 Throughout most of history, people were born into, and largely stayed in, a fairly rigid economic position. The distribution of economic benefits and burdens was normally seen as fixed, either by nature or by a deity. Only when there was a widespread realization that the distribution of economic benefits and burdens could be affected by government did distributive justice become a live topic. Now the topic is unavoidable. Governments continuously make and change laws and policies affecting the distribution of economic benefits and burdens in their societies. Almost all changes, whether they regard tax, industry, education, health, etc. have distributive effects. As a result, every society has a different distribution at any point in time and we are becoming increasingly more adept at measuring that distribution. More importantly, at every point in time now, each society is faced with a choice about whether to stay with current laws, policies, etc. or to modify them. The practical contribution of distributive justice theory is to provide moral guidance for these constant choices.