Fairness

Social justice is term bandied about with reckless abandon these days. It seems it means different things to different people as is the case with many phrases. To most people the idea of giving everyone and equal opportunity is something to strive for, the so called “level playing field”. We see those words used to describe fair trade as we point out how China manipulates their currency and tax law to keep our imports at artificially high prices. We see it in the area of civil rights when we agree that people should not be discriminated against because of their skin color. Some say that Jesus championed the cause of social justice and there are many examples of this in the New Testament. Jesus spent His time preaching to and helping the poor and sick and His life is a testimony to the concept of social justice. "Jesus said to him, 'If you want to be perfect, go, sell what you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me.'" (Matthew 19:21) When a term has such universal appealing meanings it is easy to broaden its definition to include areas, which standing alone would seem a bit much. This has been happening slowly over the past few years and has now reached the point of controversy. Advocates of social justice believe that the churches should petition the government to help the poor. They believe that we should elect public officials who feel that it is the government’s responsibility to help those in need and most people tend to agree. This is what we commonly refer to as a safety net. These trends have allowed the definition of social justice to expand the idea of equal opportunity to equal results. Why should some have so much more than others? This then leads to the concept of fairness and we hear a lot about that these days. The suggested remedy is the redistribution of income and wealth. This is not a new idea. It has been used so often we have assigned a name to it. It is called populism. Throughout our history it has been a very powerful force and it appeals to the masses. It has merit as witnessed by the change in pay for CEO’s over the past 30 years. In 1980 the pay was 40 times the hourly wage and today it is 500 times. This is considered unfair by fair minded people. It is the result of corrupting the free market system. The CEO of one company is on the board of a second and the CEO of the second is on the board of the first and the result is each one giving the other a raise. This kind of manipulation of market forces pushes people toward regulations which demand fairness. However the country can move to far in that direction and destroy initiative. The average family income in the United States is about $50,000. What could be more fair than having every family earn this amount. If we achieved this perfection of fairness what is the incentive to spend years in school to become a doctor, if you can drop out of high school and become a janitor and earn the same pay? While one group pushes for more government control of our economy the other side is resisting and hopefully we will arrive at some point in the middle where we do have equal opportunity and we will not have to use the force of law to insure equal results.