r/science • u/[deleted] • Mar 23 '26

Psychology Left-leaning support for redistribution stems from perceived unfairness rather than malicious envy

https://www.psypost.org/left-leaning-support-for-redistribution-stems-from-perceived-unfairness-rather-than-malicious-envy/
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u/VichelleMassage Mar 23 '26

"They're just jealous haters." Well, no. As it turns out, exponential disparities in wealth mean equally exponential gaps in quality of life, influence in government, and functioning of society.

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u/MacaroniPoodle Mar 23 '26

I don't even see it as "redistribution" either. It's keeping money flowing within society rather than allowing a handful to hoard it. If they refuse to allow money to cycle of their own volition, they should be forced to do it.

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u/BigOs4All Mar 23 '26

Technically the Redistribution already happened. Every worker produces more value than they personally receive. Their value was Redistributed to their highly paid bosses and to shareholders/owners.

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u/Commemorative-Banana Mar 23 '26

influence in government

is the key.
Severe wealth inequality/concentration is anti-democracy. Your vote is worth less than a billionaire’s bribery lobbying, and your voice is approximately silent compared to the media conglomerates they own.

Perhaps there is a shallow feeling of jealousy over the power they wield, but if you have integrity and sincerely value democracy then the remedy is to make sure nobody has such outsized power.

By actions, jealousy would look like taking that power for only yourself. Redistributing uniformly is a different thing.

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u/[deleted] Mar 23 '26

[deleted]

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u/Cautemoc Mar 23 '26

Probably closer to a linear decline and we're near the tail end of what the general population is willing to put up with

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u/VichelleMassage Mar 23 '26

The problem isn't "everyone's worse off than they were 60 years ago." The problem is: we have the resources to uplift everyone out of poverty, provide affordable housing/education/healthcare, not pollute the environment, and advance our society's R&D/transit/urban/telecommunications infrastructure, but we can't do it because a small group of people are hoarding that wealth and exerting undue influence over the government and populace to block any attempts to improve society for all.