Key Takeaways

  1. The Proscription: Envy historically condemned as destructive vice, "pain at good fortune of others".
  2. The Neglect: Modern social science ignores envy, enabling political use.
  3. The Political Engine: Envy as "silent partner of radical egalitarianism" mobilizing equity support.
  4. The Quantitative Link: Dispositional envy independently predicts redistribution support across countries.
  5. The Punitive Motive: Envy predicts Wealthy-Harming Preference prioritizing punishment over help.

The Condemned Vice

For centuries, envy has been strictly proscribed across major ethical systems due to its destructive nature. Aristotle defined envy succinctly as “pain at the good fortune of others”. Theological systems, exemplified by Thomas Aquinas, framed envy as “sorrow for another person’s good,” which is apprehended as one’s own evil. This moral condemnation positioned envy as the antithesis of charity and a force toxic to the social fabric. Ancient writers, including Basil and Cyprian, described envy as seeking to reduce the admired person “from happiness to misery”, cementing its status as an inherently malicious vice. This historical consensus acknowledges the severe social cost generated by envy.

Envy Condemnation

The Silent Partner of Egalitarianism

This inversion of blame allows envy to function as the “silent partner of radical egalitarianism”. This partnership is leveraged in the promotion of “social justice”, aiming for the “unachievable end” of equity, or complete material equality. Political appeals calling for redistribution are often accused of being motivated by this vice. The political project of reducing income inequality aims to punish the “haves” as much as it claims to help the “have-nots”. Rawls, while grounding his theory in “fairness”, acknowledged the possibility of “excusable general envy” undermining a well-ordered society if inequalities were too great.

Envy Redistribution Impact

Quantifying Punitive Spite

The vindictive nature of this political impulse is empirically captured by the Wealthy-Harming Preference (WHP). WHP describes the desire to tax the successful even if the resulting policy is economically inefficient and reduces total aid to the poor. In studies testing this trade-off, 14% to 18% of participants across the US, India, and the UK selected the policy maximizing taxation on the rich, despite providing less aid to the poor. Statistical analysis confirmed that dispositional envy was the only reliable predictor for this punitive preference. A unit increase in measured envy was associated with 23% to 47% greater odds of choosing the inefficient, wealthy-harming scenario. This confirms that a measurable portion of redistribution support is rooted in spite-based anti-welfare motives, prioritizing the reduction of the better-off’s welfare over poverty alleviation.

WHP Quantification

What's Next?

Political campaigns often leverage envy, appealing to a base and destructive motive to achieve egalitarian ends. For effective governance, policymakers must actively decouple poverty alleviation (a goal aligning with compassion) from wealth punishment (a goal aligning with envy/WHP). Future research must continue to quantify the aggregate economic deadweight loss caused by malicious behaviors like **sabotage and diminished cooperation** that result from these envious preferences, ensuring policy prioritizes welfare maximization over punitive spite.

Previous Post: Part 4: The ‘Top Dog’ Dilemma

Next Post: Part 6: The Spite Premium

References

External Sources

  • Aristotle, Rhetoric, Bk II, Chapter 10.
  • Basil, “Concerning Envy”.
  • Brennan, G. (1973). Pareto Desirable Redistribution: The Case of Malice and Envy.
  • Cicero, Tusc. Disp. 4.8.17.
  • Cyprian, “Jealousy and Envy”.
  • D’Arms, J. (2009). ‘Envy’. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
  • Kant, I. (1797). The Metaphysics of Morals.
  • Plutarch, Precepts of Statecraft.
  • Rawls, J. (1971). A Theory of Justice.
  • Sallust, War with Cataline.
  • Schoeck, H. (1969). Envy: A Theory of Social Behavior.
  • Sznycer, D., et al. (2017). Support for redistribution is shaped by compassion, envy, and self-interest, but not a taste for fairness. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
  • The Calculus of Comparison: An Exhaustive Analysis of Envy from Ancient Philosophy to Modern Economic Policy.
  • The Politics of Envy (Hoover Institution, 2009).