You shouldn’t count on all things being equal using The Spirit Level
I suspected the latter but thought I had better check. I was right. It seems he objected to my column last week pointing out that elaborate welfare states had to be paid for and that the country had to generate wealth in order to support all those who cannot work, cannot find work – or choose not to work, or work very hard.
As it happens, I have read The Spirit Level, the one authored by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett. It has been hailed as proof that inequality undermines any sense of community, harming not just the poorest in society but almost everyone else as well, so great are the negative effects. In Ireland, as well as Britain (the subject of its main argument), it has been praised lavishly; Senator Ivana Bacik has called it nothing less than “irrefutable”.
And it does appear to be a powerful case that is made. Inequality, it seems, is responsible for everything from drug abuse to obesity to violent crime and teenage pregnancy. The obvious implication is that inequality – and Ireland is scarcely any less unequal than Britain – must be reduced.
What sets The Spirit Level apart is that these assertions – long-held suspicions not just on the left of the political spectrum –– are backed up by what look like credible statistics from not just different countries but different US states as well.
More equal countries – Scandinavian ones are cited again and again – and more equal American states do better across a whole range of indices than unequal ones like those in the Deep South in particular.
Arguments about inequality are at the very heart of political debate. Vincent Browne, who is another Spirit Level disciple, is basically right: Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael do not want radically to change Irish society, no matter how much they talk about “change”.
Income distribution is not a major concern for them, although they support progressive taxation and welfare benefits for the needy. But they worry that too much social provision will destroy the appetite for work. Besides, if people work hard or deploy their God-given talents successfully, why shouldn’t they enjoy the benefits?
The historically weak Irish left, which includes many people in the Labour party, believe, on the other hand, that incomes need to be equalised to some extent. There should not be too much difference between those at the top of society than at the bottom. They support tax and social policies which not just offer a hand up to those at the bottom but seek actively to reduce the incomes of those at the very top.
And Ireland, they point out, according to most measures, is less equal than most European countries and somewhat closer to the ‘Anglo’ end of the spectrum like Britain, Australia, New Zealand and, of course, the US in this respect.
Most of us can see strengths in both arguments. We feel uncomfortable that a small number of filthily rich people – particularly some in the professions, finance and the entertainment industry – earn many times more than those at the bottom.
At the same time, we are uncomfortable as well, to a certain extent, with the idea of taking away too much of the money earned by people who have worked hard and taken big risks, and handing it on a plate to those who show little inclination to work and have never risked anything.
This double-think is present in the political system as much as it is within almost all of us as individuals. All parties have their lefts and rights, those who worry most about people at the bottom, and those who fear the middle class will be discouraged from trying to better themselves, and thereby create the wealth to pay for those who are at the bottom through no fault of their own.
The Spirit Level argues that as human beings our natural state of mind is egalitarian. The industrial and post-industrial society, however, has set us against each other, forever competing with each other as we strive for material possessions. This has caused all sorts of negatives as we worry that we are ‘failing’.
But Wilkinson and Pickett’s most celebrated argument is that once we get past a certain level of income – and not a very high one at that – we derive more pleasure from sharing our wealth.
Income redistribution, therefore, works for everyone.
But The Spirit Level is now under sustained attack for using obsolete data. They also exclude countries which do not fit in with the authors’ preconceived notions as well. Christopher Snowdon’s The Spirit Level Delusion takes a few good potshots.
A less hyperbolic approach was published last week by the think-tank, Policy Exchange. Beware False Prophets by Peter Saunders demonstrates how graphs have been presented in ways to support unwarranted generalisations.
The high murder rate in the US probably has more to do with their gun laws than inequality, for instance. And there are historical resentments in play in the US as well. Likewise, Japan might be a highly equal society but is that why they live so long, or is it because they eat a rather different diet? Take America out of the first equation and Japan out of the second and no real pattern emerges.
And then there is Scandinavia. Don’t get me wrong: Denmark and Sweden are lovely countries. Who wouldn’t want to bring up a family there (even if the weather is somewhat worse than here)? Both countries tend to end up at one end of the scale in The Spirit Level but, again, is that because they are highly equal (as well as rich) societies?
FOR instance, women receive a great deal in Scandinavia but do they do so well in other equal countries like, say, Japan? Or are cultural factors in play? As Saunders explains, “Japan and Scandinavia were both ‘late developers’, agrarian societies which industrialised after Britain and the USA had become the world’s leading industrial nations. They remain societies with a strong ‘folk’ tradition, a resilient sense of collective identity… Historically, they have been relatively closed… with low levels of immigration and very little intermarriage with outsiders’.”
So, as well as it being faintly nonsensical to correlate countries with such vastly different histories as Portugal (an empire and dictatorship until the 1970s) with neutral Sweden, take Scandinavia and Japan out and no real pattern emerges. Several Balkan nations are ‘equal’, but does it make them happy? Saunders found that only in the case of infant mortality is there an unambiguous link with income equality.
What is more, The Spirit Level tends to overlook other social indicators. HIV rates, alcoholism and divorce are all high in ‘equal’ societies. In unequal societies, meanwhile, charitable donations are higher and social attitudes are frequently more progressive.
The fact is that The Spirit Level has not offered a scientific answer to politics. The arguments about tax and spend are set to go on.
The Spirit Level by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett is published by Penguin; Beware False Prophets, by Peter Saunders, is published by Policy Exchange, and The Spirit Level Delusion by Christopher Snowdon is published by Little Dice
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