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Nov 20, 2019 · The authors find that people put up with high levels of inequality for two reasons: first, people generally care deeply about where they stand in terms of earnings within a group – for example ...
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Mar 27, 2018 · The two sums are the same, £350 billion. Correct: just eight people own as much wealth as half of the world’s population. That is just one of many eye-watering measures of inequality. Consider ...
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These reasons for redistribution are strongest when the poor are very badly off, as in the cases Singer describes. But there will always be some reason of this kind as long as redistributing assets increases the well-being of the poor more than it decreases that of the rich. These reasons for eliminating inequality are also based on an idea of equa...
The possibility of making the poor better off does not seem to be the only reason for seeking to reduce the worlds rising level of economic inequality. Many people in the United States seem to believe that our high and rising level of inequality is objectionable in itself, and it is worth inquiring into why this might be so. This inquiry is importa...
Second, if inequality, in itself, is something to be concerned about, we need to explain why this is so. It is easy to understand why people want to be better off than they are, especially if their current condition is very bad. But why, apart from this, should anyone be concerned with the difference between what they have and what others have? Why...
1. Economic inequality can give wealthier people an unacceptable degree of control over the lives of others.
If wealth is very unevenly distributed in a society, wealthy people often end up in control of many aspects of the lives of poorer citizens: over where and how they can work, what they can buy, and in general what their lives will be like. As an example, ownership of a public media outlet, such as a newspaper or a television channel, can give contr...
Economic inequality makes it difficult, if not impossible, to create equality of opportunity. Income inequality means that some children will enter the workforce much better prepared than others. And people with few assets find it harder to access the first small steps to larger opportunities, such as a loan to start a business or pay for an advanc...
4. Workers, as participants in a scheme of cooperation that produces national income, have a claim to a fair share of what they have helped to produce. What constitutes a fair share is of course controversial. One answer is provided by John Rawls Difference Principle, according to which inequalities in wealth and income are permissible if and only ...
Peter Singers powerful argument for altruistic giving draws on one moral relation we can stand in to others: the relation of being able to benefit them in some important way. With respect to this relation, to matter morally is to be someone whose welfare there is reason to increase.
But the objections to inequality that I have listed rest on a different moral relation. Its the relation between individuals who are participants in a cooperative scheme. Those who are related to us in this way matter morally in a further sense: they are fellow participants to whom the terms of our cooperation must be justifiable. In our current en...
These are not just objections to inequality and its consequences: they are at the same time challenges to the legitimacy of the system itself. The holdings of the rich are not legitimate if they are acquired through competition from which others are excluded, and made possible by laws that are shaped by the rich for the benefit of the rich. In thes...
T. M. Scanlon is Alford Professor of Natural Religion, Moral Philosophy, and Civil Polity at Harvard University.
Aug 19, 2015 · First, we need to break away from competitive marginal productivity theories of factor returns and model mechanisms which generate rents with consequences for wealth inequality. This will entail a greater focus on the ‘rules of the game.’ (Stiglitz et al 2015). Second, we need to focus on the interaction between income from physical and ...
Why wealth inequality matters Over the past decade, wealth inequality – driven by the private ownership of assets such as property, savings, and investments -– has increasingly been recognised as a major divisive force in the UK, and across the globe. Numerous studies have emphasised that because wealth builds
Inequality is like a spider’s web touching every part of society – from gender equality to housing to conflict – and when one strand is plucked, the effects reverberate through institutions, communities and the lives of individuals. In this article, we’ll explore 13 of the most significant ways inequality affects society: #. Topic. 1 ...
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Mar 6, 2024 · The effects of excessive wealth can be seen throughout US society—in the high rents resulting from private equity acquisition of housing, in tax structures, and in billionaire domination of our political system. If we are serious about narrowing the racial wealth gap, this silence needs to change. It’s time to change public policy to do ...