When can we say than one society is better than another ?
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Transcript of When can we say than one society is better than another ?
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When can we say than one society is better than another ?
Nicolas Gravel (CSH -Delhi & IDEP-GREQAM (Marseille, France)
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« The importance of the formal results lies ultimately in their relevance to normal communication, and to things that people argue about and fight for »
Amartya K. Sen
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What are the things that people argue about and fight for ?
People argue about and fight for the defense of their private interest (much too often perhaps)
People argue about and fight for the construction of a « better » world
A better world = a world with less suffering, less exploitation, more…justice
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What are the things that people argue about and fight for ?
People argue about and fight for the defense of their private interest (much too often perhaps)
People argue about and fight for the construction of a « better » world
A better world = a world with less suffering, less exploitation, more…justice
![Page 5: When can we say than one society is better than another ?](https://reader036.fdocuments.in/reader036/viewer/2022062816/56814d0f550346895dba4b39/html5/thumbnails/5.jpg)
What are the things that people argue about and fight for ?
People argue about and fight for the defense of their private interest (much too often perhaps)
People argue about and fight for the construction of a « better » world
A better world = a world with less suffering, less exploitation, more…justice
![Page 6: When can we say than one society is better than another ?](https://reader036.fdocuments.in/reader036/viewer/2022062816/56814d0f550346895dba4b39/html5/thumbnails/6.jpg)
What are the things that people argue about and fight for ?
People argue about and fight for the defense of their private interest (much too often perhaps)
People argue about and fight for the construction of a « better » world
A better world = a world with less suffering, less exploitation, more…justice
![Page 7: When can we say than one society is better than another ?](https://reader036.fdocuments.in/reader036/viewer/2022062816/56814d0f550346895dba4b39/html5/thumbnails/7.jpg)
What are the things that people argue about and fight for ?
People argue about and fight for the defense of their private interest (much too often perhaps)
People argue about and fight for the construction of a « better » world
A better world = a world with less suffering, less exploitation, more…justice
![Page 8: When can we say than one society is better than another ?](https://reader036.fdocuments.in/reader036/viewer/2022062816/56814d0f550346895dba4b39/html5/thumbnails/8.jpg)
« Justice is the first virtue of social institutions, as truth is of systems of thought. A theory however elegant and economical must be rejected or revised if it is untrue; likewise laws and institutions no matter how efficient and well-arranged must be reformed or abolished if they are unjust. »
John Rawls
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But what is justice ? When can we say that a particular
social arrangement is « just » and another « unjust » ?
When can we say that a social institution is more just than another ?
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Purpose of the talk To present answers proposed by
economists to answer these questions More specifically, to present methods
used by economists to compare societies on the basis of their performance in achieving justice
Methods discussed here are robust
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Comparing societies ? Comparing two different societies at a
given moment (is France more just than the US ?)
Comparing a given society at different points of time (is India better now than fifteen years ago ?)
Comparing a society after a tax reform with the same society without the tax reform
etc.
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Comparing societies ? Society = A list of individuals Approaches focus on specific attributes
of these individuals Attributes: Income, health, education,
access to public good, etc. Comparing societies amount to
comparing distributions of these attributes across individuals
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Robust methods of normative appraisal ?
Method: we want it to be routinely and « easily » implementable
Based on explicit ethical principles Robustness: ethical principles that justify
the methods are widely acceptable Price to pay for robustness:
Incompleteness. The methods may fail to provide a firm answer to the questions above.
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Comparing societies: some examples
Comparing 12 OECD countries (+ India) based on their distribution of disposable income and some public goods
Sample of some 20 000 households in each country Disposable income: income available after all taxes
and social security contributions have been paid and all transfers payment have been received
Incomes are made comparable across households by equivalence scale adjustment
Incomes are made comparable across countries by adjusting for purchasing power differences
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Australia Austria Canada France Germany Italy Portugal Spain sweden Switz. UK USA India
4733 6815 4285 6170 5855 3554 2546 2747 5808 8679 4898 5403 789
9237 10730 8977 9555 10012 6575 4602 5407 9056 14615 8598 11025 1019
11795 12850 11935 11793 12024 8059 6110 7045 10540 17334 10883 14687 1168
14580 14725 14338 13441 13229 9438 7549 8646 11982 19806 13337 18142 1309
17377 16588 16839 15092 14857 10933 8666 10113 13371 22044 15854 21581 1462
20456 18665 19494 16966 16614 12629 10028 11656 14723 24554 18579 25206 1649
24203 20921 22382 19169 18376 14769 11415 13639 16147 27696 21574 29387 1859
28467 24042 25955 22382 21221 17342 13930 16535 18140 32095 25188 34819 2167
34592 28069 30958 26834 25201 20743 18113 20968 21091 38254 30190 43373 2694
54537 38539 44457 40175 39217 31174 32047 35457 30818 61849 49022 79030 4735
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Australia Austria Canada France Germany Italy Portugal Spain sweden Switz. UK USA India
4733 6815 4285 6170 5855 3554 2546 2747 5808 8679 4898 5403 789
9237 10730 8977 9555 10012 6575 4602 5407 9056 14615 8598 11025 1019
11795 12850 11935 11793 12024 8059 6110 7045 10540 17334 10883 14687 1168
14580 14725 14338 13441 13229 9438 7549 8646 11982 19806 13337 18142 1309
17377 16588 16839 15092 14857 10933 8666 10113 13371 22044 15854 21581 1462
20456 18665 19494 16966 16614 12629 10028 11656 14723 24554 18579 25206 1649
24203 20921 22382 19169 18376 14769 11415 13639 16147 27696 21574 29387 1859
28467 24042 25955 22382 21221 17342 13930 16535 18140 32095 25188 34819 2167
34592 28069 30958 26834 25201 20743 18113 20968 21091 38254 30190 43373 2694
54537 38539 44457 40175 39217 31174 32047 35457 30818 61849 49022 79030 4735
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Australia Austria Canada France Germany Italy Portugal Spain sweden Switz. UK USA India
4733 6815 4285 6170 5855 3554 2546 2747 5808 8679 4898 5403 789
9237 10730 8977 9555 10012 6575 4602 5407 9056 14615 8598 11025 1019
11795 12850 11935 11793 12024 8059 6110 7045 10540 17334 10883 14687 1168
14580 14725 14338 13441 13229 9438 7549 8646 11982 19806 13337 18142 1309
17377 16588 16839 15092 14857 10933 8666 10113 13371 22044 15854 21581 1462
20456 18665 19494 16966 16614 12629 10028 11656 14723 24554 18579 25206 1649
24203 20921 22382 19169 18376 14769 11415 13639 16147 27696 21574 29387 1859
28467 24042 25955 22382 21221 17342 13930 16535 18140 32095 25188 34819 2167
34592 28069 30958 26834 25201 20743 18113 20968 21091 38254 30190 43373 2694
54537 38539 44457 40175 39217 31174 32047 35457 30818 61849 49022 79030 4735
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Australia Austria Canada France Germany Italy Portugal Spain sweden Switz. UK USA India
4733 6815 4285 6170 5855 3554 2546 2747 5808 8679 4898 5403 789
9237 10730 8977 9555 10012 6575 4602 5407 9056 14615 8598 11025 1019
11795 12850 11935 11793 12024 8059 6110 7045 10540 17334 10883 14687 1168
14580 14725 14338 13441 13229 9438 7549 8646 11982 19806 13337 18142 1309
17377 16588 16839 15092 14857 10933 8666 10113 13371 22044 15854 21581 1462
20456 18665 19494 16966 16614 12629 10028 11656 14723 24554 18579 25206 1649
24203 20921 22382 19169 18376 14769 11415 13639 16147 27696 21574 29387 1859
28467 24042 25955 22382 21221 17342 13930 16535 18140 32095 25188 34819 2167
34592 28069 30958 26834 25201 20743 18113 20968 21091 38254 30190 43373 2694
54537 38539 44457 40175 39217 31174 32047 35457 30818 61849 49022 79030 4735
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Australia Austria Canada France Germany Italy Portugal Spain sweden Switz. UK USA India
4733 6815 4285 6170 5855 3554 2546 2747 5808 8679 4898 5403 789
9237 10730 8977 9555 10012 6575 4602 5407 9056 14615 8598 11025 1019
11795 12850 11935 11793 12024 8059 6110 7045 10540 17334 10883 14687 1168
14580 14725 14338 13441 13229 9438 7549 8646 11982 19806 13337 18142 1309
17377 16588 16839 15092 14857 10933 8666 10113 13371 22044 15854 21581 1462
20456 18665 19494 16966 16614 12629 10028 11656 14723 24554 18579 25206 1649
24203 20921 22382 19169 18376 14769 11415 13639 16147 27696 21574 29387 1859
28467 24042 25955 22382 21221 17342 13930 16535 18140 32095 25188 34819 2167
34592 28069 30958 26834 25201 20743 18113 20968 21091 38254 30190 43373 2694
54537 38539 44457 40175 39217 31174 32047 35457 30818 61849 49022 79030 4735
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Australia Austria Canada France Germany Italy Portugal Spain sweden Switz. UK USA India
4733 6815 4285 6170 5855 3554 2546 2747 5808 8679 4898 5403 789
9237 10730 8977 9555 10012 6575 4602 5407 9056 14615 8598 11025 1019
11795 12850 11935 11793 12024 8059 6110 7045 10540 17334 10883 14687 1168
14580 14725 14338 13441 13229 9438 7549 8646 11982 19806 13337 18142 1309
17377 16588 16839 15092 14857 10933 8666 10113 13371 22044 15854 21581 1462
20456 18665 19494 16966 16614 12629 10028 11656 14723 24554 18579 25206 1649
24203 20921 22382 19169 18376 14769 11415 13639 16147 27696 21574 29387 1859
28467 24042 25955 22382 21221 17342 13930 16535 18140 32095 25188 34819 2167
34592 28069 30958 26834 25201 20743 18113 20968 21091 38254 30190 43373 2694
54537 38539 44457 40175 39217 31174 32047 35457 30818 61849 49022 79030 4735
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Australia Austria Canada France Germany Italy Portugal Spain sweden Switz. UK USA India
4733 6815 4285 6170 5855 3554 2546 2747 5808 8679 4898 5403 789
9237 10730 8977 9555 10012 6575 4602 5407 9056 14615 8598 11025 1019
11795 12850 11935 11793 12024 8059 6110 7045 10540 17334 10883 14687 1168
14580 14725 14338 13441 13229 9438 7549 8646 11982 19806 13337 18142 1309
17377 16588 16839 15092 14857 10933 8666 10113 13371 22044 15854 21581 1462
20456 18665 19494 16966 16614 12629 10028 11656 14723 24554 18579 25206 1649
24203 20921 22382 19169 18376 14769 11415 13639 16147 27696 21574 29387 1859
28467 24042 25955 22382 21221 17342 13930 16535 18140 32095 25188 34819 2167
34592 28069 30958 26834 25201 20743 18113 20968 21091 38254 30190 43373 2694
54537 38539 44457 40175 39217 31174 32047 35457 30818 61849 49022 79030 4735
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Australia Austria Canada France Germany Italy Portugal Spain sweden Switz. UK USA India
4733 6815 4285 6170 5855 3554 2546 2747 5808 8679 4898 5403 789
9237 10730 8977 9555 10012 6575 4602 5407 9056 14615 8598 11025 1019
11795 12850 11935 11793 12024 8059 6110 7045 10540 17334 10883 14687 1168
14580 14725 14338 13441 13229 9438 7549 8646 11982 19806 13337 18142 1309
17377 16588 16839 15092 14857 10933 8666 10113 13371 22044 15854 21581 1462
20456 18665 19494 16966 16614 12629 10028 11656 14723 24554 18579 25206 1649
24203 20921 22382 19169 18376 14769 11415 13639 16147 27696 21574 29387 1859
28467 24042 25955 22382 21221 17342 13930 16535 18140 32095 25188 34819 2167
34592 28069 30958 26834 25201 20743 18113 20968 21091 38254 30190 43373 2694
54537 38539 44457 40175 39217 31174 32047 35457 30818 61849 49022 79030 4735
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Australia Austria Canada France Germany Italy Portugal Spain sweden Switz. UK USA India
4733 6815 4285 6170 5855 3554 2546 2747 5808 8679 4898 5403 789
9237 10730 8977 9555 10012 6575 4602 5407 9056 14615 8598 11025 1019
11795 12850 11935 11793 12024 8059 6110 7045 10540 17334 10883 14687 1168
14580 14725 14338 13441 13229 9438 7549 8646 11982 19806 13337 18142 1309
17377 16588 16839 15092 14857 10933 8666 10113 13371 22044 15854 21581 1462
20456 18665 19494 16966 16614 12629 10028 11656 14723 24554 18579 25206 1649
24203 20921 22382 19169 18376 14769 11415 13639 16147 27696 21574 29387 1859
28467 24042 25955 22382 21221 17342 13930 16535 18140 32095 25188 34819 2167
34592 28069 30958 26834 25201 20743 18113 20968 21091 38254 30190 43373 2694
54537 38539 44457 40175 39217 31174 32047 35457 30818 61849 49022 79030 4735
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Australia Austria Canada France Germany Italy Portugal Spain sweden Switz. UK USA India
4733 6815 4285 6170 5855 3554 2546 2747 5808 8679 4898 5403 789
9237 10730 8977 9555 10012 6575 4602 5407 9056 14615 8598 11025 1019
11795 12850 11935 11793 12024 8059 6110 7045 10540 17334 10883 14687 1168
14580 14725 14338 13441 13229 9438 7549 8646 11982 19806 13337 18142 1309
17377 16588 16839 15092 14857 10933 8666 10113 13371 22044 15854 21581 1462
20456 18665 19494 16966 16614 12629 10028 11656 14723 24554 18579 25206 1649
24203 20921 22382 19169 18376 14769 11415 13639 16147 27696 21574 29387 1859
28467 24042 25955 22382 21221 17342 13930 16535 18140 32095 25188 34819 2167
34592 28069 30958 26834 25201 20743 18113 20968 21091 38254 30190 43373 2694
54537 38539 44457 40175 39217 31174 32047 35457 30818 61849 49022 79030 4735
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Australia Austria Canada France Germany Italy Portugal Spain sweden Switz. UK USA India
4733 6815 4285 6170 5855 3554 2546 2747 5808 8679 4898 5403 789
9237 10730 8977 9555 10012 6575 4602 5407 9056 14615 8598 11025 1019
11795 12850 11935 11793 12024 8059 6110 7045 10540 17334 10883 14687 1168
14580 14725 14338 13441 13229 9438 7549 8646 11982 19806 13337 18142 1309
17377 16588 16839 15092 14857 10933 8666 10113 13371 22044 15854 21581 1462
20456 18665 19494 16966 16614 12629 10028 11656 14723 24554 18579 25206 1649
24203 20921 22382 19169 18376 14769 11415 13639 16147 27696 21574 29387 1859
28467 24042 25955 22382 21221 17342 13930 16535 18140 32095 25188 34819 2167
34592 28069 30958 26834 25201 20743 18113 20968 21091 38254 30190 43373 2694
54537 38539 44457 40175 39217 31174 32047 35457 30818 61849 49022 79030 4735
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0
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disposable income
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10individual rank
AustraliaFranceGermanyItalySpainswedenUKUSAIndia
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What are these data saying on justice ?
Except for the 10% poorest, americans in every income group have larger income than French, swedish and German. Does that mean that US is a « better » society than UK, France, or Sweden ?
Americans in every income group have larger income than British, Australians, Italians, spanish and Indians. Does that mean that US is a better society than UK, Australia, Italy, Spain or India ?
It would seem so if income was the only relevant attribute. But is that so ?
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Another attribute: regional infant mortality
Infant mortality (number of children who die before the age of one per thousand births) is a good indicator of the overall working of the medical system of the region where individuals live
How do countries compare in terms of the different infant mortality rate that they offer to their citizens on the basis of their place of residence ?
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0.005.00
10.0015.0020.0025.0030.0035.0040.0045.0050.0055.0060.0065.0070.00
Number of deads per 1000
1 2 3 4 5
infant mortality groups
AustraliaFranceGermanyItalySpainSwedenUKUSIndia
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Other attribute: average class size in public schools
How do the countries compare in terms of the distribution of the class sizes at public school ?
Class size: a good indicator of the school quality
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0.00
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Class sizes (number of children/class)
1 2 3 4 5Groups of Class size
AustraliaFranceGermanyItalySpainSwedenUKUS
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General principles that can be derived from these comparisons Countries differ by the total amount of each
attribute they allocate to their citizens :« size of the cake »
They also differ by the way they share this cake
Less obviously, they also differ by the way they correlate the attribute between people between the different attributes
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2 cakes of different sizes: US & Sweden
US
Sweden
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Sharing the US cake
2% 4% 5%6%
8%
9%
10%12%
15%
29%
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Sharing the Swedish cake
4% 6%7%
8%
9%
10%11%
12%
14%
19%
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Our ethical principles will consider that: For a given distribution, a larger cake is
better than a smaller one Given the size, a « more equal »
distribution of the cake is better than a less equal one.
Given sizes and distributions, less correlation between cakes is better
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What is justice ? A welfarist answer (1) Welfarism: The only thing that matters for
evaluating a society is the distribution of welfare – happiness - between individuals
A just society is a society that maximises a function of individual happiness
Philosophical foundations: Hume, Bentham, Beccaria
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What is justice ? A welfarist answer (2)
Fundamental assumption: individual happiness can be measured and compared
We don’t need to know how to measure happiness but we have to accept the idea that we can measure it in a meaningful way.
Individual welfare is assumed to depend upon the individual attributes
The relationship between welfare and attributes is assumed to satisfy basic properties
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Specifically, we assume:
Happiness is increasing with respect to each attribute (more income makes people happier, so does more health, smaller class sizes, etc.)
The extra pleasure brought about by an extra unit of an attribute decreases with the level of the attribute (a rich individual gets less extra pleasure from an additional rupee than an otherwise identical poorer individual)
The rate of increase in happiness with respect to a particular attribute is decreasing with respect to every other attribute
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Which function of individual happiness should we maximize ?
Classical Utilitarianism (Bentham): the sum Modern view point: a function that exhibits
some aversion with respect to happiness-inequality
Extreme form of aversion toward happiness-inequality (John Rawls): Maxi-Min, we should focus only on the welfare of the less happy person in the society.
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Contrasting Maxi-min and Utilitarianism
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Contrasting Maxi-min and Utilitarianism
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Contrasting Maxi-min and Utilitarianism
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sum of income is larger in USthan in UK and in UK than inFrance
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Contrasting Maxi-min and Utilitarianism
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sum of income is larger in USthan in UK and in UK than inFrance but the poorest individualis richer in France than in the USor in the UK
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To sum up, for welfarism: 1: A society = a list of combinations of
observable attributes (one such combination for every individual)
2: Each combination of attributes is transformed into (unobservable) happiness
3: Societies are compared on the basis of their distributions of happiness
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Society A is better than society B if the distribution of happiness in A is considered better than that in B by any function that exhibits aversion to happiness-inequality, under the assumption that the relationship between unobservable individual happiness and obervable individual attributes satisfies the above properties (Welfarist dominance)
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When can we say that one society is better than another ? (the one attribute case)
n individuals identical in every respect other than the considered attribute (income)
y = (y1,…,yn) an income distribution
Q: When are we « sure » that y is « more just » than z ?
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Anwer no 1: Mana and Robin Hood
When y has been obtained from z by giving mana to some, or all, the individuals
When y has been obtained from z by a finite sequence of bilateral (Robin Hood) transfers, each transfer taking place between a donator that is richer than the recipient, and each transfer being insufficient to reverse the ranking of the donator and the recipient.
When y has been obtained from z by both manas and Robin Hood transfers
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Mana ?
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Mana ?
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Robin Hood and Mana ?
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Robin Hood and Mana ?
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Robin Hood and Mana ?
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Robin Hood and Mana ?
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Answer no 2: Poverty dominance
Important issue: poverty How do we define poverty ? Basic principle: You define a (poverty)
line that partition the population into 2 groups: poor and rich
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2 measures of poverty
1) Headcount: Count the number (or the fraction) of people below the line
2) poverty gap: Calculate the minimal amount of money needed to eliminate poverty as defined by the line
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Contrasting headcount and poverty gap
Australia Austria Canada France Germany Italy Portugal Spain sweden Switz. UK USA India
4733 6815 4285 6170 5855 3554 2546 2747 5808 8679 4898 5403 789
9237 10730 8977 9555 10012 6575 4602 5407 9056 14615 8598 11025 1019
11795 12850 11935 11793 12024 8059 6110 7045 10540 17334 10883 14687 1168
14580 14725 14338 13441 13229 9438 7549 8646 11982 19806 13337 18142 1309
17377 16588 16839 15092 14857 10933 8666 10113 13371 22044 15854 21581 1462
20456 18665 19494 16966 16614 12629 10028 11656 14723 24554 18579 25206 1649
24203 20921 22382 19169 18376 14769 11415 13639 16147 27696 21574 29387 1859
28467 24042 25955 22382 21221 17342 13930 16535 18140 32095 25188 34819 2167
34592 28069 30958 26834 25201 20743 18113 20968 21091 38254 30190 43373 2694
54537 38539 44457 40175 39217 31174 32047 35457 30818 61849 49022 79030 4735
Line = 9 600
There are 2 poor in France and 1 poor in germanybut poverty gap in Germany is 3745 while it is only3475 in France
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Poverty dominance Problem with poverty measurement: how
do we draw the line ? Criterion: society A is better than society
B if, no matter how the line is drawn, poverty is lower in A than in B for the poverty gap (poverty gap dominance)
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Answer no 3: Lorenz dominance Lorenz dominance criterion: Society A
is better than society B if the total income held by individuals below a certain rank is higher in A than in B no matter what the rank is.
Easy to see with Lorenz curves. Let us draw Lorenz curves with our data.
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Cool! the 3 answers are all equivalent to the welfarist dominance answer
It is equivalent to say : society A is more just than society B for any
welfarist ethics One can go from B to A by a finite sequence
of Robin Hood transfers and/or mana Poverty gap in A is lower than in B for all
poverty lines Lorenz curve in A is everywhere above that
in B.
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This result is a beautiful one
Comes from mathematics: Hardy, Littlewood & Polya (1936), Berge (1959),
Adapted to economics by Kolm (1966;1969), Dasgupta, Sen and Starett (1973) and Sen (1973)
It provides a solid justification for the use of Lorenz curves
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Lorenz dominance chartSwitzerland US
UKAustralia
Canada
Austria
France Germany
Sweden
Italy
Spain
Portugal
India
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Methodology can be extended to many attributes
Same welfarist ethics Suitable generalization of poverty notions
(poverty in several dimensions) No Lorenz curves New issue: Correlation between
attributes
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Aversion to correlation ?
Literacy rate (%)
Income (rupees/month)400 700
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600
a red society
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Aversion to correlation ?
Literacy rate (%)
Income (rupees/month)400 700
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a red society
and a white society
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Aversion to correlation ?
Literacy rate (%)
Income (rupees/month)400 700
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a red society
and a white society
white society is more just
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Bidimensional dominance chartSwitzerland
USUKAustralia Canada Austria
FranceGermany Sweden
Italy
Spain
Portugal
India