage increases in boom times. Braudel writes that the only time the relative position of the laboring classes improved was during downturns, when they suffered comparatively less from deflation. Of course, he was writing about the times before the 19th century Industrial Revolution.
Posted by: Antiquated Tory | Oct 29, 2009 7:53:23 PM
I find it a little difficult to entirely dismiss the review as if it didn't matter. The reviewers seems strangely unconvinced. Perhaps they are not sufficiently motivated towards credulity in this area.
Posted by: Carlos | Oct 29, 2009 8:37:46 PM
To respond to the comment made by J.H., specifically, "the American elite class prefers to maximize their wealth by minimizing their taxes and workerlabor costs and passing more and more taxes on to the workers." As one looks at the evidence, that argument has a certain attraction. However, intelligent conservatives, (there are a few still to be found if you hang around rainbows) would argue that they too want to get to the universally prosperous society but that if you disrupt the incentive system with a redistributive social welfare system, you merely reduce growth overall. I disagree with this thesis but I acknowledge the concern that the incentives for growth and productivity must be preserved while we also, with equal conscientiousness focus on a more equal and just society. I think its more productive to argue, by citing to objective facts, like some of those described in this book, that GDP is a ridiculous measure of "doing better."
Posted by: Arasmus | Nov 1, 2009 11:58:22 AM
In essence, conservatives would argue that the conclusion; " . . . that even small decreases in inequality, already a reality in some rich market democracies, make a very important difference to the quality of life’ assumes a linear function. Moderate conservatives would argue that its a bell-curve. Moderate liberals might argue its a bell curve too but debate the location of the apex. And so the real nitty-gritty of the argument is where is the point located at which increased equality lower the quality of life due to its effect on incentive systems. I also think that the location of this point depends on a number of non-quantifiable variables such as national civic culture.
Posted by: Arasmus | Nov 1, 2009 12:10:44 PM
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