David Cameron is right to point to Britain's "broken society" as an election issue. In his Hugo Young lecture at the end of last year, the Conservative leader cited in support of his thesis our research that found, in his words, that "among the richest countries, it's the more unequal ones that do worse according to almost every quality of life indicator".
Among 21 developed market democracies, we found that Britain does worst on child wellbeing and badly on teenage births, imprisonment, drug abuse, trust, obesity, social mobility and mental illness. This week brought fresh confirmation of the pervasive and profound inequality in Britain in the form of a 460-page government-commissioned study – An Anatomy of Economic Inequality in the UK – which described a nation in which the richest 10% are more than 100 times as wealthy as the poorest 10%.
But where does the blame lie? The evidence shows that almost all the problems that occur most often in the poorest neighbourhoods – including those that make us a broken society – are systematically more common in more unequal societies. Rates are not just a little higher, but between two and eight times higher. Wider income gaps make societies socially dysfunctional across the board.
Last October Cameron rounded on Labour, saying: "Who made inequality greater? No, not the wicked Tories. You, Labour. You're the ones that did this to our society. So don't you dare lecture us about poverty. You have failed and it falls to us, the modern Conservative party, to fight for the poorest who you have let down."
But the truth is that we are suffering the impact of the massive increases in income inequality under Thatcher, which Blair and Brown have since failed to reverse. In the 1980s the gulf between the top and bottom 20% widened by a full 60% – much the most dramatic widening of income differences on record. Since then there have been only minor fluctuations under Major, Blair and Brown. The result is that the gap between the top and bottom 20% in Britain is twice as big as among our more equal European partners.
Almost all of Gordon Brown's budgets did at least something to redistribute from rich to poor. But because the benefit was entirely offset by the unconstrained rise in top earnings, he can claim no more than having prevented a greater rise in inequality.
What happened in the later 1980s may now seem merely water under the bridge. But broken Britain is Thatcher's bitter legacy. Rather than having instantaneous effects, inequality gradually corrodes the social fabric. It takes a while for greater material differences to make the social hierarchy steeper, for status competition and consumerism to increase, for people to feel a greater sense of superiority or inferiority, for prejudices towards those lower on the social ladder to harden, for prisons to fill to overflowing under the impact of more punitive sentencing, and for people to seek solace in drugs.
Rather than dealing with inequality, some politicians find it tempting to blame "broken families", "bad parenting" and "damaged" children. Science has made huge leaps in understanding how our biology and psychology are affected by early life experiences, both in the womb and after. Children are deeply sensitive to family relationships and the quality of care. However, this sensitivity, and the way it shapes emotional and cognitive development, is not an evolutionary mistake.
It exists because early life serves as a taster of the kind of society that we may have to deal with in adulthood. It prepares children for the kind of society they are growing up in. Are they in a world of rivals, in which they will have to fight for what they can get, fend for themselves and learn not to trust others? Or will they need to gain one another's trust, dependent on co-operation and reciprocity, in a world where empathy and social skills are at a premium?
Whether through maternal stress in pregnancy, depression, domestic conflict or poor attachment, parents' experience of adversity in a more unequal dog-eat-dog society is passed on, with inevitable consequences for their children's cognitive and emotional development. Early intervention programmes may help but will be needed for ever unless we reduce inequality.
Because the children of single parents fare less well than children raised by two parents, it is sometimes suggested that our broken society results from broken families. In the revised paperback edition of our book The Spirit Level, we include an analysis of the effects of higher rates of single parenthood on levels of child wellbeing in rich countries. The proportion of single parents varies from under 4% in Greece to nearly 30% in Britain and the US, but this bears no relation to average levels of child wellbeing.
National standards of child wellbeing seem unaffected by high rates of single parenthood. The explanation is that the disadvantages of single parenthood are largely the result of higher rates of poverty and maternal depression. More equal countries seem to avoid ill effects by providing good services and keeping most of their single parents out of poverty.
The remedy for broken Britain is to reduce income inequality. Prime ministers who proclaim, as John Major did, that they want to create a classless society, will inevitably fail unless they reduce material differences. Similarly for those who want to give all children an equal chance in life: if the social ladder is steeper it becomes harder to climb and social mobility slows.
Greater equality improves the quality of life for everyone – not just the poor. Whatever your income or education, living in a more equal society means you will be likely to live longer while being less likely to suffer violence or have a problem with obesity. In turn, your children have a better chance of doing well at school and are less likely to use drugs or to become teenage parents. This is about the quality of life for all of us.
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