Why Does Inequality Matter?

Inequality is widely regarded as morally objectionable; T. M. Scanlon investigates why it matters to us. Demands for greater equality can seem puzzling, because it can be unclear what reason people have for objecting to the difference between what they have and what others have, as opposed simply to wanting to be better off. Scanlon’s aim is to provide a moral anatomy of six reasons why inequality is objectionable, and the ideas of equality that these reasons involve. He also examines objections to the pursuit of equality on the ground that it involves objectionable interference with individual liberty, and argues that ideas of desert do not provide a basis either for justifying significant economic inequality or for objecting to it.