WEBVTT

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You've probably heard by now

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that economic inequality
is historically high,

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that the wealthiest one-tenth
of one percent in the United States

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have as much wealth
as the bottom 90 percent combined,

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or that the wealthiest
eight individuals in the world

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have as much wealth

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as the poorest 3.5 billion
inhabitants of the planet.

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But did you know that economic inequality
is associated with shorter lifespans,

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less happiness,

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more crime

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and more drug abuse?

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Those sound like problems of poverty,

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but among wealthy, developed nations

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those health and social problems

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are actually more tightly linked
to inequality between incomes

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than to absolute incomes.

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And because of that,

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the United States,

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the wealthiest and the most
unequal of nations,

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actually fares worse
than all other developed countries.

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Surveys show that
large majorities of Americans,

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both Democrats and Republicans,

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believe inequality is too high
and want more equal pay.

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And yet as a society, we don't seem
to be able to find the common ground,

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the consensus, the political will
to do anything about it.

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Because, as inequality
has risen in recent decades,

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political polarization
has risen along with it.

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We see those who disagree with us
as idiots or as immoral.

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Nearly half of Democrats and Republicans

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now think that the other side
is not just mistaken

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but a threat to the nation.

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And that animosity prevents us
from finding the common ground

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to change things.

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I'm a social psychology professor
at the University of North Carolina,

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and I study the effects of inequality
on people's thinking and behavior.

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I'm going to argue that it's not just
an unfortunate coincidence

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that inequality and political division
have risen together.

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There are good psychological reasons

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that inequality drives wedges
in our politics.

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That means there are good
psychological paths

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to improve both at once.

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To understand why inequality
is so powerful,

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you have to first understand
that we are constantly comparing ourselves

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to other people,

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and when we do that,

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we really like to come out on top,

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and we find it painful
to be on the bottom.

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Psychologists call it
the "better-than-average effect."

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Most people believe
they're better than average

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at just about anything they care about,

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which isn't strictly possible,
because that's just what average means.

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(Laughter)

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But that's the way people feel.

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Most people think
they're smarter than average,

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harder working than average

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and more socially skilled.

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Most people think they're
better drivers than average.

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(Laughter)

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That's true even if you do the study
with a sample of people

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currently hospitalized
for a car accident that they caused.

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(Laughter)

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So we really want to see ourselves
as better than average,

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and if we find out otherwise,

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it's a painful experience
that we have to cope with.

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And we cope with it
by shifting how we see the world.

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To understand how this works,

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my collaborators and I ran an experiment.

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We asked participants to complete
a decision-making task to earn some money,

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and in reality, everyone earned
the same amount of money.

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But we randomly divided them
into two groups,

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and we told one group
that they had done better than average,

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and we told the other group
they had done worse than average.

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So now we have one group that feels richer
and one group that feels poorer,

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but for no objective reason.

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And then we asked them some questions.

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When we asked them,
"How good are you at making decisions?"

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the better-than-average group
said that they were more competent

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than the below-average group.

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The better-than-average group
said that their success

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was a fair outcome of a meritocracy.

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The below-average group
thought the system was rigged,

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and in this case,
of course, they were right.

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(Laughter)

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Even though the two groups
had the same amount of money,

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the group that felt richer
said we should cut taxes on the wealthy,

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cut benefits to the poor.

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Let them work hard and be
responsible for themselves, they said.

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These are attitudes that we normally
assume are rooted in deeply held values

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and a lifetime of experience,

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but a 10-minute exercise

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that made people feel richer or poorer

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was enough to change those views.

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This difference between being rich or poor
and feeling rich or poor is important,

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because the two don't always
line up very well.

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You often hear people say with nostalgia,

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"We were poor, but we didn't know it."

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That was the case for me growing up,

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until one day,

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in the fourth-grade lunch line,

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we had a new cashier
who didn't know the ropes,

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and she asked me for 1.25 dollars.

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I was taken aback, because I had never
been asked to pay for my lunch before.

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I didn't know what to say,
because I didn't have any money.

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And suddenly,
I realized for the first time

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that we free lunch kids
were the poor ones.

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That awkward moment
in the school lunch line

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changed so much for me,

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because for the first time, I felt poor.

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We didn't have any less money
than the day before,

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but for the first time,

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I started noticing things differently.

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It changed the way I saw the world.

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I started noticing how the kids
who paid for their lunch

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seemed to dress better
than the free lunch kids.

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I started noticing the big yellow blocks
of government cheese

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that showed up at our door

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and the food stamps my mother
would pull out at the grocery store.

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I was always a shy kid,

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but I hardly talked at all
after that at school.

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Who was I to speak up?

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For decades, social scientists
looked for evidence

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that feeling deprived
compared to other people

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would motivate political action.

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They thought it would mobilize
protests, strikes,

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maybe even revolutions.

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But again and again what they found
was that it paralyzed people,

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because the truth is,

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feeling less than other people

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brings shame.

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It makes people turn away,

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disgusted with the system.

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Feeling better than other
people, though --

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now that is motivating.

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It motivates us to protect that position,

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and it has important consequences
for our politics.

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To see why, consider another experiment.

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Again, we asked participants
to make decisions to earn some money,

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and we told one group
that they had done better than average

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and the other group that they
had done worse than average.

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And again, the better-than-average group
said it's a fair meritocracy,

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cut taxes on the wealthy,

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cut benefits on the poor.

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But this time, we also asked them
what did they think

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about other participants
who disagree with them

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on those issues.

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Are they smart or incompetent?

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Are they reasonable or are they biased?

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The better-than-average group
said anybody who disagrees with them

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must be incompetent, biased,

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blinded by self-interest.

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The below-average group

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didn't assume that about their opponents.

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Now, there are lots of psychology studies

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showing that when people agree with us,

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we think they're brilliant,

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and when people disagree with us,

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we tend to think they're idiots.

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(Laughter)

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But this is new because we found
it was driven entirely by the group

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that felt better than average,

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who felt entitled to dismiss
those people who disagree with them.

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So think about what
this is doing to our politics,

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as the haves and have-nots
spread further and further apart.

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Yes, a lot of us think
that people on the other side are idiots,

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but the people politically engaged enough
to be yelling at each other about politics

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are actually mostly the well-off.

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In fact, as inequality has grown
in recent decades,

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political interest and participation
among the poor has plummeted.

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Again, we see that people
who feel left behind

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aren't taking to the streets to protest
or organize voter registration drives.

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Often, they aren't even voting.

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Instead, they're turning away
and dropping out.

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So if we want to do something
about extreme inequality,

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we have to fix our politics.

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And if we want to fix our politics,

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we have to do something about inequality.

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So what do we do?

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The wonderful thing about spirals

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is that you can interrupt
at any point in the cycle.

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I think our best bet starts
with those of us

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who have benefited the most
from inequality's rise,

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those of us who have done
better than average.

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If you've been successful,

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it's natural to chalk up your success
to your own hard work.

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But, like the studies I showed you,

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everybody does that,

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whether or not it really was
the hard work that mattered most.

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Every successful person I know

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can think of times when they worked hard
and struggled to succeed.

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They can also think of times

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when they benefited from good luck
or a helping hand

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but that part is harder.

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Psychologists Shai Davidai
and Tom Gilovich

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call it the "headwind-tailwind asymmetry."

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When you're struggling against headwinds,

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those obstacles are all you can see.

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It's what you notice and remember.

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But when the wind's at your back
and everything's going your way,

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all you notice is yourself

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and our own amazing talents.

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So we have to stop and think for a minute

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to recognize those tailwinds
helping us along.

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It's so easy to see
what's wrong with people

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who disagree with you.

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Some of you decided that I was an idiot
in the first two minutes,

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because I said inequality was harmful.

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(Laughter)

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The hard part is to recognize

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that if you were in a different position,

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you might see things differently,

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just like the subjects in our experiments.

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So if you're in the above-average
group in life --

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and if you're watching a TED talk,
you most likely are --

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(Laughter)

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then I leave you with this challenge:

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the next time you're tempted to dismiss
someone who disagrees with you

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as an idiot,

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think about the tailwinds
that helped you get where you are.

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What lucky breaks did you get

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that might have turned out differently?

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What helping hands are you grateful for?

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Recognizing those tailwinds
gives us the humility we need

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to see that disagreeing with us
doesn't make people idiots.

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The real hard work
is in finding common ground,

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because it's the well-off
who have the power

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and the responsibility to change things.

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Thank you.

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(Applause)