Is it time for a limit on wealth?sv, 947 etme forint on wath? -Piosopy Magacoa You will receive this item from us as a gift ‘Would you lke unlimited access to the articles on Filosofie a? You ate already a subseriber from €4.99 per month. Take out subscription here and you have immediate access. yy daughter eats hundreds of euros worth of caviar in one minute’ Multimillionaire Sasan Azimi smiles broadly in his villa while being interviewed for the TV program Dit is de Issue (EO), about the unequal distribution of wealth in the Netherlands. Azimi is proud of his fortune, He used to have to ‘save for a can of coke’, now his children live in luxury thanks to his hard work and smart investments. Money doesn’t buy happiness, goes a well-known saying. And yet, like Azimi, many people do their best to get rich Some succeed exceptionally well. Elon Musk, the owner of Tesla, SpaceX and Twitter, is the second richest person in the world with about $170 billion. Above him is recently Louis Vuitton owner Bernard Arnault, whose assets, exceeded $ 200 billion in April 2023. These are amounts that most people can hardly imagine, says Ingrid Robeyns, professor of ethies of institutions at Utrecht University. And, she adds, they are immoral sums: no one should be able ‘to own that much money. Robeyns is the founder of limitarism, a political-philosophical movement that states that a limit should be set to ‘wealth, ‘Political equality theories often ask the question: what is the minimum wealth limit to lead a good life? Limitarianism shifts the focus to the top and says: it’s not just important that everyone has enough, some people simply have too much.’ Consumption Since World War IL, global inequality has increased. At the beginning of this year, the richest 1.2 percent of the world’s population owned about 47 percent of all the world’s money. In the Netherlands, a small group of, millionaires has about 28 times more wealth than all other non-millionaires in our country put together. At the same time, one in nine Dutch children grows up in poverty. According to Dick Timmer, political philosopher at the University of Dortmund and a doctorate in limitarism, this inequality is a waste of money. “The super-rich have a very climate-damaging consumption, he says, “The money they don’t really need for a good life can be better spent on. saving the planet. Or to the fulfillment of unmet urgent needs, such as education, health care and housing’ Extreme wealth leads to gross democratic inequality When is someone too rich? That should be a moral decision of the political community, ac and Timmer. Robeyns: ‘In 2018 I conducted a study that showed that a large majority of the Dutch believe that a family with a capital of 2.2 million has more than enough. But that's a descriptive boundary, That says nothing about xrding to both Robeyns where we, as a political community, want to morally draw the line, This is done on the basis of arguments, such as the negative consequences of extreme wealth” One of those negative consequences is gross democratic inequality, Robeyns continues. ‘The American philosopher ‘Thomas Christiano shows that super-rich people can easily convert their financial power into political power. Think FILOSOFIE GEE 3. Home Maguzine Learning Philosopiy Shortread Issues Disciplines Lexicon Philosophers Ge Tr ose aaa a ar NCOP ISGP ASOT 58ssa, 947 PM emo or mt on wea? -Paiosopy Magazine ‘want it to be?’ Rich people can also buy up media companies or fund research to influence public opinion. Robyns: ‘Private financial support played a crucial role in the spread of neoliberal thinking in universities and subsequently in politics. Theories about more cooperative forms of economy can still count on less financial support’ The economic fate Robeyns may be called the founder of limitarism, but the idea that an extreme concentration of wealth is bad is not new in philosophy, she emphasizes.’ Plato already thought that the richest person in the policy should not have more than four times as much as the poorest person, because otherwise that would lead to political instability. And according to Aristotle, money is nothing more than a means to a good life. Money should not be an end in itself, Pursuing wealth is, according to Aristotle, immoral and unnatural.’ Also in the work of Adam Smith, the founder of classical liberalism, pro-limitarist arguments can be found. Smith believed wealth should be limited to a “reasonable amount.” According to Smith, those who are too concerned with money no longer have room to lead a virtuous life. Just in between... Read more about thinking about wealth? Sign up for the free newsletter But not everyone is charmed by the limitarism, According to Bas Jacobs, professor of economics at the Free University of Amsterdam, the trend shows a boundless economic naivety’. It’s simply impracticable, he explains. If you want to enforce 2 wealth limit, you have to tax 100 percent above a certain limit. You can then take poison on the fact that people will do everything they can to ensure that their assets remain below that limit, They will work less or “undertake less business, causing businesses, jobs and homes to disappear. Or they move their money abroad, as a result of which the government misses out on almost all of that tax revenue.’ According to Jacobs, limitarism, with its call for greater equality, paradoxically runs counter to the principle of equality of political philosopher Jobn Rawls . According to Rawls, inequality is justifiable as long as it benefits the economic lot of the least well off. But limitarism will ensure that they, in particular, can lose their jobs or receive less {government support. If you want to help the poorest, it’s best to look for a tax structure that generates the most revenue; this means that capital income can be taxed at around 25 to a5 percent. You then realize ideas about justice at the lowest social cost” ‘The question is indeed whether limitarism is not shooting itself in the foot when it argues for a tax rate of 100 percent, Robeyns agrees, ‘But contrary to what Jacobs thinks, limitarism is not a fiscal, but a moral theory. Limitarism argues that there must be a limit to wealth from a moral point of view. How that is practically achieved depends on ‘which moral value you assign the most weight to. If political equality is most important to you, you might want a 100 percent tax rate. That doesn’t necessarily go against Rawls; according to Rawls, we need to improve not only the FILOSOFIE GEE 3. Home Maguzine Learning Philosopiy Shortread Issues Disciplines Lexicon Philosophers Ge Tr ose aaa a ar NCOP ISGP ASOT “8ssa, 947 PM emo or mt on wea? -Paiosopy Magazine Undeserved According to Robeyns, a wealth limit can not only be enforced through the state, but also through the political community. ‘Actually, you want to move towards a social ethos in which extreme wealth is no longer accepted. Rich people need to realize that they couldn't possibly have earned all that money themselves; so they shouldn't have any say in it and should give it back to socier Asan economist, Jacobs does not believe that all wealth is, by definition, unearned. "You're basically saying that all activities that earn that money are socially worthless. Incidentally, income may be uneamed in an economic sense, because it has been collected without making an economic effort such as hard work, innovation or entrepreneurship, Or you have earned your income by exploiting market power or polluting the environment, These ate all forms of ‘market failure. But it is going too far to assume that all the rich by definition have no earned income’ A wealth limit is an infringement of freedom of action ‘Timmer is not so sure, “Of course, many of the wealthy simply made their money according to the rules of the economic system,” he says. “But we also have to ask ourselves whether that wealth is also morally deserved. And I doubt that. Many wealthy people have a start-up capital thanks to an inheritance that they never had to work for themselves. Moreover, earning money from wealth is easier than from labour, Money generates money, while many people who work hard and add a lot of value to the world ~ such as cleaners, teachers, concert violinists ~ are not rewarded enough.’ Moreover, Timmer emphasizes, we often forget that the economic context in which money is made has been created by other people. “Anyone who gets rich does so in considerable measure thanks to others. ‘To what extent can you claim that entire amount” Robeyns adds: ‘Suppose one of those very rich people were to wash up on a deserted island. There’s nothing there to build on, no infrastructure, no science, no technology. Would that person also accumulate wealth there? Of course not” Freedom One of the greatest shortcomings of limitarism, Jacobs believes, is that itis iliberal It is a huge violation of freedom of action if people are no longer allowed to earn as much as they want or can.’ According to Timmer, Jacobs is talking about what the philosopher Isaiah Berlin calls negative freedom : the absence of coercion. ‘Limitarianism is indeed a limitation of that negative freedom. But positive freedom — the freedom to organize life as you see fit ~ actually becomes stronger: you can distribute the money in such a way that many more people can shape their lives the way ‘they want to’ Not only the freedom of the underprivileged, but also that of the rich is improved by limitarianism, argues philosopher Daniéille Zawarthoed in the article ’ Autonomy-based reasons for limitarianismy (2018). Zwarthoed argues that having more money can mean fewer choices. Rich people, she writes, are often caught in a status race that revolves around big villas, cars, boats, expensive clothes. The more money you have, the more difficult itis to break FILOSOFIE GEE 3. Home Maguzine Learning Philosopiy Shortread Issues Disciplines Lexicon Philosophers eT Hossa ara a arNSorT ISSP ARGO “bessa, 947 PM emo or mon wea? -Paiosopy Magazin Ultimately, says Robeyns, limitarism is about the development of a new social contract , “I think we need to find a ‘way of life where we no longer understand ourselves only in neoliberal terms, as consumers, investors or customers. ‘We have to start seeing ourselves and each other as citizens again, and ask ourselves: what kind of society do I want to live in? In my opinion, limitarism should be part of that.’ Femke van Hout Sign up for our newsletter Receive a newsletter every Wednesday with the latest philosophy news, the best articles of the week and the occasional offer. 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