I don't accept the premise. It is not desirable to reduce inequality as a political goal.
It's very desirable to reduce inequality and have it as a political goal. Inequality matters.
Executive summary
- Introduction
Many people, including some on the Left, express doubts about whether
economic inequality matters to public policy. At the same time, Britain has
become one of the most unequal countries in Europe. This pamphlet
explains why this growth in economic inequality should remain a central
political concern.
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- Inequality and poverty
Inequality and poverty are closely connected: more equal countries have
lower levels of poverty. Britain suffers from high levels of poverty, and poor
people in Britain are substantially poorer than the worst off in more equal
industrialised countries. In the developed world, inequality is more
important than per capita GDP in determining the living standars of the
poor. By ignoring inequality and the growth of incomes at the top of the
distribution the government is compromising its efforts at poverty
reduction.
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Poverty in rich countries is usually defined relative to average incomes. But
despite being richer than in the past, low-income households in Britain
today suffer from serious deprivations that are unnecessary and
unacceptable in a country as rich as Britain. The decision to redistribute
from the rich to the poor is just the decision to put scarce resources to
better use.
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- Inequality and social justice
The sharp contrast perceived by some between ?equality of opportunity?
and ?equality of outcome? is misguided. Egalitarian social democrats have
always argued that the promotion of equal opportunity will in fact require
greater material equality: for individuals to realise their potential, they will
have to enjoy roughly similar economic and social starting points.
?
Empirical evidence shows that Britain is a long way from realising equal
opportunity: the life chances of an individual in Britain today are significantly
influenced by the economic and social position of his or her parents. But
those countries which have succeeded in facilitating greater
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intergenerational mobility, notably in Scandinavia, have only done so by
promoting greater material equality.
The large inequalities of wealth and income currently found in Britain are
fundamentally unjust, whether one endorses an egalitarian or meritocratic
view of social justice. They cannot plausibly be defended as deserved
rewards for varying talents.
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- Inequality and social solidarity
Inequality in Britain today undermines social cohesion and causes the
disappearance of a shared public realm. Unequal societies suffer from lower
levels of interpersonal trust, higher levels of violent crime, and the
residential segregation of social classes. High inequality allows the wealthy to
dominate political decision-making and to reduce political support and
funding for public services.
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- Why not reduce inequality?
It cannot be straightforwardly argued that reducing inequality is a threat to
individual freedom. Economic inequality distributes individual freedom
unequally: the richer you are, the greater ability you have to do as you want
without interference from others.
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There are theoretical arguments both for and against the proposition that
economic inequality is beneficial for economic growth, but the empirical
evidence indicates that there is no relationship either way. Promoting
equality is not bad for the economy.
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Governments are not powerless before inexorable anti-egalitarian forces.
Many policy tools exist to promote greater equality, and the recent growth
of inequality in Britain is largely due to policy decisions taken by government
during the 1980s. Governments play a large role in the determination of
economic inequality and can choose to reduce it or increase it.
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- Conclusion
Economic inequality on the scale now present in Britain presents an
enormous challenge to the core values and policy objectives held by even
the most modern of social democrats. The key political objective of social
democrats must remain to end the gross economic inequality that scars
Britain, and wastes the lives of so many of our fellow citizens.
paulsegal.org/documents/Why_Inequality_Matters.pdf
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Inequality is a very dangerous metric. The last people to start to implement "equal" societies as a matter of course in every aspect of public policy (naturally, with some more equal than the others) were the Communists.
Utter nonsense and a strawman argument. You can have less inequality and still have Capitalism. Most countries in europe are far more equal, and the population are also generally far healthier and happier for it, too.