Move Over, Climate Change Deniers

[marmar]

from Too Much: A Commentary on Excess and Inequality:



Move Over, Climate Change Deniers
July 18, 2010 ⋅

Make room for a new right-wing assault on scientific research. In the cross-hairs this time: the massive epidemiological evidence on inequality’s horrific toll on our health and overall well-being.

By Sam Pizzigati


Just over three decades ago, in 1979, an obscure research paper began a scientific revolution — on how we think about what makes us healthy.

Up until then, epidemiologists — scientists who study the health of populations — had seen a simple and straightforward relationship between wealth and health. The wealthier a society, they believed, the healthier that society would be.

But that 1979 paper introduced a new factor into this simple equation: wealth’s distribution. People who live in more equal societies, the paper reported, appear to enjoy better health than people who live in more unequal societies.

In due course, hundreds of other epidemiological studies would test — and substantiate — this same phenomenon.

People, investigators would repeatedly find, do indeed live healthier as nations grow economically and create more wealth, but only up to a point. Among already developed nations, the best health outcomes don’t come in the richest societies. They come in societies that distribute riches the most equally.

Other investigators would find this same relationship on other benchmarks of social decency. They began showing that people don’t just live longer in more equal societies. They trust each other more. They bully each other less. In equal societies, infants die much less frequently and adults grow obese much less often. .........(more)

The complete piece is at: http://toomuchonline.org/move-over-climate-change-deniers/

[lunatica]

1. Sometimes the obvious needs to be stated

Never underestimate the power of stating the obvious either. It isn't always that obvious.

[DirkGently]

2. Good find, and good point.