London
Letting economic inequality flourish in a country can turn its citizens unhappy, found a new study.
The research, which has been carried out by Dr David Bartram at the University of Leicester, will be presented at the British Sociological Associationâs online annual conference to be held on April 21, said media reports.
The study was conducted in 78 countries for around four decades. It makes it the largest longitudinal research of its kind.
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âWhen inequality increases, people with high incomes donât benefit much from their gains â many rich people are focused on those who have even more than they do, and they never feel they have enough. But people who earn little really suffer from falling further behind â they feel excluded and frustrated by not being able to keep up even with people who receive average incomes,â Bartram told the Guardian.
The research has examined survey data of life satisfaction levels. In it, people gave a rating to their life satisfaction on a scale of one to 10. It also linked it to Gini coefficient numbers, which is a measure of inequality, from 1981 to 2020.
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In 1981, life satisfaction in the UK was 7.7 when it was witnessing a recession. Later, economic boom occurred leading to inequality and the figure dropped to 7.4 by 1999.
âThe data from the UK feeds into a more general finding â in wealthy countries increased inequality has a substantial negative impact on life satisfaction, and inequality has increased in most wealthy countries in recent decades,â Bartram added.
(With inputs from agencies)