The poor and excluded, and even the "squeezed middle" of the population in those societies with these economies, will be ill-disposed towards attempts at reducing inequalities between societies, when they are increasingly so hard-pressed and suffering from a lack of well-being in their own societies. Much evidence on the negative consequences of gross and unjustified inequality within the US/Anglo societies themselves has been accumulating since the pioneering work, "The Spirit Level" by Wilkinson and Pickett. (See this comment online at www.oecdobserver.org for link to UNICEF reference)

—Edward Harkins, posted on www.oecdobserver.org

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©OECD Observer No 296, Q3 2013