The paper shows that if utility is cardinally measurable and fully interpersonally comparable, if costless lumpsum transfers are possible, and if the utility profile satisfies (a) a happier person has lower marginal utility of the numeraire or wealth, and (b) “everybody is equally unhappy in...

I argue the compatibility of progress with Rawls's maximin principle when applied to individual utility functions which are "nonaltruistic" in the sense that any transfer of consumption goods from old to young (resp. from young to old) lowers (resp. increases) old people's utility. The paper...

A political-economic environment is studied in which two parties, representing different constituencies of citizens, compete over a proportional tax rate to be levied on private endowments, to finance a public good. Although parties know the distribution of citizen traits (preferences and...