Struttura assiomatica della scelta sociale ed equità distributiva

The paper tackles the problem of incompatibility between orthodox rational choice and distributive justice. Due to the linearity condition stemming from the independence axiom, the dispersion of utility values among individuals turns out to be irrelevant to the social choice. An "equity-concerned" social choice can turn out from the overall evaluation of the prospects made by an 2ethical decision-maker" but clashes with the principle of "separability" assessed by the axiom, so that the individualistic basis of social choice would be hampered. A more satisfying method is to consider an evaluation of possible outcomes in terms of equity in the determination of personal, rather than of ethical, preferences, which deviates possible outcomes from the values assessed by the expected utility theory.