Julie Rose (Dartmouth University) will give a presentation entitled “The Social Costs of the Elite’s Work Culture: An Egalitarian Case for Universal Work Regulations” as part of the activities of the Philosophy of Work Network.

The activities of the Philosophy of Work Network are open to researchers and graduate students with research interests in this area. Please write to the organizers, Denise Celentano (denise.celentano@umontreal.ca) and Pablo Gilabert (pablo.gilabert@concordia.ca), to receive the zoom link.

Summary

Highly-paid, well-educated professionals in the contemporary United States often work long hours and report that they would prefer to work less. Should work time regulations apply universally, protecting those in more and less advantaged occupational positions alike from excessive, anti-social, and unpredictable work hours? Recent arguments in political philosophy defend a view I call ‘exempt the elite.’ This position holds that egalitarian commitments do not support universal work hours regulations. Instead, the elite’s long hours are acceptable, even desirable, because if work time regulations applied universally, the result would be diminished tax revenue to redistribute to the less advantaged. I here take up the question of how egalitarians should regard the elite’s long hours work culture, and I grant that the elite may not have claims of justice to shorter work hours. Still, I challenge the position that the elite’s long hours should be welcomed by showing how their long hours work culture generates a range of inegalitarian social costs. Given a choice between public policies that aim to compress income inequality while regulating work hours universally or exempting the elite from work hours regulations, egalitarians must consider not only the tax revenue effects but the broader social effects. If the elite’s long hours are more detrimental than beneficial to the realization of broadly egalitarian commitments, there is an egalitarian argument for not exempting the elite from work time regulations.