The Spirit Level

Kate Pickett is Professor of Epidemiology at the University of York, where she leads the Public Health and Society Research Group.

Her landmark book The Spirit Level: Why Equality is Better for Everyone, co-written with Richard Wilkinson, was an international bestseller, chosen by the Guardian as one of the 100 most influential books of the century and by the New Statesman as a top ten book of the decade. Their follow-up, The Inner Level, shows how societal inequality has similarly profound effects on individual health and wellbeing.

Her writing has appeared in numerous publications, including the Guardian, Nature and New York Times, and she has delivered more than 500 keynote speeches, including at the United Nations, the European Parliament and within UK government departments.

Kate is the co-founder of the Equality Trust, an academic co-director of Health Equity North, and a fellow of the RSA, the UK Faculty of Public Health and the Academy of Social Sciences. In 2023, she received an OBE for services to societal equality.

Richard Wilkinson has played a formative role in international research and his work has been published in ten languages. He studied economic history at the London School of Economics before training in epidemiology and is Professor Emeritus at the University of Nottingham Medical School and Honorary Professor at University College London.