Dworkin's Paradox

TL;DR

This paper explores how communication and preferences influence fairness in welfare distribution, showing that egalitarian preferences form a stable equilibrium and can promote fairness even in diverse societies.

Contribution

It introduces a model demonstrating that egalitarian preferences are a strict Nash equilibrium, highlighting the role of communication in fostering fairness.

Findings

Egalitarian preferences form a strict Nash equilibrium.

Communication can promote and secure fairness.

Egalitarian approach is favorable in inhomogeneous societies.

Abstract

How to distribute welfare in a society is a key issue in the subject of distributional justice, which is deeply involved with notions of fairness. Following a thought experiment by Dworkin, this work considers a society of individuals with different preferences on the welfare distribution and an official to mediate the coordination among them. Based on a simple assumption that an individual's welfare is proportional to how her preference is fulfilled by the actual distribution, we show that an egalitarian preference is a strict Nash equilibrium and can be favorable even in certain inhomogeneous situations. These suggest how communication can encourage and secure a notion of fairness.