The Economy of Spite: How Financial Despair Fuels Conspiracy Thinking

Spite is an odd thing. In the natural world, it's one of four basic social behaviors alongside mutualism, selfishness, and altruism. But where mutualism benefits both parties, selfishness benefits one at the expense of another, and altruism sacrifices for the greater good, spite stands alone as a self-destructive force. It’s punching yourself in the face just to give someone else a black eye. And in an age of economic anxiety, where so many feel powerless and ignored, spite has become the fuel for a growing number of conspiracy theories.

Researchers at Staffordshire University and the University of Birmingham have found that when people feel like they’re getting the short end of the stick in life—financially, socially, or politically—they’re more likely to embrace conspiracy theories. It’s not just ignorance that leads people down these rabbit holes. It’s resentment. It’s a way of flipping off the so-called experts and elites who seem to control everything while they struggle.

This isn’t a new phenomenon. History is littered with examples of economic despair giving rise to conspiracy thinking. During the Great Depression, as banks collapsed and unemployment skyrocketed, many Americans turned to antisemitic conspiracy theories, believing Jewish financiers secretly controlled the world economy and orchestrated their suffering. In post-Soviet Russia, as the country spiraled into economic chaos, conspiracy theories about Western plots against Russian sovereignty exploded. Even in Weimar Germany, economic devastation helped seed the paranoid narratives that led to the rise of the Nazi Party. When people feel helpless, they search for hidden explanations, and all too often, those explanations are built on lies and scapegoats.

The modern era is no different. The 2008 financial crisis saw a resurgence of conspiracy theories, many of them directed at institutions that failed to protect everyday people. The idea that shadowy cabals orchestrated the housing market crash wasn’t entirely irrational—after all, Wall Street greed did play a major role. But rather than focusing on the very real systemic corruption of deregulated banking, many conspiracy theorists latched onto more sensationalized ideas: that secret societies were intentionally engineering economic destruction to enslave the masses, or that global elites were using financial collapses to implement a “New World Order.” The actual culprits—predatory lenders, deregulated markets, and a government that bailed out banks while homeowners lost everything—were too mundane. The narrative needed villains with a grander scheme.

The COVID-19 pandemic took this dynamic to an entirely new level. Suddenly, millions of people found themselves unemployed, locked down, and at the mercy of policies they didn’t understand or trust. And while some turned to science for answers, others turned to conspiracy theories. The idea that 5G towers caused the virus, that vaccines were microchipped by Bill Gates, that horse dewormer was the real cure while the medical establishment suppressed it—these weren’t just random absurdities. They were acts of rebellion, driven by spite against a system that seemed to have failed them at every turn. Many who embraced these theories weren’t just skeptical of authority; they were furious at it. Experts had let them down before—why should they trust them now?

But here’s the cruel irony: while conspiracy theories offer the illusion of rejecting authority, they often end up leading people straight into the arms of a different kind of manipulator. The same people who insist the mainstream media is lying to them will fork over $30 a month to an alternative “news” site that sells them even bigger lies. The same people who scoff at Big Pharma will spend hundreds on miracle cures from supplement hawkers and snake oil salesmen. There’s a whole industry designed to prey on the spiteful and disillusioned, selling them fake solutions while ensuring they remain trapped in a cycle of distrust, rage, and financial insecurity.

Spite-driven conspiracy thinking thrives in times of economic inequality because it provides an easy answer to a complicated reality. It’s simpler to believe in an evil puppet master than to grapple with the fact that capitalism itself is an indifferent system that rewards profit over people. If someone is struggling to afford rent, it’s easier to blame the secret manipulations of the global elite than to reckon with decades of policy decisions that have systematically eroded worker protections, social safety nets, and affordable housing. Conspiracies offer a sense of control. If the world is run by a secret cabal, then it means there’s at least an order to the chaos—even if that order is sinister. The alternative—that no one is in control, that suffering is the byproduct of disinterest rather than design—is too terrifying for many to accept.

This is why economic downturns and conspiratorial thinking go hand in hand. When people feel powerless, they seek meaning in their suffering. If they can’t find justice, they’ll settle for revenge—if not against the actual systems that exploit them, then against imaginary villains who serve as stand-ins for those they truly resent. It’s no coincidence that populist leaders who thrive on conspiracy theories tend to emerge in times of economic despair. They validate people’s frustrations, pointing fingers at immigrants, secret societies, or “globalists” while deflecting attention from the policies that actually perpetuate inequality. And in doing so, they ensure that the real issues—corporate greed, wage stagnation, political corruption—go unchallenged.

The researchers studying this phenomenon suggest that if we want fewer people falling down conspiracy rabbit holes, we need to address the root cause: economic injustice. People who feel secure, valued, and heard are far less likely to embrace paranoid fantasies. If someone can afford their rent, their healthcare, and their groceries, they’re less likely to believe the government is plotting against them. If they have access to quality education and reliable information, they’re less likely to buy into outlandish lies. And if they feel like their voice matters in politics, they’re less likely to see democracy as a rigged game controlled by unseen forces.

But fixing economic inequality is a lot harder than selling a $50 bottle of colloidal silver that promises to “detox” the body from government mind control. And so, the grift continues. Spite continues to be weaponized, not just by con artists but by politicians who see paranoia as a tool for maintaining power. As long as people remain broke and angry, they’ll continue to search for someone to blame. And as long as that blame is misdirected, the systems that keep them broke and angry will remain untouched.

So the next time someone insists that climate change is a hoax, or that vaccines are part of a depopulation agenda, or that a shadowy cabal controls everything, it’s worth asking: what’s really fueling their belief? Is it ignorance? Or is it something deeper—a bitterness born from being pushed to the margins of a society that no longer feels like it belongs to them? If it’s the latter, then no amount of fact-checking will change their mind. Because at its core, conspiracy thinking isn’t about facts. It’s about resentment. And until we address the root cause of that resentment, we’ll be stuck in this cycle indefinitely.