IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v5y2013i2p779-788d23716.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Inequality and Trust: Testing a Mediating Relationship for Environmental Sustainability

Author

Listed:
  • Eric Kemp-Benedict

    (Stockholm Environment Institute, 11 Curtis Avenue, Somerville, MA 02144, USA)

Abstract

Instrumental arguments linking inequality to environmental sustainability often suppose a negative relationship between inequality and social cohesion. While social cohesion is difficult to measure, there are measures of a narrower concept, social trust, and empirical studies have shown that social trust is negatively related to inequality. In this paper we test whether at least part of the observed relationship may be explained by income level, rather than income distribution. We use individual response data from the World Values Survey at the income decile level, and find evidence that income level is indeed important in explaining differences in levels of social trust, but it is insufficient to explain all of the dependence. In the sample used for the study, we find that both income level and income distribution help explain differences in social trust between countries.

Suggested Citation

  • Eric Kemp-Benedict, 2013. "Inequality and Trust: Testing a Mediating Relationship for Environmental Sustainability," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 5(2), pages 1-10, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:5:y:2013:i:2:p:779-788:d:23716
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/5/2/779/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/5/2/779/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Wilkinson, Richard G & Pickett, Kate E., 2006. "Income inequality and population health: A review and explanation of the evidence," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 62(7), pages 1768-1784, April.
    2. Rudd, Murray A., 2000. "Live long and prosper: collective action, social capital and social vision," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 34(1), pages 131-144, July.
    3. Jen, Min Hua & Jones, Kelvyn & Johnston, Ron, 2009. "Global variations in health: Evaluating Wilkinson's income inequality hypothesis using the World Values Survey," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 68(4), pages 643-653, February.
    4. Jennifer M. Mellor & Jeffrey D. Milyo, 2001. "Income inequality and health," Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 20(1), pages 151-155.
    5. E. Ostrom, 2010. "A Behavioral Approach to the Rational Choice Theory of Collective Action Presidential Address, American political Science Association, 1997," Public administration issues, Higher School of Economics, issue 1, pages 5-52.
    6. Baland, Jean-Marie & Platteau, Jean-Philippe, 1999. "The Ambiguous Impact of Inequality on Local Resource Management," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 27(5), pages 773-788, May.
    7. James K. Boyce, 2004. "Green and Brown? Globalization and the Environment," UMASS Amherst Economics Working Papers 2004-01, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Department of Economics.
    8. repec:ebl:ecbull:v:26:y:2006:i:4:p:1-20 is not listed on IDEAS
    9. Justina A.V. Fischer & Benno Torgler, 2006. "The Effect of Relative Income Position on Social Capital," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 26(4), pages 1-20.
    10. Frederick Solt, 2009. "Standardizing the World Income Inequality Database," LIS Working papers 496, LIS Cross-National Data Center in Luxembourg.
    11. Kolstad, Ivar & Wiig, Arne, 2012. "Testing The Pearl Hypothesis: Natural resources and trust," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 37(3), pages 358-367.
    12. Wilkinson, Richard G. & Pickett, Kate E., 2007. "The problems of relative deprivation: Why some societies do better than others," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 65(9), pages 1965-1978, November.
    13. James K. Boyce, 2004. "Green and Brown? Globalization and the Environment," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press and Oxford Review of Economic Policy Limited, vol. 20(1), pages 105-128, Spring.
    14. Jordahl, Henrik, 2007. "Inequality and Trust," Working Paper Series 715, Research Institute of Industrial Economics.
    15. World Bank, 2011. "World Development Indicators 2011," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 2315, December.
    16. Frederick Solt, 2009. "Standardizing the World Income Inequality Database," Social Science Quarterly, Southwestern Social Science Association, vol. 90(2), pages 231-242, June.
    17. Heerink, Nico & Mulatu, Abay & Bulte, Erwin, 2001. "Income inequality and the environment: aggregation bias in environmental Kuznets curves," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 38(3), pages 359-367, September.
    18. James Boyce, 2004. "Green and Brown? Globalization and the Environment," Working Papers wp78, Political Economy Research Institute, University of Massachusetts at Amherst.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Nigel Kragten & Jesper Rözer, 2017. "The Income Inequality Hypothesis Revisited: Assessing the Hypothesis Using Four Methodological Approaches," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 131(3), pages 1015-1033, April.
    2. Herzer, Dierk & Nunnenkamp, Peter, 2015. "Income inequality and health: Evidence from developed and developing countries," Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment E-Journal (2007-2020), Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel), vol. 9, pages 1-56.
    3. Roberta Torre & Mikko Myrskylä, 2014. "Income inequality and population health: An analysis of panel data for 21 developed countries, 1975-2006," Population Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 68(1), pages 1-13, March.
    4. Rözer, Jesper Jelle & Volker, Beate, 2016. "Does income inequality have lasting effects on health and trust?," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 149(C), pages 37-45.
    5. Wang, Moran & Li, Xuerong & Wang, Shouyang, 2021. "Discovering research trends and opportunities of green finance and energy policy: A data-driven scientometric analysis," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 154(C).
    6. Ioana Pop & Erik Ingen & Wim Oorschot, 2013. "Inequality, Wealth and Health: Is Decreasing Income Inequality the Key to Create Healthier Societies?," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 113(3), pages 1025-1043, September.
    7. Niclas Berggren & Therese Nilsson, 2013. "Does Economic Freedom Foster Tolerance?," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 66(2), pages 177-207, May.
    8. Dahlum, Sirianne & Knutsen, Carl Henrik, 2017. "Do Democracies Provide Better Education? Revisiting the Democracy–Human Capital Link," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 94(C), pages 186-199.
    9. Alassane Drabo, 2011. "Impact of Income Inequality on Health: Does Environment Quality Matter?," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 43(1), pages 146-165, January.
    10. Bartak, Jakub & Jabłoński, Łukasz & Tomkiewicz, Jacek, 2022. "Does income inequality explain public debt change in OECD countries?," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 80(C), pages 211-224.
    11. Ji-Won Park & Chae Un Kim, 2021. "Getting to a feasible income equality," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 16(3), pages 1-16, March.
    12. Rati Ram & Secil Ural, 2014. "Comparison of GDP Per Capita Data in Penn World Table and World Development Indicators," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 116(2), pages 639-646, April.
    13. Adam, Antonis & Kammas, Pantelis & Lapatinas, Athanasios, 2015. "Income inequality and the tax structure: Evidence from developed and developing countries," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 43(1), pages 138-154.
    14. Bo Yang & Minhaj Ali & Shujahat Haider Hashmi & Mohsin Shabir, 2020. "Income Inequality and CO 2 Emissions in Developing Countries: The Moderating Role of Financial Instability," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(17), pages 1-24, August.
    15. George Daniel Petrov & Mihai Marian Croitoru, 2022. "Religious diversity and pluralism. Inter-religious relations in globalization," Technium Social Sciences Journal, Technium Science, vol. 34(1), pages 566-571, August.
    16. Hajdu, Tamás & Hajdu, Gábor, 2014. "Reduction of income inequality and subjective well-being in Europe," Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment E-Journal (2007-2020), Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel), vol. 8, pages 1-29.
    17. Tim Krieger & Daniel Meierrieks, 2016. "Does Income Inequality Lead to Terrorism?," CESifo Working Paper Series 5821, CESifo.
    18. Inmaculada Martinez-Zarzoso & Leon Pilgrim, 2023. "Revisiting the link between income inequality and emissions," Working Papers 2023.04, International Network for Economic Research - INFER.
    19. Brian Burgoon, 2011. "GINI DP 14: Inequality and anti-globalization backlash by political parties," GINI Discussion Papers 14, AIAS, Amsterdam Institute for Advanced Labour Studies.
    20. Krieger, Tim & Meierrieks, Daniel, 2019. "Income inequality, redistribution and domestic terrorism," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 116, pages 125-136.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:5:y:2013:i:2:p:779-788:d:23716. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.