Whaddya mean, “economic justice?”

As we noted in last month’s essay (“Where Are You, Economic Justice Person?”) there are no comic-book superheroes devoted to the promotion of economic justice—but you may be pleased to know that there is at least one relevant comic book.

It’s called “Economic Meltdown Funnies,” and it’s available at (what else?) economicmeltdownfunnies.org. A project of Jobs with Justice and the Institute for Policy Studies, this 16-page comic lays out a cogent analysis of the root causes of our present economic troubles, in an accessible and comprehensible way.

I found out about this comic book from another IPS site, extremeinequality.org, which goes into some detail about the ever expanding gap between the rich and poor in America. Check out their charts and statistics, which tell quite a sobering story.

At this point, someone out there might be wondering just what I mean by “economic justice.” Some might suspect that I mean a leveling not just of economic opportunity but of economic outcomes, or that I want to radically redistribute wealth and incomes and thereby make everybody economically “equal.”

This is not true. I have no problem with the notion of people who carry greater responsibilities getting compensated accordingly. I accept that there will be such things as “income distribution” and “wealth distribution” curves—or as Jesus put it, “The poor you have always with you.”

To me, the question is this: what kinds of income/wealth distributions are indicative of a healthy and sustainable society, and which eventually lead to catastrophic societal collapse? Is there such a thing as an optimal degree of inequality?

And here’s another economic question I have (or perhaps it’s another way of stating the same question): is the existence of abject poverty, and the suffering it engenders, a necessary condition for the creation of billionaires?

Or might it be possible for us to at least guarantee, on a local or national or even worldwide level, a certain degree not of prosperity but of sufficiency—a minimal outcome, enough for relatively healthy survival and the meeting of basic biological and social needs—to which individuals are then free to add according to their talents and perseverance?

As I write, a great debate is occurring in the United Kingdom, where the G20 Summit is happening. Street protests call attention to the inequities that seem to be built into our present financial and governmental systems, and decry the abuses that those systems have allowed. So the G20 leaders are wrestling with a deep question: shall we simply shore up what we have, or has the time finally come for us to fundamentally re-evaluate the ways in which we relate to each other and to the planet?

By next month, we should know some of the decisions that have been made. But we can also look to ways to encourage and foster economic justice closer to home, and make ourselves more economically secure in the process. More about that next time.

- Skip Mendler