In this paper we examine the role the Dutch gymnasium continues to play in the institutional maintenance of educational inequality. To that end we examine the relational and spatial features of state-sponsored elite education in the Dutch system: the unique identity the gymnasium seeks to cultivate; its value to its consumers; its geographic significance; and its market position amidst a growing array of other selective forms of schooling. We argue that there is a strong correlation between a higher social class (...) background and the concern to transmit one’s cultural habitus. We further speculate on the moral implications of state-sponsored elite education, both as it concerns the specific role of the gymnasium in the reproduction of social inequality as well as the curious tendency among its supporters to rationalise the necessity of its existence. (shrink)

The infant mortality rate in Liberia is 50 times higher than it is in Sweden, whilst a child born in Japan has a life expectancy at birth of more than double that of one born in Zambia. 1 And within countries, we see differences which are nearly as great. For example, if you were in the USA and travelled the short journey from the poorer parts of Washington to Montgomery County Maryland, you would find that ‘for each mile travelled life (...) expectancy rises about a year and a half. There is a twenty-year gap between poor blacks at one end of the journey and rich whites at the other’. (Marmot, 2004, p.2). There are two types of questions which it is important to ask about inequalities in health such as these. The first are social scientific questions about the extent of inequalities in health and the factors which are causally responsible for these inequalities. Examples of social scientific questions to ask might be: how do infant mortality rates in the UK differ according to social class? What is the difference in life expectancy between Japanese who emigrate to the US and those who remain in Japan? Why do civil servants in higher ranked jobs tend to live longer than civil servants in lower ranked jobs? The second type are normative questions about the reasons we have to care about inequalities in health. Important normative questions to answer are: which inequalities in health should we care about (all inequalities or merely some of them)? When is an inequality in health unjust? How should we weigh our concern for equality in health against other factors such as maximising the.. (shrink)

In this book Larry Temkin examines the concepts of equality and inequality, and addresses one particular question in depth: how can we judge between different sorts of inequality? When is one inequality worse than another? Temkin shows that there are many different factors underlying and influencing our egalitarian judgments and that the notion of inequality is surprisingly complex. He looks at inequality as applied to individuals and to groups, and at the standard measures of inequality employed by economists and others, (...) and considers whether inequality matters more in a poor society than a rich one. The arguments of non-egalitarians are also examined. Temkin's book presents a new way of thinking about equality and inequality which challenges the assumptions of philosophers, welfare economists, and others concerned with these notions on a practical as well as a theoretical level. (shrink)

Temkin presents a new way of thinking about equality and inequality that challenges the assumptions of philosophers, welfare economists, and others, and has significant implications on both a practical and theoretical level.

Integrated assessment models of climate and the economy provide estimates of the social cost of carbon and inform climate policy. We create a variant of the Regional Integrated model of Climate and the Economy (RICE)—a regionally disaggregated version of the Dynamic Integrated model of Climate and the Economy (DICE)—in which we introduce a more fine-grained representation of economic inequalities within the model’s regions. This allows us to model the common observation that climate change impacts are not evenly distributed within regions (...) and that poorer people are more vulnerable than the rest of the population. Our results suggest that this is important to the social cost of carbon—as significant, potentially, for the optimal carbon price as the debate between Stern and Nordhaus on discounting. (shrink)

Michael Otsuka sets out to vindicate left-libertarianism, a political philosophy which combines stringent rights of control over one's own mind, body, and life with egalitarian rights of ownership of the world. Otsuka reclaims the ideas of John Locke from the libertarian Right, and shows how his Second Treatise of Government provides the theoretical foundations for a left-libertarianism which is both more libertarian and more egalitarian than the Kantian liberal theories of John Rawls and Thomas Nagel. Otsuka's libertarianism is founded on (...) a right of self-ownership. Here he is at one with 'right-wing' libertarians, such as Robert Nozick, in endorsing the highly anti-paternalistic and anti-moralistic implications of this right. But he parts company with these libertarians in so far as he argues that such a right is compatible with a fully egalitarian principle of equal opportunity for welfare. In embracing this principle, his own version of left-libertarianism is more strongly egalitarian than others which are currently well known. Otsuka argues that an account of legitimate political authority based upon the free consent of each is strengthened by the adoption of such an egalitarian principle. He defends a pluralistic, decentralized ideal of political society as a confederation of voluntary associations. Part I of Libertarianism without Inequality concerns the natural rights of property in oneself and the world. Part II considers the natural rights of punishment and self-defence that form the basis for the government's authority to legislate and punish. Part III explores the nature and limits of the powers of governments which are created by the consensual transfer of the natural rights of the governed. Libertarianism without Inequality is a book which everyone interested in political theory should read. (shrink)

In this article, the author addresses two feminist issues: first, how to conceptualize intersectionality, the mutual reproduction of class, gender, and racial relations of inequality, and second, how to identify barriers to creating equality in work organizations. She develops one answer to both issues, suggesting the idea of “inequality regimes” as an analytic approach to understanding the creation of inequalities in work organizations. Inequality regimes are the interlocked practices and processes that result in continuing inequalities in all work organizations. Work (...) organizations are critical locations for the investigation of the continuous creation of complex inequalities because much societal inequality originates in such organizations. Work organizations are also the target for many attempts to alter patterns of inequality: The study of change efforts and the oppositions they engender are often opportunities to observe frequently invisible aspects of the reproduction of inequalities. The concept of inequality regimes may be useful in analyzing organizational change projects to better understand why these projects so often fail and why they succeed when this occurs. (shrink)

Some political philosophers have recently argued that providing K–12 students with an adequate education suffices for social justice in education provided that the threshold of educational adequacy is properly understood. Others have argued that adequacy is insufficient for social justice. In this article I side with the latter group. I extend this debate to racial inequality in education by considering the controversial practice of paying students cash for grades to close the racial achievement gap. I then argue that framing the (...) demand for racial justice in education solely in terms of educational adequacy leaves us unable to take issue with the cash for grades policy as a matter of principle. While this does not entail that educational adequacy is unimportant, it adds to the general case for why adequacy does not suffice for social justice. (shrink)

Social and regional inequality remained of secondary importance in the 2017 House of Representatives election, especially in comparison to national security and constitutional reform. Still, the election victory of the coalition between the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and Kōmeitō was also due to its ability to shape the debate concerning Japan’s political-economic model of growth and inequality. Abenomics and regional revitalization were the dominating policies, which opposition parties criticized without having a real counter-model. A more detailed analysis shows, however, that (...) Abenomics has not yet fulfilled its promise of shared growth, and that the governing coalition’s discursive control over the political-economic agenda has significantly weakened. This creates opportunities for opposition parties in the future. (shrink)

The paper discusses the possibility that the benefits of pharmacogenomics will not be distributed equally and will create orphan populations. I argue that since these inequalities are not substantially different from those produced by ‘traditional’ drugs and are not generated with the intention to discriminate, their production needs not be unethical. Still, the final result is going against deep-seated moral feelings and intuitions, as well as broadly accepted principles of just distribution of health outcomes and healthcare. I thus propose two (...) provisos that would prevent the most offensive outcomes and moderate the scope of the produced inequalities. The first proviso rejects pharmacogenomics innovations that worsen existing group inequalities and aggravate the disadvantage of communities with a history of discrimination. The second proviso requires that there is a strategy in place to even out as much as possible the distribution of benefits in the future and that a system of compensations is in place for pharmacogenomic orphans. Given that only one moral problem generated by pharmacogenomics has been tackled, the list of provisos might be expanded when other issues are considered. (shrink)

Health inequalities are embedded in a complex array of social, political, and economic inequalities. Responding to health inequalities will require systematic action targeting all the underlying (“upstream”) social determinants that powerfully affect health and well‐being. Systemic inequalities are a major reason for the rise of modern populism that has deeply divided polities and infected politics, perhaps nowhere more so than in the United States. Concerted action to mitigate shocking levels of inequality could be a powerful antidote to nationalist populism. A (...) basic yet critical start to addressing health inequalities is to recognize them, which demands improving data collection and analysis. Certainly, global indicators show vast progress in reducing poverty and extending life. Yet aggregate health data mask a deeper reality: health gains have disproportionately benefited the well‐off, leaving the poor and middle‐class behind. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to link empirical findings concerning environmental inequalities with different normative yard-sticks for assessing whether these inequalities should be deemed unjust, or not. We argue that such an inquiry must necessarily take into account some caveats regarding both empirical research and normative theory. We suggest that empirical results must be contextualised by establishing geographies of risk. As a normative yard-stick we propose a moderately demanding social-egalitarian account of justice and democratic citizenship, which we take to (...) be best suited to identify unjust as well as legitimate instances of socio-environmental inequality. (shrink)

Why, if at all, should we object to economic inequality? Some central arguments – the argument from decreasing marginal utility for example – invoke instrumental reasons and object to inequality because of its effects. Such instrumental arguments, however, often concern only the static effects of inequality and neglect its intertemporal consequences. In this article, we address this striking gap and investigate income inequality's intertemporal consequences, including its potential effects on humanity's (very) long-term future. Following recent arguments around future generations and (...) so-called longtermism, those effects might arguably matter more than inequality's short-term consequences. We assess whether we have instrumental reason to reduce economic inequality based on its intertemporal effects in the short, medium, and the very long term. We find a good short and medium-term instrumental case for lower economic inequality. We then argue, somewhat speculatively, that we have instrumental reasons for inequality reduction from a longtermist perspective too, primarily because greater inequality could increase existential risk. We thus have instrumental reasons to reduce inequality, regardless of which time-horizon we take. We then argue that from most consequentialist perspectives, this pro tanto reason also gives us all-things-considered reason. And even across most non-consequentialist views in philosophy, this argument gives us either an all-things-considered or at least weighty pro tanto reason against inequality. (shrink)

From the author of the #1 New York Times bestseller On Bullshit, the case for worrying less about the rich and more about the poor Economic inequality is one of the most divisive issues of our time. Yet few would argue that inequality is a greater evil than poverty. The poor suffer because they don't have enough, not because others have more, and some have far too much. So why do many people appear to be more distressed by the rich (...) than by the poor? In this provocative book, the #1 New York Times bestselling author of On Bullshit presents a compelling and unsettling response to those who believe that the goal of social justice should be economic equality or less inequality. Harry Frankfurt, one of the most influential moral philosophers in the world, argues that we are morally obligated to eliminate poverty—not achieve equality or reduce inequality. Our focus should be on making sure everyone has a sufficient amount to live a decent life. To focus instead on inequality is distracting and alienating. At the same time, Frankfurt argues that the conjunction of vast wealth and poverty is offensive. If we dedicate ourselves to making sure everyone has enough, we may reduce inequality as a side effect. But it’s essential to see that the ultimate goal of justice is to end poverty, not inequality. A serious challenge to cherished beliefs on both the political left and right, On Inequality promises to have a profound impact on one of the great debates of our time. (shrink)

This book develops some of the most important themes of Sen's works over the last decade. He argues in a rich and subtle approach that we should be concerned with people's capabilities rather than their resources or welfare.

This book develops some of the most important themes of Sen's works over the last decade. He argues in a rich and subtle approach that we should be concerned with people's capabilities rather than their resources or welfare.

New communication technologies such as the microcomputer, videotex/teletext systems, the videocassette recorder, and satellite receiving dishes have been available to farmers since the early 1980s. This longitudinal study examines ethical issues associated with the impact that differential patterns of adoption and use of these technologies have had on inequalities among farmers from 1982 to 1989. The results demonstrate a strong adoption and use bias toward larger scale farmers who already have well-developed skills for handling information. This bias is especially strong (...) for microcomputer and videotex/teletext systems, and it isincreasing over time. Although the same farmers are not adopting all communication innovations, there is a strong tendency toward the already information-rich making the most use of the innovations they adopt. The article concludes with several recommendations that would help minimize some of these information inequalities. (shrink)

When it comes to improving the health of the general population, mHealth technologies with self-monitoring and intervention components hold a lot of promise. We argue, however, that due to various factors such as access, targeting, personal resources or incentives, self-monitoring applications run the risk of increasing health inequalities, thereby creating a problem of social justice. We review empirical evidence for “intervention-generated” inequalities, present arguments that self-monitoring applications are still morally acceptable, and develop approaches to avoid the promotion of health inequalities (...) through self-monitoring applications. (shrink)

In this paper we give additional arguments in favor of the point of view that the violation of Bell, CHSH and CH inequalities is not due to a mysterious non locality of nature. We concentrate on an intimate relation between a protocol of a random experiment and a probabilistic model which is used to describe it. We discuss in a simple way differences between attributive joint probability distributions and generalized joint probability distributions of outcomes from distant experiments which depend on (...) how the pairing of these outcomes is defined. We analyze in detail experimental protocols implied by local realistic and stochastic hidden variable models and show that they are incompatible with the protocols used in spin polarization correlation experiments. We discuss also the meaning of “free will”, differences between quantum and classical filters, contextuality of Kolmogorov models, contextuality of quantum theory and show how this contextuality has to be taken into account in probabilistic models trying to explain in an intuitive way the predictions of QT. The long range imperfect correlations between the clicks of distant detectors can be explained by partially preserved correlations between the signals created by a source. These correlations can only be preserved if the clicks are produced in a local and deterministic way depending on intrinsic parameters describing signals and measuring devices in the moment of the measurement. If an act of a measurement was irreducibly random they would be destroyed. It seems to indicate that QT may be in fact emerging from some underlying more detailed theory of physical phenomena. If this was a case then there is a chance to find in time series of experimental data some fine structures not predicted by QT. This would be a major discovery because it would not only prove that QT does not provide a complete description of individual physical systems but it would prove that it is not predictably complete. (shrink)

Why, if at all, should we object to economic inequality? Some central arguments – the argument from decreasing marginal utility for example – invoke instrumental reasons and object to inequality because of its effects. Such instrumental arguments, however, often concern only the static effects of inequality and neglect its intertemporal conse- quences. In this article, we address this striking gap and investigate income inequality’s intertemporal consequences, including its potential effects on humanity’s (very) long-term future. Following recent arguments around future generations (...) and so-called longtermism, those effects might arguably matter more than inequality’s short-term con- sequences. We assess whether we have instrumental reason to reduce economic inequality based on its intertemporal effects in the short, medium, and the very long term. We find a good short and medium-term instrumental case for lower economic inequality. We then argue, somewhat speculatively, that we have instrumental reasons for inequality reduction from a longtermist perspective too, primarily because greater inequality could increase existential risk. We thus have instrumental reasons to reduce inequality, regardless of which time-horizon we take. We then argue that from most consequentialist perspectives, this pro tanto reason also gives us all-things-considered reason. And even across most non-consequentialist views in philosophy, this argument gives us either an all-things-considered or at least weighty pro tanto reason against inequality. (shrink)

What can be more fascinating than experimental metaphysics, to quote one of Abner Shimony’s enlightening expressions? Bell inequalities are at the heart of the study of nonlocality. I present a list of open questions, organised in three categories: fundamental; linked to experiments; and exploring nonlocality as a resource. New families of inequalities for binary outcomes are presented.

Equality is a key concept in our moral and political vocabulary. There is wide agreement on its instrumental value and its favourable impact on many aspects of society, but less certainty over whether it has a non-instrumental or intrinsic value that can be demonstrated. In this project, Shlomi Segall explores and defends the view that it does. He argues that the value of equality is not reducible to a concern we might have for the worse off, or to ensuring that (...) individuals do not fall into poverty and destitution; instead he claims that undeserved inequalities, wherever and whenever we might find them, are bad in themselves. Assessing the strength of competing accounts, such as sufficientarianism and prioritarianism, he brings together for the first time discussions of the moral value of equality with luck- or responsibility-sensitive accounts of distributive justice. His book will interest readers in political and moral philosophy. (shrink)

Epistemic inequality is something we face in our everyday experience whenever we acknowledge our epistemic inferiority towards some and our epistemic superiority towards others. The negative side of this epistemic phenomenon has received due attention in the context of the debate on epistemic injustice: whenever an epistemic subject deflates the credibility of another or fails to recognize their authority qua knowers, unjust epistemic inequality is easily produced. However, this kind of inequality has an important positive side, as it can amount (...) to a fundamental opportunity for the subject to achieve epistemic goods—such as knowledge, understanding, and intellectual virtues—from those who are epistemically superior to them. This thesis inquires into the key features of the interaction between non-peer agents to provide a compelling account of epistemic inequality as a positive phenomenon, that is, as an inescapable and reliable source of epistemic goods. To achieve this overarching aim, the proposed analysis shall address three main questions, one conceptual, one normative, and one practical. The conceptual question asks what it takes for an epistemic agent to be epistemically superior to someone else. The normative question investigates the rational boundaries of the interaction between non-peer agents. From the standpoint of the epistemically superior agent, I examine the permissibility of epistemic paternalism, namely whether it can be legitimate for one to interfere with another’s agency for the epistemic benefit of the subject interfered with without consulting them on the issue. From the standpoint of the epistemically inferior agent, I examine which attitudes it is rational to have towards individuals epistemically superior to us. The practical question is about the implications of this analysis for a paradigmatic instance of interaction between non-peer subjects, such as the educational relationship between teachers and students. As a response to the conceptual question, I shall offer a pluralistic virtue-based framework that allows individuating various ways in which an individual or a collective agent—such as groups, committees, and research teams—can be epistemically superior to another. In particular, I shall distinguish between experts, authorities of belief, and authorities of understanding. As a response to the normative question, I argue that epistemic paternalism is permissible only insofar as the interferers are epistemically better positioned than the subjects interfered with, and I outline an account of what I call a “virtuous paternalist interferer”. Furthermore, I argue that there are cases in which it is rational for an epistemically inferior subject to set aside whatever belief they might have and defer to the epistemically superior interlocutor—thereby endorsing a limited version of the so-called preemptionist view of epistemic authority. Finally, as a response to the practical question, I shall propose an exemplar-based account of education, explain how it can be employed to educate the young to intellectual virtues, and defend the view from several objections raised against virtue-based approaches to education. (shrink)

Health inequalities are of concern both becausestudying them may help one learn how to improvehealth and because health inequalities may beunjust. This paper argues that attending tothese reasons why health inequalities may beimportant undercuts the claims of researchersat the World Health Organization in favor offocusing on individual health variation ratherthan on social group health differences. Inequalities in individual health are of littleinterest unless one goes on to study how theyare related to other factors.

Economic inequality has become a focus of prime interest for economic analysts and policy makers. This book provides an integrated approach to the topics of inequality and personal income distribution. It covers the practical and theoretical bases for inequality analysis, applications to real world problems and the foundations of theoretical approaches to income distribution. It also analyses models of the distribution of labour earnings and of income from wealth. The long-run development of income - and wealth - distribution over many (...) generations is also examined. Special attention is given to an assessment of the merits and weaknesses of standard economic models, to illustrating the implications of distributional mechanisms using real data and illustrative examples, and to providing graphical interpretation of formal arguments. Examples are drawn from US, UK and international sources. (shrink)

Which inequalities in longevity and health among individuals, groups, and nations are unfair? And what priority should health policy attach to narrowing them? These essays by philosophers, economists, epidemiologists, and physicians attempt to determine how health inequalities should be conceptualized, measured, ranked, and evaluated.

_Twenty-First Century Inequality & Capitalism: Piketty, Marx and Beyond_ is a collection of critical essays on the economist’s iconic 2014 book, from the perspective of critical theory, global political economy or public sociology, mostly drawn from the Marxist tradition.

One of the unintended consequences of the New Public Management (NPM) in universities is often feared to be a division between elite institutions focused on research and large institutions with teaching missions. However, institutional isomorphisms provide counter-incentives. For example, university rankings focus on certain output parameters such as publications, but not on others (e.g., patents). In this study, we apply Gini coefficients to university rankings in order to assess whether universities are becoming more unequal, at the level of both the (...) world and individual nations. Our results do not support the thesis that universities are becoming more unequal. If anything, we predominantly find homogenisation, both at the level of the global comparisons and nationally. In a more restricted dataset (using only publications in the natural and life sciences), we find increasing inequality for those countries, which used NPM during the 1990s, but not during the 2000s. Our findings suggest that increased output steering from the policy side leads to a global conformation to performance standards. (shrink)

Socioeconomic inequalities are functions not only of intrinsic differences between persons or groups, but also of the dynamics of their interactions. Inequalities can arise and become stabilized if there are advantages (such as generalized wealth including “human capital”) which are self-enhancing, whereas depletion of limiting resources is widely distributed. A recent theory of biological pattern formation has been generalized, adapted and applied to deal with this process. Applications include models for the non-Gaussian distribution of personal income and wealth, for overall (...) economic growth in relation to inequalities and for effects of uncoupling strategies between developing and developed countries. Note added after publication: The equations (14) for the model of the income distribution, with its characteristic non-Gaussian extension towards higher incomes (fig.4), are closely related to the Fokker-Planck equation that is widely applied in many fields of physics. (shrink)

In the literature on responsibility and health care, many associate responsibility-sensitive health policies with a form of luck egalitarianism. On this view, if some health inequality is due to the choices, or responsible agency, of one of the patients involved, then it is not unjust, and we have no responsibility to compensate for it. If the inequality’s origins cannot be traced back to the patients’ choices, then it is not their responsibility, and thus it becomes society’s responsibility to compensate for (...) it. This division of responsibilities between the individual and society applies not only to the past, but also to our responsibilities concerning the future. For instance, some luck egalitarians think that inequalities in life expectancy between men and women are unjust (Segall 2010) and should be compensated. Alex Voorhoeve has recently raised a new frontier in this debate concerning ‘prospective’ lives: the lives of those who will be born in the future. Against Voorhoeve, I argue that prospective inequalities are not a concern for egalitarians. This qualifies the claim that all inequalities not traceable to personal responsibility are unjust and suggests that there is no responsibility to structure society or our social institutions to avoid such prospective inequalities. (shrink)

This article examines inequality from a framework of justice that attends to the socially situated nature of market activity, including exchange. I argue that accounts of unsituated exchange—accounts of market exchange that abstract from social situations, such as philosopher Robert Nozick’s influential libertarian account of justice—overlook various factors that contribute to growing economic inequality in contemporary society. Analyses of market exchange must incorporate the role of “third parties” who play a role in shaping and/or who are affected by economic transactions. (...) The involvement of these additional parties, including the government and future generations, is not interference but, instead, an integral part of the economic and moral accounting of exchange. An approach to justice and inequality which embeds exchange within multiple dimensions of economy and society is needed; the latter part of this article traces such a socially situated approach. (shrink)

Measured inequality has increased tremendously between the 1960s and 1990s, not only in the United States but throughout the majority of industrial nations. Wages among people of the same race and gender have become less equal. The hours worked by men have fallen, and the drop has been more pronounced among those who earn lower wages—as a result, inequality in labor income, which is the product of the wage rate and hours worked, has increased relative to inequality in wage rates. (...) Moreover, among married couples, employment of the wives of high-income men has increased until these wives are approximately as likely to be employed outside the home as are the wives of low-income men, who have always worked for wages. In addition, due to assortative mating, wage rates of husbands and wives are positively correlated, and it is clear that the growth in inequality of labor incomes among families has outstripped the growth in inequality in individual labor income. Finally, only the highest-income families have savings in excess of home equity and company-sponsored pensions, which implies that inequality in wealth among families has been exacerbated by the growth in stock prices. (shrink)

The concept of exploitation is central in social and political theory, but there is no precise, widely accepted definition. This paper analyses John Roemer’s seminal theory, which construes exploitation as a distributive injustice arising from asset inequalities, with no reference to notions of power or dominance. First, an intertemporal generalisation of Roemer’s static economies is set up and several doubts are raised on the claim that exploitation theory can be reduced to a kind of resource egalitarianism. Then, Roemer’s philosophical arguments (...) that exploitation should be defined as a merely distributive concept are also questioned and it is argued that a notion of power, or dominance, is an essential part of the definition of exploitation. (shrink)

This volume presents a comprehensive analysis of the linkages between inequality, development, and growth from a feminist economics perspective. More specifically, it examines connections between intergroup inequality and macroeconomic outcomes, considering various channels through which gender, growth, and development interact. Using a range of analytical methods, country studies, and levels of aggregation, the contributors argue that inequalities based on gender, race, ethnicity, and class undermine the ability of people to provision and live fully to their capabilities. Authors examine the effect (...) of macroeconomic policies and economic growth on inequalities in material resources and well-being, as well as the effects of inequality on economic growth. The volume offers specific explanations for how the macroeconomy can hinder the achievement of gender equality and in turn how gender relations in areas like education and wage gaps can have macro-level impacts. Finally, the volume offers a rich array of policy options for promoting gender equality as both an intrinsic goal and a step toward improving well-being and broadly-shared development. This book was published as a special issue of _Feminist Economics_. (shrink)

We study how the optimal contract in team production is a¤ected when employees are averse to inequity in the sense described by Fehr and Schmidt (1999). By designing a reward scheme that creates inequity o¤ the desired equilibrium, the employer can induce employees to perform e¤ort at a lower total wage cost than when they are not inequity averse. We also show that the optimal output choice might change when employees are inequity averse. Finally, we show that an employer can (...) gain, and never lose, by designing a contract that accounts for inequity aversion, even if employees have standard preferences. (shrink)

Much of the philosophical literature on health inequalities seeks to establish the superiority of one or another conception of luck egalitarianism. In recent years, however, an increasing number of self-avowed egalitarian philosophers have proposed replacing luck egalitarianism with alternatives that stress the moral relevance of distinct relationships, rather than the moral relevance of good or bad luck. After briefly explaining why I am not attracted to luck egalitarianism, I seek in this chapter to distinguish and clarify three views that have (...) been characterized in the philosophical literature as forms of relational egalitarianism. I call these three relational views equality of treatment, equality of concern, and social egalitarianism. I will explain why each claims to be a form of egalitarianism and why these three views should not be seen as competitors. I will argue that each brand of relational egalitarianism describes a plausible plank of distributive justice that bears on the evaluation of health inequalities and on the political institutions that create, sustain, or exacerbate them. To illustrate this pluralistic relational egalitarian approach, I will draw on a case study by Horton and Barker (this volume) to discuss how each of the three planks might be brought to bear on the evaluation of oral health disparities among the children of migrant Latino farmworkers in California. (shrink)

Econophysics is a new and exciting cross-disciplinary research field that applies models and modelling techniques from statistical physics to economic systems. It is not, however, without its critics: prominent figures in more mainstream economic theory have criticized some elements of the methodology of econophysics. One of the main lines of criticism concerns the nature of the modelling assumptions and idealizations involved, and a particular target are ‘kinetic exchange’ approaches used to model the emergence of inequality within the distribution of individual (...) monetary income. This article will consider such models in detail, and assess the warrant of the criticisms drawing upon the philosophical literature on modelling and idealization. Our aim is to provide the first steps towards informed mediation of this important and interesting interdisciplinary debate, and our hope is to offer guidance with regard to both the practice of modelling inequality, and the inequality of modelling practice. _1_ Introduction _1.1_ Econophysics and its discontents _1.2_ Against burglar economics _2_ Modelling Inequality _2.1_ Mainstream economic models for income distribution _2.2_ Econophysics models for income distribution _3_ Idealizations in Kinetic Exchange Models _3.1_ Binary interactions _3.2_ Conservation principles _3.3_ Exchange dynamics _ 4 _ Fat Tails and Savings _ 5 _ Evaluation. (shrink)

Bell inequalities, understood as constraints between classical conditional probabilities, can be derived from a set of assumptions representing a common causal explanation of classical correlations. A similar derivation, however, is not known for Bell inequalities in algebraic quantum field theories establishing constraints for the expectation of specific linear combinations of projections in a quantum state. In the paper we address the question as to whether a ‘common causal justification’ of these non-classical Bell inequalities is possible. We will show that although (...) the classical notion of common causal explanation can readily be generalized for the non-classical case, the Bell inequalities used in quantum theories cannot be derived from these non-classical common causes. Just the opposite is true: for a set of correlations there can be given a non-classical common causal explanation even if they violate the Bell inequalities. This shows that the range of common causal explanations in the non-classical case is wider than that restricted by the Bell inequalities. (shrink)

The question of how inequality is generated and how it reproduces over time has been a major concern for social scientists for more than a century. Yet the relationship between inequality and the process of economic development is far from being well understood. These Raffaele Mattioli Lectures have brought together two of the world's leading economists, Professors Philippe Aghion and Jeffrey Williamson, to question the conventional wisdom on inequality and growth, and address its inability to explain recent economic experience. Professor (...) Aghion assesses the affects of inequality on growth, and asks whether inequality matters: if so why is excessive inequality bad for growth, and is it possible to reconcile aggregate findings with macroeconomic theories of incentives? In the second part Jeffrey Williamson discusses the Kuznets hypothesis, and focuses on the causes of the rise of wage and income inequality in developed economies. (shrink)

Consider a definably complete uniformly locally o-minimal expansion of the second kind of a densely linearly ordered abelian group. Let $f:X \rightarrow R^n$ be a definable map, where X is a definable set and R is the universe of the structure. We demonstrate the inequality $\dim ) \leq \dim $ in this paper. As a corollary, we get that the set of the points at which f is discontinuous is of dimension smaller than $\dim $. We also show that the (...) structure is definably Baire in the course of the proof of the inequality. (shrink)

Rawls argues that ‘Parties in the original position would wish to avoid at almost any cost the social conditions that undermine self-respect’. But what are these social conditions that we should so urgently avoid? One evident candidate might be conditions of material inequality. Yet Rawls seems confident that his account of justice can endorse such inequalities without jeopardising citizens’ self-respect. In this article I argue that this confidence is misplaced. Unequalising incentives, I claim, jeopardise the self-respect of those least advantaged—at (...) least under a Rawlsian schema—by undermining the very processes by which Rawls hopes to make distributional inequalities and self-respect compatible. I begin by setting out Rawls’s distinct account of self-respect before moving to describe how Rawls expects the difference principle to support citizens’ in this regard. I then draw upon GA Cohen’s distinction between ‘strict’ and ‘lax’ interpretations of the difference principle to argue that the presence of unequalising incentives undermines both the direct and indirect support that the difference principle can offer to citizens’ self-respect. As such, I claim that Rawls must either weaken his endorsement of unequalising incentives, or risk violating his ‘prior commitment’ to avoiding social conditions harmful to citizens’ self-respect. (shrink)

The study of social inequality and stratification has long been at the core of sociology and the social sciences. In this article, I argue that certain tendencies have become entrenched in our dominant paradigm that leave many researchers pursuing coarse-grained analyses of how difference relates to inequality. Centrally, despite the importance of categories and categorization for how researchers study social inequality, contemporary theories of categories are poorly integrated into conventional research. I contend that the widespread and often unquestioned use of (...) state categories as categories of analysis reinforces these tendencies. Using research on colorism as an inspiration, I highlight several components of what I call the infracategorical model of inequality, which urges researchers to disaggregate difference by shifting our focus from membership in categories to the cues of categories, membership in subcategories, and perceived typicality. (shrink)

This article argues that because racial inequalities are embedded in American society, as well as in medicine, more evidence-based investigation of the effects and implications of affirmative action is needed. Residency training programs should also seek ways to recruit medical students from underrepresented groups and to create effective mentorship programs.

Suicide is complex; yet suicide research is dominated by ‘psy’ disciplines which can falter when seeking to explain social patterning of suicide rates, and how this relates to individual actions. This article discusses a multidisciplinary report which aimed to advance understandings of socioeconomic inequalities in suicide rates in the UK. Contrasts are drawn between health psychology and sociology. Important intersections are highlighted, including a lack of attention to socioeconomic inequalities, and an emphasis on adverse life experiences and emotions to understand (...) inequalities and suicide. There are also curious disconnects, both within and between relevant psychological and sociological perspectives. The article argues that there are significant gaps in existing theorization regarding suicide, which can only be addressed through meaningful inter-disciplinary collaborations between sociologists, psychologists and others. Current theorization in mainstream suicide research is limited by its failure to engage with enduring, yet vitally important sociological debates regarding structure and agency, nature and culture. (shrink)

Bender, Robert Review of: Income inequality, equality of opportunity and intergenerational mobility, by Miles Corak, Institute for the Study of Labor, Bonn University, 2013, 32 pages.