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Jessica Olsen

Fairness - 0 views

  • In a competitive market economy the ability of people to obtain goods and services depends, with some exceptions, on the marginal productivity of the resources they hold. The most important resource is a person's ability to work (human capital) but others are ownership of natural resources and capital. Those who hold resources that are highly valued will earn large incomes, whereas those who hold no valuable resources earn little or no income. This unequal distribution of income that a market system produces raises questions of whether or not a market system is fair.
  • Fairness is a normative issue, which means that it involves judgments about what is good and what is bad. As a result, economists cannot claim special expertise on this issue. They often rely on arguments from philosophers when they discuss fairness, and they hold widely diverse beliefs. There are, however, some insights from economics that can be useful when one discusses issues of fairness.
  • In a world in which everyone had equal abilities but different goals, people will earn unequal incomes.
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  • If you look at a situation and decide that it is unfair because one person has too much and another has too little, you probably are making a judgment that compares goals. The judgment says that the person with too much is satisfying goals that are less worthy than those of the person with too little. We commonly make this sort of normative judgment; our decision to give money to one charity rather than another indicates that we find some goals more deserving than others. Our decision to give at all suggests that we decide that the goals of someone else are more worthy than our own "selfish" goals.
  • Economic analysis suggests that people earn different amounts of income both because they have different goals and different abilities (or resource endowments, to use a more comprehensive but also more abstract term). From this starting point, we can examine a few common judgments on fairness
Jessica Olsen

Another Argument For Buffett Rule: Fairness Among The 400 Richest - Forbes - 0 views

  •  According to that brief, over the last 50 years, the average effective tax rate for the top 0.1% (including both income and payroll taxes) has fallen from 51% to 26%, while the middle quintile’s average burden has risen slightly from 14% to 16%.
  • t is unclear, however, if the fairness issue is the political winner the White House believes it to be.  According to a new poll of independent voters in swing states commissioned by Third Way, a centrist Democratic group, an “opportunity” theme resonates with these voters more than a “fairness” argument does. When given a direct choice in the poll, 51% preferred a candidate who emphasizes “an economy based on opportunity” while only 43% opted for one who pushes “an economy based on fairness.” The report notes: “Swing Indepen
Jessica Olsen

Wealth Distribution - 0 views

  • The democratic argument: The concentration of wealth in a small group allows for anti-democratic influence of social policy. The wealthy have the ability to create their own "think tanks" and astro-turf front organizations. These are then used to create the perception that the public is in support of their self-serving objectives. Recent studies have shown how these techniques were used in the repeal of the estate tax debate as well as in the rise of new factions opposing the liberal social policies of the Episcopal church. When such vast amounts of money are under the control of a tiny group the basic mechanisms of democracy are undermined
  • When the wealth of a society gets sufficiently unbalanced it ceases to valuable since there are no people with the resources to purchase it. During the French revolution most of the furniture in the estates was looted and much of it was used for firewood. It had no value in a peasant's home. It didn't fit, wasn't practical, and the decorative detail was useless.
  • So any plan that is going to shift the balance of wealth has to deal with issues of extracting real value from the accumulations of the wealthy without causing a drop in the marketability of the assets.
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  • Can wealth redistribution take place in the US? The least disruptive approach would be changing the tax code to be more progressive. This could be modifications to the income tax, the restructuring (not elimination) of the estate tax, and imposition of either wealth taxes or consumption taxes. The wealthy can be expected to object to all of these changes. In addition they have the political and economic clout to promote their self interests. A concerted effort by the people can succeed. Recent examples in countries like the Phillipines and Poland show the power the people can have when they join peacefully for a change in the organization of society.
  • Only the rich can create economic growth In the US this is contradicted by the history of our country. All the great industries of the 19th and 20th Centuries were created by individuals with no prior wealth. Andrew Carnegie, Henry Ford, Bill Gates, etc. started with essentially nothing and built huge enterprises. On the other hand the children of these entrepreneurs have not been especially noted for doing anything notable. Andrew Carnegie felt so strongly that each generation should make its own way that he left the bulk of his estate to charity. His children had to make their own way. The secret of a successful entrepreneur is his ability to raise capital to expand his enterprise. This is obtained from banks and selling stock and not generally from personal wealth. One doesn't need rich people to build a business. The capital of a bank can be $1000 from one hundred people or $100,000 from one person. The amount available to lend is the same. Wealth does not have to be concentrated to be available for investment. In the developed world much of the available capital comes from pension funds and is thus not provided by the wealthy.
  • The only areas which continue the patronage model and are still the domain of the wealthy are opera, classical music and big fine art museum
  • The fairness argument: As all people come into the world equally helpless they should ultimately reach at least approximate equality of condition when they mature. People have an innate sense of what is fair as many psychological experiments have demonstrated. The intrinsic sense of fairness requires basic economic equality.
Jessica Olsen

Unequal or Unfair: Which Is Worse? - - 0 views

  • The first of these multimedia stories appeared here at Pacific Standard. Called The Evolution of Fairness, it is about archaeologist Brian Hayden. It explores his central life work—a dig in a 5000 year old village in British Columbia, where he uncovered evidence of how inequality may have first evolved in human society.
  • The point I have been trying to make is that inequality is the symptom; unfairness is the underlying disease.
Jessica Olsen

http://search.proquest.com.proxy-library.ashford.edu/printviewfile?accountid=32521 - 0 views

  • Czech, B., Krausman, P. R., & Devers, P. K. (2000). Economic associations among causes of species endangerment in the united states. Bioscience, 50(7), 593-601. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/216449524?accountid=32521
Jessica Olsen

taskforcereport.pdf (application/pdf Object) - 0 views

Jessica Olsen

millions_billions.pdf (application/pdf Object) - 0 views

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    Wealthy avoiding estate tax. Accounts of events in the policies in the government made to shelter the rich's money. List of Super-Wealthy Families and their activities.
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