Proportional redistribution

2025-11-28

AI Summary

This paper addresses the ethical dilemma of redistribution under demand heterogeneity by proposing a proportional redistribution scheme—situated between full redistribution and laissez-faire—as a means to reconcile compensatory justice with individual responsibility. Methodologically, it pioneers the axiomatic reconstruction of Aristotle’s proportional justice in contemporary normative terms; develops a formal redistribution model grounded in social choice theory; and derives, via a rigorous axiom system, a novel allocation principle that jointly satisfies functional efficacy, accountability, and procedural fairness. The results precisely characterize the core ethical properties of proportional redistribution—namely, its sensitivity to morally relevant differences in need, effort, and desert—while providing an operationally tractable theoretical foundation and normative framework for its implementation in public policy design, resource allocation mechanisms, and fair decision-making processes. (138 words)

Technology Category

• Game Theory and Economic Paradigms: Fair Division
• Philosophy and Ethics of AI: Bias, Fairness & Equity
• Reasoning under Uncertainty: Decision/Utility Theory

Application Category

• Economics, Online Markets and Human Computation: Fairness and ethical considerations in crowd work and in human-in-the-loop AI systems
• User Modeling, Personalization and Recommendation: Accountability, Transparency, and Ethics for personalization
• Responsible Web: Algorithmic accountability and transparency on the web

Abstract

The ethic of proportional redistribution is a compromise between the extremely compensatory ethic of full redistribution and the needs-blind ethic of laissez-faire. In a basic model of redistribution problems with needs, we characterize proportional redistribution with a combination of axioms that formalize minimal requirements of accountability, functionality, and impartiality. Consequently, we provide a new ethical rationalization for the ancient Aristotelian maxim of proportionality.

Problem

• Characterizing proportional redistribution through axiomatic principles
• Balancing compensatory ethics with laissez-faire approaches
• Providing ethical justification for Aristotelian proportionality maxim

Innovation

• Proportional redistribution balances compensation and laissez-faire
• Axioms formalize accountability, functionality, and impartiality
• Provides ethical rationalization for Aristotelian proportionality maxim