The limits of inequality: Public support for social policy across rich democracies

Given increases in income inequality across rich democracies since the 1980s, we expect public opinion to favor a stronger social policy role of the state as a corrective measure. A basic theory of democracy suggests that public opinion and redistributive social policies are reciprocally causal, therefore, lack of negative public reaction suggests that the public are satisfied with increasing inequality if their preferences did not help it grow in the first place. Theories of welfare state institutions and different trajectories of inequality suggest that the link between opinion and inequality depends on context. Drawing on theories of attitude formation, we use predictive modeling adjusting for the causes of public support for social policy to (a) test for public responsiveness to inequality; and (b) compare how this differs by institutional context. Our analyses use ISSP and WID data between 1980 and 2006. In liberal contexts where inequality expanded monumentally since the 1970s (mostly English-speaking countries), increasing inequality predicts higher support for state provision of social policy. In the coordinated and universalist contexts of Europe, increasing inequality predicts less support for state provision of social policy. The results suggest that the public in liberal societies – which had higher levels of inequality to begin with – reach their limits of inequality, reacting negatively; whereas in coordinated and universalist societies – starting out with comparatively lower inequality levels – they move positively with inequality, suggesting welcome cuts to the redistributive social welfare state.