Can’t Get No Satisfaction
If you saw your income steadily rise over the last 10 years, you would probably be pretty happy, right? If you lived in a place such as Russia or Peru — countries where the introduction of market reforms have left many of your neighbors broke — you might feel doubly fortunate. Not necessarily. Roughly half ...
If you saw your income steadily rise over the last 10 years, you would probably be pretty happy, right? If you lived in a place such as Russia or Peru -- countries where the introduction of market reforms have left many of your neighbors broke -- you might feel doubly fortunate. Not necessarily. Roughly half of the most socially mobile people in Peru, and even more in Russia, have soured on life, the market, and democracy, according to research by the Brookings Institution's Carol Graham.
If you saw your income steadily rise over the last 10 years, you would probably be pretty happy, right? If you lived in a place such as Russia or Peru — countries where the introduction of market reforms have left many of your neighbors broke — you might feel doubly fortunate. Not necessarily. Roughly half of the most socially mobile people in Peru, and even more in Russia, have soured on life, the market, and democracy, according to research by the Brookings Institution’s Carol Graham.
Graham dubs these people "frustrated achievers," people with the highest gains in income but who report their economic situation as negative. For the most part, this disgruntled lot comes from the burgeoning urban middle class, which, despite a few hiccups, has seen a steady rise in their standard of living in recent years.
So, what makes them so bitter? Graham admits a few of them could just be natural curmudgeons who won’t be happy until they’re "prescribed Prozac." But she thinks that for the vast majority, frustration stems from two fears. First, thanks to globalization, they are now not only comparing themselves to the richest people in their own societies but also to their peers abroad. Second, they’re scared they may lose what they’ve amassed. Despite the fact that they have generally done well, most have weathered unexpected plunges in income at some point along the way, and they remain terrified it could happen again.
Graham argues that Russia, Peru, and other recently liberalized economies must build better social insurance systems to ease the middle class’s fear of unemployment and do more to reduce social inequality. Otherwise, angst-ridden achievers may vent their frustration on the very states in which they’ve prospered.
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