Assignment task: Analyze the Clash between Liberals and Conservatives over Social Justice
Relatively liberal persons dislike discrepancies between vulnerable and mainstream populations for the reasons we have discussed, whether using an outcomes, first-ethical principle, or relativist perspective. Many conservatives are far less concerned about these discrepancies, however, because they believe that inequality produces positive outcomes and promotes specific values that they prioritize.
They begin with the belief that members of some vulnerable populations often create their relatively low income by not prizing hard work to the extent of affluent persons. This tendency toward laziness is promoted, moreover, by those social polices that create "perverse incentives". If low-income persons receive, for example, relatively generous benefits from such safety net programs as TANF and Food Stamps, they are more likely to believe they do not have to earn these resources.
In turn, they often believe that inequalities between social classes increase the work incentive of relatively poor persons by making them realize that they have to work hard (or harder) to gain equivalent resources. Were society to be relatively egalitarian in its income distribution, these incentives would no longer exist or would be greatly reduced.
Many conservatives, too, doubt that outcomes research demonstrates that inequalities in rights, life conditions, and opportunities yield negative outcomes for members of vulnerable populations or for the general society. They tend to believe that such research is flawed-and often conducted by relatively liberal persons who twist data to promote their desire to reduce inequalities.