Class, Power, and Inequality in Hunger Games vs. Great Gatsby

Introduction

While seemingly quite different in terms of subject matter, The Hunger Games and The Great Gatsby are actually more alike than they may initially appear. A group of self-identified elites engaging in depravity and excess may not seem to have much in common with the life-and-death battles waged in the Hunger Games, yet there are many meaningful parallels. The arc that most of those parallels follow is a strict and gaping divide between the rich and the poor in both stories. In both works, a group of elites controls the poor in some manner and displays disdain and a lack of regard for those beneath them. However, the elites do not sail off into the sunset in either story — things go seriously wrong for both sets of powerful figures. While wealth and power may seem enticing, both The Great Gatsby and The Hunger Games demonstrate that such an attitude, taken to any extreme, is ethically and morally wrong, and that the outcomes for the rich may not be as favorable as they might expect.

The Wealth Divide and the Valley of Ashes

As noted in the introduction, stark dichotomies around wealth, status, and geography are central to both The Great Gatsby and The Hunger Games. In The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald presents a deeply critical view of 1920s American society. He suggests that the ability to work hard and realize one's dreams had become increasingly difficult to attain given the social conditions of that era. This is depicted with particular force through the description of what is known as the Valley of Ashes.

There are three distinct areas in the novel. The West Egg represents the realm of the newly rich. New York City represents higher status and prestige. In between lies the Valley of Ashes — a desolate stretch of land littered with industrial waste. Many interpret this landscape as a metaphor for the moral and ethical decay produced by the wealthy on both sides of the valley (University, 2015). While the well-to-do engage in excess and depravity, the poor are left to scrounge and suffer in an area laid to waste by the habits and indifference of the rich. To extend this metaphor further, the so-called "American Dream" was slipping out of the grasp of many while the wealthy remained completely indifferent to the havoc they caused. Gatsby himself had acquired his wealth through means that were neither noble nor legal, making him a prime example of someone living the high life through blatant lawbreaking and moral corruption (Collins, 2010; Fitzgerald, 2004).

A similar chasm exists in The Hunger Games. Just as in Gatsby, there is a glaring dystopia-versus-utopia divide in which a select few live comfortable, insulated lives while the people of the Panem districts are ruled in a brutal and overbearing fashion. Non-adherence to the edicts of the leadership means certain death. In some respects, this makes the conditions in The Hunger Games more extreme, but the same basic social structure is clearly present in both works.

One element that is especially prominent in both stories is that the powerful do not ultimately fare as well as one might expect. Gatsby ends up killed by Wilson, his pursuit of Daisy — and everything she represented — ending in failure and violence. In The Hunger Games, the fight-to-the-death tournament imposed by the ruling class is upended when Katniss and Peeta choose to mutually commit suicide rather than serve as pawns of the leadership. Rather than allow their power to be usurped and their legitimacy questioned, the leadership intervenes — an act that sets in motion the events of the subsequent books in the series (Collins, 2010; Fitzgerald, 2004).

Consumption, Waste, and Elite Indifference

Another strong similarity between the two works is the treatment of consumption. In the Valley of Ashes and the outlying districts of Panem, people must scrape and save just to survive. Tools and items of daily life are rudimentary and basic. By contrast, the leadership and the elite lack for nothing, using food, water, and material goods in a wasteful and extravagant manner. They appear oblivious — or simply indifferent — to the people in poor areas who struggle merely to survive. The rich in both books would think nothing of waste or inefficiency, because they have the power and money to acquire more whenever they choose (Collins, 2010; Fitzgerald, 2004).

The wealthy in both books absolutely could have been more generous with their excess resources and wealth, yet both groups made an active choice not to be — unless doing so served their own interests. A clear example of this appears in The Hunger Games, when the leadership provides tournament participants with a lavish dinner and a degree of training. This generosity, however, is entirely part of the spectacle — not a reflection of genuine concern. Had the games proceeded as intended, all but one participant would have died. The point is that the leadership in both books deliberately withheld resources from those at the bottom of society, preferring instead to use people as instruments of power while keeping wealth concentrated at the top (Collins, 2010; Fitzgerald, 2004).

The concept of conspicuous consumption is therefore central to understanding how both narratives function as social critiques. Excess is not incidental in either text — it is a deliberate marker of power and a mechanism of exclusion.

Conclusion

A world that resembles the Hunger Games is far away, at least in the literal sense. However, the picture painted by Fitzgerald in Gatsby is much closer to reality in many ways and in many iterations of contemporary society. That said, different groups of people continue to compete for limited resources, status, and prestige, and that competition is often volatile or openly hostile. Rather than doing much to address this, those in power often seem to encourage such divisions, or at the very least allow them to persist. Given this, the setting of The Hunger Games feels less remote than it might initially appear. Whether the current trajectory will change remains to be seen, but if the last century offers any indication, the patterns identified in both novels are likely to continue.