Since the mid-1980s, the wealth gap between the top 1% of earners and the rest of the population in the United States has significantly increased, outpacing any other country in this measure. More recently, the issue of economic inequity burst into public consciousness with the Occupy Wall Street movement in 2011 and emerged at the forefront of the public agenda with subsequent calls for a raised minimum wage, higher taxes on the wealthy, and increased welfare spending. While the legitimacy of “the rich get richer and the poor get poorer” narrative cannot be questioned, moral and political philosophers have long contemplated the justness of inequality and the role of institutions in distributing and redistributing well-being, such as welfare, rights, and resources. Implicit in much of the critique of the income divide is the assumption that inequality is inherently unjust, and therefore the disparity between the rich and the poor is as well. In fact, equality is highly valued in liberal-democratic societies, such as the United States – after all, the guiding principle of the Declaration of Independence is that “all men are created equal.” However, America’s founding fathers would also acknowledge that individuals, while equal in some key respects, are distinctive and unique and that justice requires the recognition of these differences. Ultimately, this question can be simplified to two opposing positions – there are those who champion equality and there are those who champion individual autonomy. In political philosophy, these sentiments can be paralleled to the stances of John Rawls and Robert Nozick respectively. In this paper, I will explain both theorist’s interpretations of justice and their perspectives on economic equality. I will identify potential flaws in their premises and demonstrate that Rawls conceives a more just state, due to Nozick’s failure to address morally-arbitrary factors, such as initial social position or natural talents.
In A Theory of Justice, John Rawls provides a contract theory of the principles of social justice in terms of the “basic structure of society, or more exactly, the way in which the major social institutions distribute fundamental rights and duties and determine the division of advantages from social cooperation” (Rawls, 6). Rawls opens his theory by assuming a hypothetical thought experiment, known as the Original Position. In order to conceive a fair arrangement of social distribution, one must first eliminate all biases, influenced by “natural chance or the contingencies of social status”, to establish a paragon of justice in the society (Rawls, 11). Therefore, the Original Position postulates a veil of ignorance, in which one is oblivious to one’s sex, race, income, social status, and natural endowments, when determining what is just. The resulting conception of justice would create a basic structure of society directed by “principles that free and rational people concerned with furthering their own interests would accept in an initial position of equality as defining the fundamental terms of their association” (Rawls, 10). The distributive justice proposed by Rawls is centered behind two fundamental principles that Rawls assumes individuals behind the veil of ignorance would choose to structure society by. Firstly, individuals would champion that “each person is to have an equal right to the most extensive scheme of equal basic liberties compatible with a similar scheme for others” (Rawls, 53). Liberties include rights, such as “ political liberty (the right to vote and to hold public office) and freedom of speech and assembly; liberty of conscience and freedom of thought; freedom of the person; the right to hold personal property and freedom from arbitrary arrest and seizure…” (Rawls, 53).
The second connotation of this argument is that “social and economic inequalities be arranged so that they are both (a) reasonably expected to be to everyone’s advantage and (b) attached to positions and offices open to all” (Rawls, 53). Thus, individuals should not be impeded from pursuing upper-level positions based upon arbitrary social constructs, such as class or social status. Rather, access to careers should granted through merit or natural endowments and a fair equality of opportunity should emerge for all individuals, regardless of one’s position in society. Rawls reasons that no individual inherently deserves his or her greater natural aptitude nor merits a more advantageous starting position in society. Furthermore, the second principle extends to the distribution of income and wealth. According to Rawls, under the veil of ignorance, individuals would unanimously concur that in a just society “while the distribution of wealth and income need not be equal, it must be to everyone’s advantage” (Rawls, 53). This is known as the Difference Principle. Inequality in primary social goods, which are “things which it is supposed a rational man wants whatever else he wants,” such as wealth or income, are ultimately justified only to the extent that it improves the condition of those who are worst-off under that distribution in comparison to any other distribution. Rawls also attempts to defend the Difference Principle against the innately inferior life prospects of the “class of unskilled laborers”, which seems intuitively unjust. Despite the contrast in expectation, he claims that “the greater expectations allowed to entrepreneurs encourages them to do things which raise the prospects of laboring class” (Rawls, 68). The better prospects of the entrepreneurial class incentivizes individuals to pursue these higher positions in society and encourages more innovation and efficiency in the economy as a whole. In a sense, Rawls’ position could be described as egalitarian, with a provision that inequities are permitted when they benefit the least-advantaged.
Conversely, in Anarchy, State, and Utopia, Robert Nozick contends that a minimal night watchman state, constrained to the “functions of protecting all of its citizens against violence, theft, and fraud, and to the enforcement of contracts”, is the most extensive state that can be justified and also be non-intrusive on an individual’s natural rights (Nozick, 100). This condition is established through two core premises – firstly, rights are side constraints on what an individual or a collective may do to one another. Thus, individual rights is the key standard for assessing state action – the state cannot use any coercive mechanisms for the purpose of forcing its citizens to assist each other. Individuals, Nozick asserts, “may not be sacrificed or used for the achieving of other ends without their consent” (Nozick, 31). This grants self-ownership not only to oneself, but also to the fruits of one’s labor. Such a position rejects redistributive taxation policies aimed at lessening the wealth gap or improving the standard of living for the poor. In fact, Nozick claims that “taxation of earnings from labour is on a par with forced labour” (Nozick, 169). Secondly, wealth or income distribution itself cannot be considered just or unjust; rather, only interactions and the means of obtaining such holdings are acceptable to pass judgement on. Nozick suggests that Rawls’ conceptions of distributive justice is flawed – it incorrectly characterizes a just distribution in terms of the pattern it presents at a certain point in time, rather than in terms of the nature of the transactions through which the distribution occurs. A given allocation of holdings, regardless of inequality, is just if and only if “everyone is entitled to the holdings they possess under the distribution” (Nozick, 151). This is only possible through three legitimate means, known as the Entitlement Theory – (1) the appropriation of an item that is previously unowned in circumstances in which the acquisition would not be at a detriment to others, (2) the voluntary transfer of ownership of holdings to another individual, and (3) the rectification of past injustices in the acquisition or transfer of holdings.
Nozick proposes a thought experiment to demonstrate how liberty upsets patterns of distributions. He begins by examining a generally favored distribution of property, perfect equality. He employs Wilt Chamberlain, an icon in the National Basketball League, for his contention. Due to his prodigal talents, Chamberlain has a mass following and thus is able to negotiate a contract in which he receives “twenty-five cents from the price of each ticket of admission” (Nozick, 161). Fans are more than willing to pay to watch Chamberlain live and in one season one million persons attend his home games. Ultimately, he grosses $250,000 in total, “a much larger sum than the average income and larger even than anyone else has” (Nozick, 161). Is Chamberlain entitled to this income? This inequality in distribution arises from basketball fans transferring their personal wealth to Chamberlain for an experience they valued more than the twenty-five cents that they paid to spectate it. Nozick questions whether this distribution is unjust – if it is unjust and one wishes to maintain to the original pattern of perfect equality, then one must “either continually interfere to stop people from transferring resources as they wish, or continually… interfere to take from some persons resources that others for some reason chose to transfer to them” (Nozick, 163). This interference would be considered unjust, according to Nozick. This thought experiment serves to validate Nozick’s arguments about distributive justice – justice does not necessarily require redistribution, but rather the preservation of justice in acquisition and transfer. Thus, any action by the state to redistribute holdings that an individual is entitled to is an affront to personal liberty.
While Rawls satisfies quasi-egalitarian appeals, it is not without its share of criticisms. Rawls attempts to mitigate the impact of economic inequalities in his conception of a just society by contending that disparity compels the lower class to pursue higher positions and thus stimulates the economy. Furthermore, he asserts that his principles of justice are only pertinent to the institutions of the basic structure of society and not to the conduct of individuals outside this basic structure. This, however, can result in to two contrasting conundrums for a hypothetical just state. Firstly, he ignores the potential issue of the free-rider problem. In order to be considered just, distributions, regardless of the extent of inequality, must “result in compensating benefits for everyone, particularly the least advantaged in society” (Rawls, 13). By permitting the least-advantaged individuals to benefit from the labor of more well-off members of society, it entitles the poor to appropriate the holdings of the wealthy without exerting any effort themselves. In essence, this incentivizes some individuals to work less and still reap some rewards at the expense of others. Secondly, the role of incentives in Rawls’ conception of a just society tarnishes the fairness that Rawls had envisioned. It could be argued that incentives are not obligatory to galvanize individuals and increase the society’s level of wealth. Rather, those who benefit from these incentives, namely the more well-off, consciously choose not to exert effort when there is no potential compensation and bargain for higher incomes. This self-interested, exploitative behavior creates a condition conducive to economic inequality, as it necessitates incentives and needlessly widens the wealth gap between the rich and the poor. Ultimately, both matters create significant shortcomings for Rawls’ principles of justice.
In comparison, Nozick’s libertarian appeals in his conception of justice and emphasis on a free market fails to reasonably respond to economic inequality. Nozick maintains that inequality will naturally arise due to discrepancies in considerations, such as the social position an individual is born into, luck, effort, and natural capacities, that ultimately determine wealth and income potential. This inequity is permissible, under the condition that self-ownership and the Entitlement Theory are established and upheld. However, this is precisely the flaw in Nozick’s argument. It is morally intuitive that it is inappropriate to completely ignore the both the arbitrariness and significance of initial wealth and social status. Why is an individual born into wealth any more inherently entitled to a life of prosperity than another is who born into a life of poverty? Both are simply products of circumstance and it is unjust to indiscriminately permit this arbitrary state of external factors. Although Nozick may counter that an individual’s privileged position was earned through the transfer of wealth by previous descendants and thus just, it does not rationalize the role of luck in an individual’s life prospects. Furthermore, Nozick prohibits any form of redistribution policy on behalf of the government, as taxation is considered theft and thus a violation of one’s inherent sovereignty. Without a redistribution of wealth, the wealth gap widens between the rich and the poor. This disparity itself conversely yields a denial of liberty, the core of Nozick’s theory – it undercuts equality of opportunity and thus the poor lack the necessary resources to escape from poverty, such as political representation and education. Therefore, the cycle of poverty becomes self-reinforcing and society progressively becomes more unjust. Nozick’s conception of justice ultimately results in a state of economic unrest similar to that of the United States, in which Wall Street and Silicon Valley reap a disproportional amount of growth and worker wages fail to keep pace.
Rawls’ conception of justice appeals to most, as the first principle conforms to both libertarianism and egalitarianism and the Distributive Principle complies with proponents of capitalism. Furthermore, it’s emphasis on meritocracy and fair equality of opportunity also seems sensible in regards to justice, as this framework eliminates much of the role of luck in life prospects. Together, these components present a philosophical foundation for a just American liberal democracy. In contrast, Nozick’s argument, while logically sound, fails to rationalize the role of external factors, such as social position or wealth an individual is born into. Thus, the product is the abandonment of American principles of egalitarian economic opportunities and a state in which the wealth gap continually widens. Ultimately, inequality is a topic that either implicitly or explicitly informs our national dialogue about public policy and economy – Rawls is able to steer the conversation towards a more just future,