Question

I chose utilitarianism.

Utilitarianism: the government should chose policies that maximize the total utility of everyone in society. For example, giving $100 to a homeless person would have a bigger impact on his total utility or 'happiness' than giving it to millionaire money who probably see it as are change and therefore has little impact on his well-being.

Respond to the following prompts in a post with a minimum of 250 words

• Imagine you are a policymaker, pick one of the three political philosophies (mentioned above) that you agree with? Give your reasons. What are the arguments against the philosophy you have chosen?
• Give examples of antipoverty government policies which align with your chosen philosophy.
• How important is it to study poverty and income inequality in economics? Explain you answer.

Answer 1

Ans) A moral theory advocating actions which promote overall happiness or pleasure and rejects actions that cause unhappiness or harm is known as utilitarianism. The philosophy in regards to social, economic, or political decisions, aims for the betterment of society. "The greatest amount of good for the greatest number of people" is a maxim of utilitarianism. The philosophy was propounded and extended and explained by Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill, two well known philosophers, and political thinkers.

Thus this philosophy when looked at as a benefit for the complete economy or the maximum number of the people of a nation, sounds effective as well as promising on moral grounds, but its application and implementation is quite a tough job. To achieve such a scenario, the government will have to take strict norms in terms of understanding measuring the needs, requirements of the economy and it's people. The government will have to have excess revenue or budgets to carry out such projects, as there is a possibility that in order to achieve this, a lot of capital shall be required which is going to give minimum or negative returns except for social goodwill.

Every government has been trying to eliminate poverty, which has been in existence hundreds of years. Similarly, even US is not completely free of poverty, and following are of the main anti-poverty programs/policies adopted by the US: Medicaid is one the important anti poverty programs, which is carried out by state and federal government in combination. Another one is Medicare, then there is unemployment insurance, followed by temporary assistance to needy families, and also the supplemental nutrition assistance program.

It is extremely important to understand the exact scenario of poverty and income inequality. It gives us a better understanding of the where the economy in real stands, we get to know the disparities in income, discrepancies in calculating the Real Per capita income, we get to know how developed an economy is. Development is not exactly having the higher number of rich people, but it is a state in which maximum number of people are above the poverty line, leading a lifestyle in which everyone is able to afford necessary food, clothing and shelter, and a scenario in which the unemployment rate is extremely low. If we do not study poverty and income inequality we will never be able to understand the relation between the term socio economics.