Inequality in the UK

[@illegalalien6199]

Sure would love to see this updated.

[@Bangandthedirtisgone]

We're basically returning to a Dickensian vision of bootblacks and chimney sweeps and Lords and Ladies. The upper crust couldn't be happier.

[@aaronjamesmoore757]

find yourself a nice Indian master lol

[@anka70571]

That looks like a horror move.

[@tw3ak1t9]

This answered many question, that I looked at endless webpages for, thank you.

[@olivermorland5226]

Good video. But the fact that social mobility is higher in 1970 than 1991 does not mean it's been getting consistently worse. I wish you'd shown a graph to see the fluctuations.

[@d4v1do]

Fair point

[@lewisjennings8019]

Wealth should be earned not distributed

[@Nepetita69696]

But what if most of the time it's not earned but passed on? Ever heard of the term "born into wealth"?

[@leekelly2818]

It's misleading to use social mobility as a measure of economic opportunity. The presumption is that people in each income/wealth category would take advantage of the same opportunities in the same proportion, but this is highly unlikely. Differences in culture and genes affect peoples' abilities and personalities, and so influence what opportunities people are capable of and interested in pursuing. In fact, we should expect a highly meritocratic society to exhibit less social mobility over time, even with perfect equality of opportunity. Why? Because there would be strong selection effects for particular culture and genes, so that people who are habitually more able and motivated to earn large incomes and/or acquire great wealth will tend to rise to the top.

[@jonathonmartin8563]

Over time this might be true but there are good reasons to suppose we are not there yet. First, many countries that have prima facie a lot more meritocracy also have a lot more social mobility. e.g. Finland. Finland has less wealth inequality, more equal schools and universities, free access to education and no class system. Yet Finland also has much higher social mobility than the UK. If we are to accept your argument then we must also accept that the social mobility in Finland is a new occurrence following a move to a more meritocratic system. This is not the case - Finland is becoming more equal. The other explanation is that Finland displays a natural level of social mobility for a meritocratic society. If that is the case, the decline in UK social mobility suggests the UK was never meritocratic and has gotten worse.

[@TheAwillz]

+Jonathon Martin Very good point.

[@dmell8304]

Well none of it would matter if we didn't encourage 'aspiration' through the threat hunger and homelessness. Interesting reading people's relaxed attitude toward other people's hardship.

[@linesided]

There's nothing wrong with the rich being rich, but there is a big problem with the poor being so poor. Basic income and a livable wage is essential to our society now.

[@alex29443]

The poor are technically richer than ever, it's just harder to stomach when the TV broadcasts pictures of extreme wealth held by morons all the time.

[@linesided]

@@alex29443 In some countries yes, in others no. Plus I would say Social Media has brought about more "gap anxiety" than ever before.

[@alex29443]

Counterpoint to the idea that inequality of opportunity is rising. In the 1940's the class system was still quite entrenched and it was unwound in the 50s and 60s quite a bit, so you had a lot of good families and good people rise up. Once those people left the general quality of people in the bottom 10-20% of earners is lower so they are less likely to rise out of poverty. The reduction of social mobility over time could be a much more fundamental and difficult problem than rich people hogging the good jobs for themselves and their mates, the social stratification might actually represent talent concentration at the top and failure concentration at the bottom.

[@Nepetita69696]

So... blame the poor because they're "failures"?

[@alex29443]

@@Nepetita69696 Not at all, I'm just pointing out that back in the 20's, there were a lot of highly educated and acomplished families unable to leave the working class because the class system was genuinely believed in by a lot of people. These families generally left the working class in the 50's 60's and 70's, and once they were gone, they left the working class culturally worse off. I'm not trying to blame anyone, and I don't think this is all of the explanation, I'm just considering that there is probably more than 1 reason for a fall in social mobility. People are in control of their own destiny to a large degree, if you've been raised right, educate yourself and keep your head up for opportunities, you will make progress. There is no use pretending that there are no poor communities with real morale and cultural rot that is holding them back. Obviously there are also some communities so completely beaten down by poverty that physically finding the time to look for better opportunities or educate yourself is impossible, but this is certaintly not even remotely common in the west, most people can make progress if they try.

[@walkerhaw5468]

Dan Pena is gonna fix the problem.

[@CEP_LSE]

For more explanation of the film's findings, see our interview with CEP director John Van Reenen Explaining Inequality in the UK

[@mks8172]

What about genetics and brain development.

[@vicky_chauhan9]

It is good if inequality based on class system.but in India inequality is based on caste system.

[@ThePostalGril]

they'd rather the poor stay poorer as long as the rich are less rich. everybody in the UK is better off than our grandparents were. somebody else being rich is not the reason you're less rich. that's like saying your car drives slow because somebody else's car drives faster. and if you're on a computer on the internet reading this while stuffing your face probably then you're not poor. you're not, you don't know what poor is. go live in The Congo a month then talk about poor. Nobody in the UK is poor. they're just not rich, and that's ok.

[@aomine6817]

this is heading towards feudalism, opportunity, my ass

[@JCSTUDIOZ98]

Wealth inequality surely has to be one of the most useless statistics, I'm sure we can all agree that we don't want anyone to be poor but comparing them to the top earners and saying they take home x amount less means nothing. For example, Bill Gates is much richer than I am, yet I am not poor. Another example would be South Sudan, who have very little wealth inequality but high levels of poverty. Vast amounts of studies show that if you want to not be poor then all you have is not have children out of wedlock and graduate high school. These are not hard. In fact, I think it is something around 75% of people who do this two things will be in the middle class in the U.S. in later life. Besides, what do we do about the poorest people in the u.k.? Take from the 'rich' and give to the poor which is morally reprehensible or ensure that they have equal opportunity to go to school etc (which is already done).

[@pessimisticperfectionist2152]

It never said you are poor? It's talking about wealth inequality. The unequal distribution of wealth. Bill Gates has much more wealth than you- so the wealth is clearly not evenly distributed.

[@JCSTUDIOZ98]

@@pessimisticperfectionist2152 Where in my comment do I say wealth is not evenly distributed?

[@pessimisticperfectionist2152]

@@JCSTUDIOZ98 I'm not saying you did. I'm saying you're using the term wealth inequality wrong in your point. Also they do show the middle classes in the graph as well- where you would be.

[@JCSTUDIOZ98]

@@pessimisticperfectionist2152 Not using it wrong at all, i was illustrating how useless of a statistics it can be. It can say nothing about how poor a person is, which is what matters.

[@pessimisticperfectionist2152]

@@JCSTUDIOZ98 It wasn't being used to say how poor someone is. We know how poor people are, we track their income.