Societal Inequality, Health and Well-Being

Abstract

This chapter considers well-being at the ecological level and investigates the relationship between happiness and inequality across Britain. The chapter briefly reviews the theoretical background of happiness research and also considers its relevance to public policy. It can be argued that societies that are extremely polarized and divided are less desirable, and less ‘well’ than those which have elements of equity and communitarianism as their core values and principles.

A house may be large or small; as long as the neighboring [sic] houses are likewise small, it satisfies all social requirement for a residence. But let there arise next to the little house a palace, and the little house shrinks to a hut. The little house now makes it clear that its inmate has no social position at all to maintain, or but a very insignificant one; and however high it may shoot up in the course of civilization, if the neighboring [sic] palace rises in equal or even in greater measure, the occupant of the relatively little house will always find himself more uncomfortable, more dissatisfied, more cramped within his four walls. (Marx 1847)

In three dozen neighbourhoods of London and three in Glasgow most children aged under five are living in housing, provided by the state, with too few rooms for their family according to the 2001 census. The same source suggests that most under fives in Britain are growing up in homes, small palaces, with a surfeit of rooms. (Thomas and Dorling 2007)