People Don’t Actually Want Equality, They Want Fairness
As interesting as Frankfurt can be, this semantic quibbling is unhelpful. When most of us progressive types speak out against &quot;economic inequality&quot;, we are not saying we want everybody to have equal wealth. The concern is about <i>rising</i> inequality, of increasing wealth concentrated in an increasingly tiny percentage of the population, while millions struggle to get by, often one bad month away from financial ruin.<p>And yes, of course we care about fairness. There is nothing insightful about presenting it in contradistinction to concerns about inequality, as though it&#x27;s the thing we are &quot;really&quot; concerned about. Fairness alone does not guarantee a society where the outcome for the unwealthy is tolerable (unless you&#x27;re John Rawls). Hence, we care about both.