Wilkinson RG. Health, redistribution and growth.. In: Paying for inequality: the economic cost of social injustice. Edited by A. Glyn and D. Miliband. London: Rivers Oram Press, 1994.

Wilkinson argues that everyone's desire for additional income cannot be aggregated into a desire for economic growth. Instead, the utility of additional individual income is in improving ones relative income and position in society. Politically respectable justification for increased economic growth has been the belief that the poor in rich countries lack material goods but it is more likely their relative disparity and the resulting unhappiness caused by that disparity. The rest of the book is important for providing information other factors resulting from increasing income inequality, as well as pointing out that countries with more equality have faster economic growth. The book itself is valuable for looking at other effects of inequality on society.

Keywords

• economic
• growth
• health inequalities
• income
• income inequality
• life expectancy
• international
• material deprivation
• mortality
• redistribution
• relative deprivation