Book 3. The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better ( Richard Wilkinson)

"Between persons of equal income there is no social distinction except the distinction of merit. Money is nothing: character, conduct, and capacity are everything. There would be great people and ordinary people and little people, but the great would always be those who had done great things, and the little would be persons of small minds and mean characters, and not poor persons who had never had a chance. That is why idiots are always in favor of inequality of income (their only chance of eminence), and the really great in favor of equality”.

(George Bernard Shaw)

All the disparities evident between people that live in the same society and are caused by wealth and income differences, lead to a state of economic inequality.

In a society, when individuals have no equal social status, and the gap between who owns a lot and who owns nearly nothing is to deep, it is impossible not to have society illness.

If people have to struggle all their life after the minimum of rights, it is easy that they will succumb and direct themselves toward easy solution such as violence, addictions, they will loose interest in the rights they should have and go against them.

In « The Spirit Level : Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better » written by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett, the authors analyse different countries that have different level of equality between their citizens, to prove that, given that it isn't impossible to be more equal and doesn't need any extraordinary efforts from the State, a State is actually more developed if people that live in it are satisfied.

Some theories explain that there are some correlations between the differences in innate abilities, seen as intelligence, charisma, motivation and all this are also strongly related with health. If this innate abilities are confronted with the demand of the market, they will lead the individual that posses them to increase their life. But this only when it is possible to concentrate on them and not on surviving everyday life.

People perceive themseves in relation to all the other people around them, they are careful to who is doing better and who is doing worse, and if the inequality is to strong, it will cause mental illness.

If a State spends all is energies in containing social problems, such as physical health, mental health, obesity, teenage births, educational performance, violence, imprisonment, social mobility, it will have no left for developing the resources that are present.

The point is that it is not such an uthopy to make a society more equal, and the changment needed are so low compared to the strength needed to compensate all the problems due to society illness.

Once started a process of equality in a State the return in quality life of the people, would cause an increase in health, reduction of violence, social mobility, all positive improvements for all, State and citizens.

"In a country well governed, poverty is something to be ashamed of. In a country badly governed, wealth is something to be ashamed of."(Confucius)