Economic Equality Justification?

[Dooga Aetrus Blackrazor]

I've been reading Anarchy, State, and Utopia by Robert Nozrick, a libertarian. He has some arguments against economic equality that we've all heard. But here is a consideration that he brings up.

With respect to the moral community, the individual who is more skilled and works harder contributes more to the well-being of the individual in that community. It seems reasonable that they should be compensated in a way that reflects that contribution.

Communism assumes unlimited resources in many respects. I agree with that assumption, to a large, degree, but any society will encounter problems of rarity. If a rare pleasure exists, won't those who contribute more to the social schema consider themselves as more deserving of these rare pleasures?

My previous response would be the following. Individual advantages arise from genetic and environmental circumstances beyond the control of the individual. If you are born into a position of advantage, there seems to be no justification for you receiving more than others. This is an idealist notion. In reality, you have advantages. If you can grow 10 apples because of talent and another individual can only grow two, should you both receive six apples?

I don't see a justification for considering ideals, "how society should have been," with respect to practical matters. The fact is that some people do contribute to the moral community to a larger degree. We should realistically consider this issue. Or are ideals truly relevant to how society should be structured?

Anyway, what is the justification for economic equality? I like it in principle so I'm not going to stop advocating it, but I am curious.

[JimmyJazz]

A few points:

1. My idea of socialism is not at all incompatible with work incentives. The more productive people should get rewarded for it. I don't have any desire to handicap people.

2. Under socialism, work incentives don't always have to take the form of greater productivity over a fixed number of hours (like producing 10 apples instead of producing 2); in a planned economy you would always have the option of setting relatively modest production quotas (like 4 apples per person) and then those who are the most productive (talented, hardworking) would simply finish first and get to go play first.

3. Nozick is a dishonest scumbag if he actually frames his whole defense of capitalism in terms of people getting rewarded based on their level of productivity; someone with his education damn well knows that the real scandal of capitalism is the nonproductive people who are rewarded for pure ownership.

[ZeroNowhere]

Nozick is a dishonest scumbag if he actually frames his whole defense of capitalism in terms of people getting rewarded based on their level of productivity; someone with his education damn well knows that the real scandal of capitalism is the nonproductive people who are rewarded for pure ownership.
He doesn't, he churns out even more crap. Hell, he even does the 'voluntary contract' shit. Also, when it comes to 'economic equality', nobody is asking for equal wages and such. If a free access system were to be practical at a time, then that is all the justification required, really, unless we are to go into moralizing about work. The main reason for support of labour credits is whether or not free access would be immediately practical, or we should start with incentives, and move closer to free access if the system is stable (and back if not).

[JimmyJazz]

Zero: yeah, and of course it's not a decision you have to make for the entire economy at one time. For instance I support free access for healthcare even under capitalism. And what I said about setting modest production quotas with a variable-length work day rather than maximizing productivity over a fixed-length work day: that's a decision you would make separately for each sector of the economy as well, depending if you wanted to grow, maintain, or shrink that sector in size.