On Saturday 25th of October The Equality Trust held Inequality Today 2014. The event included a presentation by Lord Turner on the effects of inequality, a Q+A including Professors Kate Pickett and Richard Wilkinson, and a sneak peek of previously unseen footage from the forthcoming Spirit Level documentary.
In our first session Katharine Round, Producer of the Spirit Level documentary, showed a collection of clips involving those interviewed by her in the development of the film. These included people from all areas of the income spectrum discussing the effects of inequality on their lives – fast-food chain employees, financial services workers, journalists, economists and many others. Katharine said she wanted people to connect emotionally with the film and those interviewed, but that she also felt it was important to tell the story of how inequality has grown.
In our second session Lord Turner provided an insightful presentation on the drivers of inequality, implications for our economy and workforce and possible solutions to reduce it. Lord Turner outlined four key drivers of inequality – globalisation and competition, immigration, a political element including the erosion of union power, and technological changes. He argued that we may find ourselves on the edge of a quite dramatic automation of jobs and functions, and that this would have profound implications for labour. In this context, he suggested many of the usual methods cited to reduce inequality may not work, and that difficult decisions would need to be made in order for the growth of inequality not to become a feature of our economy.
We would like to thank all contributors, as well as all those who attended and provided support.
More on the comments and thoughts of contributors can be found on twitter by searching for #inequality2014.