researchers found that the levels of income inequality in the united states started to take off in the 1940s, when the first baby boomers were born, despite people thinking that income inequality was a primarily ‘90s and 2000s issue, zheng said.
that is actually seen in canada, where between 1993 and 2008 the richest group of canadians increased their share of wealth, while middle and lower class canadians lost money, according to
the conference board of canada.
the board also used the gini index for its research, suggesting that inequality was relatively low in the 1980s but has remained almost the same since the 2000s. the board also says that in the 1950s and ‘60s, the richest one per cent of canadians owned only about eight per cent of all income growth.
income inequality may impact everyones health
in the american trends, zheng says that the rise in inequality is mirroring adult health issues in both sets of data used for the study. the researchers also found that for every 0.01 gini unit increase, there was a three per cent increase in physiological dysregulation when looking at the cdc’s data.
this essentially means that as the gini increased, people’s overall health decreased.
however, there is a difference in the impact income inequality has on a person depending on age. the researchers noted that inequality experienced as children had more of an impact than inequality experienced as adults. the findings are consistent with the developmental origins of health and disease theory, which
states the role of parental and perinatal exposure to environmental factors can determine the development of diseases in adulthood.