Equality Review

Equality review Stuart White Chapter 1: The demand for equality The demand for equality is central to modern politics. Groups demanding equal rights (social, political, economic) have forced society to change tremendously since the 1700’s. The American and French Revolutions, Russian Communist Revolution, and the Civil Rights and Women’s Rights movements all strove to make their members equal to the others in society. Expanding equality to new groups often causes undesirable changes to the society and can threaten other values. Painful conformity, militarism and totalitarianism are sometimes needed to protect “equal” societies from unraveling. Liberty is therefore sometimes at odds with equality. This book will not consider human-animal equality or equality between humans across different points of time (multigenerational). Those are valid issues, but time and space constraints prevent their discussion in this book. The demand for equality is almost always a demand for several specific things at once. Forms of equality: -Legal Equality *In large societies, laws must constrain and direct individual actions and relationships to maintain order and to engender cooperation. *The government creates and enforces laws. *If a person is subject to the law, then they are a subject of the state. *Legal equality implies that all people within a polity’s borders are subjects. The law is not applied differently to any person or group. *Moreover, if legal equality exists, all people enjoy the benefits of the law equally: Police protection and the quality of courts are the same in all areas, regardless of local wealth or race. Legal resources are spread equally. -Political equality *Implies that all subjects have an equal right and ability to influence politics, thereby giving them the same ability to change the laws and their enforcement. *Subjects exercise their political power through the right to vote and to stand for office. *Meaningful participation requires some minimum level of intellect, so children and retarded people can be excluded from these rights. [But who decides what the “minimum level” is? Couldn’t this rule also justify the use of literacy tests at polling stations, which used, and still would, discriminate against blacks?] *Freedom of expression and assembly are required as supporting rights so as to allow people to be informed of problems that need government attention. The media also brings problems to the attention of government itself. [The media is also an important conduit for relatively impartial information on what the government is doing.] [Important concept: The true exercise of rights requires knowledge of all ways in which the rights may be used and all possible consequences of any decision.] *Wealth disparities affect subjects’ political power. For instance, a rich person could buy a lot of advertising to influence people with skewed information and affect some kind of political change. A poor person might not even be able to take the time off from work to vote. Some

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advocates of political freedom therefore want to eliminate wealth disparities directly through government policies, or want specific restrictions like campaign finance reform that would remove money’s influence on politics. Opponents argue that such measures come at the expense of other forms of liberty. -Social equality *Consists of status equality and the absence of domination. *Status equality means that no person is considered to occupy a superior or inferior station in life than another person thanks to occupation, wealth, sex, race, or any other characteristic. Institutions and individual people everywhere respect each other equally, and no one feels the need to be servile to others, or is allowed a privileged position of superiority. Classes don’t exist. *The absence of domination means that no person is dependent upon another for survival, money or opportunities. For example, no one needs to keep a miserable job because otherwise they will be living on the street, and no wife must stay married because otherwise she will have no source of income. -Economic equality *The Industrial Revolution created huge and highly visible wealth disparities, which caused a backlash in the form of Socialism. Economic equality consists of four parts that are listed below. *The idea of making society into a meritocracy, where people would be free to move between occupations and classes instead of being fixed in one from birth, was upheld by the American and French Revolutions. While this was an improvement upon the previous, rigid system, it soon became clear that meritocracy was imperfect since people were still born into different circumstances that strongly affected their potentials in life. *Land egalitarianism posits that it is inherently wrong for people to privately own property. This creates a situation in which a small group of people might own every part of the Earth and therefore completely control the lives of everyone else. Land should instead be considered common property and should be state-owned, with landowners in fact leasing their parcels from the government and lease payments going into a common pool that would recompense all of society for the inconvenience of not being able to access all land. *Means of production egalitarianism was originated by Marx and Engels and extended the idea of land egalitarianism to the manmade capital situated on the land. Instead of a rich elite (the bourgeoisie) owning all the capital, it would be held in common ownership for all the working people, who would equally share its profits. *Communism was the final evolution of means of production egalitarianism: All people would accept that different members had different abilities and needs, and as such, workers would be compensated differently. This would not lead to the same problems produced by capitalist inequalities. Marx assumed that people would be naturally drawn to the types of work for which they were best suited, even without any monetary incentives. (Several important questions were left unanswered: Who would determine what skills were most valuable—markets or central controllers? Would one’s claim to “needs” change if those needs resulted from personal irresponsibility?) -Moral equality *The state and all people should accept that any individual’s interests and beliefs are equally valuable as another’s. Policies that hurt one group at the expense of another should therefore always be morally justified in some way. Rules—however consistently enforced—should be sensible and fair. *All lives are equal in value and all people are entitled to a certain quality of life.

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*This causes controversy in deciding whether or not to extend equal rights to people living outside the country’s borders. While it is popular to claim that human rights should be universally respected, only a minority of thinkers—called “cosmopolitan egalitarians”—believe that wealth should also be internationally redistributed. Humanitarianism and egalitarianism are not the same thing: The former has limited aims that strive to end problems like hunger and disease. While doing such might require more reallocation of resources from the rich to the poor, this is merely a means to an end whereas egalitarianism holds it as an end in itself. Some human needs can be totally satiated. For example, at some point, a person is no longer malnourished and is no longer dominated by others. The quality can be intensified no farther. But why should we care about equality at all? How is it valuable to society? -Equality has instrumental value, meaning making people more equal in some respect makes them happier or better off in some tangible way. For instance, promoting income equality through taxes helps the poor a lot and hurts the rich a little, so net happiness increases. [People are naturally satisfied once they hit a certain income.] One might also argue that income equality is necessary for status equality, which again infers that the first has instrumental value towards attaining the second. All types of equality empower the others. -Equality has intrinsic value, meaning people are naturally entitled to certain forms of equality, even if this produces no concrete benefits. -Status equality is valuable because it would improve the self-esteem and lifestyles of lower status people and allow them to lead freer and more productive lives once class concerns were removed. [But how much self-esteem, however ill-gotten, would it subtract from the well-off? What would be the net impact?] Status inequality is clearly unjust when people are considered inferior due to race or sex. -Equality is not always beneficial. The process of making society equal in some way might simply drag everyone down to an equally miserable level of existence, a process called “leveling down.” [For example, assume that half the people in a capitalist country make $100,000 and the other half makes $10,000. Communism is instilled, and the first half of the people lose their will to work since they can’t get ahead, and everyone ends up making $10,000. The country’s citizens now have income equality, but no one is making more money than before. In fact, 50% of the people were just badly hurt by the switch. However, if the same scenario led to everyone making $15,000, half the people would be made better off, and it could be argued more convincingly that Communism helped the country.] This shows that equality is not the only societal concern. Efficiency [Pareto optimality] is also a goal. People strongly disagree over weighting these values and hence over what type of world is most desirable. In fact, allowing inequality might actually be more just than forcing everyone to be equal. History has shown that instilling income and status equality often require the severe curtailment of civil liberties, which most people consider more severely unjust than living in an income-unequal society. Pure egalitarianism holds equality to be the supreme value, meaning equality must be pursued even at the expense of other factors like efficiency and civil liberties. Pluralist egalitarianism concedes that other considerations sometimes trump equality, and that unequal systems can be more just than equal ones. It must be accepted that much inequality is beyond the control of individual people: No one has any control over being born with some type of physical or genetic defect, being born into a poor country lacking opportunities, or being born into an abusive or neglectful home. Many thinkers

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consider it unjust that society should allow these people to suffer through inequality the consequences of these disadvantages. [What about the Buddha’s teachings to accept suffering and to strive to overcome it through a lifetime of introspection and discipline?] [Indeed, equality can strongly conflict with other important values, and equality can be unjust. One value that must be considered is national survival, which impacts individual safety. Arguably, the right to live and to live in physical safety trumps all other rights, including that to equality. After all, equality and liberty can’t be pursued once you’re dead or dominated by an illiberal foreign country. Equality can therefore be temporarily shelved in many ways if it comes at the expense of other qualities necessary to promote national defense against hostile nations. Once those threats are gone, priorities can change. Ours is a complex system that evolves and ultimately strives to optimize human potential.]

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Chapter 2: Democracy Democracies are based on the principle of political equality: The power to change government and hence to change the way state power is exercised is distributed evenly among the people. Democracy has until recently been a very uncommon political system, and early Western thinkers actually attacked its value. Ancient Athens in the 500’s - 300’s BC practiced a form of democracy. -All decisions were made through direct vote at the public assembly. -Only landowning male citizens were allowed to vote. -The assembly convened about 40 times a year. -The costs of attendance [like transportation to the assembly] were subsidized for voting people. During the early 400’s BC, Athens and Sparta were engaged in a major and protracted war. Athens had to take emergency measures to ensure its own survival, and twice (414 and 404 BC), the democratic government was temporarily overthrown and replaced with oligarchies. Shortly after democracy was restored, Socrates was put on trial because it was believed that his antidemocratic teachings (but not he directly) had partly inspired the coups. The democratic government considered him a threat and their prosecution of him led to his suicide. Plato was Socrates’ best student, and he later published his master’s criticisms of democracy in two works. -Protagoras: Socrates believed that not all citizens were equipped with the same intellect and knowledge to make good political decisions, and giving everyone an equal say in politics through democracy ignored this fact. -Gorgias: Most people can be easily swayed by a skilled orator to favor or disfavor some political position, even if the orator offers no real insight into the merits of the proposal. The masses are therefore fickle and can be easily led to make irrational decisions via democracy. People are especially prone to this when the orator panders to them and leads them away from making difficult yet necessary decisions. Plato then created an alternative political system to democracy and presented it in The Republic. -Above all, a republic would strive for justice. -The citizens of a republic would be divided into three castes that would handle the nation’s different functions. *The Guardian class would be composed of philosophers and would totally control government. *The Auxiliaries would be composed of soldiers and would defend the state at the Guardians’ command. *Farmers, artisans and merchants would form the remaining class, responsible for economic activities and all else. -Specialization in national affairs would be optimal and would mirror the harmonious functioning of a human body. -Just as not everyone is qualified through intelligence and training to fight in the army or be a brain surgeon, not everyone is qualified to make political decisions. The Guardian class is therefore justified. -The republic would be a meritocracy, with citizens being able to move between castes as they proved themselves worthy. Guardians would receive the most intense scrutiny and could be removed from office. -Women can serve as Guardians. -Guardians cannot own property or have children.

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Aristotle was Plato’s best student and held similar views on how a city-state should be organized. However, Aristotle was more pragmatic than Plato and thus set his sights lower when formulating new ways to improve society. -In Politics, Aristotle stated that the oldest male was the natural master of his household, and that his wife and children were natural inferiors due to lower intellect. It was therefore natural for the state to be run by a collaboration of adult males, each of whom represented and knew what was best for their respective segments of the population. -In Ethics, Aristotle concedes that an educated and benevolent aristocracy would be optimal for running a government, but establishing such a system is impossible for most city-states. Instead, city-states should adopt a compromise system in which all male citizens are allowed to vote for government representatives, who in turn must have a high level of wealth to stand in office. The rich and hence the educated natural aristocracy remain in direct control over lawmaking, yet since they depend upon the lower classes for votes, the rich must abide by their wishes and work for their welfare. This is a mixed constitution since it has elements of democracy, oligarchy and aristocracy. It is more equal than Plato’s republic since all citizens have indirect political power. Aristotle’s concept of a mixed constitution introduced new flexibility into political thought that had previously been lacking. 150 years after Aristotle, Polybius posited that states naturally proceeded through a set cycle of regime types (monarchytyrannyaristocracyoligarchydemocracymonarchyad infinitum), and that republican Rome had endured by adopting a well-structured mixed constitution that kept an aristocracy in charge while providing enough democracy to placate the masses and prevent abuses. Polybius believed that the cycle of change had stopped in Rome thanks to a properly structured government. Machiavelli and James Harrington famously adopted the same appreciation for the mixed constitution as the optimal form of government. Plato and Aristotle strongly believed that some people had naturally superior reasoning abilities than others and were therefore more entitled to govern. Not all Greek thinkers of the time agreed. Some believed that all humans were born with “an educable capacity for intelligent moral judgment,” and that all were therefore entitled to the same political power. During the English Civil Wars, leaders and thinkers among the Parliamentarians began advancing the idea that all men (and not women) were born equal and free, and hence there were no natural leaders or followers. In part this was because all humans were created in the image of God, who was of course sacred. [But what if you don’t accept this premise?] This was consonant with social contract theory, which was simultaneously gaining popularity. The theory stated that a system of political authority was only legitimate if its subjects had first agreed to live under it, or if they would have done so given opportunity at its inception. Thomas Hobbes and John Locke famously contributed to social contract theory. Social contract theory is not a naturally ally or forebear of democracy: It was accepted that the people could—and maybe should—agree to live under an undemocratic and politically unequal state for their own good. -In Leviathan (1651), Hobbes argues that all people should submit to an absolute dictator since it would be the most stable political system. Hobbes rejects the idea of natural authority but also rejects the need for political equality. He believed that freedom would lead to chaos and death. -John Locke also believed in the necessity of social contracts for governance of fundamentally free people. In Two Treatises of Government (1689), he argued that people should first come together into a group with the intention of forming a government, then, through majority vote,

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design the government, and finally, live under that government forever. While Locke disagreed with Hobbes’ view that a dictatorship was the best form of government, he also disapproved of democracy for anything beyond the initial design process. -The key belief they shared was that intrinsic human equality did not necessitate political equality. However, not all political thinkers during this time rejected the notion of political equality. The Levellers, an antiroyalist faction (1640’s) during the English Civil War, believed that all men were born equal and free, that authority derived from social contracts, and that government should embody political equality. Specifically, they thought the English government should be run by a Parliament instead of a king, and that members of Parliament should be democratically elected by male citizens. The Levellers’ ideas were encapsulated in An Agreement of the People (1647). In the Putnam debates, the book was discussed by various factions of England’s new elite. General Oliver Cromwell and Henry Ireton took issue with the notion that poor men should have equal political power (one vote per person) as rich men since government actions were more consequential to people with property and wealth than they were for people who had nothing to lose: A material stake in the success of the nation produced responsible political decisions. The Levellers countered that excluding the poor from politics effectively made them slaves, which was again an affront to their natural rights as children of God. The poor also had the ability to reason. Jean-Jacques Rousseau argued in The Social Contract (1762) that innate equality established political equality, and they were inextricable. -All men are born with equal potential. Environment is what turns people into slaves or masters. -Enslavement is wrong because it robs people of their chances to develop that potential and become intelligent and successful. -By extension, government should exclude no one and should be a consensual association of free men. -All people naturally want to be free. If laws are created by all the people together, then the people cannot complain about laws since they themselves created them, and the laws will not infringe upon liberties any more than the people have authorized. -The government should be headed by a direct citizen assembly—no elected representatives. All people agree to put themselves under the power of everyone else. -Rousseau understood that such democracies could be hijacked by tyrannical majorities or selfish interest groups, and so he believed societies should strongly instill civic virtue and an attitude of fairness and consideration for others among their citizens. This is a moralized conception of democracy, and in effect, Rousseau believed that political equality alone was insufficient to create a successful state. [Never going to happen. Resort to a next-best option.] Modern political philosophers still strongly agree that these virtues are healthy in a democratic society: People should consider how their political choices will impact everyone else before making those choices. There is essential agreement with Plato that governments should be run by philosophers. The justifications for political equality (democracy) -All humans have the same innate capacity for reason and moral judgment. [What about retarded people and born sociopaths?] Environment leads to differential development of those qualities, yet people are all created equal in a fundamental way.

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-If people are given the opportunity to participate through political equality, then their latent abilities will have a chance to develop if they haven’t already. Disenfranchising them forever denies them this chance. -Excluding people from the political process is also immoral because it hurts the self-esteem of those people and invites others to look down upon them. -As a utilitarian argument, history has shown that democratic governments on average are more successful, behave more humanely and are more socially conscious than nondemocratic ones. Democratic governments maximize total happiness. *This is all because in democratic governments, the leaders are held accountable to the people, and are therefore loathe to act against the latter’s interests. Dictators don’t have this problem and more commonly wage wars and pursue irresponsible policies that lead to national suffering. *Condorcet’s Jury Theorem also explains the phenomenon through the wisdom of the masses: If an average person has a 50%+ probability of making a good decision, then the odds of that decision being made approach 100% as more people are added to the decision making process, as in a democracy. The case against political equality (democracy) -If leaders are held accountable, they will avoid making decisions that are unpopular yet necessary, such as adopting environmentalist policies that will cause happiness in the long run yet cause inconvenience to millions of voters in the short term. Tough choices are avoided. -Condorcet’s Jury Theorem assumes that people make good decisions the majority of the time, but it is entirely possible that, at least in some circumstances, an average person probably won’t make the right political decision (<50%). In that case, it is to society’s advantage to have fewer people involved with politics. -Democracy can lead to a tyranny of the majority, in which minority groups are abused. Protecting against majority tyranny -In Democracy in America (1835), Alexis de Tocqueville observed that the American system protected itself from majority tyranny through a strong legal system that allowed legal experts to cancel potentially injurious laws and through easy opportunities for citizen participation in government (juries, local government) that instilled notions of fairness in government among average people. -The judicial branch of government thus serves as a kind of aristocracy, and it provides a route for minorities to challenge and overturn laws passed by the majority (through legislatures) should they be unfair. -A constitution that enumerates inviolate citizen rights and guarantees liberalism (in the classic sense) is a necessary hedge against majority tyranny. -Of course, the interpretation of the Constitution and of what “fairness” entails is still left up to fallible human beings who can possess bias against minorities or the majority. -Ultimate authority to interpret laws rests with the Supreme Court, which is an unelected body of legal experts. Hence, the U.S. system (and many others) possesses a strong undemocratic element. This is not far from Aristotle’s ideal of a mixed government. -An unelected judiciary that can void majority-created laws also voids political equality. It also makes it possible for the government to behave tyrannically, with the courts favorably interpreting the Constitution to rationalize anything. -However, if the unelected judiciary is able to determine the constitutionality of laws yet lacks the power to void those laws, it merely calls public and government attention to problems and

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suggests review. If this is the case, the judiciary is a mere aid to democratic governance and does not compromise political equality. -Forcing citizen participation in government or at least making it easily available familiarizes citizens with democratic ideals and makes them responsible for shared governance. -Marxists, anarchists, and some contemporary groups wanted highly localized, democratic government. -Workplace committees and neighborhood groups are also valid bodies for instilling selflessness, responsibility for community, compromise, and democratic values in people. -The judiciary and deliberative democracy are meant to strengthen citizen’s moral reasoning abilities so they won’t succumb to a tyranny of the majority.

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Chapter 3: Meritocracy While there is agreement among scholars that political equality is very important in a successful society, very few believe that total economic equality is necessary. Inequality is fair when it is grounded in a person’s innate character and skills and in their accomplishments. A meritocracy is a system in which peoples’ status is commensurate with their abilities and drive. However, a true meritocracy will not exist if there is no equality of opportunity: All citizens must be on a level playing field to begin with. The advantages of meritocracy -The system is efficient since people who show talents and interest in a particular field will gain entry into that field, properly allocating resources to needs. Without a meritocracy, people would either be randomly or improperly assigned to roles, and efficiency would suffer. -Rewarding people for hard work and proper skills seems intrinsically just to humans. [Indeed, fairness is a biologically hardwired value that even appears among non human mammals.] Weak meritocracy -There are few disadvantages that may obstruct equality of opportunity. -Public and private sector discrimination on the basis of irrelevant characteristics (race, sex, creed, etc.) is the main obstacle to meritocracy. -While the state must always refrain from discrimination, there is so debate over whether and to what extent it should intervene to prevent private sector discrimination. -Some argue that private sector discrimination will disappear on its own over time as discriminatory firms put themselves at a competitive disadvantage and either change their practices or go out of business. -However, if most average people also discriminate, then discriminatory businesses might actually flourish thanks to their practices. For instance, a restaurant that refused to hire blacks might enjoy higher patronage from white customers. -Also, businesses might simply find it easier to discriminate. For example, if a manual labor position requires physical strength and endurance, the boss might simply stick to hiring only big men because this would be a sure bet whereas hiring a woman or smaller person would be timeconsuming since the worker would have to be tested or observed for the necessary skills. -In light of this, government antidiscrimination legislation seems necessary. Strong meritocracy -Even if discrimination is eliminated, some people enjoy advantages thanks to inherited wealth or richer or better families that care for them more and can afford to give them better schooling. -No one “earns” the environment into which they are born, and the side effects of such are therefore not their fault or credit. -Strong meritocracy aims to be more efficient than weak meritocracy by better cultivating the talents of lower-class people who don’t realize their potential in life thanks to the burdens of low birth. -Supporters of strong meritocracy believe that inherited wealth, education, and family environment are the main sources of inequality once discrimination is fixed. -In 1797, Thomas Paine recognized the unfair advantage granted by inheritances (more life freedom, better odds of long-term prosperity, more time for everything non-work related), and he proposed taxing them and redistributing them in equal lump-sum payments to all citizens upon reaching adulthood.

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-Equality of education can be achieved through preventing rich families from sending their children to superior private schools and through funding all public schools identically. -Family environment has a major effect on a child. *Nutrition and the type and quantity of parental interaction with a child during the first two years strongly affects the child’s cognitive development, motivation and social skills for the rest of their lives. *Of course, different rearing methods continue past the earliest years and continue to impact the child’s potential and direction in life. This is heavily class-dependent. *Family values and teachings also strongly influence gender roles in children, which often leads girls to circumscribe their own potential. -Strong meritocracy would involve a huge amount of state legislation to create. -Unless the family is abolished and all children raised equally by the state [all past attempts at this—even if they were just limited—failed miserably], family-based inequality will never be eliminated. How meritocratic is contemporary society? -Studies show that, even in the Developed World and even in Socialist countries like the U.K., one’s socioeconomic class of origin is probably the same class the person will stay in for life. However, there remains substantial social mobility. -It is entirely possible that some degree of social Darwinism exists and explains much of these results: People born into low class families inherit genes from their low class parents, which makes them biologically predisposed to lower IQ’s and motivation. Even if they had the same opportunities as kids from high class families, the inborn differences would probably produce different outcomes. -Incomplete social mobility is therefore not a sign of a failed meritocracy. -However, studies clearly indicate that childhood environment influences later life accomplishment. -We currently lack enough knowledge about human genetics and developmental psychology to assess how much nature and nurture respectively influence individual achievement, so we cannot determine how just the current level of inequality in our societies is. The debate remains a rhetorical one. Against meritocracy 1: threat to liberty -Meritocracies should not be established if doing so undercuts individual liberty. -The personal freedom to associate with whomever one pleases, even if this has the effect of excluding specific groups and hence disadvantaging them, is a basic right more fundamental than promoting meritocracy. -Establishing a strong or even a weak meritocracy requires using the government to curtail individual and family choices. Religious beliefs pertaining to gender roles and education might also be violated. Meritocracy and personal freedom are hence in tension. -However, the meritocratic state policies are designed to maximize the autonomy of the children once they reach adulthood, unburdened by any factors imposed by class or background. The state therefore promotes the freedom of the children in the future at the expense of the freedom of their parents in the present. There is no reason one should be favored against the other. -Moderate meritocratic policies (like allowing rich parents to give a respectable inheritance to their children, with anything above that being taxed and redistributed to all) can ease inequality while only infringing on personal freedom to a small degree. Against meritocracy 2: status inequality

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-If a strong meritocracy were successfully established, and if it eliminated all obstacles to achievement, then people of low status would know for sure that their lot in life stemmed from personal deficiencies and nothing more, and people who earned their way into the high class could consider themselves genuinely superior. “Status inequality” would thus be the result. [Give me a break. We should avoid doing all this just so people won’t have their feelings hurt at having to face what they truly are? Grow up.] -To remedy this problem, all citizens should be provided with equal public goods like universal healthcare, and should be made to interact through universal service like a military draft, instilling in all people across classes an appreciation for each others’ worth and intrinsic equality. -Society should adopt values in which different types of skills and talents, and not just those that translate into the highest salaried jobs, are more equally valued. A good mother might be esteemed as much as a good lawyer in such a society. [A very mature way of thinking, though it runs into some problems: Does a great whiffle-ball player really deserve the same esteem as a great brain surgeon? Some stations in life clearly take harder work and more talent to attain, and this must be recognized. The attitude towards lower status occupations should probably be “Well, someone’s got to do it or society would break down, so I respect him for that.”] -People should be evaluated on several dimensions, not just their class and income. -Scientific research is needed to determine how effective the proposed measures will be before one can responsibly enact them as policy. Against meritocracy 3: incoherence -No matter what, income disparities will somehow translate into different outcomes as parents find ways to use their money to benefit their children. Tolerating income inequality therefore to some extent negates the idea of meritocracy, which is inconsistent and even incoherent. -Even strong meritocracy will allow substantial income inequality. -Some amount of income inequality might be possible without compromising the potential of the subsequent generation. Determining whether this is the case or not will require further empirical research. Against meritocracy 4: unfair to the less talented -The logic of meritocracy rests upon the assumption that people who contribute services of greater worth should be rewarded with higher pay. But is this really just? -A highly talented person might work well below their potential and still produce services of greater value than a low skilled person working as hard as they can. The second person makes greater relative use of their potential and, some argue, should be rewarded the most. -Since people have no control over what talents they are born with, why should they be rewarded for them? [This implies that biology has some effect on a person’s intellect.]

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Chapter 4: Luck egalitarianism Luck egalitarianism is a recent concept and posits that society should strive to correct inequalities caused by accident of birth (luck) but should respect inequalities resulting from personal choices. Ronald Dworkin supports this view by first accepting two precepts: 1) Individuals have a special responsibility for their own lives and hence to earn success and 2) society should not allow people to suffer or gain advantage through accidents of birth. People should be allowed to gain or suffer only through adult life choices. -In a society, resources should be divided up evenly at the beginning among all citizens. -Some type of insurance system should exist to compensate citizens born with disadvantages, thus ensuring their success and happiness. State-supported equality again runs into problems: -If a person is comfortable with some perceived “disability” that they have, would the government be giving them an unfair advantage by giving them the resources to fix it? -If one person’s welfare (personal satisfaction) requires large expenditures of money (i.e. - I’m only happy eating caviar), is it fair to shift resources accordingly when it would mean depriving many other people of their welfare? Happiness (welfare) and achievement are also often inversely related, and different people value the two differently (i.e. – My life would be happier if I worked a lot less, but I would then not accomplish as much). So why should the state value ensuring equal welfare among its citizens above all else? It is more widely accepted for the state to ensure equality of resources (initial resources). But if people don’t deserve to suffer thanks to circumstances beyond their control, why should the rich and naturally talented by taxed more heavily? Dworkin fails to see that a person’s expensive adult tastes and preferences might stem from childhood environment and not just from adult choices. Using his own logic, their preferences are hence beyond their control, and satisfying them to ensure their welfare is thus incumbent upon society on principle. Goods and income enable people to be free, but do not represent freedom in themselves. Equalizing income might also hurt welfare among many people: The rich would be horrified and unhappy at having to live as middle class people, and many poor people have learned to be happy with what they have. A poor and a rich person might thus be equally happy, and maximizing net welfare might require us to maintain their wealth disparity. Reasonable people universally desire basics like food, shelter and security, so the state should ensure that these are available to all citizens. Similarly, while people disagree on how much the state should strive to ensure happiness against other goals, people are universally averse to severe, involuntary pain and physical suffering, so the government can be safely charged with alleviating those. Some level of welfare must therefore be made available for people to lead productive lives of their choosing. Against luck egalitarianism 1: threat to liberty -Taxing skilled people to reimburse untalented ones infringes upon the liberty of the first group since reduced wealth circumscribes the range of daily and long-term choices they can make. -Libertarians argue that this form of taxation is tantamount to partial slavery since part of the skilled person’s labor is effectively owned and taken by the unskilled person, even if the skilled

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person doesn’t want the arrangement. If the skilled person works, they have no choice but to work in part for the unskilled person. -However, a taxed worker still has important freedoms a slave lacks: *The skilled person is free to work as little as he chooses or not to work at all. *The skilled person is free to choose their occupation. Against luck egalitarianism 2: social and political inequality -A nation that fully honored luck egalitarianism would respect the choices of its citizens, meaning people severely injured in accidents that were their fault (or maybe just happened to them randomly as adults) would not receive extra compensation, and people who hit the lottery would not be taxed (only people with higher talents are taxed more from their incomes). -Wealth disparities could arise as a result and translate into political and social inequalities. -State compensation to people born with disabilities or other problems might take the form of condescending pity, which would insult those people and create status inequality as a superiorinferior dynamic crystallized in society. -Elizabeth Anderson argues for a different definition of “egalitarianism”: *All people should be equally free from domination, exploitation, demeaning, or the control of others, and should be equally unfree to do so to others. *All people should have the economic resources to participate equally in a democracy. This entails some, but not total, wealth redistribution. *Economic equality is only necessary to a degree that enables other forms of equality. -Rousseau argued that economic inequality in itself was evil since it was the source of social instability—rich people were the source of tyrants and poor people the source of mobs and armies. Absolute income equality was therefore necessary. -Others argue that economic inequality impedes status equality. -Wealth redistribution might itself create status inequality between skilled workers and welfare recipients. -Is Anderson right to consider economic equality not a goal in itself? After all, wealth so strongly affects lifestyle and chances of success. Isn’t it just as important as the other forms of equality? [Inescapable subjectivity, even among academics—there are no objective truths.] [So many problems stem from unequal abilities and from human psychology—the vast majority of people aren’t mature enough to simply not care what others think of them, so we have status inequality. AI’s wouldn’t have many of these problems, which would give them important advantages.] The different forms of equality are ultimately in tension with each other and with liberty.

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Chapter 5: Equality and incentives Critics of economic equality claim that policies meant to create such will destroy individual incentives to work, which when summed will lower aggregate output. Different opinions on the issue: -Douglas Jay believed that enough economic inequality should be allowed to maximize total output. [Inequality above that might actually lead to a net decrease in output from optimum] [Highest productivity, lowest low wages] -A minimum wage should be emplaced to ensure that all workers can afford an acceptable standard of living. This effectively limited economic inequality by eliminating the potential for very low pay. Economic inequality should be otherwise tolerated. [Middle] -Economic inequality should only be allowed to rise so long as it doesn’t diminish the wages of the lowest paid workers. [Lowest productivity, highest low wages] Most people find the first proposition—which would push many people below a living wage—to be the least acceptable. Rawls believes that people should use a code of justice to guide their political decisionmaking, and that in creating that code, each person should ask themselves what kind of rules and institutions they would want to live under if they were randomly assigned skills, disabilities, social class, and religions. [Basically, to consider the world from another’s eyes and to concern one’s self with how the weakest citizens should be treated] Rawls contends that two precepts should logically flow from this thought experiment: -All citizens are equally entitled to as much liberty as can be had without endangering the liberty of others. -People should not face discrimination in any sphere of work or life. -Inequality should be tolerated only when the lowest members of the society are better off than they would have been under a purely equal system. In this case, the welfare of the worst off includes their self-esteem. In a world with total economic equality, the worst off will have high status but low income, like everyone else. In an economically unequal world, the poor might have higher salaries but inferior status and self-esteem. It is a tradeoff that must be subjectively valued. Critics of Rawls question his assumption that all people should decided to “play it safe” by assuming that they will end up as worst off in society. People stand a lot to gain if they adopt less egalitarian conceptions of justice and then luck out by being born into the high end of society. Rawls responds that people should not make decisions with major, permanent consequences unless they are honestly willing to live with them. Therefore, it is unethical for a person to gamble against the possible welfare of their future selves when the stakes are so high. An alternative to Rawls’ idea of improving the lot of the worst off is to accept the justice of a welfare state that provides all people with a decent minimum standard of living. However, separated from any notions of intrinsic fairness, this leaves open the possibility that the rich might set that subjective standard so low that it defeats the purpose of protecting the poor. If it is accepted that no one is entitled to their inborn strengths or weaknesses (genetic or environmental), then no one’s salary is “earned” and everyone deserves equality in all ways. However, inequality might be justified if the resulting increase in wealth “raised all boats” and outweighed the suffering inflicted upon low-ranking people in the form of status inequality. Rawls also argues that people shouldn’t be penalized for laziness and low productivity since it is too hard to disentangle these phenomena from inborn limits, preferences and childhood

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socialization over which they had no control. But in effect, this would lead to a society in which the hardworking blatantly subsidized the lazy, which people instinctively and almost universally consider unfair. Rawls later revised his ideas on this and now claims that people who spend time at leisure should not receive the minimum income since the leisure time substitutes for the utility they would have gained from the money. Rawls also assumes that middle class peoples’ incomes follow those of the lowest class, so any income equalization that benefits the latter will also benefit the former. (Remember that Rawls largely discounts the negative effects of wealth transfer on the upper class) However, it is possible that greater economic inequality might benefit the middle classes by a huge amount and disadvantage the poor by only a small amount, which would increase the net and average utility of society. Under Rawls’ rules, this would not be allowed since it would hurt the poor, but the question arises over just how absolute the need to protect the poor from income diminishment is when cast against such large gains for so many other, non-wealthy-yet-better-off people. Supporters remind us that the poor should usually be given more weight since their need is usually the greatest. [Even if a whole lot of middle class people gain enough from Policy X to pay for a year of college, it is hard to justify Policy X if it forces even a small number of poor people to live on the streets and starve.] The question of work ethos -If skilled people worked just for the sake of contributing to society and because they enjoyed their jobs, there would be no need for heavy monetary compensation and the attendant economic inequalities that hurt society in other ways. -Hobbhouse (a Marxist) believed that in an ideal society, people would be willing to accept equal pay for different jobs because they would understand that all jobs were equally necessary and they would be happy to service the community. While he doubted humans would reach this mindset in his lifetime, he believed that the government should use propaganda to move people closer to the ideal. -Rawls doesn’t believe in equal incomes, and in fact he wants to keep taxes relatively low so as not to unduly impede efficiency. If taxes are too high, skilled workers will work less, which will reduce overall incomes, even for the poor. Using Rawls’ logic of first ensuring that the wealth of the poor does not decrease, it is therefore wrong to push for income equality beyond a certain point. -However, is it ethical for skilled workers to cut back on their labors when they know it will hurt the poor and unskilled? Cohen argues that in a society with Communist-like values, skilled workers would push themselves to work just as hard for the sake of the community, regardless of tax rates or income inequality. -The issue over the ethics of this should be recast: Most people are skilled in many ways and could function in more than one occupation. Jobs are high-paying often because they are difficult, unpleasant or very time-consuming, and it’s not worth it to the person to do them unless they receive higher compensation. Many high-paid, high-skilled workers would in fact prefer to do different jobs if those jobs paid the same amount. High skilled workers aren’t consciously trying to hurt society by cutting back their own hours or switching to more enjoyable jobs because their pay drops. The behavior is not strategic and is entirely defensible at the individual level. Insisting that skilled people ignore their own desires and work difficult jobs for low pay is thus unfair to them at a personal level.

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-On the other hand, if a skilled person refuses to work unless they get a higher salary simply so they can feel and appear superior to others, they are doing an injustice to society, especially if others badly need their skill. -Pay inequality is thus justified depending upon the individual’s motivation for higher pay. Moral incentives in a market economy -Modern philosophers continue to believe that a society could theoretically operate without incentive-driven economics and labor if all people made personal decisions based upon society’s best interests, but it is an inescapable reality of human nature that people don’t behave in this way. Attempts to come up with viable alternatives to capitalism that attain income equality without unduly sacrificing efficiency have failed. It is therefore necessary to tolerate some level of income inequality to keep the poor (and everyone else) from a worsened standard of living. The system cannot be altered beyond certain parameters given the realities of human nature. There is no agreement over what level of economic inequality is optimal, but almost everyone concedes that it is necessary for a functional society. Mainstream ethicists agree that the worst off members of society should be taken into first consideration when choosing policies that will change overall communal inequality.

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Chapter 6: Equality and difference People used to think that equality meant giving everyone the same rights, but many experts now see that different people have different values that must be satisfied through different rights. The concept is called “group differentiated citizenship.” Gender difference -While women have gained political equality in much of the world, they universally remain the poorer of the two sexes. Hence, there is pervasive economic inequality. -Almost all major philosophers before the modern age considered women the natural inferiors of men and therefore excluded them from discussions of equality. -Feminism is the movement that strives to correct these sex-based inequalities. -Feminism’s “First Wave” started in the late 1800’s and removed many political and legal inequalities facing women (voting rights, access to education and jobs, unequal status within marriage). -Even if political equality exists between the sexes, social equality does not. Women are still expected to be primary and unpaid caregivers to children, which hurts their ability to achieve in the workplace and to make money. This, in turn, makes them financially dependent upon men. -Some feminists have called for government benefits for females to balance out the effects of systemic social inequalities. This might include payment for caregiving. [Bad idea: Incentive for unskilled women to have kids to make money] -Starting with feminism’s “Second Wave” in the 1960’s, some activists began claiming that all inequalities stemmed from expectations from gender roles. True equality between the sexes therefore could never be achieved without the abolition of gender, which would free women from the expectation that they stay home and take care of kids. -Others considered this approach too extreme and instead suggested that government policies meant to recompense parents—whether male or female—for the burdens of parenthood would be preferable remedies. In any case, policies that favored female caregivers would just reinforce the existing gender stereotypes about women being the natural caregivers or being weaker than men. -There is also the question of how the state should deal with citizens whose cultures set traditional gender roles. In some cases, the women in such subcultures will embrace their roles as homemakers, and in others they will not. Even if the state respects their choices, state policies meant to indirectly equalize household labor between the sexes will send a clear message to the traditional minority that their lifestyle is viewed as less legitimate. -Using the logic that egalitarianism should be promoted by advantaging people born with natural limitations, women should be given some sex-specific benefits like longer maternity leave since they alone bear the physical burdens of pregnancy. -Some argue that affirmative action policies that advantage women are needed to accelerate society to a more gender-neutral and sex equal state (more humanist). It is also argued that government benefits might be needed to compensate for ongoing societal disadvantages that cannot be immediately eliminated. Cultural difference -“Multiculturalism” refers to a type of politics that demands protection and recognition of cultural groups. Political multiculturalists often demand things like legal exemptions, guarantees of special political representation, or redressing of past wrongs. Some view this as furthering equality while others view it as a reactionary obstruction.

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-Being a member of a group can put one at a disadvantage in society. As such, people in such circumstances are owed group-specific rights. -Kymlicka’s argument for group rights *Different cultures allow adherents to live their lives in different ways, increasing their autonomy and chances at happiness. Preserving cultures is therefore good. *Aboriginal cultures being eroded by larger, younger cultures (American Indians vs. whites) must be protected so that their members will be free to continue practicing ways of life that they find satisfying. Immigrants are not entitled to these protections since they chose to leave their homelands for a country with different customs and culture. *Protected minorities should not be able to practice authoritarianism within themselves since individual autonomy is the highest virtue. *One criticism is that members of minority groups can still have autonomy and choice as members of the more dominant culture, perhaps even more than before. Exposure to a more heterogeneous environment outside the minority might also be beneficial. *Kymlicka counters that the costs of transitioning to the dominant culture (in terms of time, money, and cultural/linguistic re-training) will be high, but the state can always assist with those. -Another argument holds that people define themselves partly by their membership in various groups (cultural or otherwise). To not recognize this is to diminish them and to hurt their selfesteem. -Problematically, there is no agreement over what government-sponsored “affirmation” of a group identity means. Moreover, if the group has bigoted views, it might be impossible for the government of a liberal state to endorse them. -Advocates of group recognition often also want government permission to stifle individual freedom within the group for fear that otherwise the group’s culture would change. This is because some group members find value in group membership so long as it remains traditional. Such measures, of course, infringe upon individual liberty. -Minority groups that seek protections for their traditional practices often request permission to mistreat women and homosexuals. -Critics contend that the modern feminist movement is run by white, upper-class women who conflate their own image of gender equality with that found in other races, ethnicities and classes. The exemptions debate -Should certain minorities be exempted from laws that place a particularly heavy burden on them? For instance, should Native Americans be allowed to use traditional yet illegal drugs for their rituals, and should turban-wearing Sikhs be exempted from bike helmet laws? -The exemptions preserve equality of opportunity for minorities. -But all laws are unfair to certain minority groups: Speed limits only hurt people who like to drive fast and anti-smoking laws only inconvenience smokers. [There are even people for whom anti-smoking laws are more of an affront than laws that restrict their religious or ethnic practices.] -Moreover, minorities still enjoy equality of opportunity in most cases since, for example, the Sikh can still just replace his turban with a helmet for bike riding. He just chooses not to do so. -The U.S. legal system has taken an intermediate approach to the subject of exemptions. The First Amendment protects freedom of religion, which complicates the imposition of laws that seriously hurt some group’s ability to exercise that freedom. The government can only restrict

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religious or ethnic expression if it has a compelling interest (protection of public or individual safety and liberty) to do so. -However, if an exemption is granted to one group, then the same exemption should be granted to all groups that demand the same exemption, which means people claiming membership in silly or archaic groups would gain the same legal exemptions as those in serious ones. [For instance, if a Sikh can publicly carry a knife for religious reasons, why can’t a devout, modernday anime Samurai man carry a sword? The Samurai might actually hold the right to be armed more sacred than the Sikh does, and on what basis can the law rule membership in one group to be more valid than another?] Eventually, so many people might gain exemptions that the purpose of the law would be defeated. This is especially dangerous if the law in question is meant to protect public safety. -The U.S. has taken the easy way out and leaves exemptions up to legislatures and not the judiciary. Decisions are simply made on a majority rules basis—fair or not. Democracy revisited -Disadvantaged groups should be protected so that they can right inequalities that make them disadvantaged in the first place. -There are disadvantaged minority groups in society that will continue to be disadvantaged under a strictly democratic system where they can be outvoted by the majority. As such, in the interests of equality, these minority groups deserve special protections. This might include reserved spots in government for women or minority ethnic groups, or support for unions.

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Chapter 7: The future of equality In the developed world, serious efforts at achieving more equality—specifically economic—have faltered. Many grassroots organizations are now pushing global equality, meaning wealth distribution from rich to poor nations. On a global level, economic inequality is severe: As but one measure of such, the top three world billionaires have more money than the poorest 600 million humans. Some activists contend that equality should transcend borders and that people in rich countries have an obligation to help those in poor ones. Rawls again uses the “veil of ignorance” device to analyze this question. He asks what sorts of international laws sensible people would establish if they had no control over what country they would be assigned to. He concludes that all would agree that large, rich countries should help small, poor ones, but only insofar as the latter were unable to protect and provide liberty to their citizens. Thus, wealth redistribution might occur, but not for the simple sake of lessening inequality. Of course, some are critical of this. -Some claim that nation-states impose no moral boundaries through the human race, and that all people should think of themselves as part of a worldwide human community. Moreover, people have no control over the country into which they are born, so why should they benefit or suffer from the lot life casts for them in this respect? Nobody “earns” being born into a rich Western country and therefore can’t claim a right to its citizenship benefits. -Others criticize Rawls’ assumption that people behind the veil of ignorance would only want the world to assure enough wealth to poor countries to provide good institutions. In fact, they might demand levels of economic equality above what is needed for the former condition. Rawls further argues that different countries value economic growth—which is balanced against other considerations—differently. Some therefore choose to be poorer than others. Forcing economic equality between such countries is therefore unjust. Going back to the veil of ignorance device, Rawls further deduces the following: -No one would want the world community to allow any country to fall below a certain standard of living. It would bring misery and dependence upon other countries. -Immigration/emigration should be allowed to preserve freedom of choice among the people. [Move to Ghana if you want a slower paced life, move to the U.S. if you want faster] The pessimists’ argument against nation-states being able to engender national or international equality: -Across the Developed World, Gini coefficients have risen starting in the 1980’s, meaning more wealth and income are concentrated among the rich. -Social mobility has also declined, meaning there is less equality of opportunity. -Globalization and the attendant mobility of labor and capital make it harder to sovereign states to raise taxes and spending to promote internal equality since business can just leave in the face of these new costs. It should be noted, however, that globalization promotes international equality since it thus enriches Third World countries. -The decline of the labor movement and the fragmentation of the working classes to many nonindustrial jobs (like service) has diluted the group’s sense of identity and its ability to influence politics in a coordinated fashion.

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-A decline in civic engagement makes people less willing to participate in politics or to support redistributive policies. -Multiculturalism has weakened trust within societies and hence support for redistribution. -History has shown that there is no viable alternative economic model to capitalism. Capitalism is a system that invariably spawns economic inequality. The optimists’ case for the future of equality: -Looking back over the long-term, equality in all respects has increased since 1800. Only recently has economic inequality risen. -Countries might be able to reverse globalization to more freely pursue domestic equality, or unify for common policies that promote global equality. -Tax burdens have not declined in the Developed World. -If citizens could be made to value egalitarianism more, then redistributive national policies could be pursued, with workers and companies willing to bear the costs and not to relocate. -The working classes might be divided by new occupations that Karl Marx had not envisioned, but they remain united by miserable work conditions, unsatisfactory job mobility, and poor job security. Harnessing them into a single political unit is still possible. -While diversity in the U.S. causes support for social programs to decline, this isn’t the case in other Developed Countries. -The government could find ways to improve civic engagement. -A large body of evidence has linked high economic inequality to societal problems ranging from distrust, crime and public health. This could be used to convince people to favor equalitypromoting policies. -While capitalism must be accepted as the winning economic model, much can be done within it to promote equality, including expansion of the welfare state and cooperative ownership of assets. There have always been obstacles to greater equality. In the 1930’s, many people even discounted democracy altogether and believed that past gains with respect to equality would be lost. The critics were wrong then and might be wrong today. The push for greater equality will always have moral authority. X and y do not exhaust the possibilities If men are treated like slaves, they will develop a character suited to that status. Priceless advantages of Incomparably weaker Brings us to a second, related point This 'Eurabia' tripe is just one more intellectual, political & publishing fad. The 20th century is full of them. I'm sure if you track back to the 50s you'll find books full of dire predictions of the US being taken over by communists. Jump forward to the late 70s, after Vietnam, the recession & oil shocks & you get a spate of books etc. on the decline of the west. In the 80s it was 'Japan is goling to overtake the US' time. Jump forward 10 years & there are a series of triumphalist books about the victory of the US & the West - the 'end of history' had arrived'. After 9/11 we get all the 'islam is evil/rampant/the enemy/taking over' stuff. After the French refused to play ball with America over Iraq there was even a little spurt of anti-French stuff.

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