PrepTest 24, Section 3, Question 24
Ethicist: A society is just when, and only when, first, each person has an equal right to basic liberties, and second, inequalities in the distribution of income and wealth are not tolerated unless these inequalities are to everyone's advantage and are attached to jobs open to everyone.
Ethicist: A society is just when, and only when, first, each person has an equal right to basic liberties, and second, inequalities in the distribution of income and wealth are not tolerated unless these inequalities are to everyone's advantage and are attached to jobs open to everyone.
Ethicist: A society is just when, and only when, first, each person has an equal right to basic liberties, and second, inequalities in the distribution of income and wealth are not tolerated unless these inequalities are to everyone's advantage and are attached to jobs open to everyone.
Ethicist: A society is just when, and only when, first, each person has an equal right to basic liberties, and second, inequalities in the distribution of income and wealth are not tolerated unless these inequalities are to everyone's advantage and are attached to jobs open to everyone.
Which one of the following judgments most closely conforms to the principle described above?
Society S guarantees everyone an equal right to basic liberties, while allowing inequalities in the distribution of income and wealth that are to the advantage of everyone. Further, the jobs to which these inequalities are attached are open to most people. Thus, society S is just.
Society S gives everyone an equal right to basic liberties, but at the expense of creating inequalities in the distribution of income and wealth. Thus, society S is not just.
Society S allows inequalities in the distribution of income and wealth, although everyone benefits, and these inequalities are attached to jobs that are open to everyone. Thus, society S is just.
Society S distributes income and wealth to everyone equally, but at the expense of creating inequalities in the right to basic liberties. Thus, society S is not just.
Society S gives everyone an equal right to basic liberties, and although there is an inequality in the distribution of income and wealth, the jobs to which these inequalities are attached are open to all. Thus, society S is just.
Explanations
This is a tougher Principle question. The passage lays out the qualifications for just societies, notably, as a biconditional. In a biconditional, either the sufficient and necessary both happen or neither happen.
To complicate matters, this biconditional has a compound sufficient condition, and its second condition has a compound exception appended to it:
(1) each person has an equal right to basic liberties
(2) wealth & income inequalities are not tolerated
(2e) unless those inequalities benefit everybody and are attached to jobs open to everybody
What a mouthful. This means that a society is just if we meet both of these conditions, or if we meet the first condition and both of the second condition's exceptions. In all other scenarios, the society is unjust.
We need to find the answer choice that properly applies these rules.
Let's take a look.
Nope. Close, but no cigar. The answer claims this society is just. We meet the first condition, then we meet the first of two exceptions to the second condition, but we fail to meet the second: "the jobs to which these inequalities are attached are open to most people." We needed that to say all people, or everyone. But it didn't, so it's wrong.
No. Tricky, though. "But, Brandon! This one says we create inequalities! Doesn't that mean this society is unjust?" Not necessarily. We don't know whether or not this creation of inequality meets our two exceptions. We're not told, so we can't infer one way or the other. Which means this answer choice's conclusion—"society S is not just"—is improperly drawn.
Wrong again. This meets both of the second condition's exceptions, but never weighs in on the first. In other words, we don't know if this society affords equal rights to basic liberties to each citizen, so we can't claim this is a just society.
Yes, this works. And it fixes the problem presented by B. In answer choice B, we satisifed one sufficient condition but left the other open-ended. Here, we deliberately break one of the two sufficient conditions: "Society S distributes income...equally, but at the expense of...the right to basic liberties." Since sufficient conditions in biconditionals are also necessary conditions, this means this society can't be just, which is what the answer choice concludes. This is the answer.
Nope. Close again, but again, no cigar. This satisfies the first sufficient condition, and one of two exceptions to the second. But we don't know if the inequalities mentioned here are to everyone's benefit. Since we don't know, we can't say one way or another, making this argument's conclusion invalid.
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