Money, Money, Money: Inequality and You
Money, Money, Money The source of pleasure or the root of all evil?
If the world were 100 people…
Let’s start with a quiz.
Find a quiet place and answer the following questions:
What percentage of ….. do you think…. %
1 children are in poverty ___
2 people live on less than $2 per day ___
3 people have no toilet ___
4 girls finish primary school in all low-income countries ___
5 people do you think own 59% of the world’s wealth ___
6 people have substandard housing ___
7 of the world’s 1 year old children have been vaccinated against some disease ___
8 of the world’s population has access to some electricity ___
9 Have a college Education ___
10 people have a mobile ‘phone ___
11 people have no shelter ___
How did you do? (Answers at the end)
The world is currently a very unequal place. Here are the latest facts from Oxfam (1):
The world’s richest 1% have more than twice as much as 6.9 Billion people
almost half of humanity is living in less than £4.03 a day
735 million people are still living in extreme poverty. Many others are just one hospital bill or failed harvest away from slipping into it.
While the richest continue to enjoy booming fortunes, they are also enjoying some of the lowest levels of tax in decades – as are the corporations that they own. Instead taxes are falling disproportionately on working people. When governments undertax the rich, there's less money for vital services like healthcare and education, increasing the amount of care work that falls on the shoulders of women and girls.
258 million children, 1 in 5 will not be allowed to go to school
public services are suffering from chronic underfunding or being outsourced to private companies that exclude the poorest people
Every day 10,000 people die because they lack access to affordable healthcare
Men own 50% more of the world’s wealth than women and the 22 richest men have more wealth than all the women in Africa
We know that:
the greater the gap between rich and poor the less happy a society is (2)
money of itself doesn’t make you happy (only by comparison over a certain amount) (3)
growth qua growth is as illogical on a finite planet as it is unsustainable (4)
on the current rate we need more earths than we have (5)
it gives more pleasure to give than to receive (6)
We also know that things are getting better:
‘This is the best time in human history to be born, for you are more likely than ever before to be literate, to be healthy, and to be free to pursue your dreams’ Barack Obama (September 2014 - to UN general Assembly)
the number of people living in extreme poverty has declined by more than half between 1990 and 2015
the number of children who will die before the age of 5 has fallen from 90 in every thousand births in 1990 to 42 in 2015
smallpox has been eradicated and polio down by 99%
between 2000 and 2012 global homicide rates fell by an estimated 16% (7) (see also Rosling H & O, Factfulness: Ten Reasons We're Wrong About The World - And Why Things Are Better Than You Think, Sceptre 2019)
But the fact that you are reading this probably means that you live in this cosseted world too. You may live in a society which encourages individual meaning by noticing nuanced differentiation from your neighbour, your brother’s wife, your work colleague, your competitor. You live in a society which in spite of all the evidence as to the paucity of its efficacy to our individual and collective well-being, is driven by the acquisition of wealth, celebrates celebrity, measures material consumption positively, and encourages the domination of work over life.
My simplistic problem is how can there be nail technicians, viola players and professional footballers in the world when most of us don’ t have food, education, fresh water and the environmental threat is on our doorstep. My compassion and unconditional positive regard for beauticians, musicians and sports people alike is part of my humanity. My passionate defence of their choice is political. Yet my heart and my soul, my connectedness to others and the world through our collective unconscious, through our shared genetic inheritance and through the non-stop immediate news knowledge transfer on the iPhone in my hand, drives me to the radical. Why don’ t we just get it sorted? Why don’ t we focus in a way that transcends our individual immediate needs for the greater good of humanity in the medium and long-term?
Here’s a very simple reflection on the current global situation:
the rich are getting richer
the divide between rich and poor is getting wider
the rich get richer often without their own labour (the rentier economy)
they got richer during lockdown
many corporations get rich because they don’t include in the bottom lines the true cost (resources, environment, education of their staff, infrastructure) (see Raworth et al)
they pay poor wages as the state often supports the low wages - thus perpetuating the divide
the rich own the major means of communication and it is in their interest to keep it that way
‘they’ suggest we turn against ‘those’ likely to ‘take’ from us rather than turn our attention to them - the ago old ‘othering’
their protection of wealth is a defence
But this is not just about the 1%. That is too easy. It is about all of us. The notion of personal sacrifice is not popular and certainly almost unthinkable to the majority, if the pay back is not immediate. Do we as a generation have to sacrifice our safety, comfort, wealth for the duration of our lives, in order that our children and theirs have a bio-diverse and sustainable planet on which to flourish and live? Is this my generation’s sacrifice? Previous generations have sacrificed their lives in wars, is it really harder for ours to give up so little? Can we really sleep at night with the thought that our children’ s children may be involved in food wars?
Ben Phillips in his inspirational How To Fight Inequality (8) talks us through the ways in which, throughout history, people have made sacrifices and continue to do so in order to make a better fairer world. History is always on their side but the costs, emotional, financial and personal are often considerable and he argues that long lasting change is rarely achieved, even if started by, the individual, but rather a whole groundswell of folk who passionately believe that there is a better way.
At Useful and Kind we are interested in combining utility and generosity to make a better world for ourselves, others and the world (SOW model) but we are also really interested in the boundaries of where kindness has to become firmness or legislation. We know and appreciate the inner psychology of those in power, who labour under the misapprehension that their wealth (often achieved without their labour) is both their just desert and will protect them in some way, often from the pain of unmet childhood needs (9). We know the almost impossibility of separating them from the teat of these false assurances. We know too that the arguments of trickle down have in the face of the evidence been widely disproved. So where does collective action lead to legislation? How do we persuade others?
And yet central to all of this is how we look in the mirror at the benefits we enjoy from the world’s inequality. How defensive do we get when asked not to fly? To give until it hurts? To organise the community garden project? To volunteer our time? We must first look critically and with love at our own actions and beliefs and indeed spending and investments.
When we are comfortable with our own authentic glorious messiness then we can work with others, with the passion of knowing our brothers and sisters around the world will benefit from our actions.
Absolutely central to U&K’s SOW model is the idea of balance, equality and equity. You need to have balance in yourself - paying attention to our physical, emotional, intellectual, spiritual and creative needs. recharging batteries. We need to balance our attitudes and beliefs about others. Where is there inequality and misuse of power in our relationships whether, friends, family, colleagues, co-workers or those we lead. And all of this should be balanced with a healthy focus on the world. Whether near or far, from our In-group or on the other side of the world how can we achieve a balance in an unbalanced world. How can we think, pray, act, campaign for a different better world?
We know that we are using more resources than the planet can sustain. We put off into the distance, geographically and temporally, the difficult decisions. We are in denial. We pin our hopes on as yet fully unrealised technological solutions to environmental catastrophe.
We know that more money doesn’t make us happier. We know indeed that there are serious downsides to wealth and that there are associated costs: obesity, mental health, depression, pollution, isolation and protectionism (gated communities).
And really importantly if we are to model a healthy, positive disruption how can we balance our lives across Self, Others and World. We are no use if we get compassion fatigue. Gently and humbly accepting that there is more to do than we alone can do and there is more change than can be made in one lifetime.
There is hope. Toby Ord, founder of Effective Altruism literally put his money where his beliefs are by agreeing to donate for the rest of his life and to measure its effectiveness. Charitable giving continues to grow. And yet. And yet. The UK government reneges on its commitment to give 0.7% of GDP in foreign aid.
The notion of ownership is, in the great swathe of history, a relatively recent thing. When we adapted to static agriculture from roaming we developed the idea of ownership, anathema to our forebears who believed we were merely but temporary stewards of the land and indeed of our children.
One thing we know is that the big changes take time. It wasn’t in the moment of Rosa Parkes refusing to stand up that made the difference, however our myth making history choses to portray it, but rather the two years working together in the planning, the collective support fo the cab drivers, the walking to work for a year and presumably the constant encouragement of each other to make things better.
However we should work with the urgent, passionate, loving belief that we must do all we can. Whether Abolition, Suffrage, equality for LGBTQI+, banning smoking, adopting seatbelts or any other major change can take years or even generations.
And we must celebrate diversity. We are not all the same we all have very different skills, knowledge and life experience but that is the great opportunity. Coming together we can make a difference if we transcend the glorious parts.
And interestingly this is where the riches of Eudaimonia can come - the joy of working with loved ones towards something greater than ourselves. Now that’s the joy money can’t buy.
Duncan Fraser, Director Useful and Kind Unlimited
Answers
1, 50%, 2, 48%, 3, 16%, 4*, 60%, 5+, 6%, 6, 80%, 7*, 80%, 8*, 80%, 9, 7%, 10, 75%, 11, 23%
Hans Rosling Factfulness 2018, Sceptre
+ Oxfam, reviewed annually
1 Source https://www.oxfam.org/en/5-shocking-facts-about-extreme-global-inequality-and-how-even-it
3 Lyobumirsky, SonjaThe Myths of Happiness: What Should Make You Happy, But Doesn't, What Shouldn't Make You Happy, But Does Paperback – 28 Jan. 2014 Penguin
4 https://www.kateraworth.com/doughnut/
5 https://www.footprintnetwork.org/resources/footprint-calculator/
6 https://www.theguardian.com/science/2008/mar/21/medicalresearch.usa
7 All quoted in The Economics of Arrival: Ideas for a Grown UP Economy, Trebeck K, Williams J, Policy Press 2019 (pp 11ff)
8 Phillips, B. How To Fight Inequality And Why That Fight Needs You, 2020 Polity Books
9 Trump, M. Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World’s Most Dangerous Man, Simon and Schuster 2021