PT Lecture 21 - More Principles of Economic Justice

Dworkin Lower-level Institutional principle(s)

Market economy + redistributive taxation according to hypothetical insurance market

Dworkin's Intermediate-level distributive principle(s)

"Equality of Resources" A distribution should be both "ambition-sensitive" and "endowment-insensitive" (equivalently, it must be "choice-sensitive" and "circumstance-insensitive"

revised first principle

Each person has an equal claim to a fully adequate scheme of equal basic rights and liberties, which scheme is compatible with the same scheme for all; and in this scheme the equal political liberties, and only those liberties, are to be guaranteed their fair value

D1: 5 5 5

Flat egalitarianism

How could D2 in Wilt be unjust

If D2 is just because arrived at by just transfers, then D1 cannot also be just. This generalizes to all patterned distributions like D1.

In sum what parties are choosing

In sum, the parties aim to secure a level of social primary goods that enables them to advance their conception of the good and develop their moral powers.

Nozick lower-level institutional principles

Minimally regulated free-market economy

Principle of original acquisition

tells us how people can justly acquire initially unowned things that can then be transferred according to i) (Based on "Lockean proviso" to leave "enough and as good" to others - we have already discussed this).

Principle of transfer

tells us that holdings justly acquired can be freely transferred ("from each as they choose, to each as they are chosen - If we can defend it, can show what is wrong w Rawls' - If holding justly, can freely transfer - Distribution of economic resources just if result of freely made transfers From each as they choose to each as they are chosen

Principle of rectification of injustice

tells us what to do with holdings that were unjustly transferred or acquired

Implication of Wilt argument

- Being entitled to your holdings means having an absolute right to transfer it as you choose.

Why deny OP info

- Eliminates effect of bias and self-interest. - All are situated in the same way so no one is able to design principles to favor their particular condition. - The principles of justice that arise are supposed to be the result of a fair and unbiased agreement that treats each as an equal. - ensures impartiality

Rawls Difference Principle

- Maximize those in the worst position - If going to allow any inequalities, they must work to the greatest benefit of the least advantaged - second principle in special conception - regulates the institutions that are primarily responsible for distributing income and wealth

Libertarian Justification

- One's property is fundamental in such a way that gov intervention nearly always violates those rights unless designed to protect those rights - Challenges Rawls approach (demands gov intervention for worse off)

Nozick's Historical Entitlement Theory

- Rights over ownership over yourself, mental and labor powers, basic rights to your holdings (property) - Defends libertarian justification

Second Priority Rule

- The Priority of Justice over Efficiency and Welfare - The second principle of justice is lexically prior to the principle of efficiency and to that of maximizing the sum of advantages; and fair opportunity is prior to the difference principle."

First Priority Rule

- The Priority of Liberty - The principles of justice are to be ranked in lexical order and therefore liberty can be restricted only for the sake of liberty.

orinciples to regulate BSS

- The parties to the OP are choosing principles - The principles constitute the basic charter of that society. It will inform the design of all other institutions and laws—the constitution, legislation, administration, and economic policy.

Rawls's original position set up

- Various parties congregated to make a choice about principles of justice - point of his contract is to try to model of deliberating justice - a situation of equality and fairness among contracting parties in which no one has any incentive to seek outcomes that favor their own particular condition over anyone else's. - Rawls asks what principles of justice people in this fair situation would have reason to endorse.

Nozick's Entitlement Theory is not patterned

- denies that there is any one "natural" criterion according to which distribution should be patterned. - a just distribution should reflect the mere fact that it is the result of human choice (notice the work autonomy is doing in his argument), not that it is worthy of being chosen according to some natural or choice-worthy criterion.

Rawls, Nozick, Dworkin autonomy principles

- developed in the broadly Kantian tradition of moral and political thought and each regards a variant of autonomy as fundamental - upper-level principles justify lower-level principles. The lower-lever principles specify more concretely what the higher-level principles require. X is some variant of Kantian autonomy

Rawls on market socialism or property owning democracy

- either of these two remaining options could satisfy the DP - empirical question which one in fact would in different places and at different times 1. make use of a market device at some level in order to achieve some of the efficiency that market economies can. - In a market socialist system, some of the efficiency of a market competition can be achieved even when productive resources are publicly owned. 2. ii) They build concern for the worst off into the choice of a market system. - They do not prize efficiency above all, but only in service of distributive justice.

OP; Who Chooses

- hypothetical representatives of their society who wish to identify fair principles to govern society inter-generationally. - not really distinct people. - The constraints placed on what they know (see question D) below) ensures unanimity in their choice of principles. - People temporarily amnesiacs (blind to various features of identity) - All attribute conception of good (some way want life to go) but do not know what it is - So, you don't actually need to envision a negotiation among different people, but instead, you can conduct the thought experiment yourself to see if you agree with the principles they all end up selecting.

End-State and Patterned Theories

- not historical All you need to look at to determine if just is non-historical test End = look at distributional matrix Pattern =criterion for just distrbution

End-State Theories

- only thing you need to look at in assessing the justice of a distribution is the "matrix" representing the distribution of holdings - don't need to know anything about the people who occupy those position - All that matters is the "time-slice profile" of how goods are distributed This could involve looking at only a current time-slice (all pertinent information is contained in a particular moment) or at many time-slices (all pertinent information is contained in more than one time-slice: e.g. "a distribution is just if its total holdings is larger than that of earlier distributions").

Defending Principle of Transfer

- show that alternative theories have counter-intuitive results precisely because they interfere with people's voluntary choices to transfer holdings to others

Each in OP have conception of good

- there is some way they want their life to be. - They each have aims, ambitions, commitments, etc. that give meaning to their lives. - They do not necessarily have the same ambitions, but they do have in common that they have some ambitions, some "conception of the good".

Rawl's Social Contract Device

- uses a social contract device not (as Hobbes and Locke did) to justify the existence of states, but to help us theorize what an ideally just society would be like. H and L = use SoN to justify state R = is not designed to justify state's authority

Each in OP have important capacities or moral powers

- where Rawls's fundamental commitment to autonomy enters his theory: practical rationality

Rawls original position

-state of nature in classic social contract arguments. - group of hypothetical individuals who are supposed to select principles of justice. - But they are special kinds of people with special kinds of goals they want to achieve through the contract, special information they possess, and special information they are denied.

2 kinds of primary goods

1. Social primary goods - can be directly distributed by social institutions, like income and wealth, opportunities and powers, rights and liberties; social bases of self-respect. 2. natural primary goods - goods like health, intelligence, vigor, imagination, natural talent, which are affected by social institutions, but are not distributed by them.

Wilt Chamberlain Question

1. Assume that D1 is just 2. Assume each fairly paid (but may not have not) If every choice that was made was freely made voluntary choices and if distribution is of great inequality, than what has gone wrong (from perspective of justice)?

Special Conception of Justice

1. First Principle - Each person is to have an equal right to the most extensive total system of equal basic liberties compatible with a similar system of liberty for all. 2. Second Principle Social and economic inequalities are to be arranged so that they are both: a) to the greatest benefit of the least advantaged, and (DP) b) attached to offices and positions open to all under conditions of fair equality of opportunity.

Rawls rejects Laissez-faire, because:

1. Gives excessive political power to owners of means of production (capitalists) and denies fair value of political liberties (i.e. allows people to buy political power). 2. There is no reason to think that an unregulated market will result in the best distribution for the worst off (it allows exploitation of wage workers and results in inequality that could hurt worst off).

What will happen; Wilt example

1. If people are free to transfer ("from each as they choose, to each as they are chosen") then some new distribution, D2, which departs from D1 will always result. 2. You cannot maintain a distribution (like D1) according to a patterned principle without interfering with people's liberty to voluntarily transfer their holdings. 3. In D2, some (like Wilt Chamberlain) may be wealthy and others impoverished. 4. But none of the individual transfers leading to D2 were unjust because all were voluntary.

Institutions that are primarily responsible for distributing income and wealth

1. The system of property rights (the laws that specify the rights, powers, duties that individuals and groups have in using resources) 2. the system of production and exchange (rules/norms that make production, trade, and consumption possible, e.g. norms constituting markets or other means of transfer of goods).

Rawls upper master principles

1. Upper - must promote the exercise and development of our two moral powers: i) power to set and pursue a conception of the good life; ii) sense of justice. (autonomy) - "To each according to their two moral powers."

4 Questions to analyze the OP

1. Who chooses (who are the "parties)? 2. What are they trying to achieve? 3. 4What are they choosing? 4. What do they know and NOT know?

3 things those in OP have

1. conception of good 2. important capacities or moral powers 3. sense of justice

Rawls against command economy communism

1. need market economy - guarantee some of the basic liberties - allocates productive resources more efficiently - will benefit least advantaged when adequately regulated by D

3 Parts of Nozick's Historical Entitlement Theory

1. principle of transfer 2. principle of original acquisition 3. principle of rectification of injustice

2 questions to consider in designing or accessing institutions responsible for income and wealth distribution

1. questions of efficiency 2. question of just distribution

What those in OP do NOT know

1. their specific conception of the good, only that they will have one. 2. what primary goods they will wind up with: social status, their talents, or disabilities, intelligence, strengths. 3. what social or economic or racial group they will wind up in. 4. chances of their ending up in some group or another because, Rawls says, this is determined, not randomly, but by their talents and capacity for efforts, and they do not know what those will be.

Problem of General Conception of Justice

1. treats all primary goods as equally significant, but that seems counter-intuitive (the liberty to vote seems more significant than the liberty to scream obscenities on the street at 2am, and arguably more significant than the liberty to invest money however you want, e.g. in the stock market); 2. What about conflicts? When primary goods conflict, how do you resolve conflicts between them? Answer w specical conception of justice

Rawls against welfare-state capitalism

1. treats the goals of efficiency or economic freedom as on a par with, or even more important than, the goal of maximizing the prospects of the worst off. 2. Welfare payments are usually justified, not on the grounds that the poor have a right to a social minimum, but on the grounds that over time reducing poverty will result in a more efficient total distribution of resources. 3/ the distributive question concerning the poor's standing is secondary, an afterthought, and so it violates the second priority rule, which places distributive justice ahead of efficiency

Each in OP have sense of justice

A willingness to comply with the demands of justice, whatever they turn out to be. They wouldn't be contracting for principles of justice if they didn't have a sense of justice.

Welfare-state Capitalism institutional principle

All productive resources are privately owned and allocated according to market. Government redistributes wealth to ensure social minimum on grounds of efficiency or freedom.

market socialism institutional principle

All productive resources are publicly owned, but leased to private firms who compete with each other for government contracts (lowering the cost of production). Social product is determined and distributed by government.

Command economy communism institutional principle

All productive resources are publicly owned. They are allocated for production and distribution by government/central planning committee.

Laissez-Faire Capitalism institutional principle

All property is privately owned by individuals or corporations. Allocations for production and distribution decided by free individual choice in unregulated market.

Rawls; primary goods

All-purpose resources that people need in pursuing their conception of the good. - the things every person needs, whatever else they need. Two kinds of primary goods:

Question of just distribution under the DP

Apart from efficiency, what distribution would satisfy the DP? - DP is a right that should take priority over efficiency

Nozick intermediate-level distributive principles

Nozick's "Entitlement Theory": 1. Principle of Just Transfer 2. Principle of Just Acquisition 3. Principle of Just Rectification

Impartiality in OP

Principles are those that would be chosen under informed and impartial conditions by free and equal parties. Parties are free and equal: no one has a prior claim to rule anyone else. - No one's way of life has a prior claim to dictate the laws that govern everyone else. - No one has a right that society be organized around their way of life.

Rawls lower-level institutional principles

Property-owning democracy or market socialism (it is an empirical question which best serves the Difference Principle)

Wilt Chamberlain according to Rawls v. Noz

R - DP would say Noz entitled to become wealthier if new inequality has it worked to advantage of worse off; if gov puts tax Noz - that effort is just an effort to promote a pattern which disrupts patterns

D3 10 7 6

Rawls's Difference Principle

Primary Goods; Rawls

Rawls; 3 resources necessary to advance conception of good

Property-Owning Democracy institutional principle

Some productive resources are publicly owned and some are privately owned and allocated by market. Social product is distributed by government.

examples of patterned theories

The principle of moral merit: "to each according to their moral virtue" The principle of contribution: "to each according to their value-add" The principle of effort: "to each according to their effort expended" Principle of IQ: "to each according to their natural intelligence"

Patterned Theories

There is some "natural" criterion, beyond the mere matrix profile, according to which the distribution should be patterned. Some patterned principles might take history into account (e.g. the principles of effort or contribution will have to look to history. Some, like the principle of IQ, will not need to look to history.) - Can't impose pattern w/o violating principles of transfer

Circumstances of Justice (Hume)

Those in OP know that society exists under the circumstances of "moderate scarcity" and "limited altruism" Basic laws of economics and human psychology. - Justice applies under these conditions because the problem of distributive shares only arises under these conditions.

Dworkin Upper-level Master Principles

Two Principles of Dignity: i) Human beings as such have intrinsic value that ought to be protected ii) We each have a special responsibility to set and pursue a conception of the good Corresponds to two principles of state legitimacy. Government must show: i) equal concern for fate of citizens ii) equal respect for each person's responsibility to set and pursue conception of good "To each according to their dignity"

D2 100 2 1

Utilitarianism

What do those in OP know

When parties thinking about social justice should not be able to rely on pre-existing knowledge - Depending on religion, gender, objective, would make decision in such a way as to bend the choice of principles of justice to favor their position - Radically ignorant of who they may end up being - Have to make decision under veil

Maximize Expected Outcome

choose the BS whose expected average payoff is highest (calculate X by adding the products of the payoffs and their probability. Rawls rejects; seems most plausible for ordinary smaller-scale decisions where you have knowledge of probabilities, but not under the Veil of Ignorance where probabilities are unknown

Rawls practical rationality

a power to rationally set, pursue, and revise a conception of the good. They try to order their ends into a "rational plan of life". - They also conform to basic canons of rational choice familiar in economic and decision theory: - they try to attain as many of their ends as is feasible; they try to make their ends consistent; - they adopt appropriate means to their ends; they take into account the probability that certain courses of action will actually serve their ends. Order life adhering to moral plan

Maximin

choose the BS whose worst outcome is best of all worst outcomes (maximize the minimum). - According to Rawls, these aims do not require them to choose beyond trying to ensure the minimum is as large as it can be. They should be happy with the best available under maximin.

Maximax rational choice strategy

choose the Basic Structure (BS) whose best position ranks highest (maximize the maximum). - Rawls rejects maximax because it involves risking everything for the best possible outcome - could never flourish if they lose the bet and become impoverished or enslaved.

Rawls's general conception of justice

conception of justice that best maximizes the parties' minimum prospects is Justice as Fairness "All social primary goods—liberty and opportunity, income and wealth, and the bases of self-respect—are to be distributed equally unless an unequal distribution of any or all of these goods is to the advantage of the least favored." - This principle ties justice to an equal share of primary goods - if certain inequalities benefit everyone, by drawing out socially useful talents and energies, then they will be acceptable to everyone.

Rawls on adopting market norms for the efficient allocation of productive resources

does not imply that the distribution of wealth and income is to be decided by whatever turns out to be an efficient allocation of resources, i.e. whatever people can gain through their market behavior. No reason that it will not result well for the worst off - No reason to raise all ships - Capitalism operates driven by motive for profit which will lead owners to try and depress wages in order to maximize their profits

Those in OP aim to develop pratical rationality and sense of justice

have an interest in developing their sense of justice because if people lacked this sense of justice, then social cooperation with them would be very difficult.

Rawls justice as fairness

his principles of justice are the principles that would be chosen in this hypothetical situation of fair deliberation. Any principles just bc they are fair (arose from fair process)

Question of efficiency

how should we allocate productive resources (capital and equipment) to produce and distribute most efficiently the things we need and want? Do we adopt a command economy or a market-based economy?

Nozick Upper-level Master Principles

must treat persons with separate rational capacities as "ends in themselves", rather than as mere means to our incidental ends This dignity of persons justifies natural rights to own and transfer property. "To each according to their capacity for voluntary choice."

What those in Rawls OP are trying to achieve

optimal social conditions for: i) for advancing their conception of the good and ii) for developing their two moral powers.

limited altruism

people are not egoistic, but they are also not all saints

Basic Structure of Society

the major political, economic and social institutions of society—especially the political constitution, the legal system, economic institutions, social institutions like the family—that have a deep and pervasive effect on people's primary goods and life prospects. - All have implications for how much stuff you can get (In a society w/o freedom of speech, Zuckerberg may not have become so successful)

moderate scarcity

there is neither so little that some must starve, nor abundance so that we can all have everything we want

DP directs us

to begin by adopting market institutions NOT because the efficient allocation they can generate is intrinsically valuable, but because their efficient allocation will better advance the position of the worst off than any non-market economy will.

Rawls intermediate-level distributive principles

two principles of justice ("Justice as Fairness") Rawls's Difference Principle (part of his second principle of justice) - governs distribution of economic resources

those who regard autonomy as a constitutive/intrinsic

usually also believe that autonomy should take priority over other master ends like the others Xs in the second table from last class.

practical rationality

very power by means of which we pursue our CoG

Nozick's Entitlement Theory is "historical":

whether a distribution is just depends on its pedigree, or how it came about through people's free choices over time. Look to pedigree of holdings (see if all were voluntary then present distribution is just)