Abstract
People may resent the fact that others have achieved or acquired something which they have not. This sentiment is called envy or `upward jealousy'. But they may also worry that other people will acquire or achieve what they have or are already, even if it causes no loss to them. This may be called `downward jealousy'. Such jealousy creates `zero-sum' situations, since someone's gain is always felt as a loss by somebody else. Jealousy, downward or upward, not only occurs among individuals, but also between groups - under such jealous group relations, the emotions are made to refer to a collectivity and are collectively articulated and experienced.
The lower middle classes around the turn of the century tended to be concerned that workers might achieve a position of security and prestige equal to their own: national insurance seemed to provide workers with a social security equal to the protection for which the self-employed had worked so hard and saved so assiduously. This resistance on the part of the petty bourgeoisie, inspired in part by downward jealousy, much delayed the advent of the modern welfare state.
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