Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Acknowledgements
- 1 Demand for Redistribution in the Age of Inequality
- Part I Demand for Redistribution: A Conceptual Framework
- 2 What Is Fair?
- 3 Unpacking Demand for Redistribution
- 4 As If Self-interested? The Correlates of Fairness Beliefs
- 5 When Material Self-interest Trumps Fairness Reasoning
- Part II Changes in Demand for Redistribution
- 6 Explaining Stability and Change
- 7 Fiscal Stress and the Erosion of Social Solidarity
- 8 Partisan Dynamics and Mass Attitudinal Change
- 9 How Proportionality Beliefs Form
- 10 The Nature and Origins of Reciprocity Beliefs
- Conclusion
- References
- Index
- Cambridge Studies in Comparative Politics
5 - When Material Self-interest Trumps Fairness Reasoning
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 07 September 2023
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Acknowledgements
- 1 Demand for Redistribution in the Age of Inequality
- Part I Demand for Redistribution: A Conceptual Framework
- 2 What Is Fair?
- 3 Unpacking Demand for Redistribution
- 4 As If Self-interested? The Correlates of Fairness Beliefs
- 5 When Material Self-interest Trumps Fairness Reasoning
- Part II Changes in Demand for Redistribution
- 6 Explaining Stability and Change
- 7 Fiscal Stress and the Erosion of Social Solidarity
- 8 Partisan Dynamics and Mass Attitudinal Change
- 9 How Proportionality Beliefs Form
- 10 The Nature and Origins of Reciprocity Beliefs
- Conclusion
- References
- Index
- Cambridge Studies in Comparative Politics
Summary
Chapter 5 examines the conditions under which people are informed of the pocketbook consequences of a given redistributive policy and act according to their material self-interest in spite of what fairness reasoning prescribes. When stakes are transparent and high, people will disregard their fairness concerns and take the self-interested position instead. This mechanism has the most consequences for policy attitudes shaped by reciprocity beliefs. Indeed, as discussed in Chapter 2, on redistribution to issues, many people are cross-pressured, that is, inclined, against their “objective” material interest, to support or oppose a given policy out of fairness concerns. For these individuals, reasoning as an income maximizer can result in a dramatic departure from what fairness reasoning would prescribe. Chapter 5 examines how this simple argument helps explain variations in the income gradient, i.e., differences in the extent to which the rich and the poor disagree on redistributive issues.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Fair Enough?Support for Redistribution in the Age of Inequality, pp. 101 - 124Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2023