Relational equality, mutual benefit and social insurance

Sugden, Robert (2022) Relational equality, mutual benefit and social insurance. In: IFS Deaton Review of Inequalities. The Institute for Fiscal Studies, London, pp. 1-10.

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Abstract

I ask whether, in democratic nation state with a relatively open economy, the state has an obligation to seek to achieve equality among its citizens. If so, where does that obligation come from? And equality of what? I argue against the luck egalitarian conception of equality of opportunity, which requires the state to compensate for the effects of contingencies for which individuals are not responsible (brute luck) and but not for the effects of those for which they are responsible (option luck). This form of egalitarianism is incompatible with the practical functioning and moral underpinning of a market economy. I discuss two views which focus on equality in social, political and economics relationships between individuals – Elizabeth Anderson’s conception of relational equality and my economic conception of mutual benefit. These approaches have a similar contractual or contractarian structure: they work from the several viewpoints of potential participants in cooperative ventures rather than the synoptic viewpoint of a moral spectator. They provide complementary justifications for social insurance.

Item Type:	Book Section
Uncontrolled Keywords:	relational equality,mutual benefit,social insurance,luck egalitarianism,universal basic income,economics, econometrics and finance(all),sdg 10 - reduced inequalities ,/dk/atira/pure/subjectarea/asjc/2000
Faculty \ School:	Faculty of Social Sciences > School of Economics
UEA Research Groups:	Faculty of Social Sciences > Research Centres > Centre for Behavioural and Experimental Social Sciences Faculty of Social Sciences > Research Centres > Centre for Competition Policy Faculty of Social Sciences > Research Groups > Behavioural Economics Faculty of Social Sciences > Research Groups > Economic Theory
Related URLs:	https://ifs.org.uk/inequality/relational...
Depositing User:	LivePure Connector
Date Deposited:	06 Jun 2022 13:30
Last Modified:	24 May 2023 05:56
URI:	https://ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk/id/eprint/85360
DOI:

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