Distinguished Lecture - Amartya Sen - What is Wrong With Inequality?

good afternoon and thank you for coming my name is dawn huben I'm the director of the Ohio State Center for ethics and human values one of the primary aims of the Center for Ethics and human values is to help the university fulfill the mission that's embodied in its motto education for citizenship we do this through different events and programs including the compass program which we which stands for conversations on morality politics and society and we describe it as a year-long university-wide conversation on the topic that raises foundational moral questions and needs the input from lots of different disciplines to be addressed this year's compass by the way is on inequality which measures nicely with today's lecture this afternoon's event the first in an annual series of distinguished lectures and ethics is another contribution to our effort to fulfill the university's mission we're delighted to inaugurate the series with today's speaker I probably didn't emphasize that correctly we're really delighted to present today's speaker but my job is not to introduce our speaker I'm one step removed from that I am introducing the person who will introduce the speaker first though a few words of gratitude are appropriate many units at the University partnered to make this event possible we are indebted to the honors and Scholars Program the Office of International Affairs the Office of Research the Department of Agricultural environmental and development economics the Department of Economics Department of Philosophy the Department of Political Science the Mershon center for international security studies the humanities Institute the sustainable and resilient economies program The Ohio State University Lima campus and the Department of Philosophy at the College of booster that gives you some indication of the breadth of interest in today's speaker I also want to express my gratitude to some people that made this event possible the associate director of the Center for Ethics and human values Steve Brown and our two terrific graduate associates Christa Johnson and lavender McKittrick Switzer at the conclusion of today's lecture there would be an opportunity for questions and answers there are two microphones at the front of each of these two center aisle if you have a question for our speaker please line up behind the microphones and we'll alternate with questions and - between the two microphones until we run out of time it's my pleasure now to introduce the person who will introduce our speaker today provost executive vice president and provost Bruce McFerrin Provost McClaren is a professor of Entomology and a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of science he joined the faculty at OSU in 2012 as vice president for agricultural administration and the Dean of the College of food agriculture and environmental sciences but he was a Buckeye long before 2012 he earned his BA in entomology from Ohio State in 1976 Provost McFerrin has been a strong supporter of the center for ethics and human values and more generally the mission to which it contributes the broad and interdisciplinary search for transformative solutions to the Grand Challenges of the 21st century please join me in welcoming Provost good afternoon everyone and let me extend my welcome as well the center for ethics and human values was formally established just a year ago although its leaders have been organizing and sponsoring events for several years across campus before that among the center strategies is a plan to bring an eminent speaker to our campus annually to focus attention on a matter of moral concern today the center presents its first annual Center for Ethics and human values Distinguished Lecture in ethics the title what's wrong with inequality also fits with the Center's conversations on morality politics and society programs this year focusing on the theme of inequality as a university community we believe in and support the core value of bringing together faculty students and staff from a variety of disciplines to discuss the interactions and impact of significant human issues and the underlying importance of their ethical and moral implications we're grateful to Don huben and his colleagues in the center and Beyond including the department's units and campuses that co-sponsored today's lecture for helping the university community focus our attention on critical issues that raise ethical concerns today we have the distinct honor of welcoming a Markey ascend the Thomas W Lamont University professor and professor of economics and philosophy at Harvard University professor sends lifelong work has contributed to welfare economics social choice theory economic theory of families and other indices that measure the well-being of people in developing countries among his many recognitions and honors professor Sen was aborted awarded the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 1998 please join me in welcoming our renowned guest professor amar TSN [Applause] thank you well it's a great privilege for me to be here and to have the opportunity of speaking with you and also since they're the new center for ethics and human values in this university is already establishing itself as a major area of new thinking it's also wonderful to have the chance for me to get 'silly ated with the center through this particular occasion today the waiting the beginning of meetings tend to be different in distance especially in some places you all come together and here you seem to come one after another so I haven't heard whether they said anything about me and whether it was good thing or bad thing if they were good things I thank them very much and with the bad things I will try to improve but it's the sense of the grandness of being invited by the force and having the opportunity of interacting with the university in addition to the center it's certainly a very pleasing one for me so I definitely know the title is what's wrong with inequality equality in one form or another has a huge appeal in nearly every society known to us it is in fact a value that communicates something warm and friendly even before its implications are fully worked-out the jolly poetry in demand of equality in Gilbert and Sullivan's gondoliers radiates with invocation easily to all I quote from that all shall equally the the Marquess and the Duke the groom the butler and the cook the ash the Kratt who banks with coats which is the way kind of upper-class bank used to be the aristocrat who cleans the boots however one it's important to applaud that lovely song we must also dig a bit deeper and subject to the appealing sentiment to critical scrutiny for this descent of ethics and human values my host in today's lecture I believe these are particularly relevant engagements to pursue so that's why I'm motivated to ask the question what's wrong with inequality it's also important to ask what lies behind the instinctive appeal of equality to the extent there is that appeal and also subject that positive instinct about the greatness of equality to careful scrutiny and ask why and how and when and in what way perhaps the foundational reason for shunning inequality lies in the general value of avoiding arbitrariness in assessing social arrangement it's hard to accept the case for having giving more consideration to the interest of some people than to those of others without there being some clearly discernible reason for paying particular attention to the favored people this is a demand for equality at the very foundational level it's like saying that if you're speaking to people in the gathering you're seeking to all that other than just number seventeen eighteen and nineteen it not necessarily however a demand for equality of income or wealth in particular the basic demands of fairness in having similar concerns for all and paying symmetric attention to everyone can be seen has been reflected in the fact that all the ethical theories of social arrangements that help made powerful a film and have had considerable plausibility of seen as having that all of them demand equality of something something that is regarded as particularly important in that theory the theories involved are diverse and frequently at war with each other but all share the common feature on insisting on equality in terms of the central variables of that respective theory let me illustrate consider examples of some of the principal theories of political philosophy with which some of you may be familiar and others could easily officiate what they're about in the theory of justice presented by the leading political philosopher of our time namely John Rawls the idea of equality figures prominently in the form of demands first for equal liberty for all and also for equality subject to some efficiency consideration in the distribution of means general-purpose resources what Rawls called primary goods similarly Ronald Dworkin one of the leading liberal theorists of justice demands the need for I quote treating all people as equal and he goes on to argue in favor of equality of resources actually extending also the ideas some of you may not have will be persuaded by these examples since Rawls and walking are seen as being politically inclined in the egalitarian direction in their general ideas and thoughts but later than consider theorists who cannot be taken at all to be predisposed to an egalitarian ISM equality in some centrally important terms is in fact demanded by those who are typically seen as being very tolerant of unequaled incomes and wealth for example Robert Novick a Harvard philosopher a one of the finest libertarian theorists may not demand equality of utility or equality of resources but it does demand equality of libertarian rights no one should have any more right to Liberty than anyone else and remember Liberty is the central concern in history similarly James Buchanan typically seen as a conservative public choice here is built equally illegal and political treatment into his vision of a just society in each theory equality is thought in some space as we sometimes feel in terms of some variable exchange that is seen at having a central role in that particular theory to need to invoke some kind of equality in terms of the variables that are central to the respective theories where the income resources primary good liberties or rights is ultimately dependent on giving everyone equal consideration in terms of the basic demands of the respective theory it is thus appropriate to think of the question what's wrong with inequality has been ultimately analyzable in terms of the need for giving equal consideration to all even when the perspectives in which considerations have to be given varies widely between one theory and another some case Liberty in some case income from case well Kahn's resources or whatever there are many others what can we conclude from this one conclusion certainly must be that being egalitarian that is being keen on equality in some space or other it's not really a uniting feature in it it is precisely because there are such substantive differences between the endorsement of different spaces in which equality is recommended by different authors that the basic similarity between them in the form of wanting equality in some space that is seen by them as important can be far from transparent the pervasiveness of the demand for equality in an appropriate form for each theory of justice has as well self also tended to remain quite hidden another conclusion to draw is that the avoidance of arbitrariness need not automatically translate into an ethical case against economic or social inequality in particular which is the context in which it's most often discussed and yet this line of approach can help to build the foundation for such a case a case at least so avoiding gross inequality of income or wealth it's an in fact an invitation to reasoning with a strong enticement to seek an appropriate way of giving concreteness to avoiding arbitrary inequality of attention and moving from there to valuing economic and social equity for example in demanding gender equity equity between women and men the argument can very easily start with noting that there is no particular reason at all why men should be given certain privilege just the corresponding parts of which are denied to women avoidance of arbitrariness is central to ethics and the place of equality in in particular the sunning of Sevilla inequality is linked through reasoning with precisely that avoidance other than trading to inequality between classes or races or genders or for that matter different in different individuals who differ from each other in many distinct ways has to be linked to reasoning to the variables to which particular theories of justice attach importance and here the question arises namely is inequality in each of these places equally serious or of the serious at all and how do we think about the choice of space because ultimately these are inequality as I've been arguing turns on the space of the variables to which the particular theory attaches importance it is obvious that not all inequalities made may be seen as reprehensible by in any theory and ethical acceptability of inequality must depend on the variables in terms of which inequality being of between people is being examined let me begin with a very easy case I read in the paper I think only last week that The Associated Press recently found a copy of the birth certificate of the singer Doris Day in this state that is Ohio's Office of Vital Statistics which definitely established that the singer Thursday who was so very popular throughout the world when I was a young man is not in fact 93 as he and other sets opposed but actually 95 years old I do not have to belabor the point for anyone who knows how to calculate these things that this involves a slight increase in inequality age-based inequality in Ohio and in the world but that recognition did not be seen as unwelcome indeed we can warmly wish the great singer many more years to come making more and more contribution to increasing inequality of the age distribution and hope that this defies the unpredictability of the future about which those they had sung in a song in my early days no 50 years ago horses every 40 years ago was extraordinary popular called que sera sera whatever will be will be the futures not asked to see as the famous songs the song says advances in her age continuously increasing the inequality in age distribution we may find the cause for celebration not grief however the news of increasing that inequality of income or wealth as has been happening over many parts of the world over recent years including the United States did not receive such warm welcome the division between the rich and the poor is being seen traditionally for a long time as an unwelcome sight in itself Jesus Christ himself was perhaps more powerfully vocal on the subject than anyone else but it can be shown how such atoms make the lives of the poor unbearable in a way that would not have happened in the absence of extreme inequality there is in fact much empirical evidence that living in unequal societies with some people being much worse off economically and socially than others to produce deprivation in the absolute quality of life that people in the bottom layers respectively enjoy for example Michael Marmot a famous British doctor and medical professional in his famous studies called the Whitehall gradient established that in a community of British civil servants who work in Whitehall this is called the Whitehall gradient the underdogs are not only less privileged than others but also but also have a significantly lower life expectancy there is an interesting thing to discuss here that is there are lives in many way the lives of these people may go worse liquor there for these are also servants in Britain and the law down the scale you have lower income but more important well micro moment lower par your control over your life your order around by others don't what to do and you don't take your own decisions now this tends to not only lead to a deprivation in itself because that's not a good way of living but it seems to produce habits of the kind that we associate with fighting again frustration excessive drinking smoking a dysfunctional lifestyle that doesn't go the way the the top dogs would lead their their time they would might go home do a bit of work out have an accessory and after the exercise do some reading and go to bed quietly and happy and what Michael Mama's medical analysis shows that this has a profound impact in life execute in fact in some cases almost half the life expectancy of the people at the bottom layer there in other studies related to this kind of work for example by K ticket and Richard Wilkinson I think in the book is called a sweet level they have given extensive evidence of the deprivation of health longevity and general well-being caused by living under unequal conditions this can be seen as absolute deprivation generated by relative inequality oddly enough and I won't have time to go into it now go if it comes up in Q&A time I'm happy to responded the first person to discuss this phenomena was Adam Smith in the wealth of nations when he pointed out how relative in equality can generate absolute deprivation of lifestyle this line of reasoning had been well captured by their idea of what is called social determinants of health and on that subject the World Health Organization the w-h-o has published an important report produced by a committee chaired by Michael Marmot himself advancing the health of the people of the world seem to need not only better health care which is where so very important and have been so much in the debate here in the context of f1 they will healthcare and they attempt to to gut it but and important as it undoubtedly is and there's no question for the world health care and the selection of coverage is very important but it's not sufficient there is an issue of inequality of incomes resources and also Akhtar that's relevant to it and big inequalities of income and wealth it can be argued a terrible not merely because they may be aesthetically unattractive and directly challenging for the people in the bottom layer but also because indeed mainly because they contribute to disparities and deprivation and seriously relations in people's living conditions and their freedom to do what they have reason to value if our concentration on the actual lives of people the question that the media is very if a concentration on the actual if our concentration is on the actual lives of people the question that immediately arises is how to understand and assess the richness and poverty of human life here I have the declaring interest and therefore have tried to pursue in a recent book called the idea of justice publish in 2009 it largely focused on freedom that people actually enjoy to do this or do that to be this or be that depending on what they would like to do or be so this is an idea of freedom in the in the in the classic sense mainly you're free to be what you want to be this conscious not really with focusing on income and wealth as such rather than their role in generating inequality of living conditions and people's freedoms but also with many other efforts the contrast so example a contrast will be in the formal theories of libertarian right where you look at the formal rights that people have whether or not these life can be actually exercised the question there is is anyone topping you it's not that you have that freedom whether or not you actually have the freedom to do it it is of course good to know and I'm not dismissing it that we are not prevented from doing certain things with the state might prevent us and that is important or others may prevent us and that's also important but there are lots of things where the freedom is not primarily limited by what others do but by but by your means for example no one may stop a destitute from going to Acapulco for a holiday but the difficulty in going to Acapulco for a holiday may arise not from that reason but from other reasons an effort based on freedom interest that we scrutinize and assess the different features of living and their combinations that a person can choose from this takes us naturally enough beyond the domain of formal right often get better the formal right which are often better discard this permission rather than facilitation that the institution of the secular libertarian philosophy has tended to highlight if the requirement to go beyond the institutional libertarianism is one necessity do not need to go beyond the mental metrics of utilities in the form of pleasure or desire fulfillment is surely another important issue the evaluative exercise of taking note of people's actual freedom cannot be avoided by concentrating instead only on some features of mental reactions to it such as pleasures happiness or desire fulfillment as utilitarian from Jeremy Dental onward have tended to forget long short Nell was the exception to that of the usual return who will deeply skeptical of this and that was hard because she was never really a food utilitarian I learned from which agrees wonderful biography of meal that when he was fifteen you were very tempted by Benthamite utilitarian ISM and I think 15 years available age for being dentalized utilitarian even if a chronically deployed person affected areas landless liver or a subjugated housewife or a chronically unemployed person learns to accept cheerfully a defined lifestyle and indeed underprivileged people without hope of liberation often try to do just that to cope with inescapability of the deprivation involved that calculated cheerfulness will not eliminate the real deprivation from which she will continue to suffer the approach of concentrating on actual freedom does however meet resistance not only from utilitarian or institutional libertarian but also from many others even though the opposition is often in direct and implicit rather than directed explicit and it happened freed of it not only among the most valued ideas in the world it's also among the most feared of human conditions which freedom comes both opportunity and responsibility and while the formerly defies the latter can cause anxiety and concern this conflict has engaged many distinguished psychologists but if the problem arises even in your first lesson thought it arises very much more in the third person thought that is in a purely individual context it's not typically not the case that people fear freedom in their own life as the grand great French political theorist Tocqueville of historians note that more than a century and a half ago in his work on the ancient regime published in 1856 I quote from dr. despots themselves do not deny that freedom is excellent only the desire it for themselves alone and they maintain that everyone else is altogether unworthy of it unquote those are afraid of freedom tend mostly to be afraid of freedom of others disaffected underdogs of society the discontented lower classes the agreeing masses in a country with a high growth but social by polarization as example in my country in India disgruntled feminists grumbling about the at their assigned place their assigned place of women their values youthful shielding to be compliant and obedient and in many authoritarian societies determined dissidents protesting about the existing order it is other civil freedom that avoid commentators who are suspicious of the perspective of freedom and who have not however offered to give up offered to give up their own those who find the perspective of freedom to be deeply suspect and certainly can entertain the serried believes with a different diagnosis of which of where the poison lies the poison could be democratic rights civil liberties freedom of market transaction of basic social opportunities such as the identification involved in women being educated as you can see the examples indicate the attacks come can come from many different direction the respective suspicions of freedom leads to the advocacy and imposition of unfreedom to one kind or another in political economic or social field this applies as much to authoritarian rulers including military dictators as to intellectual commentators including many leaders of thought who have championed what they describe as order discipline and necessary sacrifice for higher causes for example for successful economic development what can be best described as the blood Frette and tears view of development even though empirical evidence is plentiful in the literature and development that there is no basic enmity between freedom and development the blood sweat and tears will continue to resurface in many practical debate going on today in India itself is very recently when the government decided to get rid of 86% of the cache in ad monetization rules this is was disastrous of the economy and the NATO the disastrous is slowly unfolding on the other hand that was a huge vote getter and the ruling government argument was that if you want the goodness of the country then you have to make sacrifice and those who are critical of this decision don't want to make the sacrifice sacrifice is a huge appeal I must say it's amazing how a feeling it is if it hurts it must be doing some good if you thought that so-called that the blood sweat and tears view is very difficult to eradicate someone's thinking even though there's hardly any example of successful development through the blood sweat and tears angle in phacelia fulfilling the perspective of freedom there are caused many difficulties to be faced that has to be admitted and problems to be resolved because freedom has many aspects it is necessary both to distinguish between them and to choose the focus of analysis depending on the nature of the problem that is being addressed freedom has to be seen at the wave of perspective with varying relevant of with different aspects in different exercises for example in dealing with the issue of torture and the unacceptability of torture ring a and is a prisoner suspect as a means for other end which is important in the classical libertarian aspect of freedom and what it is really arguing for is the needful immunity of everyone from deliberate infliction of pain and other hand by others were powerful people in the society as one said it seemed that that particular debate had gone away from the United States but we seem to have returned now the focus had to be somewhat different when the concentration is mainly young issues of economic and social advantage and in general about the inequality of the deals that different people get in any society these aspects of freedom can be captured better by what is called in the new literature capability which reflect opportunities a person actually enjoys to do this V that think that he or she may value doing a being and have reason to value being and doing obviously things we value most are particularly important for us to be able to achieve but the idea of freedom also aspects of being free to determine to determine what we want what we value and ultimately what we decide to choose and for what reason the idea of actual capability not just potential but the actual power every reflexion of freedom is central to the capability perspective it is easily checked that means such as income and other resources while valuable in the pursuit of capabilities are not themselves indicators of the capabilities that people actually have the ability of a person to convert resources into capabilities depends on the variety of contingents of countess for example the person's biological physical and mental characteristics his or her firmness to illness the physical social and academia logical environment in which the person lives and so on the real opportunity the different person enjoy a very substantially influenced by variation of individual circumstances age disability firmness grill neck specific talents or absence our gender and the state of being in Maternity for example and also by disparities in the natural and social environment epidemiological condition extent of pollution the prevalence of local crime under these circumstances an exclusive concentration on inequalities and income distribution cannot in any way be adequate for an understanding of economic even economic inequality vanillin human freedom referred us from focusing on income and wealth which as Aristotle had noted is I caught that is income wealth is evident I'm closing my eyes that wealth is not the good we are seeking for it is merely useful and for the sake of something else and God if you focus on freedom we would of course be interested in income and wealth as on instrumental ground that persons respectively have and other set means captured by within work young walls called primary goods but ultimately we have to examine the freedom that people actually enjoy first of all being disabled has a double effect in reducing the person's ability to earn an income what can be called the earn earning handicap and making the conversion of income in the good living that much harder thanks to the cost of processes and the impossibility of fully correcting certain types of disadvantages caused by this ability and this can be called conversion handicap for example a person who happens to be say crippled by an accident of my illness may need assistance also stress is a vote and even with them the person may not become as able to move around freely as someone without that disability the conversion handicap refers to the disadvantage that a disabled person has in converting money into good living a system of poverty removal that concentrates only on the lowness of income in particular where their persons of families income is below what is defined in that in that country as the poverty line will catch the earning handicap but not the conversion handicap and this could make the poverty relief program fundamentally inadequate and ineffective let me illustrate the influence of conversion handicap with some with us from poverty studies in the United Kingdom obtained by with Kate cook less young German woman in an illuminating pieces recently completed in Cambridge investing unfortunately she herself had a huge problem and then and diagnosed as having cancer shortly after a PhD and died but the work that she did was extraordinary important let me try to summarize it very quickly she took a poverty line as being sixty percent of the British national median income so you look at the Devine come take the median income and take sixty percent of it and anyone below it is called for quickly finds that about eighty percent of individuals lived in family 18:1 aid in families with below poverty line income if the tension is not shifted to individual in families with a disabled member the percentage of such individuals living in the villa poverty line in is just above 23 so I rises from 18 to 18 when we look at all families 23 when you look at families with disability this gap of about 5% would largely reflect the earning handicap associated with disability of the affected matters and the and the earning disadvantages of those who have to care for the disabled among other members of the family if now conversion handicap is introduced and notice taken of the need for more income to ameliorate the disadvantages of disability to the extent it can be ameliorated to processes and other contracting arrangements the proportion of individuals in families with disabled members I mean now you have to adjust the income needed to avoid poverty by including in it the cost of processes and if you fall below that you will before the proportion of the poverty ratio then jumps from 23% to 47% indeed the bulk of poverty even in terms of inadequate income just for prosthesis turns out to be due to conversion handicap the gap between 23 and 47 going well beyond the earning handicap that 5% between 18 and 23 unless the standard poverty statistics almost in every country concentrate I think the quick-cook this method is not used in any country including in this one this can make the poverty relief program inadequate and on one sided unless we look not just at low incomes but also at the insufficiency of income to overcome the capability disadvantage is related to conversion handicap and bear in mind that even with the processes the disabled person will probably continue to suffer from handicap which is navel the person would not so this is an underestimate rather than overestimate in general going beyond the particular domain of policies for for poverty removal we have to take interest in the overall capabilities that any person enjoys to lead the kind of life she has reason to want to lead and this requires that attention be paid to her personal as well as environmental characteristics going beyond the income statistics indeed the nature of every serious economic and social problem may be significantly influenced by taking the importance of freedom seriously freedom in the sense that have been trying to discuss in this talk I will stop here and look all very much to discussion I hope it will be a lively discussion with quick question and answer the answer to the question what's wrong with inequality may ultimately involved the fairness of giving social attention to all in a symmetric way but we must recognize that there will be different ways of understanding how people can be treated as equals central to those debates is a clear need to fathom and clarify what actually the way to think about actual freedoms that people enjoy to invert an analogy if slavery entails a soft inequality of freedom against which the United States fought hundred fifty years ago there are other inequalities in substantive freedom that persist today in the world including in the United States that demand our intellectual as well as our political attention so I end by thanking for the privilege of having given the opportunity of talking about this issue today thank you [Applause] [Music] I also I have to explain that I am I have kind of 35 years of running at reduce terrible effects on the knees one of which is replays and the other is not so after I talk I get completely frozen and when I hold to the chair usually the audience decide that I'm having a heart attack or something and but I'm not having that and in what to win this time after I stretch my leg with good judgment and I do what I found my two-year-old grandson do with visiting British which is Serge so the weekend and notice that he doesn't go from one chair to another scent Akkad walk until it's called chair and then only after he's caught hold of the other chair he would let the first one go so I'm going to take Shattuck advice of my grandson no teacher I think I can just ever follow the grandsons advice please if you have questions line up behind the microphones I am going to exercise the host privilege by asking the first question and if you've never heard the host privilege before I just invented it but I'm going to ask the first question anyway um professor Sen every way in which relative poverty can generate absolute poverty is interesting and I think it's underappreciated but the results of Marmot and others suggest that there this happens when there are certain kinds of social relations between tho that those are more advantage and those who are less advantaged and so I want to ask you a question that bears on issues of global inequality on what sorts of social relations do you think are necessary for the relative poverty to cause the absolute poverty is the sort of relationship that we now have in the global community enough or is it really membership in a in a single system I need that produces these effects well I think that two questions here I think they gaze at one level certainly global differences in living standard have tended to produce a kind of acceleration on the path of the relatively rich in the four countries who have generated standards which a absorb a lot of resources including governmental resources and we also make others feel that they're definitely devised compared with people running around with Foss Carson and another other such problem and this is nothing new of them this is also my first PD student in in in in in Cambridge Rossum sixty-five years ago actually haha and he was in Italian he was working on or the Italian called Mexico no namely the south and one of the problem was that many of the relatively richer habits have spread south so that quite often even though therefore rather than the money going in for nutrition often went into other other things I mean it's that's actually what Adam Smith of the two examples that he gives of that proposition which is really a sanity and for the recent one of them is that that the standard of normal living is made much higher by the presence of relatively rich people so that a different of if you live in a very poor country you don't mind you can participate in a public discussion as for example Nelson Mandela discusses in his long walk to freedom that in there in the village in in his native village in the region thousand people met they could discuss anything and the clothing they now remember another reason the shelter of Menifee properly dressed in any Western sent on the other hand as Smith says already in the 18th century you cannot appear in public without shame without having certain things like having a linen curtain and so on she said leather shoes actually that seemed to have gone out of fashion but in this time clearly was in fashion and and he also says there's a kindlier thing namely it necessary in London to have leather shoes but nothing from interest because it was at that time in little for the necessary in London was not in Edinburgh so there's that issue but there's also the issue that the huge inequalities in the different countries I think most of the problems of inequalities for example in India and if you have time I'll be happy to talk a little about the nature of it the pernicious nature of it I don't think most of it is coming from outside I think it's cust coming from these social barriers within the country yeah and and if you ask a question of the kind that of this chasm India has thermal healthcare and no acceptance of the right of everyone to other healthcare and is very clear because people have been talking about it for three thousand years go to Buddha in 5th century sixth century BC was talking about the importance that prevent people from having premature mortality morbidity disability talk to us and yet why doesn't this happen because it's always somehow been friends that yeah it is a very important but not for everyone I think that and here I let's say I think that international influence is entirely positive they'd love to try and learn from your national service and I go up and down all that from China from Japan and South Korea and Thailand to show a I'm genuinely suspicious of blaming the international roots of inequality for many things because they it can do that but it also does alphabets of in trying people to do something positive that's how I gave it long run the common surface so let me say two things to our questioners please if you're comfortable say with what your name is of your student what your major is if you're a faculty member what department you're with and please keep your questions brief and no follow-up question so let's start right here hello my name is Wyatt um as a psychology member I'm particularly psychology major I'm particularly interested in expectation effect such as the placebo and nocebo effect you said in the middle of your talk that even if someone on the lower end of relative inequality were cheerful about that inequality they still would be effective in certain ways by their social situation what extent if any do you think that expectation effects such as the placebo and nocebo effect can explain the apparent consequences of relative inequality that you've discussed in your comment and if they can't explain those consequences in major ways does that have normative yeah excellent question let me say two things here one is that the retrieval effect could be quite important and that works in one direction namely that if you are made to feel that look which is good and your life isn't so bad and if you feel careful well that is a and if that make you really in some ways better and that is a positive thing and we should dakota that's certainly right on the other hand it has two problems gotten like a with me one is that it may also prevent you from agitating for change because you get slug and you feel and this is the way in equality has always been told that you know and it's something you know it's not so bad you have your own way of being excellent and we shake I used to when I was young and had most calm to litical views then I've managed to retain over the years I remember I used to get very upset about the word dignity of Labor saying okay worn laboring it waving back breaking it just country now mining is regarded for some reason a very good work but of course typically it we've seen has the most bad waking of all work and highly dangerous and if you take that to be I mean this country in the context of this case intentionally election but if you go on say yeah but you you know you work retail but we respect you you have dignity I found that very unacceptable as a statement that dignity the very important thing in its own but it can be an excuse for not doing enough about society the other point is that I wasn't saying that with the fluffer value cause everything that it may affect you in another way I was really concerned the way the social status station like you looked at it you say look this chat is not so badly off because he's fearful I would say that is not acceptable because if he has created universe all your life is they defy it generally doesn't even in debt is looking for yoga not getting a job when you get to go week with no income and he can be dismissed anytime he doesn't know why constantly about where to go during illness but image that he had generated some cheerfulness and people do I think it will be adding insult to injury by saying that believe not so badly off wiggly's fearful because all the deprivation are there the fact that is fearful should not reduce it clay to social attention so that's the whole that was making so these on the other side but what you're saying on the fluffier thing is also quick so it's a question of I'm sorry I'm being a teacher I've always loved my children or the concern that I can't stop like you will get a living a class like you that you find often that that's the case they the flaws of allow more than one time you have to ask other any arguments again and these are the two arguments against fear but thanks for the question hello dr. Sen I thank you for speaking with us today my name is Phil Barker I'm currently a biology major here a senior and next year will be attending medical school at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill you spoke very heavily about the importance of freedom and also the importance of breaking down barriers to freedom so I was thinking while wondering and sense of healthcare in the context of healthcare in the United States what are some of these barriers that met with future medical professionals and policy makers must break down to improve outcomes so if they'd save bit more I love weight really well oftentimes when I think of healthcare in the United States I think the primary problem was access and we need to improve access to people but I feel like there's more to the issue than that so I was wondering from your perspective what yeah well that certainly is it you're absolutely like that I would say you know access to the good blood I think affordability which is already used in Hindi Obama care is very important because there may be access in the center that go there but you may not be able to afford it and of course it reduces basically a route of getting health care when you are not in a provision where for the standard one I knew it when my my children were growing up in the Harvard Square area you know we lived just outside on the square and when we were young we are quite old now but when you young and there were lots of people the mix with who really didn't have any secure income and no any means of medical coverage and I and they often came to my home because I hope in about 3 minutes walk from Harvard Square they will come and have coffee and tea and I gather there talking with them I gathered what the strategy was that when you get into some kind of illness you have to get into some kind of an accident and then you go to the emergency and then for a little while you get attention even for unrelated to the accident something else you had when a doctor is looking at it see it's the other side of the professionalism of medical care that it is something full of contradiction it is the best medical care in the world that is also have the the worst neglect of medical care and similarly it have got hugely professional ethics none of them they will be built none of them will be I mean they will be built but they will not be sued and they would go back again and they won't say that you didn't pay the last time to bail they would do it and I've talked later since I'm interested as we must three years I've been teaching a course in a medical school and in the public health school bus with a colleague of mine called Paul Farmer with a great doctor and he and I taught a course in the medical school and then and next two years I taught a course in public health school and taking a gap from medicine this year and I found that that's way ingrained value in that among the doctors to wit goes along with profit-seeking and the other things that many your film find difficult and so it's a there are all kinds of problems but they have different sides to it and I think if well I don't like a real opinion of the studies have been all done so far in terms likely for what alternative Obamacare with a particular way of doing it earlier that the clintons type slide that I think it would be nice to have an epistemic if it's a neurological study of the values of the doctors and the unlived and the medical profession as well as the medical administrators what they would exercise and what they would not and it's really quite important accountability is certainly one of them but there is a central respond to it I don't think for example national service in Britain of Europe would not have runs but for responsibility that goes well beyond the accountability there will be I mean I had a had a medical condition returned and I also think now but I think I was in England I called the doctor and I my own doctor and he returned you know and I said you could you find out whether I did I ever have that in the kind of I was getting it a kind of there is a term for a ship atrial fibrillation and alack I think I'll do it now that I said did I have that because I remember they doctor checking my pulse rate and then she said look it's 5 o'clock now I'm supposed to go somewhere and and she said I'm very much better in giving medical aid life than pursuing history but I will pursue history and she called me a lot a to focus on and saying that he had found and indeed I didn't have that and I said that that now no one will have held it against her that he didn't do it because 5s of a duty of time was over but she did it other was a central responsibility which is not accountability so those who take responsibility is the failing accountability I think entirely mistaken responsibility is enormously more than that of its accountability is only one part and I think it's very different ways the American and the European system and and also we have to look the Japanese and they recently evolving the Chinese system or the Korean state where the ties do now already they've been doing with this 30 bucks scheme of covering everyone there are enormous amount to be learn on the ethics and human values issues if I may point out about how the different cultures of helping others of which medical treatment is one but education is another you dare I think we would be living in a much more racist society in every country in Europe and in America but for the farmer is the role of the primary schools by richly an abiding value not always totally follows but has been a school atmosphere you do not encourage gracious thinking it has rated hugely important part in thinking about that so I think I extended your question but as you can see have think what you're suggesting is very important but I want you to go more beyond that and fast you and I could chat on that thank you and one within such that there is always a sense of geographical fairness look one means idea hello my name is Cassandra I'm a sophomore majoring in economics and political science and minoring and screenwriting and my question goes back to the idea that you've pointed out about sacrifice and freedom so you rail against the idea that you can't have you can have the government asking people to sacrifice or curtail their freedom and develop the country that manner but if you look at say South Korea at Singapore or to an extent Taiwan and China you'll see that political and other freedoms have been curtailed initially ah to reach that economic development and these societies specially Singaporean South Korea have still been able to like maintain decent amount of social and economic equity so how would you explain that I would direct by paying that self I think you may have to reexamine the reading of these countries such countries take the ASEAN ones the first country that began in that's what the ban so softly after they made you a Croatian it is 60 the you don't we actually and and any number of other thing what we need most now in education now it actually made a lovely statement saying why is it that American workers are more productive than Japanese decide to tell you which nineteenth-century story I don't think that would be necessarily the story today but and then he said well lexical the Americans are educated we are not so that's again that's how began Japan's attempt to get it rest fully literate in 40 years everyone going to South Korea did something very similar drawing always on the past to including the neo-confucian thinking for this thinking also but then education healthcare when Lee Kuan Yew who the leader of the of the Union and Labour Party went to England had be saved in Singapore story here she's noticed she was very most impressed of all he was with the National Health Service and then also there's a leak on you touch rather than being completely I should charge them something like six months and they disgusted the executive but you can see that the idea of everyone having health care very important now they clearly that is India that's emerging now include also tyranny of affection and there you might be able to say that India was better off in many ways than Singapore was and and China was until recently unfolding conversation today on the other hand in terms of the basic utility for real so leaving a freed life full of freedom education health care social safety net all over Asia with the exception of South South Asia India Pakistan and he's an actually Bangladesh is overtaking India in this looks like it had been liking him or committed to a full freedom solution in the broader sense so I think I would not agree with the view that what you're saying said anything against Sweden we just offered it it's the freedom oriented of food that has got them they're accepting freedom had been broadly interpreted and I don't want to reset the stock I think it's very important to have sweets which very important not to be to be stopped from missing something not afraid of that and in some respects India had some achievement but I know Dresden I studied that if we look at the huge amount of editorials it's something like 1 in 68 Orioles deal with the lack of health care and education of huge section of the community and I think they're they the stratification has played an originally big part in keeping people answered which near freedom of expression does not compensate my name is Brian muds on fourth year computer science dude than a holiday and I was hoping you could elaborate more on the removal I think it's dark money the terms like the fifteen hundred dollar bills in India the removal of dark money from India and the effect that's had on their economy okay you're talking about the do monetization yeah I well I think there's a lot of money a rod but they don't come in the form of these notes you know there's a lot of studies on the on the by God money I take it to calling black money as well the Indian expression is that one and the black money is the gold flower channels and they don't know they never go in towns no you don't carry notes on to Switzerland in your briefcase you don't you get David and it differently so I think it was estimated about six percent of black money will help in currency so that even if they they'd been completely successful it would have dealt with maybe six percent but in fact about 95 percent of the currencies have already been recast so they you know maybe there will be some legal cases but not many have come yet and so I don't think that approach really work and III think was worthless i I have to say that self I mean I was critical of class and and sure many others and some people said that look they've got it wrong look at the way the people have reacted clearly it has been successful where I disagree is that I don't judge the success of the economy by saying which party they vote for people have voted for absolutely terrible things which are not accepted as bad because David and India just full of history of that lost life you did bad things and therefore you having all these problems with life don't complain about it this live you behave better next one you would would do much better there's a whole lot of these thing there at the time of the Irish Famine there wasn't a single both flowing from down the river shannon carrying full three and and and and milk products and cheese to prosperous England although Ireland not one of them there was no no granola basket no one got killed most of the votes were not even guarded and then 50 years later God made it impossible for Britain to have an England rather normal relation with with Ireland I think that may well happen in India too in the Diwali ties Asian but the fact that it happened in 50 years time indicates that to expect that in the next election in the United College you have with operation you have that was a was a mistake okay but they if you're interested I can tell you about this you also study better we made a I hope that there will be more studied now because this issue had been taken up by a number of economists I know young economist or no see mine own way of learning things for a long time now had been to get a good student and ask him or her to do it and then when she read it finishes up easy I'm a much more learn that person and since I the other day I was kind of a child of it I counted I found that there 155 PC students for who I would either the sole advisor or the chair of the committee so and then I decided what that's why I've learned something Thank You Anderson my name is Arshad Mohammed and I'm a typical political science student here at fat Arshad yeah after idea I want you mentioned that there are certain sorts of inequalities you mentioned a disability thing that they're not just an earnings gap that could be addressed by what redistribution there's also a conversion gap that even if they were to be given more money they wouldn't necessarily equate to a higher attainment of like no I don't need that really okay nobody sir I might ask is there what other sorts of disadvantages what other sorts of inequalities other sectors does there exist an analogous conversion handicap by that I mean they're not as clear than in money and effect out relationship for like scientific productivity for the ability to form high wage jobs for the kind of communities that we're trying to address you you're not money's always a good thing to have yeah yeah and they're all I was saying is that you don't fix poverty level I mean I was saying two things one you don't get fixed a poverty level at the same level of income irrespective over they know handicapped or not and the disability has not been incorporated in poverty measurement there were a little attempt in the United States but not very much and bitten not Germany France north and you have to adjust for the first exit as well as coating which Kay cook mrs. what else and so you need money but you need more money for that reason and that second and again I was also saying that even after become Russian handicap it with many of the money and instead of not being able to walk you now have something to hold on to you can walk you may not be able to walk as well as and that deprivation hasn't gone away either so you have to take that into a consult so I was kicking up these things but I wasn't arguing against 1500s I just I gather things are concerned whether to extend money I mean if you are were you talking about scientific it disadvantage is right things that we've these sort of disadvantaged communities they don't have the ability to produce valuable things which they would be paid essentially and the conversion handicap yeah I won't go the converse and handicap there because you know they have been quoting Smith and let me go back to in it there's a passageway I mean Evan Smith have been seen in certain narrow lights that there are 13 lines that people read about the butcher the baker and the brewer that's it but if you read something else of the book as one sledge we said that the main source of productivity increase in the world if learn and for that you need education and for that you need practice and for fact if you need division of labor and trade help you that's my reasoning he goes and there's also you need lesser in the context just as I was talking about the mama Michael mama thing where he was discussing that she said what happened to people like us he was talking oh I think you David you nothing and he says that them well you know we come back even if you have a job I come back exhausted then we have some time to recover and then we read a book or so well a heavily worth manual labor comes back to exhaust it to read anything so not only is it important no there is no way of improve in any case this person has adverse education in school but then they tend to accumulate and then he makes an appearance changes and the involvement interesting thing given the way Smitty's have advised reading there's a section way said why do you need good political economy she said we need it for two different reasons one because it will increase Engels in fact which would allow them to have a better life and second because it will give the state more money to provide education health care and so on which the state alone can provide which others cannot so I think it's this combination that we are looking at so I think I look at that direction rather than you had conversion handicap to but that's not to look at in this case I said I think but thanks for the question okay all right yeah hi I'm Kelly Wilson I'm a doctoral student in international agriculture development I'm specializing in gender and livestock management but I mostly care about chickens because yeah like oh yeah speaking Egyptian okay yeah my question is about in terms of freedom the idea of freedom of mobility especially with restrictions based on cultural norms and religious norms and if you've seen or can think about any strategies towards decreasing those barriers of freedom of mobility of values coming from probably from cultural norm go circles you know and I'm certainly speaking well I could there's a lot of different aspects of freedom of mobility crit but from cultural norms of religious norms based around you could look at as gender or certainly associate anomic status yeah yeah that is a big issue I think it's all my thing about culture though have been them constant move like quickly also the only way of doing it is taxes actually I mean if you want to do something about and save becoming a doctor and so it's easier for women to become a doctor than becoming a doctor is a look at where not only for yourself but also for others I think is we tend to underestimate the extent to which she'll think smooth if you look at food habits I can't take Chile ago rather than I was 18 I had cancer in the mouth and I had a hydro radiation and along with that a logic to tell you and I am impressed by the fact that India in Calcutta some decent food until the 16th century when the photo bigger eye for the new world with Chile Indians de Marigny Chile and then they suddenly developed and this fell to Chile like fish to water and then then of course all the food became in a divorce right I can see food have explained very well immunity I'm read in the in a one-of-a to ascribe to the authentic British share is if the college and since the kayakers recursively the booty should get credit for because I think if Indian didn't have high and we need a concoction trained individual ominous but that's the most successful thing and now for their things like Kickham tikka masala and ice read in The Telegraph someone being discarded she as she is an English and daffodil so chicken tikka masala and that indicates that it has reached and grown roots in a way that you hardly think possible so I think habits change digital thing you know they reminisce some classic clash of civilization Samuel Watson I can't in my old age I get don't they get that look special civilization Huntington yeah when Huntington likely book he said that in 1940's Ghana and Korea had the same level of income now Koreans have seven tons more income what change and and he said was then his answer it because Koreans believed in hard work and ghanians did not believe in hard work I mean this is of course had it not been a friend and a colleague I would have called it's racism but but then then why did in the forties if there so is Koreans are so hard-working and ghanians now how come they had the same income in the forties something change what change is that Korea was the low education country and became rapidly to a great extent following Japan one of the highest education country where the students are constantly worried about whether they're doing the best possible in class and on so things change and I think that's way the chain how did that happen for such a low government trade apart what people imitate each other so I think cultural barrier is a barrier to be overcome not that it doesn't exist but it's not a barrier in the sense that it it's not likely imagine Mexican wall with no one will be able to cause it may be like the actual Mexican wall which people would be easily able to cross by with apologies to those who are still in line I think I need to cause I like all that Iran thing I'm very sorry please join me in thanking professor Sam [Applause]

Channel: Ohio State Center for Ethics and Human Values

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Id: pe302zGGRT4

Length: 88min 28sec (5308 seconds)

Published: Sat Jul 29 2017