Why is wealth redistribution bad? (First post at a new blog.)

What-Ho All.

I’ve just put up my first (serious) post at a joint blog called Suite Talking. The title refers to the fact that it is a joint venture between myself a college suitemate. From now on I’ll probably be double posting most of my more “serious” posts over there. Feel free to come over and visit and comment and even check out some thoughts by that lanky bastard known as Nate.

So, without further ado, my first crossposting:

Why is wealth redistribution bad?

[Quick summary: a principle of fairness isn't enough to establish wealth redistribution policies as bad as there are two main intuitions about what fairness means, I predict that these two intuitions fall in line with two major ethical theories.]

One of my (many) major problems with the Obama campaign is its support of policies that would function as wealth redistribution. Like most conservatives, I find such socialistic tendencies abhorant*, but why?

Common answers would almost all appeal to fairness. It seems inherently fair that each person should receive compensation relative to the extent, difficulty, and quality of his work. To take compensation from those who have earned it and give it to those who have not is, without a doubt, unfair. But is that enough? Life after all, and as parents are so fond of reminding children, is not fair. Why should taxes be?

Or consider that the distribution of circumstances for those who are extremely wealthy and extremely poor has not been fair. The majority of the extremely poor were born in circumstances that significantly contributed to their poverty.**

The government could never make the world’s circumstantially fair. But if it redistributes wealth, then to some extent hasn’t it mitigated the unfairness of the world? If bad circumstances tend one toward bad decisions which tend one (and one’s children) toward bad circumstances, then isn’t it the case that not redistributing wealth is systematically contributing to the unfairness of the world?

I’m interested to hear what any of you think about this. Is it more fair to try to increase equality in the end result? Or to try to treat everyone the same as possible?

There are plenty of people in both camps, a good number of which like to argue. But, as per usual, I would bet that there is actually a more fundamental disagreement between the two camps than the surface quarrel over taxes. My guess is that the two groups will fall more or less in line with the following two ethical theories: those who tend toward a deontological ethic (focusing on duty and action) will have the intuition that everyone should be treated the same, and those who tend toward a utilitarian ethic (focusing on outcome) will have the intuition of endpoint equality.

My intuitive ethic is something of a Duns Scotian mix of deontology and divine command theory (a standard package, I’d wager, for most conservative Christians), and I bet that that accounts for my status as a wealth-redistribution-abhorrer. But I also question whether all of ethics can be propositionalized, which means that I’m open to understanding ethical decisions in other manners (e.g. faithful interpretation of a role rather than instantiation of a rule). And that probably correlates pretty well with my feelings that the case against wealth redistribution is not open and shut.

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*-I know it’s not a word… I’m working on making it one.

**-It may be argued that no one in America will be in abject poverty unless they make conscious decisions to act in a manner that directly leads to poverty (immoral or illegal activity, failing to perform well enough to even meet the minimal work requirements of a minimum wage job, etc.). These people are fully responsible for the decisions that they have made and therefore fully responsible for their impoverished state.

But for that argument to work mustn’t it be true that the (unfair) circumstances do not affect these decisions? But of course they do. A child raised to think that criminal activity is the norm would seem in some way to be less (ethically, not legally) culpable for criminal activity than one who has had a clear demonstration and example of right and wrong since we know that these sorts of examples leave a distinct impression on children and inform their decision making.