Just Returns from Capitalist Production
What explains and justifies factor shares, that is, the returns that workers and capital owners receive on their contribution to economic production? Arguably, neither economic theory nor theories of distributive justice give a satisfactory answer to this question. One important explanation of this...
| Auteur principal: | |
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| Type de support: | Électronique Article |
| Langue: | Anglais |
| Vérifier la disponibilité: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | |
| Interlibrary Loan: | Interlibrary Loan for the Fachinformationsdienste (Specialized Information Services in Germany) |
| Publié: |
2023
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| Dans: |
Ethical theory and moral practice
Année: 2023, Volume: 26, Numéro: 5, Pages: 785-801 |
| RelBib Classification: | NCC Éthique sociale NCD Éthique et politique NCE Éthique des affaires VA Philosophie ZC Politique en général ZE Économie / Sciences économiques |
| Sujets non-standardisés: | B
Cooperative surplus
B Distributive Justice B Increasing returns B Labour B Capital |
| Accès en ligne: |
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
| Résumé: | What explains and justifies factor shares, that is, the returns that workers and capital owners receive on their contribution to economic production? Arguably, neither economic theory nor theories of distributive justice give a satisfactory answer to this question. One important explanation of this shortcoming, this paper argues, lies in the fact that they fail to take the full measure of the phenomenon of increasing returns from specialisation or, as economist often call it, of total factor productivity. This paper aims to fill this gap by asking what follows for distributive justice from taking this phenomenon seriously. The paper proceeds in four steps. First, it demonstrates in detail how a sophisticated division of labour creates a cooperative surplus. Second, it puts forward a counterfactual experiment to measure this surplus. Third and crucially, the paper argues that justice requires an equal division of this surplus and that this idea turns out to be a surprisingly ecumenical one. The final section defends the equal surplus proposal against two objections, namely the suggestion that an equal distribution of the cooperative surplus is either politically unfeasible or economically inefficient. |
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| ISSN: | 1572-8447 |
| Contient: | Enthalten in: Ethical theory and moral practice
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1007/s10677-023-10407-y |