A recent piece of research by British economist James Rockey into people’s misperception of their place on the political spectrum got a certain amount of gleeful mileage in the right-wing press, and for predictable reasons. The research claimed that many people mislocate themselves – identifying with the “left” even though they hold opinions that are fairly right-wing. Having worried this over for a few weeks now, my considered view is that whilst the research is flawed at a quite fundamental level, the conclusion might contain some truth. Let’s see if I can express that thinking without contradicting myself!
The key difficulty with the research as I see it is that it relies on a right-wing economist’s idea of what left-wing people ought to think, an idea that it then presses into the service of the conclusion that, since they really don’t think those things, they are not actually on the left. Specifically, the research asks two questions, the first of which is used the generate the variable that is central to the project and the second of which generates another variable which the researcher thinks ought to line up with the first. This provides a check: sharp divergence might show that there was something weird about the main variable and its associated question, thus invalidating the findings.
Here are the two questions, the first is associated with the variable moreineq and the second with variable secfair .
“Incomes should be made more equal vs We need larger income differences as incentives. How would you place your views on this scale?”
“Imagine two secretaries, of the same age, doing practically the same job. One finds out that the other earns considerably more than she does. The better paid secretary, however, is quicker, more efficient and more reliable at her job. In your opinion, is it fair or not fair that one secretary is paid more than the other?
A moment’s reflection by anyone familiar with the political philosophy literature of the past forty years will show that (a) there are good reasons why someone might think of themselves as being “on the left” and yet give the “wrong” answer to each question and (b) that different flavours of leftie-liberal will give the “wrong” answers in each case for different reasons. So, in the case of the moreineq question, a committed Rawlsian might – in the right circumstances – favour more inequality to provide incentives that would ultimately benefit the least advantaged. (This, incidentally, is a big problem for the claim that moreineq is a variable that tracks leftwingery across different societies, since, obviously, a Rawlsian with invariant principles will answer the question quite differently depending on what the local and temporal facts are.) In the case of secfair, it is the luck egalitarians who will be tempted by the “wrong” answer, unreconstructed loons though they are (by right-wing standards). Admittedly, the question is rather underspecified from the luck-egalitarian point of view, but, assuming that the secretaries face identical opportunity sets to one another (etc, etc) then divergence in income that is down to choice isn’t going to be a problem.
But whilst the research is therefore a mess, and doesn’t justify its conclusion, I suspect the conclusion is closer to the truth that is comfortable, a belief that I base largely on observation and anecdote. Why so? Well, it is very implausible that the inequalities that exist in actual societies are mainly caused by the exercise of choice against a fair background. Rather, brute luck plays the main role. I’m just going to assert that. Nevertheless, many self-described left-wing academics of my acquaintance, though earning in the very highest percentiles of the income distribution, believe they are underpaid and ought to get more. This belief, I submit, is in practice inconsistent with even sophisticated egalitarianisms, and supports the view that they are more right-wing than they fancy themselves to be.
(In the interests of full disclosure I should reveal my own view, which is that a just society would be massively more egalitarian that the one I live in and that it would require me (and others like me) to take a pretty large pay cut. I’m lucky to earn what I earn, and don’t usually experience strong feelings of desert, entitlement, or resentment about my relative position (OK, the occasional irrational twinge when I compare myself to some other professors). It would hurt me to give up what I have, but that’s what I think ought to happen, that’s what I would vote for, but I lack the strength of will to do much about it individually (I do a bit). That’s how come I’m so rich, even though I’m an egalitarian .)
http://crookedtimber.org/2010/08/02/do-people-think-of-themselves-as-further-left-than-they-really-are/
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