MOST Islanders will have well-formed ideas about the nature of the community in which they live and work, but the results of a well-designed survey are a more reliable guide to what might be described as ‘the state of the nation’ than any subjective perceptions.

For the sixth year in succession, just such a survey, conducted by the States Statistics Unit, has painted a picture of who we are and the way we live. In many respects this is familiar and largely reassuring image, but some details are jarringly alien.

It might, for example, surprise some to learn that 53 per cent of those currently living here were born outside the Island. However, those died-in-the-wool xenophobes who continue to insist that the community’s identity is threatened by other cultural influences might be surprised to learn that only four per cent of residents were born in Portugal or Madeira. The figure for those of Polish origin, meanwhile, is just one per cent.

More noteworthy information is to be found in the survey’s section on health. No doubt as a consequence of long-term affluence, 56 per cent of Islanders can be described as overweight or obese. And more than one in ten said that they had mobility problems, through age, infirmity or poor physical condition.

There are also disturbing signs that all is not well in economic terms – though this might be expected as the Island struggles to recover from the effects of the global recession. A quarter of the heads of households who responded to the survey indicated that they were finding it difficult to cope financially. The proportion in difficulty increased to 38 per cent when only families with children were taken into account.

These figures in particular put Island prosperity into perspective. It remains the case that Jersey has one of the highest per capita incomes in the world, yet it is clear that this wealth is anything but effectively distributed.

It is possible that future economic growth will help to ease the money problems of those currently feeling the pinch. That said, the latest data are a timely reminder that trickle-down from a profitable finance sector does not guarantee general prosperity and that, in the wake of the global financial crisis and in the presence of rising personal taxation, it would be all too easy for this to slip towards becoming a dangerously unbalanced two-tier society.