The future of equality: A moral case for the long term
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Updates every hour. Last Updated: 12-May-2026 03:15 ET (12-May-2026 07:15 GMT/UTC)
At a time when public policy is overwhelmingly shaped by short-term pressures, Prof. Shlomi Segall, from the Department of Political Science and the Philosophy, Economics and Political Science program at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, challenges readers in his new book, The Future of Equality, to confront a fundamental moral question: what do principles of distributive justice say about people who do not yet exist?
IIASA researchers explored why mortality among adults of working age remains high in India alongside rapid economic growth, finding that education – at both individual and community levels – is more strongly associated with lower premature mortality than income or household wealth.
Approaches by some European countries and Australia to protect energy consumers could help countries worldwide phase out harmful electricity disconnections without destabilising power markets, new research has found.
In Bangladesh, programs targeting ultra-poor, rural households can help families escape extreme poverty. However, the programs may have the unintended consequence of reinforcing gender gaps, a new study from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign finds.
Young adults in Sweden feel significantly worse than older people in almost all areas of life. While older Swedes rank among the happiest in the world, young adults struggle with loneliness and psychological distress. These are the findings of a new large-scale study on flourishing in Sweden, published in the International Journal of Wellbeing and conducted by researchers at the Stockholm School of Economics, Lund University, Oslo Metropolitan University and Harvard University.
Most African countries have in-use steel stocks below 1 tonne per capita—less than one-twentieth of industrialised levels. Meanwhile, €10 billion in European subsidies for domestic green iron has yielded only one project reaching final investment decision. A new article in Technology Review for Carbon Neutrality argues these are not separate problems: they share a solution. Green iron produced in developing country "sweetspots" could supply European steelmakers at 27% lower cost—delivering a competitive decarbonised EU steel industry while providing the bankable anchor investment that developing countries need to build their own steel industries and infrastructure in parallel.
A new study examined whether providing financial vouchers to offset medication costs, conditional on improved blood sugar levels, could enhance glycemic control. The results demonstrated that participants receiving these performance-based incentives achieved a significantly larger reduction in HbA1c levels compared to a control group, an improvement clinically comparable to adding a new pharmacological treatment. Based on these findings, the authors conclude that incorporating financial incentives into health insurance plans could serve as an effective, optional tool to improve health outcomes and equity for low-income populations.