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The Spirit Level: Inequality effects, The notion that people are…

- - - - therefore, relative not absolute levels of income are effecting
  - - - higher levels of stress in unequal societies therefore this is a more prevalent problem
    - - recent research food stimulates the over-eaters as drugs stimulate addicts
    - - Suggest that when a pregnant woman is stressed, the development of her unborn child is modified to prepare it for life and life of a stressful environment
      - Babies have a lower birth weight and a lower metabolic rate
        
        more prone to obesity, diabetes and CVD
      - unequal societies provide more stressors so this hypothesis may well be contributing to high levels of obesity
  - - - We have always followed this behavioural path
      - We are increasingly irresponsible
- - - - equality of opportunity but not equality of outcomes
    - - related to inequality rather than absolute poverty as no state has a poverty rate higher than 17% and 16 states have drop out rates above 20% (+dropping out not confined to the poor)
    - - debunks the idea that increased educational equality will reduce national standards in performance
      - "There is a strong inverse relationship between average proficiency levels and the slope of the socio-economic gradients"
  - - - early years are critical in brain development - this early learning can be enhanced or inhibited by the environment in which a child grows up
        
        enhancing = stimulating, safe, challenging environment
        
        inhibiting as these qualities are harder to achieve for poor/stressed/unsupported parents with a lack of control
        
        increased inequality (heirarchical + mistrustful) is linked to mental health and substance abuse issues - breakdown in domestic life
        
        UK millennium cohort study - mothers in second from top social class more likely to report feelings of incompetency/poor relationship with their child than the topmost group - gradient
    - - caste experiment and white vs black
      - in situations where we are happy and confident, our brains benefit from dopamine not only happiness but also memory, attention and problem solving
      - in stressful situations cortisol inhibits memory therefore a demonstrable effect on educational performance
  - - - Disadvantaged children with high-quality early childhood education are less likely to become involved in crime and they earn more as adults
- - - - the impact of widening inequality due to the 1980s recession in UK can be traced in the homicide rates - "no natural rate of murder... for rate to increase in particular places people have to be made to feel more worthless" - Danny Dorling
  - - - Even within the most violent of societies most people don't react violently to these triggers because they have ways of achieving and maintaining their self-respect and sense of status in other ways
        
        materially: nice house/car/job
        
        relationally: friends and family to esteem them
        
        educationally: qualifications to be proud of, desirable skills, an education that gives status and opportunity for realistic dreams
      - We all know the feeling of shame and know how important it is to feel respected and valued so why is it predominantly among disadvantaged young men that those feelings escalate into a violent acts?
        
        In more unequal societies more people lack these protections and buffers – humiliation is a more sensitive issue in hierarchical societies as more people are deprived of access to my markers of status and socia success
    - - the increased family breakdown in unequal societies leads to inter-generational cycles of violence - abused fatherless becomes abuser and unsupportive father
- - - - Netherlands and Japan have notable humane penal systems where education, recreation and training are a model of best practice - strict discipline maintains a calm not aggressive atmosphere as inmates are stimulated and treated as humans
      - higher rates of imprisonment due to harsher sentencing rather than crime rates
    - - men are products of their circumstances so this only fuels the growing prison pop
  - - - 17% of whites have committed a violent crime by 17 compared to 36% of blacks, property crime rates are the same and black youth commit fewer drug crimes
      - therefore not due to ethnic disparities in rates of crimes committed yet due to systemic racism in the rate of arresting, convicting and the severity of charges
    - - Prison admissions for parole violations rose from 18% to 35% from 1980 to 1996 in the USA
- - - - the psychological effects of stigma are sometimes strong enough to override the health benefits of material advantage
  - - - poor people in poor neighbourhoods are exposed to all kinds of stresses and deprivations thats reduce mobility
    - - despite modern ideology of equality of opportunity these distinctions in taste limit peoples belief and self-confidence therefore they feel trapped in their social class
      - what is high-brow and what is popular is constantly shifting (elitism is maintained by changing the boundaries)
      - causes hostility of lower classes to upper classes due to discrimination/prejudice and the unobtainable air of cultural things
- - - - in health people with higher levels of trust live longer
      - the death rate was lower in equally poor Hispanic neighbourhoods than black neighbourhoods in the Chicago heatwave 1995 because levels of trust were much higher - people checked on eachother, felt safe to open windows + go to cooling centres.
- - - - monkey expt - brains scanned before and after put in groups. monkeys that exerted themselves as dominant in the hierarchy exhibited higher levels of dopamine than before becoming dominant and self-administered cocaine less than the subordinate monkeys who showed no change in brain activity but administered more cocaine - medicating themselves against the impact of low social status
  - - - costing $100 billion in mental health treatments
- - - - the increased levels of obesity, smoking, high blood pressure and lower physical activity only explained one third of the increased risk of deaths from heart disease in lower grade jobs
      - job stress and peoples sense of control over their work had the biggest impact - PSYCHOLOGICAL factors having biological outcomes
    - - chronic stressful situations eliciting a fight or flight response mobilises energy in the form of glucose the bloodstream and can lead to putting on weight in the wrong places/ diabetes
      - Chronic constriction of blood vessels and raise levels of blood clotting factors can lead to hypertension and heart disease
      - Chronic stress suppresses immunity
  - - - 40-50% of global spending on healthcare for 5% of world pop
      - one of richest countries in the world with 1/2 the worlds billionaires
    - - Average income not much more than half that of the USA
      - USA equals $6000 per person per year and healthcare, Greece equals $3000