March 2006: When Does Inequality Matter?

Lead Essay

» When Inequality Matters by David Schmidtz

Reaction Essays

» Why Care About Equality? by Peter Singer

"When Jeremy Bentham first suggested that the pains and pleasures of an African should count as much as the happiness of an English person," philosopher Peter Singer writes, "this view had radical implications, for slavery was still legal in the British colonies. Today, the suggestion that the pain of a nonhuman animal might count as much as the pain of a member of our own species is still radical. That is why this sense of equality remains important."

» Which Inequalities Are Ours to Arrange? by Tom G. Palmer

Picking up where David Schmidtz's lead essay ends, Cato Institute Senior Fellow Tom Palmer argues that a common line of reasoning used to justify the authority of the state to rearrange the unequal distribution of wealth is based on a mistake. The kind of equality that matters, Palmer argues, is the "equal right of every person to excercise choice over his or her own person." The inequalities that emerge from the voluntary interaction of persons excercising that right are not "ours" to reconfigure.

» Down to Earth by Jacob Hacker

In his reply to David Schmidtz's lead essay, Yale political scientist Jacob Hacker agrees that material inequality as such is not our greatest concern. "The problems arise," Hacker argues, "when resource inequalities translate into substantial, cumulative, and self-reinforcing inequalities of political power."