36 The geography of poverty, inequality and wealth in the UK and abroad
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Daniel Dorling
Abstract
This paper considers the temporal changes in levels of recorded poverty in Britain distinguishing between times of anecdotal reporting (1845–1901); the first national counts and geographical distribution descriptions (1895–1965); to the current era of an industry dedicated to poverty counting and cartography (1968–2008).The persistence to the geography of poverty over time is remarked upon and speculated over. In conclusion it is argued that it is important to understand the distribution of wealth to better understand poverty.
At the very centres of the twin hearts of the world economy, in London and New York, great wealth and miserable poverty are located only a stone’s throw apart. We now know how unequal we are in great detail. But how did we get to know this detail so well? There are many stories that give an answer. This particular story goes back a century and more to the four hundredth odd page of the 186th volume of the Philosophical Transactions of London. London is the most unequal part of the United Kingdom, a city of even greater social contrasts now than it was then.
At the foot of page 404 of Volume 186 of the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, Series A (Mathematical), is a reference to an obscure diagram labelled “Plate 14, Figure 17: Statistics of Pauperism in England and Wales, distribution of 632 Unions, 1891.”The diagram shows several curves and is reproduced as Figure 1 here. The curves describe the probability distribution for paupers by Poor Law Union (area), ranging from 1% up to almost 8.5% of the population of some areas of England and Wales, but with a mean about 3.5% and: “the observations are at once seen to give a markedly skew distribution” (Pearson 1895, p. 404–405).
Abstract
This paper considers the temporal changes in levels of recorded poverty in Britain distinguishing between times of anecdotal reporting (1845–1901); the first national counts and geographical distribution descriptions (1895–1965); to the current era of an industry dedicated to poverty counting and cartography (1968–2008).The persistence to the geography of poverty over time is remarked upon and speculated over. In conclusion it is argued that it is important to understand the distribution of wealth to better understand poverty.
At the very centres of the twin hearts of the world economy, in London and New York, great wealth and miserable poverty are located only a stone’s throw apart. We now know how unequal we are in great detail. But how did we get to know this detail so well? There are many stories that give an answer. This particular story goes back a century and more to the four hundredth odd page of the 186th volume of the Philosophical Transactions of London. London is the most unequal part of the United Kingdom, a city of even greater social contrasts now than it was then.
At the foot of page 404 of Volume 186 of the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, Series A (Mathematical), is a reference to an obscure diagram labelled “Plate 14, Figure 17: Statistics of Pauperism in England and Wales, distribution of 632 Unions, 1891.”The diagram shows several curves and is reproduced as Figure 1 here. The curves describe the probability distribution for paupers by Poor Law Union (area), ranging from 1% up to almost 8.5% of the population of some areas of England and Wales, but with a mean about 3.5% and: “the observations are at once seen to give a markedly skew distribution” (Pearson 1895, p. 404–405).
Chapters in this book
- Front Matter i
- Contents v
- Sources of extracts vii
- Foreword xi
- Acknowledgements xiv
- Introduction 1
-
Inequality and poverty
- Prime suspect: murder in Britain 13
- The dream that turned pear-shaped 31
- The soul searching within New Labour 41
- Unequal Britain 49
- Axing the child poverty measure is wrong 57
-
Injustice and ideology
- Brutal budget to entrench inequality 63
- New Labour and inequality: Thatcherism continued? 65
- All in the mind? Why social inequalities persist 83
- Glass conflict: David Cameron’s claim to understand poverty 93
- Clearing the poor away 97
-
Race and identity
- Ghettos in the sky 103
- Worlds apart: how inequality breeds fear and prejudice in Britain 111
- How much evidence do you need? Ethnicity, harm and crime 115
- UK medical school admissions by ethnicity, socioeconomic status, and sex 121
- Race and the repercussions of recession 125
-
Education and hierarchy
- What’s it to do with the price of fish? 133
- Little progress towards a fairer education system 139
- One of Labour’s great successes 147
- Do three points make a trend? 149
- Educational mobility, England and Germany 155
- Cash and the not so classless society 159
- Britain must close the great pay divide 165
- Raising equality in access to higher education 170
-
Elitism and geneticism
- The Darwins and the Cecils are only empty vessels 189
- The Fabian essay: the myth of inherited inequality 193
- The return to elitism in education 199
- The super-rich are still soaring away 209
-
Mobility and employment
- The trouble with moving upmarket 217
- Britain – split and divided by inequality 221
- London and the English desert: the grain of truth in a stereotype 225
- Are the times changing back? 237
- Unemployment and health 243
-
Bricks and mortar
- Mortality amongst street sleeping youth in the UK 249
- Daylight robbery: there’s no shortage of housing 251
- The influence of selective migration patterns 255
- The geography of poverty, inequality and wealth in the UK and abroad 263
- All connected? Geographies of race, death, wealth, votes and births 291
-
Well-being and misery
- Against the organization of misery? The Marmot Review of Health Inequalities 299
- Inequality kills 307
- The geography of social inequality and health 311
- The cartographer’s mad project 327
- The fading of the dream: widening inequalities in life expectancy in America 333
- The importance of circumstance 339
-
Advocacy and action
- Mean machine: how structural inequality makes social inequality seem natural 347
- Policing the borders of crime: who decides research? 351
- Learning the hard way 357
- When the social divide deepens 363
- Ending the scandal of complacency 365
- Our grandchildren will wonder why we were addicted to social inequality 369
- Mind the gap: New Labour’s legacy on child poverty 373
- Remapping the world’s population: visualizing data using cartograms 379
- If I were king 385
- Bibliography 387
- Index 389
Chapters in this book
- Front Matter i
- Contents v
- Sources of extracts vii
- Foreword xi
- Acknowledgements xiv
- Introduction 1
-
Inequality and poverty
- Prime suspect: murder in Britain 13
- The dream that turned pear-shaped 31
- The soul searching within New Labour 41
- Unequal Britain 49
- Axing the child poverty measure is wrong 57
-
Injustice and ideology
- Brutal budget to entrench inequality 63
- New Labour and inequality: Thatcherism continued? 65
- All in the mind? Why social inequalities persist 83
- Glass conflict: David Cameron’s claim to understand poverty 93
- Clearing the poor away 97
-
Race and identity
- Ghettos in the sky 103
- Worlds apart: how inequality breeds fear and prejudice in Britain 111
- How much evidence do you need? Ethnicity, harm and crime 115
- UK medical school admissions by ethnicity, socioeconomic status, and sex 121
- Race and the repercussions of recession 125
-
Education and hierarchy
- What’s it to do with the price of fish? 133
- Little progress towards a fairer education system 139
- One of Labour’s great successes 147
- Do three points make a trend? 149
- Educational mobility, England and Germany 155
- Cash and the not so classless society 159
- Britain must close the great pay divide 165
- Raising equality in access to higher education 170
-
Elitism and geneticism
- The Darwins and the Cecils are only empty vessels 189
- The Fabian essay: the myth of inherited inequality 193
- The return to elitism in education 199
- The super-rich are still soaring away 209
-
Mobility and employment
- The trouble with moving upmarket 217
- Britain – split and divided by inequality 221
- London and the English desert: the grain of truth in a stereotype 225
- Are the times changing back? 237
- Unemployment and health 243
-
Bricks and mortar
- Mortality amongst street sleeping youth in the UK 249
- Daylight robbery: there’s no shortage of housing 251
- The influence of selective migration patterns 255
- The geography of poverty, inequality and wealth in the UK and abroad 263
- All connected? Geographies of race, death, wealth, votes and births 291
-
Well-being and misery
- Against the organization of misery? The Marmot Review of Health Inequalities 299
- Inequality kills 307
- The geography of social inequality and health 311
- The cartographer’s mad project 327
- The fading of the dream: widening inequalities in life expectancy in America 333
- The importance of circumstance 339
-
Advocacy and action
- Mean machine: how structural inequality makes social inequality seem natural 347
- Policing the borders of crime: who decides research? 351
- Learning the hard way 357
- When the social divide deepens 363
- Ending the scandal of complacency 365
- Our grandchildren will wonder why we were addicted to social inequality 369
- Mind the gap: New Labour’s legacy on child poverty 373
- Remapping the world’s population: visualizing data using cartograms 379
- If I were king 385
- Bibliography 387
- Index 389
