Equality

I have begun to read the book 'The Spirit Level' by Wilkinson and Pickett. It is an interesting book which strikes a chord with me. I don't intend to review it, nor summarise it fully, but this post (and any subsequent ones) is intended to be a summary of what I read and my thoughts on it, for me to return to later.

They start off with some simple graphs showing that measures of quality of life, such as the UNICEF child wellbeing index, life expectancy and a range of health and social problems all correlate to greater or lesser degrees with inequality in rich countries, but not with GNP or per capita measurements of wealth.
This is not to say that inequality is important across the world, because poorer countries do show a very strong relationship between these things and wealth. It is simply that this relationship is not a straight line, but reaches a plateau which the richer countries have already hit.
I have raised this in discussion and not been believed, despite the relative fame of the book, and the same person also wondered if this plateau were gradually moving, so that countries need growth in order to remain at the top. This could only be due to technological progress, rather than directly from growth, since growth would merely move a country along the plateau. If technological progress is important, but not other forms of growth, then a measure such as GDP which incorporates both, but mostly other growth, is not an appropriate goal for countries to chase.
His point probably comes from data on happiness, which follows a similar pattern, in that increases in happiness get smaller and smaller as income rises, until it too becomes a plateau. There is some evidence that the income at which people hit this plateau rises over time. I wonder if this might be explained by GDP growth, societal inequality and the need to keep up. It might also, as part of 'keeping up', be a feature of human nature always to want improvement (well, it certainly is; this feature might be influencing the income threshold for happiness). If humans are as happy as they could be on 25,000 dollars a year, but humans also have an intrinsic desire for improvement, then 5 years later the same person who was happy might be discontent if he's still earning that amount and able to buy the same things.

The authors then have a number of chapters examining the health and social problems that they chose earlier, but individually. Aggregating them together tends to emphasise what they have in common, so splitting them up might reveal points where inequality is more or less important.
They start with trust; trust directly follows income inequality, both across nations and US states currently, but also as we look back in time. Statistical analysis can look for the probable direction of the relationship and show that it is most probably one way, such that inequality reduces trust. Trust is easy to measure, but does it matter?
Well, trust has been linked to health and lifespan. This is probably not via the common factor of inequality because it applies within small communities; those who are not trusting but are rich enough to live in wealthy, trusting neighbourhoods still show this effect, even though the relationship between inequality and lifespan has not been reproduced at such an individual level. Trust matters in dangerous situations; white families in New Orleans after the hurricane were allowed to pass; black families were shot. If you're scared of theft you'll keep your windows closed even in a heatwave, or if you run a Norwegian cafe, you'll stop leaving blankets outside for customers to use. The authors mention gas guzzlers and Chelsea tractors, but only in the context of the names: Defender, Shogun, Raider, Commander, which show a preoccupation with looking tough, even at much greater cost both initially and in refuelling. I feel compelled to add my own thoughts about these giant cars, which are that Chelsea mothers buy the abominations because they're safer.
That is safer for the occupant, but much less safe for everyone else. In traffic collisions the heavier vehicle wins, and these vehicles are bigger than an average car. Cars are much safer nowadays, but if you want to be even better off, you'll buy a slightly bigger car than everyone else, increasing your safety at the great expense of everyone else. The reasoning is, of course, that your baby takes priority over worthless things like other people's babies.
This is why we end up with solid cars, and why it's currently safer to drive than to walk or cycle in the UK (although that figure includes very safe places like motorways, where we don't find pedestrians or cyclists, so it's not comparing like with like. The figures showing that motorways are much safer than anywhere else also support my opposition of speed limits on them).
What else can we examine? Well, women have better lives and are less discriminated against in more equal societies. On this subject, men and women have lower death rates when women have equal status, and women's status has its negative effects on women even if they're rich and therefore high status for other reasons. These findings imply the general principle that rich people (men, in the studies on women's status) have death rates that are affected by status inequalities, even though they might be perceived to benefit from status inequalities, since they're at the top.
They then conclude by suggesting that inequality increases the social distance between people, making them see 'them' as 'them', rather than more of 'us'.