Abstract
This chapter discusses the impact that economic inequality has on people’s desire for wealth and status. We first review three major perspectives from previous work suggesting a potential association between higher inequality and a greater desire for wealth and status: the social comparison perspective, the neo-material perspective, and the status anxiety perspective. In order to understand when (and for whom) this “higher inequality–greater desire” association is likely to be salient, we then propose a social identity perspective considering socio-structural factors such as the feasibility to achieve upward mobility in an unequal society and the stability and legitimacy of existing levels of inequality. According to the social identity perspective, we argue that in unequal societies both the “have-nots” and the “haves” are likely to be motivated to pursue more wealth and status, but for different reasons. We then report evidence from our recent research that not only provides evidence of the “higher inequality–greater desire” link but also shows that this link varies as a function of social class. We further discuss implications of these findings and suggest directions for future research.
This research was supported in part by an International Postgraduate Research Scholarship (IPRS) awarded to the first author and by a grant from the Australian Research Council Discovery (DP120100053) awarded to the second author.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Bowles, S., & Park, Y. (2005). Emulation, inequality, and work hours: Was Thorsten Veblen right? The Economic Journal, 115(507), F397–F412. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-0297.2005.01042.x
Callan, M. J., Shead, N. W., & Olson, J. M. (2015). The relation between personal relative deprivation and the urge to gamble among gamblers is moderated by problem gambling severity: A meta-analysis. Addictive Behaviors, 45, 146–149. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.addbeh.2015.01.031
Card, D., Mas, A., Moretti, E., & Saez, E. (2012). Inequality at work: The effect of peer salaries on job satisfaction. American Economic Review, 102(6), 2981–3003. https://doi.org/10.1257/aer.102.6.2981
Cheung, F. (2015). Can income inequality be associated with positive outcomes? Hope mediates the positive inequality–happiness link in rural China. Social Psychological and Personality Science, 7(4), 320–330. https://doi.org/10.1177/1948550615619762
Clark, A. E., Kristensen, N., & Westergård-Nielsen, N. (2009). Job satisfaction and co-worker wages: Status or signal? The Economic Journal, 119(536), 430–447. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-0297.2008.02236.x
Côté, S., House, J., & Willer, R. (2015). High economic inequality leads higher-income individuals to be less generous. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 112(52), 15838–15843. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1511536112
Festinger, L. (1954). A theory of social comparison processes. Human Relations, 7(2), 117–140. https://doi.org/10.1177/001872675400700202
Greitemeyer, T., & Sagioglou, C. (2016). Subjective socioeconomic status causes aggression: A test of the theory of social deprivation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 111(2), 178–194. https://doi.org/10.1037/pspi0000058
Haslam, S. A. (2004). Psychology in organizations: The social identity approach (2nd ed.). London, UK: Sage Publications Ltd.
Hirschman, A. O. (1973). The changing tolerance for income inequality in the course of economic development. The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 87(4), 544–566. https://doi.org/10.2307/1882024
Jetten, J. (2019). The wealth paradox: Prosperity and opposition to immigration. European Journal of Social Psychology, https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.2552.
Jetten, J., Mols, F., & Postmes, T. (2015). Relative deprivation and relative wealth enhances anti-immigrant sentiments: The v-curve re-examined. PLoS One, 10(10), e0139156. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0139156
Jetten, J., Wang, Z., Steffens, N. K., Mols, F., Peters, K., & Verkuyten, M. (2017). A social identity analysis of responses to economic inequality. Current Opinion in Psychology, 18, 1–5. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.copsyc.2017.05.011
Kiatpongsan, S., & Norton, M. I. (2014). How much (more) should CEOs make? A universal desire for more equal pay. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 9(6), 587–593. https://doi.org/10.1177/1745691614549773
Kondo, N., Sembajwe, G., Kawachi, I., van Dam, R. M., Subramanian, S. V., & Yamagata, Z. (2009). Income inequality, mortality, and self rated health: Meta-analysis of multilevel studies. BMJ, 339, 1–9. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.b4471
Kondo, N., van Dam, R. M., Sembajwe, G., Subramanian, S. V., Kawachi, I., & Yamagata, Z. (2012). Income inequality and health: The role of population size, inequality threshold, period effects and lag effects. Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, 66(6), 1–6. https://doi.org/10.1136/jech-2011-200321
Layte, R. (2012). The association between income inequality and mental health: Testing status anxiety, social capital, and neo-materialist explanations. European Sociological Review, 28(4), 498–511. https://doi.org/10.1093/esr/jcr012
Layte, R., & Whelan, C. T. (2014). Who feels inferior? A test of the status anxiety hypothesis of social inequalities in health. European Sociological Review, 30(4), 525–535. https://doi.org/10.1093/esr/jcu057
Lynch, J. W., Smith, G. D., Kaplan, G. A., & House, J. S. (2000). Income inequality and mortality: Importance to health of individual income, psychosocial environment, or material conditions. BMJ, 320(7243), 1200. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.320.7243.1200
Marx, K., & Engels, F. (1969). Manifesto of the communist party (S. Moore, Trans.). In Marx/Engels selected works, Vol. 1 (pp. 98–137). Moscow, USSR: Progress Publishers. (Original work published 1848) Retrieved from https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/index.htm
Mols, F., & Jetten, J. (2017). The wealth paradox: Economic prosperity and the hardening of attitudes. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
Newman, B. J., Johnston, C. D., & Lown, P. L. (2015). False consciousness or class awareness? Local income inequality, personal economic position, and belief in American meritocracy. American Journal of Political Science, 59(2), 326–340. https://doi.org/10.1111/ajps.12153
Norton, M. I. (2014). Unequality: Who gets what and why it matters. Policy Insights From the Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 1(1), 151–155. https://doi.org/10.1177/2372732214550167
Norton, M. I., & Ariely, D. (2011). Building a better America—One wealth quintile at a time. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 6(1), 9–12. https://doi.org/10.1177/1745691610393524
Olson, J. M., Roesesc, N. J., Meen, J., & Robertson, D. J. (1995). The preconditions and consequences of relative deprivation: Two field studies. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 25(11), 944–964. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1559-1816.1995.tb02384.x
Paskov, M., Gërxhani, K., & van de Werfhorst, H. G. (2013). Income inequality and status anxiety. Retrieved from Amsterdam: http://www.gini-research.org/system/uploads/546/original/90.pdf
Paskov, M., Gërxhani, K., & van de Werfhorst, H. G. (2016). Giving up on the Joneses? The relationship between income inequality and status-seeking. European Sociological Review, 33(1), 112–123. https://doi.org/10.1093/esr/jcw052
Payne, B. K., Brown-Iannuzzi, J. L., & Hannay, J. W. (2017). Economic inequality increases risk taking. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 114(18), 4643–4648. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1616453114
Piketty, T., & Saez, E. (2014). Inequality in the long run. Science, 344(6186), 838–843. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1251936
Ravallion, M. (2014). Income inequality in the developing world. Science, 344(6186), 851–855. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1251875
Ritzen, J., & Woolcock, M. (2000). Social cohesion, public policy, and economic growth: Implications for countries in transition. Retrieved from Annual Bank Coference on Development Economics (Europe): http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/914451468781802758/820140748_200404140033848/additional/28741.pdf
Roth, B., Hahn, E., & Spinath, F. M. (2016). Income inequality, life satisfaction, and economic worries. Social Psychological and Personality Science, 8(2), 133–141. https://doi.org/10.1177/1948550616664955
Rousseau, J.-J. (1950). A discourse on the origin of inequality (G. D. H. Cole, Trans.). New York, NY: Everyman’s Library (Original work published 1754).
Runciman, W. G. (1966). Relative deprivation and social justice: A study of attitudes to social inequality in twentieth-century England. London, UK: Routledge and Kegan Paul.
Scheepers, D. (2009). Turning social identity threat into challenge: Status stability and cardiovascular reactivity during inter-group competition. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 45(1), 228–233. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jesp.2008.09.011
Scheepers, D. (2017). Intergroup status differences as challenge or threat: The role of legitimacy. Group Processes & Intergroup Relations, 20(1), 75–90. https://doi.org/10.1177/1368430215595108
Scheidel, W. (2017). The great leveler: Violence and the history of inequality from the Stone Age to the twenty-first century. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Solt, F. (2008). Economic inequality and democratic political engagement. American Journal of Political Science, 52(1), 48–60. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-5907.2007.00298.x
Sprong, S., Jetten, J., Wang, Z., Peters, K., Mols, F., Verkuyten, M.,... Wohl, M. (2019). “Our country needs a strong leader right now”: Inequality enhances the wish for a strong leader. Psychological Science, in press.
Starmans, C., Sheskin, M., & Bloom, P. (2017). Why people prefer unequal societies. Nature Human Behaviour, 1, 0082. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-017-0082
Stewart, M. (2018). The 9.9 percent is the new American aristocracy. The Atlantic. Retrieved from https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/06/the-birth-of-a-new-american-aristocracy/559130/
Tajfel, H., & Turner, J. C. (1979). An integrative theory of intergroup conflict. In W. G. Austin & S. Worchel (Eds.), The social psychology of intergroup relations (pp. 33–48). Monterey, CA: Brooks/Cole.
The Urban Institute. (2017). Nine charts about wealth inequality in America. Retrieved from http://apps.urban.org/features/wealth-inequality-charts/
Turner, J. C., & Brown, R. (1978). Social status, cognitive alternatives and intergroup relations. In H. Tajfel (Ed.), Differentiation between social groups: Studies in the social psychology of intergroup relations (pp. 201–234). London, UK: Academic Press.
Twenge, J. M., Campbell, W. K., & Carter, N. T. (2014). Declines in trust in others and confidence in institutions among American adults and late adolescents, 1972–2012. Psychological Science, 25(10), 1914–1923. https://doi.org/10.1177/0956797614545133
Uslaner, E. M., & Brown, M. (2005). Inequality, trust, and civic engagement. American Politics Research, 33(6), 868–894. https://doi.org/10.1177/1532673X04271903
U.S. Census Bureau. (2017). Income and poverty in the United States, 2016. Retrieved from https://www.census.gov/library/publications/2017/demo/p60-259.html
Van de Werfhorst, H. G., & Salverda, W. (2012). Consequences of economic inequality: Introduction to a special issue. Research in Social Stratification and Mobility, 30(4), 377–387. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rssm.2012.08.001
van Deurzen, I., van Oorschot, W., & van Ingen, E. (2014). The link between inequality and population health in low and middle income countries: Policy myth or social reality? PLoS One, 9(12), e115109. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0115109
van Hoorn, A. (2017). Informational content of relative deprivation as a channel linking economic inequality to risk taking. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 114(25), E4899. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1706625114
Walasek, L., & Brown, G. D. A. (2015). Income inequality and status seeking: Searching for positional goods in unequal U.S. states. Psychological Science, 26(4), 527–533. https://doi.org/10.1177/0956797614567511
Walker, I., & Smith, H. J. (Eds.). (2002). Relative deprivation: Specification, development, and integration. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
Wang, Z., Jetten, J., & Steffens, N. K. (2019). Economic inequality and heightened desire for wealth and status. Manuscript submitted for publication.
Wilkinson, R., & Pickett, K. (2010). The spirit level: Why equality is better for everyone. London, UK: Penguin.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2019 Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Wang, Z., Jetten, J., Steffens, N.K. (2019). Do People Want More Wealth and Status in Unequal Societies?. In: Jetten, J., Peters, K. (eds) The Social Psychology of Inequality. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-28856-3_18
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-28856-3_18
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-28855-6
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-28856-3
eBook Packages: Behavioral Science and PsychologyBehavioral Science and Psychology (R0)