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Fair. For the US, the top 1% seems to own 40% of all wealth, a little bit less but still a staggering number i.m.o. My problem with this is not so much the wea

Fair. For the US, the top 1% seems to own 40% of all wealth, a little bit less but still a staggering number i.m.o. My problem with this is not so much the wealth of the top 1% in itself, but the lack of equal opportunity in the bottom 50%. A child that is born in this demography has much, much lower chance on a successful life than a child that is born in a wealthy family. That simply can't be fair. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wealth_inequality_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wealth_inequality_in_the_Unite...

BeetleB 10y ago
>That simply can't be fair. This word "fair" keeps being thrown about in these discussions. All such discussions are useless unless the people involved specify what they mean by "fair". And I'll give you a hint: You'll find many people will disagree with your definition (and there isn't consensus on any one definition). A simple example: Fairness in equality vs fairness in proportion. The former is about everyone having equal services/wealth/etc (usually aligned with far left), and the latter is about everyone having these in proportion to their efforts (usually aligned with far right). Neither is right or wrong. High wealth inequality, while often correlated with lower opportunities, does not fundamentally imply it - it is not a causation. Using it as a metric is a poor choice. Instead, the metric should be what the lowest N% have access to, regardless of the wealth inequality. You can get low wealth inequality where everything is bad for everyone, or high wealth inequality where only a few "suffer". Just saying something is "unfair" without explanation is merely an attempt at making an emotional argument. It is identical to just saying something is "wrong".
- Maarten88 10y ago
  Fairness means getting what one deserves. The world is unfair in many ways, and I thought I was quite specific in my example of this by comparing two baby's: one born with top 1% wealthy parents, and another one born in the bottom 50% income parents. The baby's have done nothing in their lives yet and are equally talented, yet one of them will almost certainly have a much better life. Unless you want to argue that the rich baby somehow deserves more, I think it's better to assume she was just lucky being born rich. And this luck will extend throughout childhood: positive environment, more friends, better care, better schools, etc. You are right that this still does not make it unfair. This is all luck. But what would be unfair is when the rich kid gets to inherit all of the wealth, and not pay a disproportionate part of that wealth toward taxes that are needed to pay for the poor kids' education and healthcare, to give her at least some chance to grab an opportunity and work herself to a somewhat better life.
  - BeetleB 10y ago
    >Fairness means getting what one deserves. Merely begging the question. You might as well say "fairness means doing the right thing." In your comment, you've use the word fair/unfair, but still not specified a proper criterion. If you want to say baby's born to the lowest percentile should have the same opportunities as those in the top, that's a concrete statement (measurable, etc). Why do you have to bring the word "fair" into it? Incidentally (and off the topic of fairness), there are easy ways to solve the problem - but those are ways no one (including, I'm sure, you) would accept. So looking at one criterion in a vacuum with the rest of society is problematic.

BeetleB 10y ago

>That simply can't be fair. This word "fair" keeps being thrown about in these discussions. All such discussions are useless unless the people involved specify what they mean by "fair". And I'll give you a hint: You'll find many people will disagree with your definition (and there isn't consensus on any one definition). A simple example: Fairness in equality vs fairness in proportion. The former is about everyone having equal services/wealth/etc (usually aligned with far left), and the latter is about everyone having these in proportion to their efforts (usually aligned with far right). Neither is right or wrong. High wealth inequality, while often correlated with lower opportunities, does not fundamentally imply it - it is not a causation. Using it as a metric is a poor choice. Instead, the metric should be what the lowest N% have access to, regardless of the wealth inequality. You can get low wealth inequality where everything is bad for everyone, or high wealth inequality where only a few "suffer". Just saying something is "unfair" without explanation is merely an attempt at making an emotional argument. It is identical to just saying something is "wrong".

Maarten88 10y ago
Fairness means getting what one deserves. The world is unfair in many ways, and I thought I was quite specific in my example of this by comparing two baby's: one born with top 1% wealthy parents, and another one born in the bottom 50% income parents. The baby's have done nothing in their lives yet and are equally talented, yet one of them will almost certainly have a much better life. Unless you want to argue that the rich baby somehow deserves more, I think it's better to assume she was just lucky being born rich. And this luck will extend throughout childhood: positive environment, more friends, better care, better schools, etc. You are right that this still does not make it unfair. This is all luck. But what would be unfair is when the rich kid gets to inherit all of the wealth, and not pay a disproportionate part of that wealth toward taxes that are needed to pay for the poor kids' education and healthcare, to give her at least some chance to grab an opportunity and work herself to a somewhat better life.
- BeetleB 10y ago
  >Fairness means getting what one deserves. Merely begging the question. You might as well say "fairness means doing the right thing." In your comment, you've use the word fair/unfair, but still not specified a proper criterion. If you want to say baby's born to the lowest percentile should have the same opportunities as those in the top, that's a concrete statement (measurable, etc). Why do you have to bring the word "fair" into it? Incidentally (and off the topic of fairness), there are easy ways to solve the problem - but those are ways no one (including, I'm sure, you) would accept. So looking at one criterion in a vacuum with the rest of society is problematic.