The Broken Ladder: How Inequality Changes the Way We Think, Live and Die

the goal is to adjust the level of inequality to a more human scale, one that gives people ample room to compete and to move up in their lives, without making economic competition a winner-take-all contest.

“fundamental attribution error.”

The test subjects allocated the wealthiest quintile in this scenario about a third of the wealth, and the poorest group about 10 percent.

It becomes ever more difficult to see those on the other side of the aisle as well-meaning individuals who share our goals but differ in what they believe are the best means to reach them. Instead, the other side begins to look more and more like enemies.

When a sense of meaning is what we are looking for, we tend toward the epic.

Reducing inequality, similarly, has the potential to address scores of problems at once. But that requires moving away from seeing inequality through a moralizing lens. Instead, I believe we have to view inequality as a public health problem.

a large percentage—typically between 50 percent and 80 percent—fail to notice the switch and go on to give plausible-sounding reasons for choices they did not make.

When stress hormones stop insulin from storing glucose for extended periods of time, we are at greater risk for diabetes and obesity. When they make the heart pump harder and the blood vessels constrict for months on end, we become prone to cardiovascular disease. And when inflammation goes unchecked, the immune system can become overactive—so eage

subjects who see the world as a threatening and dangerous place tend to be more politically conservative.

about 70 percent of a company’s performance, for which the CEO normally gets credit and blame, is a matter of pure random chance.