The Guardian allowed David Cameron’s favourite think tank — Policy Exchange to launch comment on their latest report on the Comment is Free website.
In a piece headed “The Spirit Level is not on the level” and subtitled “A new report fatally undermines the [Spirit Level’s] authors' claims about the link between income equality and social problems” the Policy Exchange editor of the report in question says:
Beware False Prophets is a hard-hitting critique that shines a powerful spotlight on the flaws in the analysis, assumptions and conclusions of The Spirit Level. We all want to improve people's quality of life and tackle deep-rooted social ills, but as Saunders clearly identifies, the case for radical income distribution to achieve this is no more compelling now than it was before The Spirit Level was published.
Two instant reactions overwhelm any reasonable reader of this really nasty comment. The first is that when Conservative thinking is all about more material well being as the solution to all personal ills such a comment, so blatantly intended within the subtext to say sufficient income is to be enjoyed by a minority and not to be shared with a majority , is so obviously hypocritical that all else the author says is to be doubted.
Second, you’re left feeling, having read the book and having seen so much research suggesting similar conclusions, that it would be stunning that if a work of real quality proving Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett were wrong was to be published then Policy Exchange would be the likely publisher.
And of course the Policy Exchange paper is wrong — as even the briefest review shows. But perhaps that destruction is best left to the Spirit Level authors who have issued a statement saying:
Beware False Rebuttals
A response by the authors of The Spirit Level to a report by Peter Saunders (Beware False Prophets), published by Policy Exchange
Responding to the new report by Peter Saunders, published today by Policy Exchange, Professor Richard Wilkinson & Professor Kate Pickett said:
“We welcome open debate of our findings that more equal societies do better, but Peter Saunders' analysis contains serious methodological errors. There are many peer reviewed analyses of relationships with inequality carried out by other researchers which support The Spirit Level's conclusions. In particular there is substantial evidence elsewhere that infant mortality, life expectancy, violence, trust, social capital and school bullying are all worse in more unequal societies. The evidence for the benefits of greater income equality remains compelling.”
The Spirit Level is based on many decades of research by its authors and other respected academics — it represents a synthesis of research and critical thought that has been subjected to stringent and robust quality control before being widely disseminated.
All analyses of income inequality and health and social problems in The Spirit Levelhave been either: (a) replicated by other researchers, in some cases hundreds of times, or (b) published in peer-reviewed academic journals This is fully referenced in The Spirit Level, but Peter Saunders is either unaware of this very large body of evidence or has chosen to ignore it. (1)
The selective removal of countries suggested by Peter Saunders does not have the effect of removing the relationship between inequality and health & social problems. The Index of Social Problems (http://www.equalitytrust.org.uk/images/index-graph-inequality.jpg) remains statistically significant even if those countries suggested for removal - Japan, Norway, Sweden, Finland, USA and Portugal - are disregarded.
Peter Saunders analysis includes much poorer countries. The Spirit Level explicitly restricts analysis to rich, developed market democracies, where average levels of income are no longer related to average life expectancy, happiness or quality of life.Confining the analysis to the richest countries very clearly demonstrates the effects of relative income (Fig 1.4 in The Spirit Level) which contrast so clearly with the lack of effect of absolute income (Figure 1.3 in The Spirit Level). By including poorer countries the sharp distinction between relative and absolute income is lost. (2)
Saunders is wrong to claim, in analyses of the US states, that many of the associations are explained by the proportion of African Americans in each state. There is a detailed, empirical argument against Saunders' claim and other researchers also show his analysis is incorrect. (3)
Saunders misunderstands the evidence that shows that almost everyone does better in more equal societies. The Spirit Level does not say that everybody in a more equal society does better than the highest social class and income groups in a less equal country. It shows that for any given social class or income level, people do better than their class or income counterparts who live in a less equal society. (4)
The Spirit Level is sometimes called a 'theory of everything' but the book makes it clear that it is a theory of problems which have a social gradient — that is, problems which become more common further down the social and income ladder. Saunders ignores this and chooses counter examples such as suicide rates which do not have this social gradient.
And so what does one really conclude of the Policy Exchange paper? Simply this: that it is further example of the sheer nastiness of the Tory party — the left of the Tory party on this occasion. These people hate those not on above average income. It is clear they not only want them to suffer inequality and all that goes with it — but to increase that inequality — as the plan they put forward in the budget to create mass unemployment proves.
You were right Theresa May when long ago you termed your own party the Nasty Party.
But you may have understated the case for just how nasty it is.
Thanks for reading this post.
You can share this post on social media of your choice by clicking these icons:
You can subscribe to this blog's daily email here.
And if you would like to support this blog you can, here:
“We all want to improve people’s quality of life and tackle deep-rooted social ills”
I wonder if he typed that with a straight face.
This comment has been deleted. It failed the moderation policy noted here. http://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/comments/. The editor’s decision on this matter is final.
Exactly the same as global warming denialism: respond to careful research a load of old cock, and hey presto, you’ve got a “debate”. You can insist that the churnalists “report both sides of the debate” and label the original work “controversial” etc etc, anything to sow the seeds of doubt over the findings in the casual observer.
A technique pioneered by the tobacco industry’s PRs as is well documented by Monbiot etc
Theresa May didn’t ‘term’ her own party the Nasty party, as you well know. She merely drew attention to the problem of the Tories being PERCEIVED as nasty:
“Yes, we’ve made progress, but let’s not kid ourselves. There’s a way to go before we can return to government. There’s a lot we need to do in this party of ours. Our base is too narrow and so, occasionally, are our sympathies, You know what some people call us: the nasty party.”
By the way, The Spirit Level IS poor science and is being proved to be poor science. There is nothing ‘nasty’ about telling the truth.
@Chris Snowdon
I am assured by others that the Spirit Level is not poor science
I am not a scientist
In my opinion it has all the weaknesses inherent in the use of statistics in it
But it finds convincing evidence, honestly presented that supports a hypothesis and that is it seems to me good science
What you are saying I think is you don’t like the hypothesis and wish to find alternative evidence
I think that a very different assertion
And your truth is not the truth – any more than the Spirit Level is true. It is an assertion
Please recall that
We do not live in a black and white world
On the other hand – nastiness and class hatred can be spotted a mile off
This comment has been deleted. It failed the moderation policy noted here. http://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/comments/. The editor’s decision on this matter is final.
This comment has been deleted. It failed the moderation policy noted here. http://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/comments/. The editor’s decision on this matter is final.
There is no doubt that the politics is nasty – in the economic “war for survival” they have called, the government is using children, the old and the sick as its frontline troops.
However, it seems to me that what motivates the Conservatives and Liberals is not nastiness for its own sake, but rather fear, and fear grounded on understandable insecurity. David Cameron was a millionaire in his crib – how can that possibly be justified in terms of any need or contribution made to society? Obviously it can’t. Neither he nor his kids will ever rely on work to provide their food and shelter – how can he understand what losing a job through no fault of one’s own feels like? He can’t. But he can very much fear losing all that and know that a society that distributes wealth so unequally and so much by chance is unjust in a fundamental way – and that maintaining the kind of life he and his family have means fighting to keep that injustice in place. Which leads directly to nasty policies.
Pete
@Chris Snowdon
I have read “The Spirit Level”, Chris. It seems to me that it actually uses evidence rther than the bigotry we have come to expect from the Tories who never have any evidence for what they say, except smears, hate and promotion of fear. Your mere assertion that The Spirit Level is poor science is just a groudless assertion from someone who cares nothing for anything but money. You merely reinforce the Tory stereotype.
Okay, my previous comments were deleted. But surely if I just say that Wilkinson’s conclusions disappear when you include countries that don’t agree with his conclusions, and direct readers to the book The Spirit Level Delusion, and ask them to do a google search for “site:super-economy.blogspot.com spirit level” where they can find two exchanges with Wilkinson and a few other critical posts… if I just say that, surely that will get through? Surely this comment won’t be deleted?
@Hugo
Your previous comments were abusive
And there is good reason why Wilkinson chose his sample – as he properly explains in his book
he sought to exclude absolute inequality from comparative inequality
Since he was testing the latter he was right to do so
Anything else would be comparing apples and oranges
In suspect that’s what others do
The right is good at that
P.S. I think you mean “absolute poverty” and “comparative poverty”. What’s “absolute inequality” and/or “comparative inequality”, and what’s the difference? I know “relative poverty” was always an Orwellian attempt to confuse poverty with inequality, but I wasn’t aware that the left finally had started using the words interchangeably.
It reminds me of a story I heard the other day about a business where they referred to “problems” as “opportunities”, until someone said they had an “insurmountable opportunity”!
An example from Snowdon:
They use the United Nations Human Development Report as a source. Sometimes they use the 2004 edition, sometimes the 2006. Why? Because the effects they get when they use the 2004 edition disappear if you try to recreate them using the 2006!
@Hugo
And much much more likely – this reflects the data available when the work was done
@Hugo
The book is about inequality
I think I meant what I meant
Maybe you just don’t get it
@Hugo
I think we have the message that you have an obsession with this issue
But I am not offering you space to share it