Every time someone argues in favor of equality as an unquestionable good I have to ask: Have you done a thought experiment where you have a perfectly equal society? Like tomorrow imagine that all the world's wealth was equally distributed for a moment. Now play out the scenario into the future one year, 5 years, 10 years, 25 years, 50 years. Think about all the unintended consequences of that policy.
What does it mean for those that now have power? What does it mean for those that do not? Is the equality maintainable? How are decisions made? Other than maybe land, is the wealth that has value today even valuable any more once divided equally and everyone has it? From the point in time where the wealth is divided equally, does it increase or decrease globally from that point forward? Why or why not? How does the change in incentives change people and change the world?
Now this thought experiment should be the most extreme end but not misaligned with what many people think is ideal. Ideal doesn't mean workable and it's important to explore what aspects are workable and what are not because if we're going to chase something utopian on paper, we better well understand the unintended consequences.
My bet is that anyone that honestly pursues this line of thinking and really considers the second and third order effects, that they'll quickly discover lots of problems and come to the conclusion that like extreme inequality, extreme equality is also bad over time, and it's only after coming to that conclusion do they concern themselves with the better question "how much inequality is the right amount of inequality and what kinds of inequality are in everyone's best interest?
Anyone that has spent time really pondering Rawls' thought experiments such as the original position and veil of ignorance should be right at home here.
> Like tomorrow imagine that all the world's wealth was equally distributed for a moment.
This is a straw man. No one is arguing equal distribution of all wealth. Any sane observer is arguing the historic levels of inequality are a cause of many undesirable social issues.
It's a thought exercise presented in socratic style so that someone learns to recognize the problems with the other extreme. Only when you see the dilemmas that exist at both extremes do you start figuring out where the balance it.
When someone is fighting equality with no hedging in their argument, that's usually a sign that they haven't considered what happens if they achieve what they are arguing for.
I'm not arguing that extreme inequality is good. It's bad in the same way extreme equality is bad. Once you recognize both are bad and why they are bad, you're more free to explore where you believe the balance point should be.
My personal view is that the problem isn't that we have a power law distribution (1/x). My view is that a distribution of 100/x is preferable to one of 1/x. The difference in equality from the top to the bottom can be extreme so long as the distribution between the two contains lots of people fairly evenly spread out and there is the possibility for someone to move up and down on that distribution on their own volition and effort. This produces a society that will produce productivity benefits that over time improve the conditions of those worst off.
I didn't see this response for whatever reason so sorry about the delay.
I think the premise is a bit flawed here. An argument for reducing inequality isn't an argument for enforced equality. I would actually largely agree with you in that one of the main flaws of an extreme communist / no personal property approach is that it fundamentally isn't compatible with human nature.
However, that wasn't something I was arguing for at all either so I can't really defend it.
Just so I am not accused of hiding behind vague statements though what I am actually arguing for is more aggressive taxes on billionaires both in terms of real numbers but also primarily in addressing avoidance issues. I am also extremely in favor of the idea that workers should receive a living wage. I don't see any aspect of that which I would consider to be incompatible with a healthy and functional democracy / capitalist society.
Inequality has positive consequences as well as negative ones. It's more likely to create venture capital and a market for high risk investments that have a significant chance to lose all the capital invested. Venture capital is a bad idea for retirement funds which would be the majority of investments in a relatively or perfectly equal world. I think it's likely you'd see significant declines in pursuing risky ideas that can change the world, for example a lot of the projects pursued by the Bill & Melinda Gates foundation, wouldn't be possible without the unequal capital that leads to billionaires contributing significant capital to such endeavours. Space exploration seems to be an area of substantial interest to billionaires where we now see private companies making substantial achievements while NASA and many other government space programs seem to be in decline from their peak.
As for maintaining inequality, it usually involves some form of force exerted on labour markets where voluntary exchange gets replaced by something involving almost entirely compulsion. Voluntary exchange of labour will always result in inequality as people's talents and the value of those talents are radically different. I'm not claiming markets get these problems correct (Many education and some health professionals seem to be dramatically underpaid relative to value), but people can at least make somewhat informed choices as to what they want to do with some knowledge of the value they will gain from it. A world where equality is enforced will have the government at a minimum telling people what they can earn from what they can do, and in sectors where demand is higher than supply they very likely end up enforcing who can do those things as well. Freedom of association in labour is very important to me and to me seems more valuable than enforced equality in a lot of ways.
I agree with the conclusion that the one big question is "How much inequality is right for society?". Another big question is some variant of "How can governments influence the distribution of that inequality without violating individual rights, while working to maximize a reasonable function of overall happiness?"
I'm of the opinion that trending towards a guaranteed basic income in supported by higher taxes and reduction in redundant programs is likely to be a good path forward provided those programs are carefully designed around incentives and the taxes are designed to be revenue efficient and minimally disruptive. I'm partially of this opinion because I believe it frees people up to pursue their artistic goals and could usher in a wave of unprecedented creativity in society. Not everyone is willing to go homeless to produce the next Harry Potter but many people will choose writing over a minimum wage job if given the choice. I think lower supply in labour markets leading to higher wages for some of the terrible jobs that currently people are made to do because of lack of alternatives is a net good thing for society even with the consequences of higher prices on some essential goods.
What does it mean for those that now have power? What does it mean for those that do not? Is the equality maintainable? How are decisions made? Other than maybe land, is the wealth that has value today even valuable any more once divided equally and everyone has it? From the point in time where the wealth is divided equally, does it increase or decrease globally from that point forward? Why or why not? How does the change in incentives change people and change the world?
Now this thought experiment should be the most extreme end but not misaligned with what many people think is ideal. Ideal doesn't mean workable and it's important to explore what aspects are workable and what are not because if we're going to chase something utopian on paper, we better well understand the unintended consequences.
My bet is that anyone that honestly pursues this line of thinking and really considers the second and third order effects, that they'll quickly discover lots of problems and come to the conclusion that like extreme inequality, extreme equality is also bad over time, and it's only after coming to that conclusion do they concern themselves with the better question "how much inequality is the right amount of inequality and what kinds of inequality are in everyone's best interest?
Anyone that has spent time really pondering Rawls' thought experiments such as the original position and veil of ignorance should be right at home here.