I am not sure why equality === misery. But I am not talking about everyone having the same amount of money- using the word equality did not adequately convey my feelings on this. I am talking about setting a standard for living (we already have explicit and implicit standards) and then actually following the standard.

Depending on the metric you are using we do well. If you are talking about making sure people have the bare essentials, we do pretty well. The "extras" like education are lacking though.