Perceived inequality, justification of the system and redistributive preferences in university students

Abstract

Inequality affects the population differently according to their socioeconomic status and their perception, therefore it requires study from an economic and social point of view. Inequality is commonly studied from quantitative indicators such as the GINI coefficient, in 2017 Colombia registered one of the highest levels of inequality in Latin America (0.517), in fact, in Santa Marta it has increased, going from a Gini from 0.450 in 2016 to 0.467 in 2017. The present research work aimed to characterize economic inequality based on the justification of the system, the perceived inequality and the redistributive preferences of the students of the Universidad del Magdalena and the Universidad Cooperativa de Colombia in Santa Marta according to socioeconomic status. For which a quantitative analysis was developed with a descriptive design. The sample size was defined by the simple random sampling method, resulting in a sample of 133 university students, to whom a survey with open and closed questions was applied through the Quantris methodology (online). Inequality constitutes a social problem, in Colombia, most of the literature shows that its study has been biased with an economic approach, omitting social variables, such as motivations, beliefs and perception of individuals. In general, it was found that the university students surveyed, regardless of their social stratum, justify the economic system and prefer a paternalistic state, support the merit system, redistributive measures, especially access to health, consider that individuals should access with equal quality of service, regardless of your income. However, with regard to the health service, there was a differentiated behavior, observing that strata 5 and especially 6, consider education as a commercializable service, supporting less redistributive measures for this sector.