Elite capture causes extinction---it decreases institutional quality which locks in a laundry list.

It is often argued that a country's long-term performance depends to a significant extent on the quality of its institutions, including its political and legal institutions (Acemoglu et al., 2005). Economic research mostly focuses on explaining long-term differences in growth rates. As seen above, some researchers argue that high inequality will reduce growth rates, among other things, because it can worsen institutional quality. However, besides facilitating economic growth, public institutions have other functions that matter from a long-term perspective. For example, disaster preparedness, education, public health, foreign policy, science policy, and many other areas could influence the expected value of the long-term future. If such things go badly, they could increase existential risk. Conversely, good institutions will help reduce existential risk. For many existential risk reduction strategies likely require public goods and collective action, which in turn require good public institutions (among other reasons, because some such public goods are unlikely to be provided by markets). So, it seems reasonable to assume that, with most other societal goals, good institutions can help deliver existential risk reduction. Here is a cheesy analogy: targeted actions like washing your hands regularly or getting a flu shot can reduce your risk of dying from an infection. But you will also do well investing in a strong immune system, as that is an ‘all-purpose good’ in lowering your risk of dying from any bacterium or virus. Investing in good institutions might similarly be an all-purpose-good: rather than tackling individual sources of existential risk directly, we improve conditions for tackling whatever existential risks may come our way.

There are several reasons why higher inequality could weaken institutional capacities for longtermist public goods.

First, there is some direct evidence that, whatever the causal pathway, inequality reduces institutional quality (which in turn typically leads to more inequality) (Chong and Gradstein, 2007; Savoia et al., 2010).

Second, high inequality can lead to elite capture. Empirical work on studying political and de facto legal power is difficult, yet there is a growing consensus that high levels of inequality can lead to elite capture and thereby reduce the long-term quality of legal and political institutions (Acemoglu and Robinson, 2008, 2013; Bartels, 2018; Chong and Gradstein, 2007; Cummins and Rodriguez, 2010; Savoia et al., 2010; van Bavel, 2016). Further, if institutions are disproportionately geared towards elite interests, then they might be less likely to be geared towards positive long-term trajectories. We might see observe more rent-seeking and less investment in public goods. Moreover, if elite capture is strong enough, such capture, and the potential inequality that comes with it, can intensify going forward (Chong and Gradstein, 2007).

Now, one might object and wonder whether elite interests and longtermist interests will necessarily be misaligned. Could an enlightened elite not even be more longtermist than a more democratic system? Here are two potential arguments. First, wealthy donors fund a significant part of research and direct action on existential risk and longtermism (the Open Philanthropy Project, for example). Indirectly, inequality might thus reduce existential risk through such funding. Second, rich people might have a lower rate of pure time preference than less well-off people, which might make them more aligned with investing in long-term causes.

In response to the first argument, remember we here focus on income inequality reductions. Private funding only requires ‘enough’ wealth inequality going forward, it need not require elite capture. And reducing income inequality is unlikely to eradicate the required wealth inequality and the existence of big donors. In response to the second argument, we are sceptical that elite capture would translate a lower impatience rate into longtermist strategies in policy. First off, a successful transmission would require influence to be systematic and well-coordinated across time and, probably, across different elite actors. Yet lobbying and elite influence must often capitalise on shorter windows of opportunities, which makes well-coordinated intertemporal policy capture less likely. Second, even if rich people have a lower impatience rate in the sense that they might care more about returns on investment rather than direct consumption, this is quite different from being concerned with the far future. It would be a coincidence if being concerned with getting a good return in the next years (or even decades) on my own investment converged much with policies that protect the interests of far-future people.

Of course, such considerations are speculative. But, in any case, we think that, on balance, there are stronger reasons to believe elite capture would increase – rather than decrease – existential risk. First, elite capture often comes with rent seeking, which lowers institutional quality (Chong and Gradstein, 2007). Second, industries like oil, gas, weapons and others are often concentrated and well organised in exerting influence in law and legislation. Their interests and influence overall are likely to be more short-term than longtermist. Third, recent decades have seen a shift towards a stronger shareholder value orientation in corporate governance. A common criticism of this shift is that it incentivises more short-term decisions. Accordingly, corporate influence into public institutions will likely display short-termist bias too. Finally, we can, of course, imagine that ‘pro-longtermist elite capture’ could happen and gamble on that possibility. However, if strong democratic and legal oversight and the power to check elite influence is lost, we might struggle to reverse our gamble.

Third, high inequality is likely to reduce social capital and trust (Alesina and La Ferrara, 2002; Knack and Keefer, 1997; Rothstein and Uslaner, 2005). Social capital and trust in public institutions in turn are important for effective public goods provision (Beugelsdijk et al., 2004; Knack and Keefer, 1997). Effective public goods provision, in turn, is important for (some) effective measures to reduce existential risk (and, more generally, to coordinate towards more valuable long-term trajectories). Therefore, high inequality could reduce societies’ capacities to effectively respond to large-scale challenges like existential risk.

Finally, some limited direct evidence suggests societies with higher social capital and lower inequality exhibit better preventive and adaptive outcomes for environmental risks and can show greater resilience to external shocks (Kahn, 2005; van Bavel et al., 2018). For example, Matthew Kahn provides some evidence that more equal countries, when controlled for GDP, have significantly lower death rates in natural catastrophes (Kahn, 2005). While smaller natural catastrophes are different from global catastrophic risk scenarios, resilience in such events might be somewhat indicative of societies’ resilience to catastrophic risks.

So, good social and institutional conditions could help reduce existential risk. Consider next how, conversely, bad conditions might increase existential risk. A key driver of existential risk is conflict, both between and within nation-states (or what (Ord, 2020: 175–9) calls a ‘risk factor’). Conflicts and arms races raise human-induced existential risks such as nuclear war, the outbreak of a bio-engineered virus or the launch of misaligned artificial intelligence. Note that an existential catastrophe could be set in motion either purposefully or accidentally. Both are more likely during conflict. Nuclear warheads, cyberweapons, and bioweapons could all be used purposefully to attack enemy states, leading to potential global escalation. But as past nuclear incidents and close calls during the Cold War show, arms races also increase the probability of accidental catastrophes (Schlosser, 2013).

Esteban and Schneider find that formal and empirical evidence suggests that political and social polarisation increases the risk of violent conflict, both intra-nationally and internationally (Esteban and Schneider, 2008). If income inequality increases polarisation, inequality may indirectly drive existential risk. Indeed, recent evidence suggests that income inequality can increase the degree of polarisation between groups of citizens. Bonica et al. find that the degree of polarisation within the US House of Representatives, for example, is accurately tracked by domestic income inequality, with correlation coefficients rising up to 0.95 depending on the chosen time-period (Bonica et al., 2013: 105–8). Of course, correlation does not imply causation and the correlation is likely at least partially the result of reverse causation or a confounding variable. That said, we should assign a non-negligible credence to inequality partially causing polarisation. Moreover, inequality and polarisation might also play some role in getting polarising and populist candidates elected (Piketty, 2018). In a preliminary analysis of US election data, Darvas and Efstathiou find that more unequal states were more likely to vote for Donald Trump, after controlling for variables such as income, race and education (Darvas and Efstathiou, 2016). Populist politicians – like Trump, Bolsonaro, and others – are likely bad news for existential risk reduction. They are less cooperative in delivering regional and global public goods and typically prefer riskier, and more conflictual and nationalistic policy styles.

Differential progress

We have surveyed some reasons why inequality might translate into worse institutional conditions for longtermism. Beyond more formal institutions and avenues for collective action, we might also consider the cultural, moral and informal social norms that could potentially impact existential risk or whose underlying values might get locked in in the future.

The simple idea is that countries that sustain low levels of inequality will foster – and require for their support – a public moral culture that values solidarity and cooperation. More egalitarian policies might in turn move citizens and leaders towards more altruism and stronger regard to moral and social considerations in decision processes. Societies that actively work against income inequality may thereby reinforce broadly ‘pro-social’ social norms. Arguably, more egalitarian attitudes and norms might support public goods provision and favour expanding one's moral circle to other countries and future generations. Countries with high levels of inequality, in contrast, might reinforce norms of competition, individualism, and personal responsibility. Policies that encourage competition and smaller moral circles also seem more likely to attract leaders that value individualism and competition. Indeed, as Wilkinson and Pickett note, more equal societies give more in development aid and score better on the Global Peace Index (Wilkinson and Pickett, 2010: 227). Again, we may wonder whether these relationships are not partially explained by confounding variables or reverse causality. That said, the causal link through social norms and public morality has some intuitive force. If true – and drawing on what we said above – a public commitment to equality might support a public moral culture that values solidarity and cooperation, which could help reduce existential risk and lower the risk of negative value lock-in.20

A related idea is that egalitarian societies might provide better conditions for differential progress (Tomasik, 2015). The thought is that new technologies often pose a risk when they become available before society has developed the collective ‘wisdom’ to use them well. Technology should not develop too fast relative to progress in wisdom. Consider artificial intelligence for example. Bostrom argues that once artificial intelligences (AI's) outsmart humans in AI-creation, systems might iteratively improve themselves and potentially set in motion an intelligence explosion (Bostrom, 2014). Quite quickly, it might become difficult to control AI and align it with our interest. Such a scenario, if it happens, might still be some time away (or not). However, if we do not develop collective wisdom first, it might be too late by the time superintelligent AI arrives on the scene.

But what goes into the wisdom side of differential progress? Minimally, it requires effective institutions, values, and empirical insight and understanding. We have argued that equality might help strengthen the public institutions required for effective collective action to reduce existential risks. But society and the institutions governing it might also require public commitment to values conducive to longtermism. A commitment to equality and cooperation, and the norms required to sustain such a commitment, might help. Together then, equality could improve differential progress.21