The kind of society we live in is said to effect who we are and what happens to us, helping even to determine how long on average we live. In this talk I'll make the case for the importance of inequalities and present some results comparing different countries. I'll talk quite a lot about health, but I think all these issues are closely connected. I'll end by mentioning racism and the theory that it is something akin to racism that divides us most deeply.

1. Health and other inequalities -
why should they matter to you?
Danny Dorling
Sheffield
University
18/3/2013
Discover
and
Understand
Lecture
series,
Monday
morning.

2. Here is one way of presenting the top
25 countries’
Rich World Inequality League
Ratio of the income of the best-off tenth to worse of tenth of
households
17.7 Singapore 15.9 US 15.0 Portugal 13.8 UK
13.4 Israel 12.5 Australia 12.5 New Zealand 11.6 Italy
10.3 Spain 10.2 Greece 9.4 Canada 9.4 Ireland
9.2 Netherlands 9.1 France 9.0 Switzerland 8.2 Belgium
8.1 Denmark 7.8 S. Korea 7.3 Slovenia 6.9 Austria
6.9 Germany 6.2 Sweden 6.1 Norway 5.6 Finland
4.5 Japan (countries in black are in Europe, 18 of the richest 25)
The 25 richest countries in the world with a population of 1 million+
Source, UNDP world development report 2009, not updated since then.

3. This is the most reliable league
table I can find on that shows just
how very different some affluent
countries are from others.
The Netherlands is the country of
average inequality by this
measure (or was). It is unusual in
that is richest 1% receive less
than in similar countries.
In general the more equitable a
country the more that people are
concerned about inequality and
suggest that child poverty is too
high in their country.
It may be more widespread lack
of concern that allows inequalities
to grow (Norway exemplifies
concern, USA is the opposite).

4. Inequalities are everywhere – take within London

5. Social visualization is partly viewing the invisible social
landscape, all kinds of things matter, the next slide
concerns how much we use cars as an example and the
effects that can have on our health…

7. In the 1970s
different
choices
were made
in each
country of
the rich
world –
some chose
inequality
(Graphs from the No-
nonsense guide to equality,
NI: 2012)

8. GDP, inequality, voting, health: THE UK
(Graphs from: Injustice: why social inequality persists, 2011).
GDP (10 year) The 1% (+ after tax)
One measure of voting inequalities One measure of health inequalities

9. Some
countries are
more
equitable
because
equality was
forced upon
them
(Graphs from the No-
nonsense guide to equality,
NI: 2012)

10. Some countries still have
an aristocracy (old and new)

11. And some, not
too far away,
and not too
Scandinavian
(or East Asian)
are very
different to the
Portugal & UK
(Graphs from the No-nonsense
guide to equality, NI: 2012)

12. People behave differently in regimes of
differing inequality
“In the UK, a parallel but more isolated push is evident in the
coalition’s decision to use government debt problems as the
thinnest of veils for raising university fees to the highest levels in
the western world, removing direct state subsidies from most
university teaching. Deliberately picking a ‘strategic’ fight with
the weakest of the state-dependent ‘vested interests’ (in this
case young people) is a classic ‘shock doctrine’ tactic. And
Cameron, Clegg and Cable clearly appreciate that privatising
university finances will have long-run implications. If the
changeover sticks, it will inevitably create a future electorate in
England where the same high personal debt burdens as in the
US sustain a public opinion believing in ‘self-reliance’ and calling
for the state’s share of GDP to be pushed down” Patrick
Dunleavey page 6 of Political Insight Dunleavy, P. (2011). "The
backlash against the State." Political Insight 2(1): 4-9.

13. Portugal looks
good on this
measure
Nowatzki, N. R.
(2012) Wealth
Inequality and
Health: A
Political
Economy
Perspective,
International
Journal of
Health
Services, 42, 3,
403–424,
http://www.ncbi
.nlm.nih.gov/pu
bmed/2299396
1

14. Inequality and health is most studied
The Broad Street Pump, Safe &
Sound, Penguin, 1971

20. Take a step
back:
The period
1851-1971
was when the
population
explosion,
which began
earlier in
Europe,
globalised.
For 40 years
we have had
deceleration.

21. There are
temporary
blips in long
term
patterns,
such as in
the UK and
Russia right
now as
inequality
and fertility
rises.

22. suggestions – what’s so good about
greater equality; 1: religion
• Religions are very often tales of good
triumphing over evil in times of great
inequality. You probably know all of these
tales, one of the oldest recorded is
Zoroaster’s triumph over, amongst much
else, obstacles imposed by the ruling
class*. Many world religions began in
times and places of greater inequality,
always advocating more equality in one
way or another (NNGE pages 88-92).
* For a map of Zoroastrians see: http://
www.worldmapper.org/display_religion.php?selected=579

23. 2: creativity, patents, papers
• There is a growing body of evidence
suggesting that creativity is enhanced
under conditions of greater equality.
This ranges from work finding a strong
correlation between high cultural activity
in those European countries with higher
equality to reports that Leonardo da
Vinci’s artistry was encouraged by his
working in an atmosphere of higher
than usual equality fostered by his
sponsors (NNGE pages 94-95).

24. 3. Scientists and footballers work and
play- better and harder
• Scientists today are at their most
productive, publishing most academic
papers, when they work in more equal
countries such as in Sweden and Finland
(NNGE page 124). Precisely why they are
more creative is hard to judge, but it may
well be linked to the same factors involved
in recent suggestions that top football
players are more successful in clubs that
pay players more equally (Bucciol and
Piovesan 2012), see http://t.co/dphrqwNq

25. 4: The Structure of Society is stable
under greater equality
• Recently, in the USA, the average black
family saw their assets fall in value to have
recourse to as little as 19 times less wealth
than the average white family. This is possibly
the highest monetary inequality recorded in
the United States at any time since slavery
(NNGE page 111). There is evidence that the
growth of housing bubble in the states was
partly fuelled by rising inequality there. Poorer
people tried harder to move nearer richer
people (see Robert Frank’s work on “How Rising Inequality
Harms the Middle Class”)

26. 5: The most fundamental aspects of
our lives improve faster
Greater equality is not just possible. For many
people in many parts of the world, rich and poor,
it is a reality.
Infant mortality falls fasters in times and places of
greatest equality (from 42 to 40 per 1000 in the
last year, possibly the fastest drop ever).
Population growth slows most quickly when
equality rises and consumption is lower per
person (especially of food in rich countries).

27. 6: Greater equality is essential for non-
coerced full employment
• In unions like the UK or USA, where incomes
are now so incredibly unevenly distributed,
there is enough money to employ every
young person, full-time, who is out of work
under the age of 25 on living wages at least
ten times over! The money is to be found in
the extra incomes that the very richest 10% of
the populations (in unions like these) have
secured for themselves over the course of the
last four decades. It is not that we don’t have
enough money spent in the pay bill to employ
everyone anymore – we just spend it badly.

28. 7: In countries of Greater equality you
can walk to school
• When inequalities are less the differences between
groups living in different areas are less. Parents
have less fear of the local schools. More children can
go to their nearest school. More are friends with
those who live near them. Less cars are driven
(including to schools). There is better motherhood,
fatherhood and more apple pie can be shared by all.
These are all statements of principals and values few
disagree with.
But some people still argue: pavements=socialism!

29. Conclusions and more ideas
• We need to better control a psychotic minority. We
need new collective mechanisms of defence.
We’ve reinvented these for centuries.
• We need to recognise that most people can
become less violent but still violence increases
overall due to the (ideologically encouraged)
actions of a few.
• Our world is changing very quickly 1492, 1544,
1607, … , 1755, 1789, 1848, 1917, 1968… today
It takes only 16 generations before my generation
(generation ‘X’), to get back to when a new world
was discovered and everything changed – don’t
despair at our slow adaptation to rapidly changing
circumstance.

30. The wealth of the
11 million richest
people on earth
fell, not just in
2008, but also in
2011.
In the UK it fell
from 1912 all the
way through to
1978. In 1912 no
one recognised
‘peak wealth’.

31. The wider effects of the effects...
of inequality (to end with)
We are going to look at
Meat consumption
Water consumption
Waste production
Number of Flights
Ecological impact
in each of the most affluent countries.
You might think: "Surely, if a few people hold most of the wealth we all consume less?"

32. Inequality and meat
Meat consumption in kg per year per person
USA
Spain
France
Portugal
Germany
UK
Japan
Inequality
Not if you are concerned about how much meat we farm and consume

33. Inequality and water
water in m3 per year per person
USA
Spain
Portugal
France
Germany
UK
Japan
Inequality
Not if you are concerned about how much water we use (apart from the UK!)

34. Inequality and waste
1100
Singapore
Municipal waste collected (kg per capita per year)
USA
Spain
Germany France UK
Portugal
Japan
Inequality
Not if you are concerned about how much waste we each produce

35. Inequality and flights
New Zealand
60
Ireland
Norway
annual aircraft departures per thousand
Canada
USA
people
UK
Spain
France
Germany Portugal
Japan Italy
Inequality
Not if you are concerned about how many flights we each take (on average)

36. Inequality and ecology
Ecological footprint in global hectares per
USA
capita
Spain
UK
Japan
France Portugal
Singapore
Germany
Inequality
Not if you are concerned about how many planets we might need to exist:
An Ecological Footprint of 2.1 global hectares per capita equals one-planet living

37. Data sources
UNDP/FAO http://www.worldmapper.org/display.php?selected=126
UNDP/LPR http://www.worldmapper.org/display.php?selected=104
UNSD http://unstats.un.org/unsd/ENVIRONMENT/qindicators.htm
World Bank World Development Indicators 2005 (IS.AIR.DPRT)
WWF Living Planet Index 2008
More and more geographical data is becoming available, often for the first time.

38. Ecological Footprint
The map shows the ecological footprint (EF), a measure of the resources used per head in each country. A
EF of 2.1 global hectares per capita equals one-planet living on the basis that everyone is entitled to the
same amount of the planet’s natural resources. - Source: New Economics Foundation, Happy Planet Index

39. Ecological Footprint
When we draw the same map upon the world population cartogram it may not initially appear to be so bad.
The countries that consume too much contain fewer people, so not such a problem?
However...This map is misleading – we need to reproject the basemap again for a fair picture

40. Ecological Footprint
Germany
UK
Japan
USA
France
Spain
If we reproject the globe again so that the area of each grid cell is drawn in proportion to the ecological
impact of the people who live in that area, then we see that most of the damage is being caused by the rich
world and more of that (per capita) by the most unequal countries of the rich world (which China services).

42. Thank you ---------------- www.shef.ac.uk/sasi