yet another post on intrinsic value

            While Posner finds many concepts such as rights, the law, etc. conveniently affirmed by his appeal to the wealth-maximization principle, I find his justification of the wealth-maximization principle in relation to corrective justice very flawed. In an attempt to justify how wealth-maximization would account for corrective justice, he appeals to the Aristotelian concept of corrective justice. Since the Aristotelian concept of corrective justice is procedural (reification for wrongful acts is determined without appealing to the “relative merit of injurer and victim considered apart from the act”(74)) and because the definition of ‘wrongful’ is not explicitly stated, Posner believes that his theory is consistent with Aristotle’s. According to his theory, “an act of injustice [is] an act that reduces the wealth of society” (74). An unjust act is only instrumentally “unjust” in that it does not lead to an efficient outcome.

Consider the following example:

Joey is a homeless man. Joey sits outside Bob’s café and oftentimes scares away customers by virtue of his haggard appearance. Bob becomes enraged by all of the potential customers that he loses. Finally, he decides to take action by hacking Joey into pieces.

            According to wealth maximization theory, Bob was warranted in killing Joey. Killing Joey did not result in any loss of value to society—the murder actually resulted in an increase in value because Joey prevented Bob from doing business and generally being productive. This case of ‘corrective justice’ fails to punish Bob for killing another human being—a morally egregious act. Our intuitions tell us that a human being’s life is intrinsically worth something or at least that Bob should be punished for what he has done. According to Posner, however, a human being’s life is worth as much as he or she contributes to society.

            If Posner finds this situation to be as morally abhorrent as I do, he may have to admit to some substantive definition of what is morally wrong instead of deeming wrongfulness equivalent to inefficiency. There is absolutely no place for ethics in his theory—it is pure economics.