A lot of people have been talking about economic inequality since the last financial crisis and Occupy Wallstreet. But why care about inequality? Helpfully, the Equality Trust has gathered together statistics on the relationship between inequality and social problems. Here’s some of their diagrams:

Mental illness reflects inequality very closely:

Imprisonment also sharply follows levels of inequality (correlation=.75)

Something as simple and necessary as being able to trust other members of your society is a function of inequality:

Life-expectancy too is an incredibly close correlate:

Homicide also has a strong (r=.47) relationship with inequality.

And even at the very beginning of life there’s no escaping it:

What happens when we make an aggregate index?

At the risk of sounding trite- or inflicting suffering on my readers, I’d suggest an exercise. Look through each of these graphs again and try to imagine what each means in terms of human suffering, the anguish that makes each number. It’s not an easy thing.