Schoeck_2010_EnvyATheoryOfSocialBehaviour.pdf

366 IS OWNERSHIP THEFT?
groups, and the stronger is this envy of others, the heavier must be the
tax. ,3
Mishan continues that according to Duesenberry, who speaks for
many like-minded people, there can be a situation of 'excessive' income
in which
any net increase of output-for instance, more of 'every' good without
additional effort-will not advance the welfare of the community no matter
how it is distributed. Indeed, any increase of output makes the community
worse off, since, no matter how the additional goods are distributed, the
additional envy generated cannot be adequately compensated for out of
these extra goods. 4
Mishan, who uses the term 'envy' three times on the same page, is,
however, critical of this view. In his opinion, there might be a distribution
of additional goods, made available without any additional effort,
which, in spite of evident envy, would improve the position of everyone
in the society. Yet if this book has successfully demonstrated that it is
envy's nature to be on principle wholly intractable to quantitative manipulations,
the fallibility of welfare economics is even more evident.
Yet Mishan does allow welfare economics some prospect of success in
that they take account of the envious:
Indeed, not only does an income tax correct for social envy, this envy
itself is reduced in so far as it is provoked by disposable rather than gross
incomes. The more sensitive [Le., more envious] is the community in this
respect, the steeper the progression of the tax necessary to correct the
conventional conditions. In extreme cases only complete equality of disposable
incomes solves the problem of interdependent welfares. In the
nature of things, so extreme an institution is more likely to be encountered
in an opulent society than in an indigent one. 5
3 B. J. Mishan, 'A Survey of Welfare Economics, 1939-1959,' The Economic Journal
(London) Vol. LXX, June 1960, p. 247.
40p. cit., pp. 247 f. Mishan refers to J. S. Duesenberry, Income, Saving, and the
Theory of Consumer Behavior, Cambridge (Mass.), 1949.
5 E. J. Mishan, op. cit., p. 254.