 |
The Great Wealth Divide. Photo: BBC
World Service
|
Updated: 06/02/2012
Last week I had the good fortune to stumble across a great little two-part radio documentary on the BBC World Service called The Wealth Gap: The View from London. The programme vividly brought to life how our lives are shaped by inequality. It also succeeded in conveying the complex nature of inequality and the challenge it presents to policy-makers wishing to take steps to reduce it.
2012: a year defined by inequality?
Inequality and the widening gap between the richest and the poorest in our society has hardly been out headlines of late. Wherever you look, from the recent political jockeying over the size of Stephen Hester's bonus to the ongoing high-profile protests organisers by the likes of Occupy movement and UK Uncut, it seems, at a rhetorical level at least, everyone is agreed that 'something has to be done' about inequality.
Throw in some added economic gloom for good measure and the timing of The Wealth Gap's broadcast starts to look like an inspired move on the part of the BBC World Service (itself a victim of deep reductions in public funding).
The Wealth Gap: Economics with a Human Face
The
Wealth Gap's chief strength is that it succeeds in turning what
could easily be a very dry discussion about economics and statistics into a
gripping human interest drama with a satisfyingly complete three-act narrative
arc. Well, not quite, but the producers of The Wealth Gap should be
commended for bringing out the human impact of widening inequality without
sacrificing the underlying substance.
The programme focuses on inequality through the lives of people living in London, one of the most-international cities and a magnet for many of the wealthiest people. At the start of the first episode we're told that rising inequality is a global phenomenon, with statistics in both developed and emerging economies showing an increasing share of income and wealth is held by an ever-narrower elite. After that, however, we're given the chance to focus on the lives of different people living in the capital and how they relate to inequality.
Home
is where the heartache is
The focus of the first episode is London's over-heated housing market. We hear from a range of voices: an an estate agent who has witnessed first-hand the rise of 'super-prime' £5 million+ properties; a low income family with young children experience over-crowding and a senior teacher who cannot afford to buy a property within commuting distance of her school. These voices bring to life what it feels like to live in a city where housing has become ever more expensive as people at the top end of the income distribution, whose earnings have outstripped those of the population as a whole over the past thirty years or so, continue to exert upward pressure on housing prices.
Sufficed to say, after the first episode my moral indignation at rising levels of inequality was turned up to 11. What's new, you might say? Luckily, episode two of The Wealth Gap came along an shook me out of my comfort zone by suggesting that inequality can also bring with it certain benefits and, gulp, maybe we should in fact show a little more gratitude for the super-rich and the jobs they support.
Let's hear it for the 1 per cent
Making the case for inequality, we hear from management and shop-floor staff from a company that produces luxury £80,000 beds fit and another company that arranges bespoke experiences for super-rich clients. As unpopular as they may with the public at large, are the world's super-rich an important source of jobs in London. Similarly, despite everything we know (and even more we don't) about the consequences of tax avoidance and tax evasion. Paul Johnson, Director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, tells us that the top 1 per cent of earners now contribute to around 28 per cent of all income tax paid in the UK, an increase from 11 per cent in the late 1970s. While Paul is quick to point out that this change reflects the extent to which incomes of the super rich have grown, it also shows the extent to which current levels of public spending are dependent on high levels of income inequality.
Living with complexity
Given the recent brouhaha over bankers' bonuses and executive pay, there was something refreshing and daring about The Wealth Gap being prepared to make the case for the super-rich. While I remain unconvinced that the growing inequality we are experiencing in London is neither inevitable nor is it a price worth paying for the tax base and jobs the super-rich support, I feel I have a better appreciation of just how complex the issue is. As someone who is keen to see a progressive future I would have liked to have seen more attention given to the practical steps we as a society and through our individual actions can take action to manage and ultimately reduce levels of inequality but this is a huge subject in of itself.
If you hurry you should still be able to find both episodes of The Wealth Gap on BBC iPlayer. and as a podcast download.
What did you think of the programme? Do you think rising levels of inequality are a fact of life? Would we be better off spending our time focusing on other matters? Feel free to get in touch and share your thoughts and experiences of inequality.
The focus of the first episode is London's over-heated housing market. We hear from a range of voices: an an estate agent who has witnessed first-hand the rise of 'super-prime' £5 million+ properties; a low income family with young children experience over-crowding and a senior teacher who cannot afford to buy a property within commuting distance of her school. These voices bring to life what it feels like to live in a city where housing has become ever more expensive as people at the top end of the income distribution, whose earnings have outstripped those of the population as a whole over the past thirty years or so, continue to exert upward pressure on housing prices.
Sufficed to say, after the first episode my moral indignation at rising levels of inequality was turned up to 11. What's new, you might say? Luckily, episode two of The Wealth Gap came along an shook me out of my comfort zone by suggesting that inequality can also bring with it certain benefits and, gulp, maybe we should in fact show a little more gratitude for the super-rich and the jobs they support.
Let's hear it for the 1 per cent
Making the case for inequality, we hear from management and shop-floor staff from a company that produces luxury £80,000 beds fit and another company that arranges bespoke experiences for super-rich clients. As unpopular as they may with the public at large, are the world's super-rich an important source of jobs in London. Similarly, despite everything we know (and even more we don't) about the consequences of tax avoidance and tax evasion. Paul Johnson, Director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, tells us that the top 1 per cent of earners now contribute to around 28 per cent of all income tax paid in the UK, an increase from 11 per cent in the late 1970s. While Paul is quick to point out that this change reflects the extent to which incomes of the super rich have grown, it also shows the extent to which current levels of public spending are dependent on high levels of income inequality.
Living with complexity
Given the recent brouhaha over bankers' bonuses and executive pay, there was something refreshing and daring about The Wealth Gap being prepared to make the case for the super-rich. While I remain unconvinced that the growing inequality we are experiencing in London is neither inevitable nor is it a price worth paying for the tax base and jobs the super-rich support, I feel I have a better appreciation of just how complex the issue is. As someone who is keen to see a progressive future I would have liked to have seen more attention given to the practical steps we as a society and through our individual actions can take action to manage and ultimately reduce levels of inequality but this is a huge subject in of itself.
If you hurry you should still be able to find both episodes of The Wealth Gap on BBC iPlayer. and as a podcast download.
What did you think of the programme? Do you think rising levels of inequality are a fact of life? Would we be better off spending our time focusing on other matters? Feel free to get in touch and share your thoughts and experiences of inequality.
No comments:
Post a Comment