This fascinating paper in Nature makes a case that is, I think, instantly persuasive. That the quest for “equality” is hugely problematic, and that humans are more attached to “fairness” as an aspiration.
I’d go further than that. This is something that everyone who is active in electoral politics has known all along. The public don’t completely buy the version of equality that the different political tribes are selling, and, for a politician, success depends on an ability to steer a battle-cruiser through the holes in the version that is promoted by their rivals.
The solution to this also seems obvious to me, to the point at which I wonder of I’m not missing something.
It can’t be this simple, surely?